Eating on a Budget: 24 Favorite Dirt Cheap Meals

Eating on a budget these days often doesn’t end up in eating healthy foods, as fruits, vegetables and other whole foods are often expensive and less affordable than processed foods that you can find in supermarkets or fast food stores, packed in bags or boxes. However, being on a tight budget doesn’t necessarily have to mean that you can’t prepare healthy and tasty meals on a daily basis without emptying out your wallet and bank account. Don’t let the fast food industry fool you into denying yourself proper nutrition just to save some money and time, because in most cases you will only think you are saving, but the fact is that you will be spending more than you would by just eating homemade meals.

Eating on a budget doesn’t have to be expensive, figure out a way to combine groceries and make the most out of every meal. When you get a hang of it, making cheap tasty meals will come easy to you. Of course, buying groceries in bulk will make your purchases less costly and you will be able to stretch one food item into multiple meals. Also, planning your shopping trips in advance wouldn’t hurt, especially if you want to avoid buying unnecessary items. All this may sound boring and unnecessary to you, but once you start planning and organizing better, you will see how saving money on food and eating on a budget is not such a hard thing as you thought it was. Here are 24 favorite dirt cheap meals that will satisfy your taste and save you money.

1. Sesame Chicken

Sesame chicken is very easy to make, it is tasty and this meal will cost you less than $1.5 per serving. This is probably cheaper than any food you would buy pre-packed at a fast food restaurant. You need less time preparing this meal than you would spend waiting for the delivery guy to bring your ordered meal to your door.

For 4 servings you will need around $5.5, which will cover for all the necessary ingredients and condiments. You will need the total of 25 minutes to prepare sesame chicken, 10min for preparation and 15min for cooking. You can use any chicken meat you like for this, but the best choice would be skinless chicken thighs or breasts (depending on the price when you go to the store, choose the part of chicken meat that is cheaper at the given moment). One serving of this meal is not as large as a take out meal would be, but it will be enough to fill you up and satisfy your taste buds and hunger. You can check out the recipe here.