I’m looking to have tasty and balanced food while maintaining a reasonable budget and being more organised.
I know how to cook. I already have tasty yet not complicated meals I’m use to make but I never needed to be organised about it before.
So I decided to start to write menu in advance, do a some meal prepping probably a bit of batch cooking.
I found resources online to start following a plan but maybe you have advices for the beginner that I am.
Thank you!
Try cooking Indian and East Asian foods. Very affordable and healthy. Many don’t even require meat. If you get rice get easy Asian rice not south Asian, ie long grain. Personal opinion, it tastes much better.
Super easy meal is Japanese curry and rice. Get the premade curry packs that you put into your vegetable and water mix.
Fried rice is a good easy one.
Fun new snack I’ve done recently is seasoned then baked chickpeas.
Always have an easy breakfast and sandwich supplies. I just tomato or cucumber sandwiches.
I think the best thing is just to eat similar meals each week but can switch things up.
This is something I really need to be careful about. Now that I don’t cook for a very spontanious and flexible day, I need to have quality snack available. Or esle, I’ll end up having good lunch and dinner but a bunch of unhealthy food all day long.
Well those examples do include a decent amount of mayo… but you could go worse with a nice bread and vegetables.
Have you found anything that works since you made the post?
Yes. I’ve plan of doing sandwiches using houmous and lentils spreads as the sauce. I also want to do muffins, I have a recipe that’s easy for both sweet and savory, that can be packed with any dices or grated fruits and vegetables, and I could make bran muffins as well. For breakfast, I think I will just go for good quality bread, butter and jam. French breakfast is a sweet lunch to north-america standards.
And fresh fruit in season.
That’s really smart protein wise, thanks for the inspiration.
Legumes spreads are great as sauces in sandwich or in pasta and also for dips. You can buy premade houmous and adjust the seasoning or cook any legume and blend it with your favorites spices, herbs and condiment. Here is my favorite recipe:
I blend cooked brown lentils with a bit of dried tomatoe and bell pepper preserved in oil (or just the oil) some onions (sauté), a bit of dried garlic, tomato paste and harissa. Paprika, cumin and a bit of tumeric. All proportions to taste. I make it more runny either buy adding more oil or some water.