Hello.
My microwave died in spectacular fashion today. It was the lifeblood of my kitchen. I’ve had it so long I’ve forgotten how to cook without one. And I can’t afford to buy a new one. I was going to post in eatcheapandhealthy but that place looks as dead as my microwave. I don’t know what I’m going to do.
Jamie Oliver often went on about cheap recipes… that required 30 ingredients and a bunch of equipment I don’t have. These are not helpful. I need recipes that are cheap to shop for, cheap on electricity usage, easy to prepare with limited equipment, and it would be a bonus if they are healthy and tasty. I know I’m being picky, but I don’t have much to work with.
I figured this would be the community to ask because to cook well, you need to know stuff that a bad cook wouldn’t know. I hope I can get a few useful ideas. Thanks.
I would recommend checking out: https://www.budgetbytes.com/
Lots of straightforward recipes, and they all have price breakdowns for the ingredients, cost per dish and cost per serving. There is even a category for meals under $10. You do have to keep in mind those are the local prices for the blog author and I’ve found it can vary for my region, but it is still a helpful guideline.
As far as cheap quick and easy it’s hard to beat Midwestern style “salads”. Egg salad is something I eat fairly often. Mix hard boiled eggs, mayo or miracle whip (I use light), and sweet pickle relish in whatever proportions you prefer. I generally add some frozen peas and top mine with Tajin powder but you can add veggies, nuts, seeds, cheese, seasonings or sauces… whatever you want to customize it. To make a different kind of “salad” replace the eggs with ground, chopped, or shredded meat (home cooked, deli, or canned) of whatever type you prefer or a can of beans with the liquid drained. It can be made into sandwiches, wrapped in a tortilla, used as a dip, served over rice, noodles, cooked or fresh veggies, it can be eaten cold or hot, if you add a lot of veggies, pasta, or rice and some liquid it can be baked off as a casserole maybe topped with cheese. The meat/eggs/beans should be cooked before they go in so all you have to do is dump it in a bowl and mix it up.
For a dessert “salad” there is cottage cheese salad. Mix a tub of cottage cheese, a can of fruit (pineapple is the norm but I use oranges because I don’t like pineapple and it’s suppose to be drained but I don’t), and a small package of flavored gelatin (sugar free store brand works fine) in a large bowl then fold in a tub of whipped cream. Sometimes I add some cherries and/or walnuts. Any fruits, nuts, or seeds can be added. It has to be refrigerated for a couple hours so the gelatin can set up.
I used to live off of Spanish tortilla when I was a student. All you need is potato, egg, onion, salt and pepper, and a bit of cooking oil for your pan. You can also add other ingredients like muahrooms, tomatoes, sausage, or bacon when you have it.
Just dropping in to thank everyone for the ideas, encouragement etc, and a bit of an update.
I bought some onions and added them to my edible-but-not-very-tasty rice, and fried them together, and it tastes a million times better. I have pasta and tuna as backups, and will keep referring back to this thread every time I shop. The positivity in the thread also got me to clean my fridge, which was absolutely filthy (I don’t even know how it got like that) to mark the beginning of new kitchen habits. The fridge is still depressingly bare, but it’s clean and that makes it less depressing haha. It’s nice having more bench space where the microwave was… it almost looks like a kitchen now.
Thanks again! 👍
