Best budget cooking books according to redditors
We found 459 Reddit comments discussing the best budget cooking books. We ranked the 86 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
We found 459 Reddit comments discussing the best budget cooking books. We ranked the 86 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
You can't go wrong with Vegan with a Vengeance.
Being vegetarian is very easy. The meals are not bland. The typical meat-eater cook will marinate meat, cover it with tons of spices, bake it to perfection. Meat by itself is bland. My point is that it's all in the flavors and spices, and learning how to cook vegetables, tofu, etc in new ways. Indian vegetarian food is delicious for example, as well as Japanese, Mexican, etc. You get to be adventurous and try new food!
It's absolutely possible to be vegetarian on a small budget. Beans are much cheaper than beef after all. The key is to stock your kitchen with bulk items such as beans and rice, potatoes, pasta, canned goods, so that you always have some core meal ingredients on hand. Then you can buy fresh vegetables and fruits on sale.
I eat a lot of black bean tacos, tortilla chips with salsa, etc.
Also pasta with vegetables. Veggies with dip such as hummus. Breakfast food (such as eggs and potatoes). Homemade vegetable soup. Etc.
I think it's awesome that you're considering vegetarianism. It's important to do your research however.
Here's some links to get you started:
i'll try to change your view by taking it to a further position that i believe you do not hold, which would require you to either move to that position or reject your view on animal abuse altogether. the position, of course, is veganism, and i don't believe you hold that view as evidenced by "The person has no intention of eating the bird", which implies that you would find killing an animal acceptable if that person intended to eat the bird. essentially, i'm going to argue that if you hold a position that grants animals any rights then you must find it absolutely unacceptable to kill and maim them unnecessarily. establishing this is necessary to have any meaningful discussion concerning animal rights or consideration, and it will point out some flaws in your CMV.
first let's establish that killing and/or torturing animals for food is not necessary in our modern society (and for you). please abstain from arguments such as "but if you were on a desert island" or any variation of it that implies you are unable to go vegan. if you live in the first world and you are able to make decisions on what you eat, then these do not apply to you because you are perfectly capable of going vegan. i am not arguing against someone on a desert island eating meat, i am arguing against you eating meat and animal products.
now, the line of defense is usually to claim that veganism is unhealthy. it is not. this study by the ADA (full text) demonstrated that a vegan diet improved lipid and glycemic control in type 2 diabetes, more so than an ADA approved diet. not to mention of course that there are many vegans out there doing just fine, and they in fact tend to be healthier and have decreased mortality ("Our review of the 6 studies found the following trends: 1) a very low meat intake was associated with a significant decrease in risk of death in 4 studies, a nonsignificant decrease in risk of death in the fifth study, and virtually no association in the sixth study", and abstract only on this one). so clearly there are no health reasons for a normal, healthy human to eat meat. if you are not a normal, healthy human in this context then that is a different discussion, but if you are, any point regarding someone who must eat meat for whatever reason is irrelevant, as you are not that person, nor are most people. and to grab this as well, many argue that it is too expensive for most people to go vegan, but on the contrary one can go vegan for $4 a day, and linked is a well known cookbook that outlines how you can eat vegan on a budget, and often vegan eating can be cheaper than omnivorous options. it is essential that we establish that the only reason one would kill an animal for food in our situation is for taste pleasure. this is entirely trivial and is no different than the abuse you say you abhor. it's not for health reasons, it's not for economical reasons, the only things that remain are lack of education on the topic and taste pleasure. lack of education can be addressed; taste pleasure is entirely unjustified.
now to the ethics. to quote you, "if a person intentionally causes harm to an animal in an abusive way, then that person should be penalized just as harshly as if they had committed that act against a human". why? i mean i know the reasons you listed, but none of them are sufficient. the only one that's reasonable is your second point, which i want to highlight:
> Abusing animals is wrong in and of itself. It causes pain and suffering, regardless of the species. There is no good reason to do it intentionally.
i agree, this is an excellent argument for veganism. in fact, an extremely well-respected bioethics professor and powerhouse in vegan philosophy is Peter Singer, who wrote a book called "Animal Liberation" on the topic and summarizes its purposes in this paper, it's a good read. his argument goes a bit further, though, and examines equal consideration of interests. Singer proposes that animal pain and suffering should be considered, as should their desire to live, which is just as much as the former. it readily follows that if it is unacceptable to disregard an animal's desire to avoid pain and suffering, it must be unacceptable to disregard an animal's desire to live. similarly, if it is acceptable to disregard and animal's desire to live, it follows that it must be acceptable to disregard their desire not to feel pain and suffering. you cannot have one without the other, they are inseparable.
"well", one could say, "there is an obvious flaw in your argument. if the animal is killed instantly and painlessly, then there is no harm done, for the animal is unaware". this is an untenable position, though, because there is no good reason why this should also not apply to humans. if we replace "animal" with "human" in that argument, what has changed from a moral standpoint? surely we are repulsed by the idea that it would be acceptable to kill a human for any reason so long as it's painless, but why? and particularly, what trait is found in humans that changes the argument? why is it acceptable to do this to an animal, but not a human? is it because the human is more intelligent than the animal? this cannot be, because rights are not distributed to humans based on individual intelligence, so how can we distribute them to animals on that basis and maintain moral integrity? more concretely, if there was a severely mentally disabled individual with similar intelligence to a pig, would it be acceptable to kill and eat that individual? you must be appalled by such a proposition, but there is no justification to be if you find killing the pig acceptable. the only difference between the two is that one happens to be a member of your species. how is this not arbitrary? sure, in the natural state it's necessary to find your own species more valuable than any other, but that is not the case here. from a purely moral standpoint, why would one be acceptable and not the other? what trait is present in that particular human which is not present in the pig that gives you moral justification for killing and eating that pig unnecessarily? remember, the pig and the human are cognitive equals. they exist in a vacuum; nobody knows or cares about either one. why is one acceptable and the other not?
in fact, what about a normal, healthy human grants it the moral right to kill and eat an animal unnecessarily? here is a succinct argument for you to ponder:
> P1 - Humans are of moral value
> P2 - There is no trait absent in animals which if absent in humans would cause us to deem ourselves valueless
> C - Therefore without establishing the absence of such a trait in animals, we contradict ourselves by deeming animals valueless
here we establish that animals have moral value. therefore it follows:
> P1 - Animals are of moral value
> P2 - There is no trait absent in animals which if absent in humans would cause us to consider anything short of non-exploitation to be an adequate expression of respect for human moral value.
> C - Therefore without the absence of such a trait in animals, we contradict ourselves by considering anything short of non-exploitation (veganism) to be an adequate expression of respect for animal moral value
the answer here is plain and simple. if you assign any rights to animals, you forfeit your moral justification for killing them unnecessarily. you must name the trait present in animals which if present in a human would make it acceptable to exploit that human. i've already gone over why intelligence is not this trait, for we do not distribute rights or moral value among humans based on intelligence, nor would we find it acceptable to kill and eat a human which lacked the significant intelligence we have over animals, so this clearly is not the trait. species membership cannot be this trait either, since it is arbitrary from a moral perspective. if we discriminate based solely on the fact that we are members of a species and others are not (not citing any specific differences between the species, just the fact that they are different), why not discriminate based on the fact that we are a different sex? or different race? they are all arbitrary.
so, unless you can name that trait, it is impossible to refute veganism and assign animals rights of any kind. even without all this, it is common sense that if you grant animals protections against pain and suffering, you must obviously grant them protections against the taking of their very lives. there are two ways you can go with this. the first is accepting consumption of animal products unnecessarily as in the same category as the senseless abuse you describe. if you were to keep your current view, then you would also need to believe that any meat-eater should suffer the same punishment as would be expected from a murder charge. this is an absurd position, most people eat meat and don't even think twice about it, they do not deserve such punishment for that. the other is to refute this claim to veganism, but that would require you to refute claims to animal rights as well, which would leave your argument in the dust, as in order for animal abuse to be wrong, they need to be moral agents and have some level of rights. if an animal is of the same moral value as a table, then there is no reason for abusing that animal to be any different than abusing a table. either way, your current position can't remain the same.
Hey rastamon, I was a varsity athlete through all of college and went vegan in junior + senior year. At first it was tough to switch cause it requires more prep work but it is definitely possible and you'll feel better. So, to alleviate your concerns when it comes to protein, if things get really bad and you just don't feel like cooking a heavy meal at all here's a pretty good go to - http://shop.myvega.com/products/vega-sport/recover.html?mode=grid . This is a line of nutrition shakes created by a vegan ironman triathlete that is dopest shit around lol. This is just the recovery shake but there are lots of different types of shakes. Hemp protein powder is another good example of a good and dense protein shake (can get it at GNC for example).
As for the food / cooking part, if you eat a well balanced diet you'd be surprised how much protein you will actually get. For specific protein based foods that are my favorites, I'd have to say nuts, lentils (red lentils... so fucking good when cooked right), quinoa, tempeh, seitan, soy (try not to eat too much of it for a variety of reasons), avacado (just an all around awesome food), seeds (pumpkin, flax seeds, etc.), brocolli surprisingly and a few other veggies have quite a lot protein, and lastly beans (chickpeas, kidney beans, baked beans, any sort of beans has a lot of protein usually). Most of the vegan milks like almond milk and hemp milk are pretty good on the protein side.
The only thing that you really need to make sure of is to get b-12 pills cause when you drop eating meat that is the vitamin you will be missing most. I take one weekly and it definitely goes a long way (although I think some of the vega shakes have b-12 in them).
As a vegan working out and burning upwards of 2000+ calories in 2-3 hour workouts, I was eating a lot of food so I understand what you mean about wanting nutrient dense foods, but I think you will definitely get the hang of it once you start learning the recipes and plan for it.
I highly recommend this book - http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Vengeance-Delicious-Animal-Free-Recipes/dp/1569243581 for all around good cooking and this one - http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Diner-Classic-Comfort-Food/dp/0762437847/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1368216762&sr=1-1&keywords=vegan+diner for the seitan loafs that you can make yourself (if you ever need help with these ones then just direct message me and i can gladly help out cause this shit is the dank... simply put. It's the closest thing to a chicken / meat replacement i've had once you tweak the recipe to get it the way you like and so much cheaper than buying it from the store).
I think that covers most of the initial questions unless I left out something...
EDIT: also, nutritional yeast is going to be your new BFF soon - doubly dankness
For ease, and to give big ups to the author, here's the link:
https://www.amazon.com/Good-Cheap-Eat-Well-Day/dp/0761184996
Instant Pot should dramatically increase the things you can cook. Stop being so picky. Vegan is the cheapest diet. https://www.amazon.com/Eat-Vegan-4-00-Day-Conscious/dp/1570672571
Alright, I'm gonna give you the advice that I've tried to practice myself and that I have heard from other radical vegans and folks who are poor vegans.
First off, you have to start buying bulk foods. For example, instead of canned beans or lentils, buy bulk beans, bulk lentils, etc. These should be in an ordinary grocery store, like stop and shop, a big box store, whatever. These, along with bulk grains, will provide most of the bulk and calories in your meals. I would recommend finding an indian or asian grocery store near you if you can, and make a plan to go there once. See if you can find bulk brown rice, bulk soybeans, and large sizes of seasonings like soy sauce. Also, shit like beans you have to soak if they are bulk, so just leave them in a bowl while you are at work and cook when you get home. Or get a slow cooker if you can find one thrifted.
Second, buy vegetables as cheaply as you can. I recommend frozen vegetables, cause frozen broccoli is often cheaper than fresh, and the same is true for most other veg. Make sure to compare the prices though, as you can get screwed sometimes. Canned might be cheap too, but I don't know really. Bananas are a good cheap fruit, and you can buy frozen berries and stuff and make smoothies easily. Frozen foods will also be better for you out of season. In season you should try to find farmers markets or farm stands, they might be cheaper, and CSA's can be cheap if you are okay with a lot of the same vegetable.
For vitamins, I would recommend eating a variety of vegetables, have like two or three in each meal (you can make a lot at one time and refrigerate) and then switch that up week to week. For B12 and vitamin D and Iron, I would recommend eating either nooch or purchasing a large bottle of like 250 sublingual (that's imprtant) pills, Vitamin D you can get from the sun if you get like a half hour each day from 10-3 you'll be good in the summer and the body should store some. Soymilk is often fortified with D as well. Iron you can get from green leafy vegetables, and if you eat them with vitamin C you'll absorb more, but cooking in a cast iron pan will also help, you can find these at a thrift store usually. Cook in Canola or olive oil and eat walnuts or ground flaxseeds occasionally for omega 3's.
This cookbook would also probably help you out.
In an average day I eat
Breakfast
Oatmeal cooked in soymilk with 2 tbs of peanut butter
Lunch
Apple, Banana, PB&J, and Pistachios (buy these in bulk)
Dinner
(I can give the recipes I use for these, but they are pretty informal, and all should be served with rice or noodles, which can be bought in bulk for cheap.)
Stirfry, with garlic sauce (include tempeh/tofu, broccoli, onions, garlic, carrots, mushrooms, peppers, and seasonal veggies)
Burrito meal (includes potatoes, beans, broccoli, kale (frozen), onions, peppers, tomatoes)
Lentil Dal (includes lentils, tomatoes, coconut milk (depending on the recipe), and spices, serve with spinach or kale on the side.)
Snacks
Hummus with veggies or crackers
Raisins
Fruit smoothies
Pick up a copy of the The 12-Bottle Bar. Also check out their website: http://12bottlebar.com.
This should set you up for maximum output with minimal investment.
~Good luck!
I think for me (i'm not a bartender - just a lowly at-home hobbiest), the most transformation book i've read was the Seven Bottle Bar. It seems like your books are leagues above that.
I started by wanting to make specific drinks that i'd had in the past, but Seven Bottle gives you a primer and base that lets your understand drinking construction before you move on to bigger and better things. Also, being able to whip up real and delicious drinks from minimal ingredients, or substitute ingredients has been a skill i rather enjoy having.
edit: it's twelve bottle bar.
This is a great idea for a challenge. I'm not so great at budgeting but I always enjoy reading about other people's money-saving victories.
Budget cooking resources. I only know of two budget cooking cookbooks for vegans, Eat Vegan on $4 a Day by Ellen Jaffe Jones, which I don't have, and Vegan on the Cheap by Robin Robertson, which I do.
https://www.amazon.com/Eat-Vegan-4-00-Day-Conscious-ebook/dp/B006IS83W0/
https://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Cheap-Robin-Robertson-ebook/dp/B00BKROO22/
Vegan on the Cheap is a good money-saving cookbook, especially if you're fast in the kitchen. The thing about trying to budget is that you often have to trade time, creativity and effort for money. Some of the recipes in the cookbook are geared toward making your own staples rather than purchasing them at the store. Others use affordable ingredients like potatoes, cabbage, lentils and winter squash to create tasty main courses. Each meal lists its supposed cost although food has gone up in price since this cookbook was published, so I'm not sure how helpful that is.
While I don't own it, Miyoko Schinner's The Homemade Vegan Pantry is a cookbook of staples. I suspect it's also money-saving for that reason. Maybe those who have this cookbook can weigh in on whether it is?
https://www.amazon.com/Homemade-Vegan-Pantry-Making-Staples-ebook/dp/B00NRQXT70
These are a couple of college cookbooks that say they have affordable vegan recipes, though I have no personal experience with them. Maybe someone can weigh in on them? The are:
PETA's Vegan College Cookbook
https://www.amazon.com/PETAS-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious-ebook/dp/B01CO4HH4Q
Student's Go Vegan Cookbook by Carole Raymond
https://www.amazon.com/Students-Go-Vegan-Cookbook-Recipes-ebook/dp/B003EVJKIU
There is a new money-saving vegan cookbook in the works that won't be out until June, Frugal Vegan by Katie Koteen.
https://www.amazon.com/Frugal-Vegan-Affordable-Delicious-Cooking-ebook/dp/B01MQ3O7DK/
Finally, I'd like to recommend a book on money-saving that is entertaining as well as educational, The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn.
https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Tightwad-Gazette-Promoting-Alternative/dp/0375752250
Dacyczyn and her husband's dream was to raise a family of six kids, but to do this, the Dacyczyns had to become radical money savers. They tried and tested many money-saving strategies, and eventually began to publish a newsletter. Their newsletter subscribers contributed suggestions of their own. This book is a compilation of all their newsletters. It is somewhat dated, since they were published in the 1990s, but many of the money saving tips in it can still be applied.
Did you know that soy flour sold in bulk makes a good egg substitute in baked goods? I didn't either, until I read this book. Did you know that you can calculate the energy costs you accrue when you turn on the oven for an hour? This book shows how it can be done. The book also has some strategies for how to grocery shop -- the authors take in account not only prices at the supermarkets in their area, but also the cost of gasoline when they make multiple trips.
They're not vegan, and many of their strategies were too radical for me, but I really enjoyed reading about their creativity and ingenuity.
These are all the resources I know of, off the top of my head, but I'm really looking forward to hearing what books and blogs others have tried!
No, no, no! I am broke too! There are EASY recipes out there with minimal ingredients. Not everything needs 1000 spices like an Indian dish. Do some research for your health, if anything, because the diet you have now honestly sucks, and there's no way you are getting everything your body needs.
Here's a book to check out: http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850
People are recommending Veganomicon, which is a great book and you should pick it up (along with everything else by Isa Chandra Moskowitz), but since you mentioned finances, allow me to recommend Vegan on the Cheap. Every recipe is ≤ $2 per serving.
my friend chris made these videos, they wrote a book too
https://www.amazon.com/Claras-Kitchen-Memories-Recipes-Depression/dp/0312608276
You don't have to be vegan chef to cook vegan food. Check out eat vegan on $4 a day and /r/veganrecipes :) Eat lots of soups, dried(not canned) beans, rice and produce. I do a lot of vegan cooking so pm me for recipes! Good luck!
First of all, good for you two for jumping in, it seems like a huge challenge at first so good for you for taking it on. Having a partner puts you both at a serious advantage, the transition is completely painless.
I would suggest the website vegankit.com for help getting started. I found the site a few weeks after I had been vegan and if nothing else it can point you in the direction of other references. Also I suggest the book eating vegan on $4 a day . I haven't read the book but I have seen it recommended several times on vegan youtube channels. That's another huge resource, youtube has a ton of recipes and tutorials.
I would also try your best to forget things people have told you about veganism especially that it is "expensive". This is simply not true.
Also from what I have researched on soy, (I am not a doctor) just a passionate vegan that wants to encourage you both, consuming normal amounts is perfectly fine for you, anything you can get from too much soy is probably not nearly as painful as the consequences of too much meat (colorectal cancers, bowel cancer, heart disease, etc.) I feel like many of these arguments are just based on things that are spread solely by word of mouth and don't really hold up to argument whenever you look at them critically.
Go into this experience with an open mind, and a positive outlook knowing that you are making a simple and exciting change (read that improvement) in your daily lives and in your health while simultaneously excluding yourselves from supporting mass torture and killings of innocent, sentient individuals.
One other thing, you don't even need that much soy, a lot of the easy pre-made kind of stuff is soy based, but definitely not all of it. I personally eat about as much lentils as I do soy (maybe more?), there are a ton of options. I have been vegan for about six months now, and from what I hear it has never been easier; and I believe it.
The Frugal Paleo Cookbook
I found it at my local library and wrote down the recipes I liked.
Grab a copy of The 12 Bottle Bar ...its about maximising drinks whilst minimising bottles and expense.
Pinterest might be an easier way to find links. I know not a lot of guys use it... but there's a reason girls are obsessed with it.
Type in meal prep with your choice of adjective (cheap, easy,
vegetarian, chicken, etc) and you'll come up with tons of options.
But in the meantime, here are a few links! Chicken burrito bowls. Teriyaki Mushrooms with steamed broccoli, rice, and salmon if you're feeling fancy (I watch for sales on the frozen preseasoned fillets and just pop them in the oven the night before to avoid them sitting cooked in the fridge for too long). Greek Chicken Bowls. When I'm feeling ~decadent~ and have enough time I like to make a big batch of mushroom bourguignon to go with noodles or mashed potatoes during the week. Crockpot meals are also usually good for 2-person meal prep because the recipes are usually designed for families/parties. Throw them in at the start of your prep day, then portion them out with your meal prep basics like rice and veggies. Bonus points if one day you prep a bunch of crockpot freezer meals so that you can either have them ready for your foreseeable prep days or in the middle of the week when your fresh prep has run out. There are too many crockpot options to link up so I'll just say again, Pinterest it up! I do have a killer pot roast recipe if you want it but if you're avoiding beef it's null. Lastly, I'd recommend the cookbooks Well Fed, Flat Broke and Good and Cheap which aren't meal prep specific, but are fantastic resources for learning how to cook cheaply and deliciously. Some of their big batch or casserole recipes work well for meal prep (WFFB's tuna dill pickle casserole or potato mushroom thingie, GaC's peanut chicken come to mind). Others are just nice quick recipes to have around when you need them. Best of luck!
>Except that eating is necessary. Killing someone would only be beneficial in the same way if you're a cannibal.
But you already admitted that meat is a choice. If you can eat something that doesn't require the death of an innocent creature, why in the world would you choose to kill an innocent creature for your meal? I view this as ethically impermissible. In fact, I view meat eaters in roughly the same way as cat torturers. I can't imagine why a person with a choice in the matter would actually choose to kill innocent animals because they taste good. I find it deeply disturbing, and I can't view those people as anything other than soulless monsters. For that reason, I have great difficulty with the idea of dating a meat eater. I wouldn't date a hobo-killer either.
> my goal is to cut out that expense and prepare food at home which is where my plan tends to fall apart.
You can be vegan on four dollars a day.
> I just don't think the OP's tactics are right. Making him hide his food, making him hide when he eats, "rewarding" him by allowing him the use of a room in his own house...it's so degrading. You don't come at someone like that if you are hoping to convert them.
I agree, but I also understand the sentiment. I've been vegan for nearly four years and I approached it initially in roughly the way you seem to be doing now. My problem now is that I have been exposed to too much information. I believe I suffer from mild Secondary Traumatic Stress Disorder, and I think many vegans can claim likewise.
The problem, of course, is that we live in an omnivorous world and it's very difficult to find love even without the added constraint of ensuring that our loved ones are vegan. I once had a girl who was interested in me hint that I must get lots of girls because I'm vegan. Girls are often attracted to my dedication when they find out I am vegan, but you've heard enough from me to understand the problem with that. My life would be a lot easier if I just gave up and went back to killing animals, but I would hate myself (to put it mildly). So even though I don't agree with OP's approach, I have a lot of sympathy for her.
Did you mean 12 Bottle Bar, possibly? If not, can you link to the book you're talking about?
It can be done cheeper. I did it a lot when I was a student. I bought the ugly produce for cheap at a farmers market/vegetable store (go there with cash in the pocket just before they are closing - then they are much more easily convinced to give you a great price. Be flexible on which items.). I made big batches of food and froze them in freezer bags. I bough cheap, fresh fish from fellow students that fished at their spare time. It's a bit different than the mealprep you often see, but the thought proces behind it is the same.
E.g.:
Don't cook when it's convenient, cook when you can get cheap produce.
Try to get inspiration from sites like this:
Edit: these books are great for cheap recipes and tips for cooking and saving money (buy them used). On his youtube channel he has free tips and tricks as well (search words "jamie oliver save with Jamie"):
My wife and I try to cook at least one meal a day from scratch. We have old favourite recipes to fall back on and love to try new ones.
It's a great way to get good food, spend time together and learn new skills. It's actually cheaper that pre-prepared meals too. Jack Monroe's cookbook is a great place to start.
Go pick up the book 12 Bottle Bar by the Solmonson's, work your way through that, then pick up The Bar Book by Jeffrey Morgenthaler, and work your way through that. Then if you want to get all crazy on recipes get the PDT app on your iPhone or pick up the PDT or Death and Co books if you don't have an iPhone. Then if you want to get crazy with techniques... Pick up Liquid Intelligence
Brand suggestions?
Bourbon - Old Granddad or Buffalo Trace
Scotch - Famous Grouse Blended and Laphroaig 10
Irish Whiskey - Bushmills
Brandy - Paul Masson VSOP
Cognac - Jacques Cardin VSOP Cognac
Vodka - Tito's
Gin - Aviation/New Amsterdam and Tanqueray
Tequila - All the Espolon stuff for Blanco, Reposado, Anejo
Mezcal - Del Maguey Vida
Rum - Flor De Cana 4 year+Plantation 5 year+Myers (people may scoff at Myers, but it's a signature style in a way, good for the price too)
Vermouth - Dolin Dry Vermouth and Carpano Antica Sweet Vermouth (Keep them in the fridge after opening!)
Bitters - Angostura, Regan's Orange bitters
Others - Campari, St. Germain, Benedictine, Pernod Pastis, Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur
Non-alcoholic - Lemons, Limes, Oranges, Fever Tree Ginger Beer, Fever Tree Tonic Water, Fever Tree Seltzer, Eggs, Cream, Orange Blossom Water
Watch small screen network's videos, read jeffrey morgenthaler's blog, and keep an open mind.
Don't know if I missed anything.
So I went and read that report you referred to (or at least, what they said in the Washington Post about it):-
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/04/03/the-hidden-crisis-on-college-campuses-36-percent-of-students-dont-have-enough-to-eat/?utm_term=.dd26d35d9f78
I must admit that some things do sound a little odd to me. For example, here is one passage from the Washington Post article:-
>“I’m not going hungry per se, but there are days I’m just not going to eat,” she said. “Today, I am kind of hesitant to buy food, because I have less than $100 and I need to do laundry. Do I want to do my laundry or do I want to eat today? That is the kind of question I’m dealing with.”
OK, so I'm a bit confused here. Does doing your laundry in a laundromat cost the best part of $100 in the USA?
Is food really so expensive in the USA? If I walk down to my local British equivalent of Kroger or Walmart I can easily find a 16 ounce frozen spaghetti bolognese or chicken curry with rice or shepherds pie that is going to cost me a pound (US$1.40 - and that's including tax) that I can quickly do in the microwave in four minutes without any problem.
Do these sort of things not exist in the USA? The spiritual home of fast food?
Then. I know that it can be a real pain to cook for yourself while at university - but there again I managed it living with three other guys and we didn't starve or live off take outs (apart from a Saturday night kebab [gyro for Americans] after a couple of beers).
I think that u/horse19 referred to this in another reply but it is certainly more than possible to live spending US$100-150 per month on food.
For example, there is an English food blogger, author and activist by the name of Jack Monroe (she's also done a TEDx talk here )
This is a bit about her on Amazon:-
>Jack was a cash-strapped single mum living in Southend. When she found herself with a shopping budget of just £10 a week to feed herself and her young son, she addressed the situation with immense resourcefulness, creativity and by embracing her local supermarket's 'basics' range. She created recipe after recipe of delicious, simple and upbeat meals that were outrageously cheap. Learn with Jack Monroe's A Girl Called Jack how to save money on your weekly shop whilst being less wasteful and creating inexpensive, tasty food.
https://www.amazon.com/Girl-Called-Jack-Delicious-Recipes/dp/0718178947
and this is the blog:-
https://cookingonabootstrap.com/
There is a similar author in the US that I'm aware of by the name of Leanne Brown:-
>Cheap Eats: A Cookbook For Eating Well On A Food Stamp Budget
>
>When Leanne Brown moved to New York from Canada to earn a master's in food studies at New York University, she couldn't help noticing that Americans on a tight budget were eating a lot of processed foods heavy in carbs.
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>"It really bothered me," she says. "The 47 million people on food stamps — and that's a big chunk of the population — don't have the same choices everyone else does."
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>Brown guessed that she could help people in SNAP, the federal government's Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, find ways to cook filling, nourishing and flavorful meals. So she set out to write a cookbook full of recipes anyone could make on a budget of just $4 a day.
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>The result is Good and Cheap, which is free online and has been downloaded over 700,000 times since Brown posted it on her website in June 2014. A July 2014 Kickstarter campaign also helped her raise $145,000 to print copies for people without computer access. And on July 21, the second edition was published with 30 new recipes.
https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/07/27/426761037/cheap-eats-a-cookbook-for-eating-well-on-a-food-stamp-budget
It's also available on Amazon:-
https://www.amazon.com/Good-Cheap-Eat-Well-Day/dp/0761184996
Now before anyone starts saying that the recipes are likely to all be tofu and lentil burgers - no that isn't the case. I just had a quick check on her blog and one of the latest recipes was Sausage & Bean Casserole which, quite frankly, was exactly the sort of thing I lived on in university.
She claims that this recipe would feed four people at a cost of 60p (84 cents including tax) each. If this was a family of four with two children I could quite believe it but, if it were teenage guys living at university then it would probably only feed three. But there again, that still only works out at 80p (US$1.13 including tax) each.
I certainly remember that I had to be very careful indeed about what I spent my money on - are things really that significantly different nowadays? Or are students choosing Netflix over food?
Hi, I went vegan straight from eating meat, dairy etc, I had like 2 weeks as a transition phase as that all I felt I needed.
Some of my reasons were health, some were ethical. I'm going to try to keep this fairly short.
The ONLY "ethical" eggs you will find are ones that come from a neighbour's/friend's/relative's backyard, even commercially available "free-range" "organic" eggs aren't that fair to the chickens.
There is NO ethical dairy. No matter what a female cow is kept pregnant on a very regular basis, her calf is taken away from her, they are often tortured and turned into veal. The mother and infant both become incredible distressed by this, they understand that their infant is being torn from their side. She is then milked, given high doses of antibiotics to keep the pus from her mastitis at a low level, but this doesn't really work so it still ends up in our milk. then the cycle repeats for a few year and then she is killed. In the wild cows will live around 20 years, a LOT longer than they do in any farm.
So that is a HUGE reason I went vegan, I used to consume a SHIT LOAD of dairy and then I came to understand that and I (just me personally here) became really, really saddened and disgusted in myself for supporting this. After I went vegan I read a quote somewhere that as some dude went vegan he just "saw a slice of veal in every glass of milk". So there really isn't any such thing as ethical dairy.
Egg replacer products are easy to find and you can get used to non-dairy milk, I got used to it by drinking the chocolate kind with a snack, it helped. Here are some (hopefully) useful links for you, if you don't get to cook on campus then you may have to wait to go home to use them:
http://www.savvyvegetarian.com/vegetarian-advice/student-needs-easy-healthy-diet.php
http://www.skinnybitch.net/
http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=vegan%2Bstudent&x=0&y=0
Good luck! (:
One suggestion I have is Clara's Kitchen: Wisdom, Memories, and Recipes from the Great Depression. I've actually used this book as a cost saving measure when things were financially tight.
>I can agree we can survive, however I do not believe judging if humans are able to thrive on something if that means it is natural.
So you're saying you'd rather choose a diet that is more destructive to animals and the environment, because you deem it to be more natural? Even though the other option is perfectly fine and can't even prove that one diet is more natural.
>Dogs can thrive off of dog food however it is not their natural diet.
What's more important? Thriving on a "unnatural" diet or thriving less on "natural" diet?
I'd argue all the nutrients are "natural" btw.
>It is hard to claim which one is clearly more more ethical as it does need close attention to make sure you have the nutrients you need on a vegan diet.
What nutrients do you get in animal flesh that you can't get in plants?
Like I said, all the major dietetics and health organizations in the world agree that vegan and vegetarian diets can be perfectly fine.
This had been paid close attention to.
>It is also generally more expensive and hard to upkeep which can give people with low income tough results.
This is another weird myth I hear occasionally.
If you go into any grocery store, the most expensive foods tend to be the animal flesh and cheese. The cheapest foods are the beans, rice, potatoes, pasta, lentils, etc.
Since going vegan I actually spend less money on food than I used to, as the majority of my diet consists of ingredients like oats, starches, carbohydrates and vegetables, all of
which are among the cheapest foods you can buy. The only time where vegan food can be more expensive is when buying the substitutes, for example, frozen vegan ‘chicken’ nuggets are still more expensive than non-vegan chicken nuggets, but this is to do with supply and demand. As more people go vegan and buy those products, the cheaper they will become.
Plenty of material out there to help people on a budget. Here's a book on how to live vegan $4 a day.
https://www.amazon.com/Eat-Vegan-4-00-Day-Conscious/dp/1570672571
Vegan with a Vengance! Even if you're not Vegan it's got some good stuff (like carrot raisin muffins).
Drink This - Wine Made Simple - Great book for beginners
The Wine Bible
The Essential Scratch and Sniff Guide to Becoming a Wine Expert - Seems like it's a joke, and it sooort of is, but there's some good information there, and the scratch and sniff thing is actually quite useful.
The World Atlas of Wine - Pretty much the ultimate wine book. If you don't want to spend that much on it, consider buying a used copy of the older edition. You can get it for just a few bucks. Obviously it won't be as up to date, but it's still extremely useful.
Pairing Food and Wine for Dummies - John Szabo is legit
Great Wine Made Simple
Up until recently I worked at a book store, these were the books I recommended most frequently to people. If you want ones about specific regions, there are some good ones out there too. These are all more general.
Another redditor beat you to it When you buy it, one goes to you and they send one to someone else. Also, there's a PDF version for free.
Getting the required amount of protein is no problem for either a vegetarian or vegan diet/lifestyle. You must simply mix incomplete proteins in one meal in order to account for a complete protein. The most used example is mixing rice with beans. Whereas most non-animal protein sources must be mixed, there are a few which stand alone as a complete protein. Vegan complete protein sources include soy and quinoa (a grain). Quinoa is really delicious and can be used from a couscous alternative, to a main bulk ingredient to stuffed peppers.
As for recipes, I suggest Isa Chandra Moskowitz
The PPK (PostPunkKitchen) has some good recipes, but I would really suggest buying her book Vegan For a Vengeance.
I recommend Peta's Vegan College Cookbook for recipes. I don't know if you mind the vegan diet, but it has about 300 recipes that can all be cooked in a microwave and are made with easy to obtain, cheap ingredients http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850
Wine is a huge beast, but a lot of fun. You can't really sit down in one weekend and completely understand everything.
Your first step is trying different red and white wines - red wines being red grapes soaked with their grape skins before fermentation, and whites being white grapes drained off immediately. The extra skin contact lets tannins enter the liquid, and creates the bitter/dry taste (think what your mouth feels like after eating a slightly too-ripe banana).
Your local wine store is going to be your best friend in your experimentation - those clerks are very knowledgeable (unlike the ones at the grocery store, for example), and can help guide you when you tell them what you thought of each wine you try.
As for actual recommendation: go to your local wine shop and ask for a good budget Riesling and Shiraz/Syrah that aren't blended. Expect to spend about $15 on each. Chill the Riesling when you get home.
When you're ready to try the wines, get a notepad out so you can remember what you thought weeks later (I ran into this problem when I first started). Open one, pour a glass, and smell it. The bouquet is extremely important in wine. Sniff it for a good minute and write down what you smell. Different fruits, foods, not-foods (rubber is a common aroma in some varietals). Then taste it, hold it in your mouth for a second and make sure it gets your whole tongue. Again, write down what you taste and what you think of it. If you want to try both wines at the same time (actually a great idea), I'd do the white one first, and make sure to drink some water between the tastings (the traditional cleansing of one's palate).
Wine doesn't have to be snooty - this is supposed to be fun. I swear I had a wine that reminded me of a meat-lovers pizza.
If you really enjoy it, I picked up a book recently: Drink This. Very down to earth and good information for beginners.
3 I'm curious, what does Rød grød med fløde mean??
http://12bottlebar.com/
Go to that site, which is sadly no longer active, but the back log is great. Find recipes that basically use the stuff you have, and start working your way through it. Read the articles.
Or, they have a book, which is worth buying.
You will likely not be needing that blender, at least not very often. I find most blended drinks are more work than what they're worth on a small scale.
Otherwise, you just need a shaker and a pint glass for stirred drinks. You also might want to purchase a Hawthorne Strainer, a jigger, and possibly a mesh strainer.
I could list out 50 drinks that basically just use the spirits you have plus some juices/sugar, but I'd just be listing the stuff that's on 12 Bottle Bars site.
I won't do a ton, but here's an example of one rabbit hole: First, make a Gimlet, if you like it, then try a Fitzgerald, if you like it, then make a Bee's Knees. If you like that, then make a Gold Rush...
You get the idea.
I don't really have any specific rules, per say, other than drink what you like. If you read enough around here, you'll notice that vodka doesn't exactly get put up on a pedestal by many. I personally find I use gin in almost any situation that calls for vodka so I don't really sweat which brand I have in the house (currently Tito's).
As for tequila, it's not so much about avoiding gold tequila (my house tequila is the lunazul reposado which is a gold tequila), it's making sure that you're using a quality 100% de agave tequila. Most brands that produce tequila this way will let you know somewhere on the label, but brands like espolon, lunazul, milagro are all safe bets. Otherwise, they're making the tequila from some percentage neutral grain spirit (typically distilled beet sugar) and adding tequila flavoring.
Read around here and on specific spirit subreddits to get further recommendations. I also recommend picking up a beginners cocktail book to give you an idea of which elements of your bar to stock first and prioritize what to buy later. 12 Bottle Bar focuses on what bottles to buy to make an array of classics. Bar Book is more focused on helping shape your technique and palate.
There is a great book called The Frugal Paleo Cookbook: https://www.amazon.com/Frugal-Paleo-Cookbook-Affordable-Delicious/dp/1624140882
I borrowed it from my local library. It contains lots of cheaper recipes and tips for frugal cooking. I know paleo is not the same as keto but you can easily adapt the recipes to suit.
My go-to mince recipe is to make simple balls of mince with just some spices, put some kind of cooking liquid (stock, curry, tomato, whatever) in the slow cooker and throw them in. Serve as a soup, as a zucchini ‘pasta’ sauce, over cooked cabbage or cauliflower ‘rice’. Make lots and save some for another meal. Many butchers have bulk deals for mince.
I also tend not to eat special keto foods, like breads and noodles, except as a special treat. I stick to meat and veges and fats. Hope that helps.
If you're just starting, you might want to check out Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution Cookbook. It's got a good overview of what a well stocked pantry needs and the a really wonderful variety of recipes from easy to complex. There's also some nice recipes for condiments that can be used for any dish.
Will you be living in an apartment or a dorm? I ask because most dorms don't have any cooking access besides a microwave. If that's the case, there's PETA's book about cheap college vegan recipes (HERE) It's not necessarily the best food, but it is really cheap and microwavable. A lot of them are absurdly simple like "Take bread and put vegan cheese in it and cook it," so it gets ridiculous. It's also not really the healthiest, but I think overall it is worth a look to get ideas.
There's also another book called Vegetarian 5 ingredient gourmet. I don't have it, but I saw it at the bookstore yesterday. It might be worth it, too. Here
One standby that my ex always ate, and I do now, is to use a rice cooker to make rice and beans. It's super simple. Just use whatever amount of rice the cooking times tell you, add your favorite salsa and your favorite beans and the amount of water it says to use, and cook it. It's simple and cheap, but has plenty of nutrients.
I occasionally make my own vegan substitutes and generally use recipes from vegweb.com that have good reviews.
Vegan on the Cheap is another good source for these things. It even tells you how much each recipe costs to make.
The 12 Bottle Bar
The book starts off with a 1-bottle bar, then a 2-bottle bar, 3-bottle bar, etc. so basically you build up your bar a bottle at a time, each bottle allowing more and more cocktails to be made.
This book will show you how to eat a vegan diet very inexpensively:
http://www.amazon.com/Eat-Vegan-4-00-Day-Conscious/dp/1570672571/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1369194374&sr=8-1&keywords=eat+vegan+on+%244+a+day
In theory that would bring you down to $28 a week.
Out of curiosity are you eating a lot of vegan fake meat products or other packaged foods?
Three big ones that immediately come to mind:
I make a vegetarian slow cooker chili (I'll update this comment with the recipe in a bit), but this cookbook is a godsend for veg-heads in college.
THE BEST!!! A lot of recipes for all different budget, it Also has a bit of beginner keto tips and food lists.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/162315734X?psc=1
Followed the recipe from the Wicked Good keto cookbook, which we just got last week and have been trying different recipes from.
It came out okay - next time, I'll probably cube the chicken before cooking, and cut up the zoodles a little bit. Everything clumped up and we ended up with some chicken and sauce left over and no more zoodles. Also, the sauce was too thick, and then I stirred in the zoodles and it got a little too thin. Not sure what to do about that.
Squeeze of lime at the end was crucial!
It's the prefabbed meat substitute and fermented nut cheese section of the store that is too expensive.
https://www.amazon.com/How-Cook-Everything-Vegetarian-Meatless/dp/0764524836
https://www.amazon.com/BOSH-Recipes-Amazing-Plants-highest-selling-ebook/dp/B0722J1XDB
https://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Vengeance-Delicious-Animal-Free-Recipes/dp/1569243581
There's vegan for $4 a day. I can get you a pirated copy if you want it. I don't know what your budget is, but you can follow this and then spend the rest on proteins like TVP and seitan as others have mentioned.
There is an awesome cookbook called Clara's Kitchen: Wisdom, Memories, and Recipes from the Great Depression.
Clara is an awesome 96 year old lady and has a cooking show on youtube called Great Depression Cooking which I highly recommend watching.
My apologies if I came off as a dick-- I didn't realize you were honestly asking the question. I thought it was rhetorical (but I answered anyway, heh).
As for the protein powder, GNC probably sells way more whey protein than soy. If you're really interested in protein powder, though, here's 2lbs of soy protein powder that's way cheaper than either of the GNC links: http://www.amazon.com/Jarrow-Formulas-Iso-Rich-Soy-32/dp/B0013OQG64/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1371059605&sr=8-1&keywords=soy+protein+powder
A few other things:
Further, one pound of dry beans is about 12 servings. So one pound of beans has 12 servings x 8g protein = 96g protein for one pound of beans. Finally, the price you quoted is far more expensive than most canned beans, which are more expensive than bagged (dry) beans (see http://money.msn.com/saving-money-tips/post.aspx?post=0d2d3ebc-1ee5-4734-a34a-53ad26b5e3e7).
See this info sheet for nutrition facts on pinto beans: http://www.fns.usda.gov/fdd/facts/hhpfacts/New_HHPFacts/Beans/HHFS_BEANS_PINTO_DRY_A914_Final.pdf
Huh!
That's really interesting!
A close friend's father introduced me to brewing when I was, like, 16 (after sneaking no small amount of his home brew) and we spent several afternoons brewing together and he told me a lot about how the different ingredients and brewing methods work to create different flavors and styles of beer, so I have an (admittedly basic and ineloquent) understanding of hops and grains and malts.
I also cook a lot, so flavors and ingredients are really important to me and I'm keenly aware of what a big difference something like fresh basil can make over a dried ground powder in a freshly prepared meal. That's not snobbery, it's just a fact. Good quality ingredients are important to crafting excellent food.
I got curious about wine a couple years back and read Drink This, which is an amazingly easy to read and unpretentious guide to learning what exactly the difference between Syrah and Merlot is. (And all the other varietals.) The book recommends a lot of tasting, and I can't drink 5 bottles in one go by myself so I decided to make a game out of it and gave a powerpoint lecture on each chapter to my friends and we did all the tastings together. Super educational and a great experience. Would definitely recommend.
For the record, I didn't know anything about anything regarding wine when I started out on that little adventure. No shame, full curiosity.
Anyway.
I don't know of any great books about beers off the top of my head but this is the book I was given to learn about brewing. It will give you a huge amount of insight into the process and ingredients (and history!) of brewing if you're interested.
I totally understand why you made the analogy you did now. Thanks for clearing that up!
And yeah, while I totally agree that people can use beer knowledge as a way to feel superior to those around them, and that habit is stupid and annoying, there really is a lot to learn about beer (and pretty much everything else in the world, duh) and a whole lot of great stuff out there to taste! So don't let those jerkbags ruin that experience for you. Go check it out!
Well, you could get this one:
http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Cheap-Robin-Robertson/dp/0470472243/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1404636748&sr=8-1&keywords=inexpensive+vegan
I've only browsed it at my girlfriend's place, but it looks pretty good. But I'm the same as you. I cook a lot, but I almost always just wing it. A little bit of this, a little bit of that.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/jun/02/un-report-meat-free-diet
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/03/140304125639.htm
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Eat-Vegan-4-00-Day-Conscious/dp/1570672571
Here ya go: http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850
are you good with recipes? maybe a beginer level cookbook would be your jam.
peta's always good for cookbooks.
http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850
and veganomicon is quite popular as well.
http://www.amazon.com/Veganomicon-Ultimate-Isa-Chandra-Moskowitz/dp/156924264X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1416511134&sr=1-1&keywords=veganomicon
both are good starter level cookbooks.
i'd reccomend cooking in big batches and freezing stuff.
if this doesn't work, try your local asian or indian grocery store. they have a ton of instant meals for dirt ass cheap (like a buck or 2 each) many of which are vegan..
congrats on going vegan too, btw!
Small note: Check what other books by Debbie Madson are available for free. I nabbed at least three others, including the very apropriate for this subreddit $5 Meals Cookbook: 50 Budget Friendly Recipes (UK link). (Note: I make no guarantees on the suitability or quality, but hey, it's another free eBook :) )
I really like PETA's Vegan College Cookbook. Lots of cheap, "I would actually eat this" recipes. http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious-ebook/dp/B003TFE09U/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1413949892&sr=8-1&keywords=peta%27s+vegan+college+cookbook
Don't forget "Eat Vegan for $4 a day"!
http://www.amazon.com/Eat-Vegan-4-00-Day-Conscious/dp/1570672571
Your post made me think that we should have our own "Random Acts" sub. There are several specialized ones--Christmas, Food--heck, they even have one just for games! Why not one where people who are already living compassionately can help one another out? I see we have /r/veganexchange but it's more about, well, exchanging.
I'll start--I have about 20 packages of pasta that I'm not supposed to have any more due to stupid GERD :( If you'd like them, PM me the address and I'll send them over
If you want to feed him, cook for him but don't be giving him money because you can't trust his judgement.
This will help: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Girl-Called-Jack-delicious-recipes/dp/0718178947
Have you seen the Vegan College Cookbook from PETA? The recipes are VERY simplistic but a lot of it got me through college a few years ago.
I would start with this book:
Jamie's Food Revolution: Rediscover How to Cook Simple, Delicious, Affordable Meals
Dead simple, and years later I still have many of the recipes in my rotation. He really gets delicious easy cooking. The salmon tikka knocks people's socks off. Any of the stews are great. Something like this is good as well:
This is a Cookbook: Recipes For Real Life
I make a baked pasta dish that is appealing to just about everyone, even (especially?) omnivores.
I use 50% whole wheat pasta, cooked, and pour on some marinara sauce. In a baking dish or lasagna pan, I pour half of the saucy pasta. On top of that, I add a layer of vegan ricotta cheese, which is just mashed tofu with lemon, a little nutritional yeast, salt, and oregano. Sometimes I mix some sliced fresh basil in with the ricotta, or a package of cooked frozen spinach. On top of the cheese goes the rest of the pasta. I usually top the whole thing with Daiya mozzarella, some red pepper flakes, dried oregano and basil. Cover with foil, bake at around 400 degrees until it starts to bubble, then uncover and let the Daiya melt. Serve with a salad and vegan garlic bread. Everyone loves it! It's based on a recipe from Vegan on the Cheap.
Baked potatoes with cheese and broccoli. Rice and beans. Pasta with garlic sauté in some olive oil, with Parmesan cheese. Edit: This may have a lot of good ideas too. http://www.amazon.com/Starving-Students-Cookbook-Dede-Hall/dp/0446679615
I'd check out this book called "The 12 Bottle Bar" http://www.amazon.com/The-12-Bottle-Bar-Cocktails/dp/076117494X/
Sounds like what you might be looking for.
Some fast food options: http://www.peta.org/living/food/chain-restaurants/
Vegan food at gas station: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UI8uNCMs2pY
If he has access to an electrical outlet, everything (rice, quinoa, potatoes, bulgar, lentils, beans, frozen veggies, etc.) can be cooked in a rice cooker (more healthy & cost efficient): http://www.amazon.com/Rice-Cooker-Recipes-Friendly-Beginners-ebook/dp/B00MUEK59A
Best thing you can do right now is come up with as detailed as possible budget for your future. Set up a Mint account, read some articles on basic personal budgeting, and be realistic about your lifestyle. I like to recommend the 50/30/20 as a jumping off point. Try and also get a realistic estimate on your take home pay. (65k-retirement contributions-healtchare-taxes)/12 is a decent estimate until you see your 1st paycheck.
As far as ways to save, there a ton of little things you can do. Major thing I did was use Good & Cheap to drastically cut down on my food expenses. I was spending way too much on eating out, and it was unhealthy both physically and financially. You should also look at public transportation. Taking a train or bus to work will reduce fuel costs, and is also a nice way to get some reading or music in before and after work. If you do drive, drive cheaply. You don't need a brand new car right away. Whatever can get you around safely is all that you'll need. Build wealth, not debt
Peta has a book called Vegan College Cookbook, all cheap and easy to make recipes. You can get it here http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850
I have thumbed through several of his books in the store, and have come up with a pretty good sense for a couple of them.
Cook with Jamie - My Guide to Making You a Better Cook - I dove into learning how to cook using Mark Bittman's "How to Cook Everything" series, and I feel this has been infinitely valuable and my top beginners cookbook recommendation. If that book wasn't available, I think my second would be Cook with Jamie. There aren't as many recipes as Bittman's books, but I think it's geared more toward the absolute beginner, with a slower pace, and more focus on details of skills. The best part is, I've been seeing it on the clearance racks of chain bookstores for $7 - $12.
Jamie's Food Revolution: Rediscover How to Cook Simple, Delicious, Affordable Meals - This is the American edition companion book to the BBC TV show "Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food". In it, he went to an unhealthy Northern England industry town with a reputation for unhealthy inhabitants, selected a handful of people, taught them some super simple everyday recipes, and implored them to spread the knowledge to their friends and neighbors. These are the recipes he taught, which tend to be universal Western dishes, with a British slant (ie. meat pies, curries, etc.). If it sounds frightening similar to the "Food Revolution" show he talks about in his TED talk, that's because it is.
I have also heard great things about Jamie's Italy, but frankly, I'd go for Marcella Hazan's, or Mario Batalli's books first.
Yes get a rice cooker! If you have a blender you can make smoothies with both fruit and vegetables (well, green, leafy ones at least). The other vegetables you could totally be able to put in the microwave, which you should have!
You can get your hands on a few cookbooks like PeTA's:
http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850
There are other college cookbooks that also come up on the search.
And here are some relatively easy recipes:
http://theveganstoner.blogspot.com/ (this is more for the munchies)
http://www.collegiatevegan.com/recipes
http://www.foodandloathing.com/2012/10/the-easiest-beginners-vegan-recipes.html
http://vegetarian.about.com/od/vegetarianfamilies/qt/collegeveg.htm
http://theveganzombie.com/webisodes/
http://ohsheglows.com/categories/recipes-2/food-quick-n-easy/
Since you're broke here are some ideas on eating on the cheaper side of things:
http://plantbasedonabudget.com/
http://www.peta.org/living/food/making-transition-vegetarian/ideas-vegetarian-living/vegetarian-eating-budget/
http://www.care2.com/greenliving/6-tips-to-eat-vegan-on-a-budget.html
http://www.cok.net/blog/2013/08/eating-vegan-on-a-budget/
http://www.foodispower.org/eating-on-a-budget/
http://veganbodybuilding.com/?page=article_mindy_003
And don't forget proper nutrition:
http://veganhealth.org/
http://www.theveganrd.com/food-guide-for-vegans
http://www.vrg.org/
http://vegankit.com/eat
http://jacknorrisrd.com/
http://nutritionfacts.org/
The flawless recipe from Vegan With a Vengeance with an extra tsp of cinnamon and a cup of local mcintosh apples grated in.
Shit.
Cheap eats
More cheap eats
Even more cheap eats
Low effort.
Might be a mobile link but here
Edit: link fixed
Pork Rinds, Parmesan Cheese, and Italian Herbs. I got it from The Wicked Good Ketogenic Cook Book. I've been baking chicken with that for a few weeks now...amazing. I recommend that book too.
12 Bottle Bar by David and Lesley Solmonson
I haven't read it myself, but [Peta's College Cookbook] (https://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850) is a book full of microwave vegan meals.
Work on expanding your social network to find friends, acquaintances and strangers that can help you, and perhaps you can help in exchange. This could help you get childcare, a place to live and another, perhaps better-paying job. Friends can make life suck less too. Groups on Meetup.com and Facebook are good places to start. Look for groups for moms, single moms, working moms, anything that interests you and any subculture that you consider yourself a part of or might want to join. Most Meetup groups have mailing lists and discussion boards where you can post requests for or offers to help.
I don't know your socioeconomic background or ethnicity, but don't limit yourself to people just like you or worry too much about how you are perceived by others or will be. This applies whoever you are, but especially if you grew up poor or are a person of color. White liberal guilt is this nation's greatest untapped resource.
Whether you are religious, spiritual but not religious, secular humanist or whatever, there is likely a community for you near you. Find it; participate somehow; make connections. It's good for expanding your social network, giving you a sense of community and getting you through difficult times. Unitarian Churches are very welcoming, though I have found that the accusation that they have minds so open that their brains fall out is often accurate. For a more secular community, check out Sunday Assembly.
Many cities have established childcare sharing groups, or you could start your own. See https://www.babysitterexchange.com. I'm not a mom. I haven't used it, but maybe it could help.
Leverage local social services as much as you can. They may be able to help with childcare, food, shelter, job search, and job training. Your local United Way should be able to tell you what's available. See http://www.211.org/ or dial 211.
$5 day is pretty good, but how healthy is it? I recommend this book. Beans are cheap, nutritious and covered by WIC! Soymilk, tofu, breakfast cereal and peanut butter are covered too! Your local vegheads, hippies and anarchists can hook you up with all kinds of stuff, especially food. Try freecycle instead of buying things, though you'll likely need to offer something first.
I didn't find many things I loved in that one either. I also found her kind of preachy and off putting. =\ Bacon & Butter was much better. I also like Amanda Hughes' Wicked Good Ketogenic Diet. Not many pictures, but what I've made so far has been delicious. I just made her Chicken and Broccoli Alfredo last night and even my non-keto husband loved it.
Most practical is this to help me eat cheap
Least practical is probably this because I absolutely don't need it
The 12 Bottle Bar is a great read for someone putting together their own home bar.
Vegan on the cheap
Here is PETA's Vegan College Cookbook. It's an alright cookbook but I personally think Vegan on the Cheap is way better. I'm sure there are plenty of other good cookbooks too. I also recommend the Vegan Stoner blog, like rockmeahmadinejad said. It's a great site even if you don't smoke!
I just bought Vegan with a Vengeance, Isa Chandra Moskowitz's first cookbook, and I love it. I've already tried a few recipes, and the pancake mix recipe is perfect.
Other than that, my standbys are anything Moosewood, like Moosewood Restaurant Celebrates or Moosewood Restaurant Low-Fat Favorites. I also like Toni Fiore's Totally Vegetarian, especially for the Italian recipes.
http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Cheap-Recipes-Simple-Strategies/dp/0470472243
best book i've found
I have a million vegan cookbooks and my favorite is still the PETA's Vegan College Cookbook. It's probably just me though, I'm lazy and cheap.
It's really the most practical cookbook I own because all of the recipes only have a few ingredients and can all be quickly made quickly in the microwave. Many of the recipes are common sense, like "veggie burger", but many of them are really creative and worth checking out.
It's not a vegan cookbook focused on health, like many you see, so it includes a lot of fake meat and dairy substitutes in it's recipes. At the same time, none of the recipes are that unhealthy either.
Everyone can cook, just grab some Jamie Oliver's recipes book, illustrated with all the tips to actually cook healthier.
http://www.amazon.com/Jamie-Olivers-Meals-Minutes-Revolutionary/dp/1401324428/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323524229&sr=8-1
http://www.amazon.com/Jamies-30-Minute-Meals-Jamie-Oliver/dp/0718157672/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1323524229&sr=8-2
http://www.amazon.com/Jamies-Food-Revolution-Rediscover-Affordable/dp/1401310478/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1323524229&sr=8-3
Just look at the recipes and do them. Although some recipes gets a lot of olive oil and stuff that seems to have too many calories, it doesn't, the average calories count of these recipes is around 700kcal.
I've started to cook my own meals, although I knew how to cook some basic things, these books and the app for iPhone (20 minute meals) just got me kicking. I'm eating a lot healthier and tastier food than ever.
P.S.: broccoli and garlic rules. :P
Eat Vegan on $4 a Day
http://www.amazon.com/Starving-Students-Cookbook-Dede-Hall/dp/0446679615
Have the book in my hands now, (the one suggested earlier)! It's called Peta's Vegan College Cookbook, conveniently broken down into sections. Haven't tried too many of the recipes but they're all very simple to make and there's room to tailor the recipes for your specific palette, switching out topics or seasonings here and there. Of course nuked spuds aren't as great ones slowly roasted but the recipes still seem nice. Here's a link: http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850. Enjoy!
http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1311538779&sr=1-1
It's vegan. But. There's hella good food in it. I'm a vegetarian and I love it.
If you're a microwave chef like myself PETA's Vegan College Cookbook is great because it is EASY PEASY! I'm a vegetarian not a vegan so occasionally I add cheese, use real milk and so on.
My personal recommendations:
http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Cheap-Robin-Robertson/dp/0470472243
It has recipes broken down for 3 categories: under $1 a serving, under $1.50 a serving, under $2 a serving.
By serving, they mean one person eating a meal.
I would also recommend this blog: http://www.budgetbytes.com/
That blog is not a vegan blog, although some of its recipes are vegan.
I find the recipes by Jack Monroe to be delicious as well as very cheap to cook. They're on the website Cooking on a Bootstrap but I think the book A Girl Called Jack is definitely worth the money.
/r/EatCheapAndHealthy/
Honestly, you don't have to go out of your way to actually cook fresh food, as a lot of it can be eaten raw if you're busy or don't know hw to cook. You can make big salads with lots of stuff on them. You can take fruits and vegetables (cut up) to school or work with you. You can eat cut up fruit and yogurt/cottage cheese for breakfast, lunch or dinner.
If you want to learn how to cook from fresh, you can get more gourmet-stye cookbooks instead of Betty Crocker or Joy of Cooking style cookbooks.
One good advocate of people changing their cooking habits is gourmet chef Jamie Oliver. He cooks simple guy-gourmet style meals, often using stuff out of his garden. He has several books that teach cooking from fresh for people who want to (1) learn gourmet cooking and (2) learn how to cook from fresh.
Yay! Congratulations on becoming vegan! Lets get you started with some resources for vegan eating in your town/city! It doesn't have to be that hard if you look in the right places!
Vegan Apps/Websites
"Is It Vegan?" is an app available for your iOS or Android smartphone. The way it works is you can scan the UPC (barcode) on any package of food in a grocery or convenience store and the app will analyze the ingredients, making it easier to find out if you're favorite snacks are vegan or not. Cool, huh? When I first went vegan, I think the iPhone wasn't a thing quite yet, so I had an old school little book filled with animal ingredients to watch out for.
Animal-Free & Cruelty Free by Symbiotic Software for iOS and Android are more like that little book I took around. Animal Free is a list of confusing ingredients, both animal based and vegan. If you're ever not sure about something, it's a great resource. Cruelty Free lists cosmetics and products which are safe to use and not animal tested! These can be a big help while shopping!
Happycow.net is kind of like Yelp! or AroundMe for vegans and vegetarians. If you let the site use your locations, it finds veggie restaurants around your current location. You can search for restaurants that are vegan, vegan/vegetarian, or simply vegetarian/vegan options. Other vegans post reviews. It's pretty useful if you're traveling. They also have forums and link to other resources (I think under "Veg Topics" in the top bar.)
A Few Easy Vegan Cookbooks
The Vegan Stoner is EXACTLY what it sounds like. It's packed with adorable illustrations and it's super easy to follow. While simple, most of the recipes are really good! It beats the hell out of the weird microwave college PETA cookbook I bought when I was 18.
Vegan With a Vengeance was the first vegan cookbook I ever used that resulted in me making food that was actually edible to my friends. I started having vegan brunch parties at my apartment with the help of this book! I love the recipe for tofu scrambles!
And since we're talking about Vegan With a Vengeance, let me just rep ALL of Isa Chandra Moskowitz's cookbooks, her cookbooks are almost always amazing and super easy to follow.
Vegan Eats World is another great starter cookbook! It features recipes from around the world, and it's generally easy to follow.
Clothing/Lifestyle
Herbivore Clothing is a clothing/accessory store based out of Portland with some cute hats/hoodies/shirts/stickers/wallets... you know. When I first went vegan I got really into repping the cause and bought like 9 stickers for my laptop and a bunch of t-shirts and totes.
Moo Shoes makes vegan "leather-alternative" shoes. I have a pair of faux-shearling/ugg-style boots from them and they're of really good quality. Also, keep in mind that a lot of shoe companies like Doc Marten and TOMS make specifically vegan counterparts for their most popular shoe styles--also, thrift shopping.
As far as I'm concerned thrift shopping is a vegan's best friend, if you're buying second hand whenever you can, you're helping the planet.
Other Info
If you want to visit a zoo, don't visit a zoo, visit an Animal Sanctuary near you. Sanctuaries are rescue shelters where animals are brought to live and be protected for the rest of their lives. Try searching for Animal Sanctuary + Your State or Country. They are great places to visit and volunteer.
Also, I'm just gonna have to slip Vegan Black Metal Chef in here. The videos I've seen are hilarious and the recipes actually aren't bad.
I might edit this later with some more resources... stay tuned. Hope this helps!
Also, invest in the Starving Student's Cookbook (http://www.amazon.com/Starving-Students-Cookbook-Dede-Hall/dp/0446679615/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267066900&sr=8-6). They've got tons of recipes and budget-saving tips.
Peta wrote a cookbook of only recipes which can be made in the microwave: <http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;s=books&amp;qid=1266097407&amp;sr=8-1&gt;
Also, if you have access to a fridge, keep fake lunchmeat and bread around; pretty easy to make a sandwich.
Rice cookers are the greatest invention ever; rice is retardedly cheap and a rice cooker means you need no skill whatsoever to cook it; many come with a steamer on top so you can steam vegetables at the same time as cooking the rice. At my university you're allowed to keep them in the dorm.
You will love this cookbook then:
http://www.amazon.com/Mark-Bittmans-Kitchen-Express-Inspired/dp/1416575677/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1416752557&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=mark+bittman+20+minutes
I recommend Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express. You can also check out his NYTimes Minimalist video podcasts, which will give you a sense of his approach to cooking.
He has a "trust the reader" style and the book's recipes are basically paragraph walkthroughs of un-fussy approaches to dishes. I turn to this book when I want to cook with a new ingredient or get some seasonal inspiration.
Wow! How kind of you!
Here is my wish list, but if I could only have one item, it would be this one.
This is ridiculous... $200 USD for both Season 1 and 2 on Blu-ray?
I’m in need of some dire need of cash to pay off student loan debt / afford to eat, so I’d be more understand than most (living that struggle life: I work two jobs + Uber, I strictly follow a $32/week grocery budget and exclusive eat meals from Eat Good and Cheap: Eat Well on $4/Day Sunday-to-Friday, considering giving up my house to live in a modified van/stealth camper) but selling drugs is safer than going up against the film and television lobby...
everyone doing this is going to get smacked with $50k lawsuits from an army of lawyers soon, perhaps even criminal charges. Poor souls don’t know what they’ve just gotten themselves into.
I would wait until chicken would go on manager's special the day or before it expired. Then I would freeze it or cock it up in an easy meal.
Also these cookbooks have helped tremendously:
$5 Meals Cookbook
$5 a Meal College Cokbook
Wickedly Easy Healthy Recipe Meals for Less than $5
Isa can do no wrong. Be sure to check out her two books as well:
Vegan With A Vengeance
http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Vengeance-Delicious-Animal-Free-Recipes/dp/1569243581/
Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World
http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Cupcakes-Take-Over-World/dp/1569242739/
My wife and I have cooked with many of her recipes, and we have yet to encounter a bad dish. Even non-vegans I know have really enjoyed her desserts.
> "And what if Aliens space bats came down and killed humans because they said they weren't proper anarchists like the aliens, would you support them then?" Don't be fucking absurd, even with the microscopic chance that aliens do somehow exist and would come down with a taste for human flesh, of course I'd not support them because I'm a fucking human.
I'm highlighting a hypothetical to show that in a different frame of species reference, you wouldn't hold the same position of needless inter-species consumption. If you hold that a being with higher sentience or intelligence or moral value than humans, you would then have NO problem of being eaten, by the same logic you apply to sentient animals. I see no resolution to this on your end.
> You seem to forget humans are sentient, animals are not, and even if they were they aren't even the same species as us anyways.
Animals are sentient, this has been shown extensively, since they do experience a subjective experience, which is the crux of sentience.
If you want to apply a sentience argument to plants, then we agree because plants do not have qualia, nor can they because they do not have brains to create subjective experience. For animals, again this argument does not hold up.
> Because you can stand against murder and decrease the amount of it.
Ok well I can stand against climate change and help decrease the amount of it too.
> Climate change you can put off for a few years at best or end if you held the entire world hostage and forced everyone to live in mud huts.
Ok well back to murder then, everyone is going to die anyway, so why do anything about it?
> Which, once more, goes back to my point of Climate change being impossible to stop.
>....Secondly even if we did abolish it, even you just admitted that can't actually "stop" Climate Change, merely slow it down.
Ok well to be clear, I agree that climate change is real and there will be climate change that will happen over the next 100 years at least. However, this is no justification to not to ANYTHING about it or to not do anything to mitigate it.
If you are about to get into a car crash going 50 miles an hour, and you're going to hit a wall and you know you're going to hit the wall, are you going to hit the brakes? Or the accelerator?
> You somehow think you can abolish a major aspect of humans diets for centuries and enforce such an absurd law without immediately being toppled, it's sheer idiocy.
Ok so you're now appealing to tradition to justify eating meat
Well we could have applied the same thing to slavery at one point in human society, yet this would not be a valid justification for it. Tradition is not a valid justification.
> Which once more goes back to what I was saying: it's impossible to actually stop it without a massive quality of life decrease.
What is the "massive quality of life decrease"? Vegan diets are generally healthier than vegetarian diets and omnivorous diets, with an abolition of animal agriculture, we can feed more people in the world, reducing world hunger. Hell, in the U.S alone, we could feed an extra 800 million.
> "I don't understand, why do you think the idea of being completely poor"
So veganism makes you poor? Thats weird.... because you can eat vegan for about $4 a day
> dominated by a foreign culture and people
Again, I see no causation or justification that if we go vegan, then China wins. This just sounds like xenophobia as a justification to continue the needless suffering of animals.
> and all of these sacrifices we expect you to willingly make doing absolutely nothing but giving a few of us a few possibly extra years on this world is somehow a bad deal?"
.... and again, reducing greenhouse emissions, increasing global food security, reducing water consumption ("For producing 1 kg of cheese we need for instance 5000-5500 kg of water and for 1 kg of beef we need in average 16000 kg of water"), and huge reduction of deforestation and loss of biodiversity, caused by meat-centric diets.... just to name a few.
12 Bottle Bar would be a helpful guide in this subject: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GU2RGPY/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&amp;btkr=1
If memory serves its gin, vodka, whisky, tequila, brandy, light rum, and dark rum. They do not count sweeteners toward the twelve. Personally, the real choice is in the modifers. There are just too many to really get them all. But most people here will argue between a few bottles: chartreuse, maraschino, elderflower, benedictine, campari, ango, peychaud, reagan's, cointreau/grand marnier.
For some base recipes and staples, you can rent this from the library (if available): https://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Cheap-Robin-Robertson/dp/0470472243
It's pretty helpful.
VWAV
Check out Vegan with a Vengance.
That cook book author has many great books, but that one is geared most toward cheap and quick meals.
Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:
amazon.com
amazon.co.uk
amazon.ca
amazon.com.au
amazon.in
amazon.com.mx
amazon.de
amazon.it
amazon.es
amazon.com.br
amazon.nl
amazon.co.jp
amazon.fr
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There is a British one. A Girl Called Jack don't buy it from amazon, check ebay and other 2nd hand book places. Or keep an eye on the amazon kindle price (she's knocked it down to 99p a few times).
It's the premise of the entire book, and a later one called cooking on a bootstrap.
If you really can't afford it, check out her website. She archives all of her recipes on there, she also blogs political stuff aimed at the austerity stuff in the uk, because she's been there. But you don't have to read through it to get to the recipes.
Any techniques she mentions that you're not sure on, have a look as t the BBC Good Food website, they usually have tutorials for anything little bit complicated.
I wish she'd been writing cookbooks when I was in that position!
She's gone vegan in recent years, but not all of her recipes are because she started writing cookbooks before she went vegan, and she still writes non-vegan recipes because she is writing for her audience. Although, there's not loads of meat because its expensive.
Her newest book, tin can cook, is aimed at people who are relying on food banks, most of which give out tinned food to people, so if you are in that situation, there are recipes for that too.
And I'd also head over to r/frugal to help get through your financial stuff, if you haven't already. Most of us have been there and it's shite, but you can get through it. I think the best advice I ever got was to sit down and deal with it head on, make a full list of how bad it is so you can make a plan to deal with it.
Good luck and if you just need to talk to someone, to vent or anything, I'm only an inbox away x
Good and Cheap: (Note: This is also available for free download in PDF format on the author's website. I know many folks who have downloaded it and printed it out for offline use.)
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0761184996/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_EVLLDbRBSQMBH
Depression Era Recipes:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0934860556/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_9OLLDbTKCP8B4
Clara's Kitchen:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0312608276/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_MPLLDbWM71RM9
More-with-Less World Community Cookbook:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/083619263X/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_nQLLDbF12CDHM
Finally, a word on creating your own cookbook binder: Bookmark the recipes you've tried and loved (using Pinterest is okay for this, too), print them out, and either laminate the pages, or use clear sheet protector sleeves to keep them fom getting cruddy with repeated use. Pick out a binder you like or have handy, create labeled categories using tab dividers, then sort your recipes into said categories as you put them into the binder. Voila! Your own collection of recipes you know and trust. 😁
Of my veggie cookbooks, this one has by far the most wear on it.
I've pulled a few recipes from this book that are surprisingly good. Recommended.
https://www.amazon.com/Good-Cheap-Eat-Well-Day/dp/0761184996
[Good and Cheap](Good and Cheap: Eat Well on $4/Day https://www.amazon.com/dp/0761184996/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_48MxybC731DDN)
Good and Cheap is a cookbook/shopping guide that helps you to do just that. It was written by a graduate student whose Master's project was to see if it was possible to eat healthfully while receiving Food Stamps (what you Brits would call on the dole, I guess?).
It's hard to choose but my favorites atm are: Vegan Yum Yum, Vegan with a Vengeance, and Vegan Family Meals.
If you want an excellent beginner's cookbook, I would recommend Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. The recipes are all really simple and designed for someone just starting out cooking. I cook something out of it at least once a week.
I just got this book Christmas:
http://www.amazon.com/Good-Cheap-Eat-Well-Day/dp/0761184996
I got it as a gift because I'm also a frugal person. However, reading through the book, all of the meals are heavily based around vegetables because, well, they're cheaper than meat. Duh. It took me a second to figure out why there wasn't meat in every recipe. There's even a smoothie page for your nutribullet. The recipes generally don't have too many ingredients to keep cost down. This is super appealing to me because I don't like cooking extravagant things and i dont always have a slew of perishable items on hand.
The recipes are all very healthy, but don't contain calorie counts. If you're motivated, you can tally them up. I have done this for a few meals I made from it.
Other than this book, I more or less eat the same thing every day for weeks and often months on end. I know some people can't handle that, especially with other family members that are involved. But, if that's an option, it makes tracking calories and shopping so much easier.
My wife went Vegan about two months ago due to Health issues. She picked up Vegan with a Vengeance and raves about it. I've had roughly a dozen recipes from the book, and for the most part they're very good.
If you're unfamiliar with Veganism, it's basically a diet where one does not consume animals or animal products. I still eat meat products (no red meat), but I can say that I don't miss the meat in the meals she makes. There are lots of good alternatives out there.
I did that too. Here's a tip: Buy a few good cookbooks! Not crazy gourmet ones that require lots of ingredients or big fat ones without any pictures, ones that are meant for beginners, students, young people, working moms, or single people. Keep in mind, lots of recipes are for a family of four. When cooking for yourself, just use half the ingredients and have leftovers for the next day!
I bought this book by Jamie Oliver (I gave you a US link, since I see from your shopping cart that you've chosen American snack food) for my roommate while in Germany. At age 30, he still hadn't learned how to cook for himself. Absolutely great, lots of pictures, easy, tasty, basic recipes that were surprisingly easy for him to tackle on his own.
While I am not a complete novice in the kitchen I am far from an expert. I would highly recommend this book by Jamie Oliver as starting point. There is a pretty wide variety of easy to follow very tasty recipes.
Welcome and congratulations! Watching Earthlings is what did it for a lot of us.
I recommend getting this book. http://www.amazon.com/PETAs-Vegan-College-Cookbook-Delicious/dp/1402218850 I don't have it personally but I looked through it at the bookstore and wished that I had had it when I first became vegan. Lots of very easy simple things to make!
If you're on facebook I also recommend joining the group Veganism as they have a lot of good advice and I feel the more support systems you have the easier time you'll have on this major lifestyle change.
The best of luck to you my friend.. you've made a wonderful decision. The animals and all of us here thank you! :)
google is your friend.
"eating vegan for cheap at trader joe's" - first result
"cheap vegan recipes" - first result
"vegan budget recipes" - first result
this way you can make a list based on stores around you & recipes tailored to your tastes/skill level. i love throwing veggies in a skillet with some tofu and brown rice, or black bean burritos with whatever veggies i have on hand. good luck, you got this!
edit - this book is called "Eating Vegan on $4 A Day" and I think the author is on social media!
I bought a book for my roommate last year at xmas and she loves it. It's great if you are on a budget. Most of the recipes are vegetarian and everything is cheap. Oh, and also they are a delicious.
Good and Cheap: Eat Well on $4 A Day
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0761184996/ref=od_aui_detailpages05?ie=UTF8&amp;psc=1
Have you seen this book http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1570672571?pc_redir=1405488280&amp;robot_redir=1 eat vegan for $4 a day?
1.Purple Crock pot.
Slow cookers are awesome. Things that come in purple are more awesome.
2.This cookbook of good & cheap meals.
Eating better is one of my goals this year. The book will total help.
3.This Zelda wallet
I need a new one and I love Zelda. It's from a site off Amazon, but it's on my wish list. Best thing, free global shipping!
4.MtG Gift box for 2014
I thought someone would get it for me for Xmas that year and I got other stuff instead. I collect them and missing it makes me sad.
5.Double up and get something for your self OP. I'm in the UK, so my items are all way under £50 including shipping.
Thanks for running the contest.
Drop weight watchers and buy/eat more whole vegetables for a healthier and cheaper grocery list. Farmers markets are a great and affordable choice.
Here's a book on eating plant based for as low as 50cents a serving.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0470472243/ref=pd_aw_sbs_14_1?ie=UTF8&amp;psc=1&amp;refRID=6AENTBNR03GCJNS74BJX&amp;dpPl=1&amp;dpID=51KC-3Lr62L
I have like 30 containers but have been so unmotivated on where to go from here haha. I used to be in the Army, all my buddies used to meal prep so they gave me new packs I never opened. Is there a book you recommend? I purchased this today so far, https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0761184996/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
If they have this book at the library, check it out and copy down some of the recipes. It's got a lot of really good advice in there, and if you are doing veggie burgers, there are plenty of recipes out there to make your own that are substantially cheaper than the frozen ones. Basically just black beans, bread crumbs, and spices, with a little hummus to get them to stick together.
Jamie Oliver has done a lot of great cookbooks for home cooks. Jamie's Food Revolution has a broad range of recipes - all healthy, affordable, and easy. I also recommend his early Naked Chef books. I've been really into food and cooking since I was a kid, but I feel that Oliver really improved my technique and style more than any other cookbook author.
I'm a fan of classic cocktails and the stories behind them, so here are my top three at the moment:
Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails by Ted Haigh.
Imbibe! By David Wondrich (new edition coming out next April)
Esquire Drinks by David Wondrich (out of print but available used on Amazon).
For those just starting to build a home bar, 12 Bottle Bar by David and Lesley Solmonson is well worth $10.
And another vote for Death & Co. (Amazon's "#1 New Release in Cocktails & Mixed Drinks!)
EDIT: Added links and Death & Co.
Cooking does not take that much time. If you want to live cheap and healthy i suggest using what i use.
http://www.amazon.com/Starving-Students-Cookbook-Dede-Hall/dp/0446679615
The citric acid trick was from a culinary enthusiast friend, Dave Solmonson, who co-wrote, 12 Bottle Bar. Unfortunately Lillet Blanc fall outside of his 12 bottle philosophy, so it's not in the book, but it was a good trick.
You can't afford canned beans, bananas, rice and other grains, pasta and potatoes but can afford animal products? Read this or at least this.