What are your best tips for preparing healthy, budget-friendly meals?

For example "Brown Bag lunch".
1. We can plan ahead, which makes this the best choice for health and budget.

Plan Ahead
Take food with you. Refrigerate and microwave food at work, and use a cold pack.
These healthy lunch ideas can save you money, and your health.
Breads
• Whole grain breads and rolls such as:
Whole wheat, 12 grain, rye and pumpernickel
• Look for 100% whole wheat as the first ingredient
• Aim for at least 3 grams of fiber per slice
• Strive to find breads and crackers that don't contain hydrogenated fat.
This fat will raise cholesterol just like saturated fats.
• Try English whole wheat muffins, whole wheat bagels, whole wheat crackers,
whole wheat tortillas, seaweed wraps, and pita bread.

Fillings and Entrees
• Chicken and turkey breast
• Hummus or bean dip in pita bread or on crackers with salad
• Egg salad, (made with 2 boiled egg whites, celery and light mayo
or nonfat yogurt and/or mustard). This is best in pita bread for less mess
• Grilled fish over salad or on crackers
• Peanut butter and jam, or banana
• Grilled vegetables
• Reduced fat cheeses
• Seaweed wraps with barley and cucumbers

Leftovers

• Dinner leftovers are great.
• Grilled vegetables like portabella mushrooms and red pepper, add beans,
drizzle vinaigrette dressing and have a whole-wheat roll.


• How about salad greens topped with one or more of the following:

• Chicken, turkey breast, chic peas, kidney beans, London broil, marinated tofu,
egg whites, tuna, salmon, (all low sodium packed in water and rinsed), low fat cheese,
tomatoes, sunflower seeds, almonds.
• Leftover vegetables or warmed up frozen vegetables topped with the same
• protein choices listed above.
• Make extra chill, (with beans or turkey), and freeze in portion sizes.
• Cook in bulk, freeze in portion size, save time and money.

Toppings/condiments
• Reduced fat mayonnaise (or try mixing it with Nonfat or Lowfat yogurt.
This reduces the fat and adds a nice creamy texture.)
• Mustard and ketchup: 1 Tbs. maximum to keep the sodium down.
• Add more tomato, lettuce, sprouts, pimentos
• Green peppers and onions
• Try pickle relish, but also keep it to 1 Tbs. because of its sodium content
• How about salsa to liven up things, choose low salt or make your own.
• How about salsa mixed with plain yogurt for an interesting new spread?

Fruits and Vegetables to go
Use fresh and frozen. Frozen can be a major timesaver and it can actually be more
fresh than fresh when you consider how long fresh produce sits before eaten.
Include:
• Carrots, celery, bell peppers
• Mushrooms, cauliflower, broccoli, cherry tomatoes
• Hummus, salsa, bean pureè, or canned low fat and low sodium refried beans
• Frozen vegetables of every variety that can just be microwaved
• Salad: (easy to use mesclun greens or baby spinach)
• Fresh fruit of all kinds
• Cut up fruit in plain or vanilla yogurt
• Dried fruit and nuts: a concentrated food snack, ex. 2 Tbls almonds with an apple.
• Canned vegetables are more processed and usually higher in sodium
but you can rinse them thoroughly.
• Canned fruits may be a good option if they are in water or juice, but not syrup.

Soups and Meals in a Bowl - Watch out for the sodium content in most canned soups.
• Homemade: make a large amount and freeze in smaller containers.
• Low-sodium canned soups: aim for less than 600-mg sodium per serving and note
how many servings there are per container and how many you eat.
Most cans provide 2 servings, most people will eat the whole can.
• Check out the instant soups where you just add boiling water,
especially from a Natural Foods store or from the Natural Foods section of your
supermarket. Watch the sodium.
• Note: if a soup tastes bland because it is low in sodium, don't give up on it,
add salt-free spices, cayenne, herbs or vinegar to jazz it up.

Treats and Snacks
• Yogurt, low, nonfat or frozen, including soy yogurt
• Low sodium pretzels
• Air popped or light popcorn
• Crackers, bread sticks or graham crackers
• Small bran or fruit muffins or split a large one with a friend
• Packaged applesauce or nonfat puddings
• Fig and fruit bars
• Fresh vegetables with dip, (or without)
• Low-fat or nonfat cheese slices
• Frozen juice on a stick
• A blended fruit smoothie made with yogurt, juice or soy milk.

Food Safety Use a good insulated pack or bag to transport food and several cold packs.
When you come home at the end of the day, the packs go back in the freezer and the bag
into the frig, perhaps after rinsing.

See youtube for healthy budget friendly meals

All the best,
Danielle

1) Buy fresh veggies in season, wash them cut them up, and freeze them. Buy organic meat in bulk, cut it up and freeze it. Can sauces, salsas, and pickled goods (try okra in fig vinager w/ red bell pepper, its awesome); or freeze them in freezer bags. Prepare whole meals... and freeze them.
2) Get a pressure cooker. You can make a bunch of things, real quick, even from frozen. ;)
3) Learn the beauty of BROIL. This underused setting on an oven is like getting 80% of the goodness of grilling, without maintaining a fire. Do invest in a good in-oven thermometer though.

These few things have worked for me (9pm-ish) for years.

start a vegetable garden, buy in bulk.

We have a great lady in Raleigh who set out a few years ago to demonstrate that you can create healthy organic meals on a very tight budget. Her name is Linda Watson, and her web site is www.cookforgood.com . You can peruse her web site and sign up for her newsletter, and you will never be without another idea for a healthy meal that is budget-friendly.

1. Purchase your food in season.
2. If it is on sale and you use it frequently purchase more and freeze it.
3. If you eat bread, buy a breadmaker. You can throw the ingredients in the previous night before and have fresh hot bread the next morning.
4. Purchase your grains dry and from ethic shops as opposed to frozen or boxed grains.
5. Grow your own herbs, tomatoes and peppers at home.
6. If you have a deck or a patio, grow your own potatoes or peanuts. (If you want to learn just google the topic).

Buy frozen fruits and veggies. Use less meat and add other protein sources like beans or green veggies like spinach and frozen asparagus. Experiment with foreign foods Indian is my favorite it can be challenging to cook in an unfamiliar cuisine at first but rewarding.

My best advice would be to use fresh vegetables as much as possible. On a per-serving basis, fresh vegetables (particularly those "in season") is one of the least expensive and healthy ways to prepare a meal. Of course, a corollary to this is also buy less (or NONE) already prepared foods (most are way over-priced!).

Oh, and buy a vegetable steamer! One of the best single purchases I ever made!

I hope that this helps.

LaRue, CSCS
www.lecfitness.com
larue.cook@lecfitness.com

I roast veggies a few times a week, it's easy, cut them up, put them on "cookie sheet tray" with a bit of olive oil at about 400 degrees until done
You can add them to everything from eggs to beans, to rice etc!

Buy in bulk

I think Danielle covered the rest!

Have you heard? We should stop eating wheat.

There are so many ways to reduce costs on meals. I take clients to the grocery store and teach them about looking for the best deals in produce, grains, legumes, etc. We look at which items provide the best nutrition for the dollar and look at ways to prepare them. I teach the clients how to make easy and healthy sauces for adding flavor to foods without adding a lot of salt or empty calories.