Healthy Budget Cooking
Budget cooking is a lot easier than you may think… Despite the rising food costs, good quality and healthy meals are not that hard to achieve on a tight budget. It may take a bit of checking prices at the markets, evaluating your budget and planning for the week ahead but it is well worth the effort for the money you save and the quality of the final products.
• Shopping well is an important part of budget cooking and eating well. Street markets are usually much cheaper than supermarkets although supermarkets are convenient for staples such as tinned tuna, pasta and rice but it can be cheaper to shop for other ingredients, such as fresh fruit and vegetables, elsewhere. Fresh herbs and spices are about a third of the price you’ll pay in a supermarket.
• Take your time in the supermarket to check the prices as well as nutrition labels of the items. Some finest or healthy range products may be on special that day and cheaper than lower quality super market value brand products.
• Having said that, cheap value products are occasionally lower in sugar, salt and saturated fats than the finest range. You will need to work out in your head, if it is worth paying the extra for the quality.
• Check to see whether any of the items you need are on sale or have special offers, through coupons, or discounts offered to store-card holders. Most supermarkets will have a section for ‘reduced items’ and it may be well worth having a look but don’t forget to check the expiry dates.
• It is always a good idea to keep a good stock of staple foods like rice, pasta, tinned tomatoes, legumes and tuna in your cupboard.
Leftovers: Do not chuck the leftovers in the bin. Most leftover meals can last for a day in the fridge and a lot longer in the freezer. Buy in bulk, cook in larger quantities and keep the leftovers in the freezer and defrost when you fancy eating them.
Tinned foods: Cooked tomatoes have more health benefits than raw tomatoes, so it is perfectly fine to use tinned tomatoes in your cooking. Canned tuna is not the same as fresh tuna and doesn’t include as much Omega 3, but it still has all the other nutritional benefits of fish. You may choose canned sardines or salmon for more Omega 3, and they are not expensive either.
Chicken: A whole chicken is usually cheaper than buying half a kilo of of chicken breasts, remember to remove most of the skin before cooking and eating it. Use leftovers in soups, sandwiches or other dishes. Skinless chicken thighs are also less expensive than breast and they don’t have that much extra fat.
Dried herbs and spices: Dried herbs are very practical, last a lot longer than fresh herbs and cost less. You can use them in pasta sauce, soups, omelette and a variety of other dishes.
Red meat: Eat red meat occasionally, you probably won’t buy the expensive steaks and very lean red meat, however it may be worthwhile to pay a little extra for the good quality meat. Minced/ grounded meat that you buy doesn’t have to be super extra lean, all you need to do is cook the meat on a pan for a few minutes and drain the liquid fat then continue cooking.
Dairy: A block of cheese is cheaper than a pack of grated cheese, you can always grate it yourself. Low fat cheese, low fat milk and low fat yogurt don’t cost more than full fat or whole milk.
Fruits and vegetables: In the supermarket you can save a lot of money by buying ingredients loose rather than pre-packed. A couple of carrots, for example, will cost you around 10-15p. A pre-packed kilo bag will cost about 90p.
Eggs: Great source of low cost protein. If you only have three eggs and some cheese in the fridge and some dried herbs and black pepper, you can always make a nice omelette. Make boiled egg for sandwiches or scrambled eggs with baked beans for breakfast.
Beverages: Opt for fruit juices and water. Never buy sweetened juice drinks, go for the natural fruit juice or even the concentrated varieties. There is no need to buy bottled water when you can fill your bottle from the tap. What about spending that money on low or no fat milk?
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Budget Cooking- References:
Cooking on a Budget: Quick and Easy, Parragon Publishing (Mar 2006).
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/news_and_events/ events_student1.shtml: Budget Cooking .
http://www.netmums.com/food/ Cooking_on_a_Budget.266.
http://www.beyondbakedbeans.com/ categories/20080907_1: Budget cooking .
http://www.peter-thomson.co.uk/foodc/ budget cooking .html
