Extremely low food budget plan ideas for a $20 a week?

[Bushman]

Rice, beans, pasta, potatoes, hot dogs and pancake mix. You can cut up the hot dogs to serve with the rice and beans and pasta. This is what is in my food preps and I do eat it periodically to try to rotate it. Realistically a bag of 50 lbs of rice can be had for $17 at cash and carry and will last you for MONTHS, same with their $20 giant box of pasta or pancake mix. So you're really only buying hot dogs and potatoes every couple weeks and probably spending closer to $60 a month...

You can make all kinds of different things out of potatoes....and a 15 lb bag is like $2....

 

[The Heretic]

Rice.

Lentils & split peas (dried).

Potatoes.

^ Carbs and protein.

Kielbasa is tasty meat, but expensive (at least IME). I slice up about half a sausage and put it into a crockpot with some gumbo mix and lentils and mixed veggies. Then I have a bowl that about once a day - lasts about a week.

I have a sandwich with a slice of pastrami once a day. Put a little "spring salad mix" (various lettuce, spinach), onion and various condiments.

For one meal I have some dried soup - like Nissin chow mein pad thai - 60-80¢ per meal.

I switch those around for variety.

For breakfast I have a mix of malt-o-meal, grits, cream of rice hot cereal - a little honey and cinnamon with a bit of butter. A large bowl of that fills me up and is cheap. It takes much less milk than cold cereal. On weekends I have two poached eggs on hash browns or a english muffin - sometimes with a slice of bacon.

Once a week I have a salmon fillet (about $15 for 8-10 IIRC) for dinner, with tartar sauce - I keep them frozen and defrost the day I want one. Maybe some seasoned rice of fries to go with that or a baked potato.

The key is where you shop for the groceries. I shop only at Winco and Costco - mostly Winco. I also shop for bread at the bakery outlet stores that supply the grocery stores - their bread is one-third to one half the cost in the grocery store. Unfortunately those stores are closed now.

For $20 per week you have to be willing to not splurge, to fix your own meals, and use inexpensive but nutritious staples. It would be hard. I think double that would be a lot easier. I tend to splurge, eat comfort foods (chocolate) and eat more than I should.

 

[Stomper]

Some days it feels like it. At sunup I dole out the daily assignments to the hands then spend the rest of the day running around the ranch taking care of the things I assigned to myself, helping the hands with their assignments and taking care of the unassigned things that inevitably crop up. I get plenty of cardio and strength training daily.

Ahhh... ranching, that 'splains it! OK 3,500 cals a day is TOTALLY legit for that stuff!

 

[Stomper]

1) rice
2) beans

Not very exciting, but you can go a long way with these two staples.

Protein and carbs to light up the protein!

 

[CountryGent]

Beans, rice, and tortillas. Tinned fish (e.g., tuna, sardines, etc.) are inexpensive, lean protein.

 

[arakboss]

Rice, beans, pasta, potatoes, hot dogs and pancake mix. You can cut up the hot dogs to serve with the rice and beans and pasta. This is what is in my food preps and I do eat it periodically to try to rotate it. Realistically a bag of 50 lbs of rice can be had for $17 at cash and carry and will last you for MONTHS, same with their $20 giant box of pasta or pancake mix. So you're really only buying hot dogs and potatoes every couple weeks and probably spending closer to $60 a month...

You can make all kinds of different things out of potatoes....and a 15 lb bag is like $2....

It's been a long time since I visited a cash and carry, last time I drove by the one in Tigard it had different name. How many pounds is in that $40 box of pasta?

 

[RicInOR]

If you had to eat on $20 a week what would you buy? Assume roughly 2500 calories a day for calorie requirement.

Go thru the dollar menu at the local fast food places. You get roughly 3 items/day.

 

[arakboss]

Rice.

Lentils & split peas (dried).

Potatoes.

^ Carbs and protein.

Kielbasa is tasty meat, but expensive (at least IME). I slice up about half a sausage and put it into a crockpot with some gumbo mix and lentils and mixed veggies. Then I have a bowl that about once a day - lasts about a week.

I have a sandwich with a slice of pastrami once a day. Put a little "spring salad mix" (various lettuce, spinach), onion and various condiments.

For one meal I have some dried soup - like Nissin chow mein pad thai - 60-80¢ per meal.

I switch those around for variety.

For breakfast I have a mix of malt-o-meal, grits, cream of rice hot cereal - a little honey and cinnamon with a bit of butter. A large bowl of that fills me up and is cheap. It takes much less milk than cold cereal. On weekends I have two poached eggs on hash browns or a english muffin - sometimes with a slice of bacon.

Once a week I have a salmon fillet (about $15 for 8-10 IIRC) for dinner, with tartar sauce - I keep them frozen and defrost the day I want one. Maybe some seasoned rice of fries to go with that or a baked potato.

The key is where you shop for the groceries. I shop only at Winco and Costco - mostly Winco. I also shop for bread at the bakery outlet stores that supply the grocery stores - their bread is one-third to one half the cost in the grocery store. Unfortunately those stores are closed now.

For $20 per week you have to be willing to not splurge, to fix your own meals, and use inexpensive but nutritious staples. It would be hard. I think double that would be a lot easier. I tend to splurge, eat comfort foods (chocolate) and eat more than I should.

I have been in the Franz store off Greenburg in Tigard since the Covid mess began but they probably don't have the deals you were getting at the other stores.

 

[arakboss]

Go thru the dollar menu at the local fast food places. You get roughly 3 items/day.

Those dollar menus have been shrinking in recent years. I ate a lot of dollar items in my younger years. Tons of double stacks from Wendy's.

 

[Bushman]

It's been a long time since I visited a cash and carry, last time I drove by the one in Tigard it had different name. How many pounds is in that $40 box of pasta?

Looking at what they have online it's $24 for 20 lbs but I got a different carton that I'm almost certain was 25 lbs. Mine was a large brown box.

They go by smartfoodservice now.

 

[Joe13]

I'll +1 to the beans/Rice.

Can be bought in bulk, makes all of your complete proteins so you can live off it technically, easy to store for very long times so it won't go bad, you can add different seasonings to it to keep it from getting boring, if you happen to have a little extra cash you can buy hot dogs and such to add to it for variety.

only eat once or twice a day and you'll stretch it out even further.

 

[Tony617]

Here is a Patriot Nurse Video for upcoming election.

 

[Bushman]

Rice.

Lentils & split peas (dried).

Potatoes.

^ Carbs and protein.

Kielbasa is tasty meat, but expensive (at least IME). I slice up about half a sausage and put it into a crockpot with some gumbo mix and lentils and mixed veggies. Then I have a bowl that about once a day - lasts about a week.

I have a sandwich with a slice of pastrami once a day. Put a little "spring salad mix" (various lettuce, spinach), onion and various condiments.

For one meal I have some dried soup - like Nissin chow mein pad thai - 60-80¢ per meal.

I switch those around for variety.

For breakfast I have a mix of malt-o-meal, grits, cream of rice hot cereal - a little honey and cinnamon with a bit of butter. A large bowl of that fills me up and is cheap. It takes much less milk than cold cereal. On weekends I have two poached eggs on hash browns or a english muffin - sometimes with a slice of bacon.

Once a week I have a salmon fillet (about $15 for 8-10 IIRC) for dinner, with tartar sauce - I keep them frozen and defrost the day I want one. Maybe some seasoned rice of fries to go with that or a baked potato.

The key is where you shop for the groceries. I shop only at Winco and Costco - mostly Winco. I also shop for bread at the bakery outlet stores that supply the grocery stores - their bread is one-third to one half the cost in the grocery store. Unfortunately those stores are closed now.

For $20 per week you have to be willing to not splurge, to fix your own meals, and use inexpensive but nutritious staples. It would be hard. I think double that would be a lot easier. I tend to splurge, eat comfort foods (chocolate) and eat more than I should.

It's easy to live cheaply and heartily if you prep your own food. A rice cooker and crock pot work wonders. I buy one of those large hams for meat or hot dogs lately and some bulk packs of steak/pork. With rice and frozen veggies it's pretty cheap to eat. Of course I do splurge on frozen pizza's as well. Winco is amazingly cheap.

I have a lot of pancake mix I need to start eating. Thank God I have a waffle maker to add variety, but pancakes are super cheap and filling....

 

[jbett98]

Get a part time job washing dishes at a restaurant. All the calories you can eat and take home.

 

[Joe13]

It's easy to live cheaply and heartily if you prep your own food. A rice cooker and crock pot work wonders. I buy one of those large hams for meat or hot dogs lately and some bulk packs of steak/pork. With rice and frozen veggies it's pretty cheap to eat. Of course I do splurge on frozen pizza's as well. Winco is amazingly cheap.

I have a lot of pancake mix I need to start eating. Thank God I have a waffle maker to add variety, but pancakes are super cheap and filling....

Quoted the wrong person sorry****
So is this a thought exercise or are you really needing to aim for $20/week?

if it's the later then I would call around and hit up some of the food banks - trust me, little to none of the people using those services are eating one $20/person/week.

There are even time that food banks toss perfectly good items like bread etc because they can't unload it fast enough so it wouldnt be like you're taking some single mother of 4's food out from under them.

 

[The Heretic]

Another cheap veggie is hominy - basically slightly processed corn. In and of itself it is not tasty, but it takes on the flavor of what you cook it with over time and it is a lot MUCH more digestible than simple corn. I add it to my crock pot stews.

 

[The Heretic]

I have been in the Franz store off Greenburg in Tigard since the Covid mess began but they probably don't have the deals you were getting at the other stores.

I went to Bimbo's in Beaverton and the outlet store was closed. I used to stop by there weekly, buy good whole wheat and multi-grain dense bread for$1 per loaf. I put it in the freezer and it lasts a long time. They stopped making dense honey wheat bread - my favorite. Now it is much less dense.

I will try Franz next time I am in that area.

 

[arakboss]

It's easy to live cheaply and heartily if you prep your own food. A rice cooker and crock pot work wonders. I buy one of those large hams for meat or hot dogs lately and some bulk packs of steak/pork. With rice and frozen veggies it's pretty cheap to eat. Of course I do splurge on frozen pizza's as well. Winco is amazingly cheap.

I have a lot of pancake mix I need to start eating. Thank God I have a waffle maker to add variety, but pancakes are super cheap and filling....

Winco is great and you don't have to fuss with sale ads.

 

[arakboss]

Quoted the wrong person sorry****
So is this a thought exercise or are you really needing to aim for $20/week?

if it's the later then I would call around and hit up some of the food banks - trust me, little to none of the people using those services are eating one $20/person/week.

There are even time that food banks toss perfectly good items like bread etc because they can't unload it fast enough so it wouldnt be like you're taking some single mother of 4's food out from under them.

I have plenty of means for more food so I don't want to take what others may need. I am trying to maximize my savings and finally get debt free. Only one credit card left with about $2000 remaining to pay off. This $20 a week idea will be experimental. Maybe a month tops. Thanks for the suggestion though.

 

[ZA_Survivalist]

$20 a week? Assuming its starting from scratch?

Eggs run .88¢-$2.00 per dozen
(for the cheap ones)
6 eggs in the morning and 6 at night. A dozen a day puts you at $14 for the entire week (7 dozen total) butter ups the calories and helps with cooking so another $2-$3 for a box of butter.. putting you at $17 total,
Leaving you $3

Its protein over mere calories. But that remaining $3 could easily be used on low budget, high calorie bulk junk food that is often on sale and could fufill the rest of the caloric requirements. PB, Chips, cookies, candy.. its not healthy but it gets you more calories.

That $3 could also be used on a multivitamin bottle. So you arent lacking important nutrients.

Im sure there are other options here.. my version isnt insanely healthy.. but you said $20 a week. I doubt someone would live like that for years.. but Ive eaten like that when money was tight and it worked just fine.