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[lillim]

An interesting followup to the 'can you eat healthily on the cheap' discussion that happened a week or so ago.

A few points I picked up from the article, for your ponderance whilst reading:

• the author admits to the massive amount of time and energy required to source and cook the meals she prepared, time and effort that would be unrealistic for a

Comments

[koru_bakasana]

All of your points are excellent and the article is very interesting. :)

Fifty dollars for a week's worth of food for two people can be done, I've done it before and the reasons I'm not able to stick rigidly to the budget right now involve ongoing illness and a husband with a prelidiction for picking up a takeaway on the way home from the gym. That being said, the other day I made dinner for the both of us and enough for my lunch the next day for about five dollars, including oil and spices etc.

It does require meal planning and very careful shopping but not really that much time cooking once you're in the groove.

Most of my dishes involve some form of pulses or legumes with seasonal veges and either pasta, polenta or rice. All weekday dishes must be able to be completed within half an hour of dragging my exhausted carcass through the doorway.

[lillim]

I think once you've been given the exposure to, or have experiemented with, cheaper cooking, it becomes easier. Educating people about the kinds of things they can do to bulk out meals or make them cheaper is pretty important if you want to help them eat healthily.

[koru_bakasana]

Absolutely!
:)

Also, packets of seeds are even cheaper than buying veges. Having a bokashi bucket or a compost heap helps turn peelings and such into food for the next harvest -- not that I have a vege garden yet, having a plot in a communal garden would be excellent.

[_ariadne_]

I think one point to keep in mind is that the cheaper cuts of meat aren't always the fattier ones - quite often they're just unfashionable

[la_traviata]

Interesting article, but she really went about it the hard way as far as I'm concerned. Why does she have to use recipes and fresh herbs and the like? I always find it easier to keep costs down by taking the "bung a bunch of stuff in the pot and see how it works out" attitude. The meals tend to be tastier and quicker to prepare too.

Plus if she's concerned about waste minimisation and value for money, surely dried herbs would be a better option? And she totally overlooks long-lived bulk foods like legumes and rice.

Mikey and I get by quite well averaging about $100 per week on groceries (of course, this is covering breakfast and lunch as well), but then we do eat out and order in a lot too. Plus, I'm not entirely happy about the amount of food we throw away each week. :\

Mind you, I've got to get a bit more comfortable with wastage now I have a mini-me to look after! We'll do what we can to minimise it, but we're definitely turning into good little consumers now...