Hello hello, and welcome to Episode 98 of Life On the Brink!
I’ve been rediscovering my love for cooking yet again, this time as a way to ground and stabilize myself, but also to explore creativity and welcome new fall flavors. I’ve realized lately, though, that many may not have a passion for cooking in the same way, and that’s ok! Perhaps you just want to eat yummy things that make you feel good, making the often-more-affordable choice of cooking at home rather than buying out actually worth your time. Well today’s episode is for you!
In this episode I’m talking about some very simple ways to build a balanced, nourishing meal that is delicious and affordable to make. It may not be quite as quick as picking up takeout, but none of these recipes or strategies will be too complicated or time-consuming.
What’s in my teacup? French roast coffee, topped with frothy milk with maple syrup and a dash of cinnamon.
By now you may have heard about my theory regarding many things in life, it’s the way I tend to assess food, work, finance, fashion, home renovation, and probably a lot more. It looks like this:
Pick 2- Energy vs Money vs Quality
1. The amount of time or effort you must expend
2. The amount of money you spend
3. The quality of the result
I’ll be honest, in most scenarios I tend to pick Quality and Energy, consistently choosing to save money over the others. As I’m getting older (and thankfully, more financially stable), though, I have found certain instances where the money makes the quality or the convenience of time saved worth it. It’s all about your priorities.
When it comes to cooking, I will gladly expend plenty of time and energy in the kitchen to have a delicious and quality meal for far less money than dining out for that same meal. However, even if you’re not interested in spending lots of time messing around in the kitchen, we all have to eat. What’s more, it behooves us to eat well, as it fuels and nourishes our bodies. Unless you have serious cash to blow, I would venture to guess that most of us would like to eat good-quality meals without spending lots of money every day. In that case, it’s necessary to expend time and energy for those meals, and that’s where today’s episode comes in!
I’m going to share some simple ways to
1. Save money on food
2. Produce quality, delicious meals
AND
3. Not take up too much time.
It will take a bit of shop planning, possible meal prepping, and time cooking, but I’ve designed these tips to be as streamlined and simple as can be so you can easily integrate it into your routines.
7 TIPS FOR COOKING (and eating) WELL ON A BUDGET
1. Eat Seasonally. This is great for many reasons. Not only does eating what’s in season tend to taste so much better, it’s filled with the nutrients that our bodies need in that season. Also, it tends to be cheaper. I’ve seen this in a couple of ways:
-At many grocery stores, especially in the summer, you can find stalls of seasonal local produce that’s cheaper than the usual stock.
-If you can find a local farmer’s market with reliable, affordable produce, GO THERE. I shop around the stalls until I find the best prices and stock up.
-Grow it yourself! It’s not exactly cheap to get started on a vegetable garden, but once you get it started you can grow much more than you might expect.
2. Have a Plan: This will help you not to get overwhelmed when grocery shopping. There are a couple of ways you can go about this as well:
-You can go super strict and plan out each of the meals you will prepare that week (I tend to grocery shop every week to 10 days) and write a shopping list of everything you will need to purchase.
-OR if you don’t want to plan specific recipes, just write a list of the essentials and make room for what you find at the store. For example, I’ll write down “veggies (2-3)” and see what’s available. Sometimes I get ideas when shopping and let the ingredients dictate the meals.
3. Shop Around. This is the step that will probably feel the most time-consuming. Sometimes certain grocers or markets will have excellent prices on certain things, but not others. Sometimes I’m willing to sacrifice a little bit of quality (i.e. not everything I eat is organic) for a better price. This is where you will again get to know your priorities!
-I, for example, shop at Trader Joe’s (blessed shop that it is) for most produce, canned goods, snacks, non-perishables and wine, but I hardly ever buy proteins or dairy from them. While I’m sure they’re delicious, I can get a better deal from the Aldi across the parking lot. There’s still a great selection of cheese and dairy, and the prices for chicken, beef, pork, fish, and seafood are consistently better. It’s an extra step in my grocery process, but actually doesn’t take that much longer to shop.
4. Adjust Your Recipe. If an ingredient isn’t available or affordable, sub it!
-If a recipe calls for bell peppers in your stir fry, but it’s spring so the greens are at a great price at the farmer’s market, why not use bok choy and cut asparagus instead?
-I do this a lot when it comes to cuts of meat. Bone-in chicken thighs will be much cheaper than chicken breasts (and are more juicy and delicious, hello) and country style pork ribs are an affordable substitute for beef short ribs. If the tacos call for ground beef, but the ground turkey is on sale, I’m subbing. Just consider the potential change in cooking times when you do this.
-In general, just think about the role the ingredient is playing in the dish, and try to bring it out in another way. Don’t have a lemon? Add a little vinegar. Don’t have spinach? Make a kale salad instead. Literally no fresh produce? Use frozen! I’ve discovered many delicious combinations and hacks simply by experimenting with this.
5. Batching. Also known as meal-prepping, this is a huge time saver. Here’s a few ways you can go about it:
-Of course, there’s the classic route in which you spend a Sunday (or your least-busy day) prepping a large quantity of a meal and packing it up for the week. This is ideal if you truly don’t want to cook at all during the week and if you don’t mind eating the same meal every day (this is not for me).
-Now, there’s a variation on that idea that I found very useful in college. I would spend a Sunday afternoon making things like quinoa, roasted chickpeas, chia seed pudding and granola. These were elements of several different meals that could then be made much quicker.
-Another, less strict variation on this would be to simply make extra when you’re cooking, either by making leftover meals (delicious and easy), or by cooking extra pasta, rice, proteins, etc. when you’re cooking one night.
-I just have to speak about how easy and yummy roasted veggies are. I love roasting large pans of whatever is in season, keeping the seasonings semi-neutral with salt/pepper/garlic powder/onion powder so that they can be used in a variety of flavor profiles or cuisines. Just toss with olive or avocado oil, your seasonings and roast at 400 degrees F for 20 minutes (or 40 for potatoes).
-Breakfast may be the most difficult meal to cook during the week, so I think prepping with yogurt parfaits, homemade muffins, breads, or granola bars, or even making breakfast burritos to store in the freezer.
6. Recreate Your Favorite Take-Out. The idea with this one is simple: cook what you crave. If you regularly find your money going to Chipotle, why not meal-prep some rice and protein, then add whatever veggies and sauces you like to make yummy burrito bowls at home? If you get good at making the food you actually want to eat, you’re less likely to crave the convenience of take-out.
7. Prevent Waste. Letting your groceries go bad is a real money-waster (though it happens to us all from time to time). Try to prevent throwing away your food with these ideas:
-Try not to overshop. It’s hard to keep track of what you have if you can’t see all your lovely groceries, so keep it visually tidy by buying just what you need for that week. This will obviously look different depending on your household, but check in with your fridge every week or every few days to see what needs to be eaten.
-Challenge yourself to use everything up. It’s sort of like a game or a round of Chopped, just look at what’s about to go bad and make it a challenge to incorporate that thing into your meal.
-Especially for fruits and veggies, if something is going bad just wash, cut and FREEZE it for when you can use. I currently have a big bag of pears that my brother-in-law gave me that’s washed and prepped in my freezer, waiting to become a compote or something. Also smoothies
I hope these 7 tips have helped frame food shopping and cooking in a bit of an easier light. Don’t worry about doing all of this at once! It’s just a few ways to get you in the kitchen and saving money. Now, naturally, I need to offer up some recipe ideas! Here are some dishes that I have found very easy to cook and customize.
VERSATILE (and cheap) MEALS TO PREP
Soups: It’s autumn now, so I’m back on my soup game. Truly just saute aromatics (onion, garlic, ginger, etc) in oil, add proteins or veggies (fresh or frozen), add stock and flavorings and cook till heartwarming. Soup is the easiest and most versatile thing on earth, so here’s a few recipes to get you started:
Bowls: The building blocks are simple: carb + protein + veggies + SAUCE. Also some nice fats like greek yogurt, avocado or feta are a nice element. The flavor profiles can be so varied and these can be super easy to prep. It’s also a nice way to make sure you’re getting your vitamins in. Check out the link below for LOTS of bowl inspiration.
Pasta: Like a bowl, but more SAUCE. Noodles can come in so many forms, and are a great vehicle for so many proteins and veggies.
*Here’s a slew of wholesome pasta recipes to get you started. Feel free to customize!
Sauces: Can you tell I like sauce? This is the one thing that can take any noodle, bowl, wrap, salad, anything from palatable to stellar. Definitely a worthy addition to your meal prep Sunday. Here’s a few recipes to help get things rolling:
-Carolina Gelen: Spicy Roasted Pepper Pasta (I would eat this sauce on many things)
Spices: Had to mention them because the use of herbs and spices can totally change up the flavors for what would otherwise be very similar dishes. Maybe you usually add cinnamon to your oatmeal, but maybe you add a spoonful of pureed pumpkin or squash and add nutmeg and clove to the cinnamon and BOOM, you have an autumnal variation!
And there you go! I hope that this episode has empowered you to cook for yourself and your loved ones just a little bit more. Nourishing your palate and body while keeping a budget isn’t necessarily intuitive, so cut yourself some slack and remember you can enlist help from those in your household as well!
More Inspiration:
This Week’s Little Joy: I had a VERY fancy gig about an hour away from home last week, and since it was on a Saturday morning, Josh and I decided to make a little getaway of it. We drove up Friday night, went to a really cool Cuban place that my parents always recommend, stayed in a super quaint hotel for one night, then I played a grand piano for an hour and we got brunch. There's this French restaurant that I've wanted to take him to since forever, and it finally worked out! We then changed and went to the botanical gardens in Richmond and it was a spectacular 24-hour getaway.
What I’m Listening To: This is such a nice, cozy playlist of music to set some ambience to your space this fall. The video is called "1 Hour of Vintage Autumn Music" and is accompanied by some charming vintage illustrations.
Thank you so much for listening! Feel free to leave a comment with your favorite recipe, or if you have any suggestions for future episodes please send an email in the contact form on this site! I’d love to hear from you, happy eating my friend!