There is a misconception that eating healthy has to be expensive and that isn’t true. Eating healthy is simply avoiding unhealthy processed foods and unhealthy foods. Does a fast food meal or prepackaged microwave meal really cost less than a healthy home cooked meal, no, it does not. Healthy foods are not more expensive and with a little planning, it is simple to eat healthy and cheap.
Eating Healthy and Cheap
Eating healthy conjures up images of rich people shopping at gourmet grocery stores. Eating healthy is wrongly seen as buying the priciest vegetables, meats and expensive fish.
Unhealthy foods are usually fast foods and prepackaged processed foods that contain a lot of calories, fat, saturated fat, sugars, and chemicals that are terrible for your health.
Healthy and cheap is using healthy simple ingredients, buy in bulk whenever possible, always look for the sales, use coupons and use leftovers. And cooking your meals will be healthier and cheaper.
Here are some ideas for eating healthy and cheap. The information in this article is a guideline since food prices can vary widely depending on the time of year and your location. It also depends on how many people you have to feed.
Healthy, Cheap and Filling Side Dishes
Grocery store ads have some great buys all of the time. Many times they have a buy 10 for $10 sale, you can buy 10 bags of frozen vegetables for $10. Brown rice, hash browns, sweet potatoes, and many more choices do not cost much.
Healthy Chili
Ingredients using a 5-quart pot:
Using hamburger will make the pot of chili last longer. If you use beef, it is healthier to use grass-fed beef. Grass-fed beef is higher in vitamin E, omega-3 fatty acids and lower in total fat.
These ingredients will give you plenty of protein from the meat and the beans. Vitamin C and A from the vegetables and plenty of fiber.
Sauté the vegetables in a small amount of olive oil before adding to the chili. Olive oil is also healthy.
This should be a dinner for at least two nights for four people and several nights for two people. You can sometimes lower the price of the chili by using 1 pound of ground turkey instead of beef.
Using a crock pot or an InstaPot makes cooking easier and you can find hundreds of recipes for them.
Other Healthy and Cheap Ideas
These are other ideas you can experiment with each time you make a meal using nothing but healthy foods, which is the fun and healthy part of cooking yourself. They are not just healthy and cheap but they also taste great.
- Beef stew: Onions, carrots, potatoes, beef, stew seasoning, a little olive oil and flour for browning. The 5 qt pot will last several nights.
- Spaghetti sauce: Add peppers and onions to the sauce. Mushrooms are also healthy, and can reduce the risk of cancer. Mushrooms and quinoa are both cheaper than hamburger and quinoa is a complete protein. They will make the sauce nice and thick.
- Burritos: Sauté the vegetables first, then add and brown the meat with the vegetables. Then add taco or other seasoning if you like. Add the beef, vegetables and black or pinto beans to the shell. You can also try these healthy and cheap vegan burritos.
- Lentil stew: Onions, red potatoes (not creamer potatoes), carrots. Dried green or brown lentils, diced tomato, olive oil to sauté the potatoes and onions, curry seasoning (optional), 6 cups of water, chicken or vegetable broth, this is your choice.
- Tomato soup: Making a big pot of tomato soup is healthy, cheap and filling that you can have before or with dinner. Eating soup is a great way to fill up so you don't have to eat so much for dinner.
- Breakfast: A big bowl of rolled oats cost just cents per bowl. Overnight oats are great because you can make them the night before and grab them the next morning before work or school.
Any seasonings and dried herbs you initially buy will last quite a while and they can usually be found cheap in the bulk section of the grocery store.
Final Tips on Eating Healthy and Cheap
Buying and cooking enough for more than one night is healthy and cheap. Buying what products you can in bulk will save money.
Look for ads in the paper and each week in your mail. Most everything you need to cook healthy meals can be found in bulk actually, oats, beans, lentils, flours, rice, spices.
There is no more need to fear that healthy foods are expensive and beyond your budget.
About the Author
Sam Montana is a certified Food Over Medicine instructor from the Wellness Forum Health Center and certified in optimal nutrition from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Copyright © 2009-2019 Sam Montana
