Tips for Cooking Cheap Meals and Saving on Groceries
Looking for ideas for delicious cheap meals? Want to find out how to save money on groceries? Join the club ... and then check out these simple tips from Boston-area personal chef Karen Eddy.
She says amateur cooks can save major bucks by boning up on basic skills. Her Boston Center for Adult Education class "Save Money With Home Cooking" cautions students against the financial perils of eating out willy-nilly and emphasizes using kitchen staples -- both ingredients and tools -- to plan low-cost menus for amateur chefs.
Roasting a chicken
The highlight of her one-day course, it's not only a one-pot meal, but one that provides ample leftovers.
"This is stuff their grandmother did, not something their mother even did. When they taste it, it's almost like they've never had it before," said Eddy. "People don't know how to roast a chicken anymore. Learning how to roast a chicken and cut up the vegetables, take all the meat off of it, make that into a salad or a wrap or put it in a sandwich as lunch the next day."
One of her favorite tips for saving money is menu planning that includes using leftovers. Multiserving casseroles are other dishes she recommends, especially for the amateur chef who may be put off by lots of cleanup. And the slow-cooker is making a huge resurgence.
"It's one of those things that everyone just seems to have," said Eddy. It's a great way to use the inexpensive cuts of meat ... Chili, pot roast, that stuff's all coming back into fashion."
Where's the beef?
One of her other favorite tips for cutting grocery budgets -- and fats and cholesterol -- is replacing recipes that require ingredients such as ground beef with beans.
"That substitution is something that's foreign to a lot of people. If we make a chili, we put in beans instead and the savings is huge ... If you look at your grocery receipt, meat is usually your most costly ingredient. We make a lentil loaf (in class) that's delicious. That's one thing that people are learning about -- these sort of really savory, satisfying foods that don't have a lot of meat in them."
Eddy, whose vegetarian husband provides good training for cooking sans meat, said she did the math for her home meals and they typically cost about $3 per serving, with careful planning.
Bean counting
For recipes such as hearty soups that require beans, the class includes basic skills like learning how to soak them overnight. And legumes are an easy way for Eddy to illustrate cost savings of buying in bulk; a 3-pound bag typically costs the same as a 15.5- ounce can. Though the former takes more prep work, it is healthier because canned foods are typically preserved with salt.
Veggies at the ready
Eddy recommends cutting vegetables on the weekends if concerned about weekday prep time. Doing your own prep work not only costs less, but is healthier than canned counterparts. New England winter is the most difficult time to buy fresh, but the timely root vegetables make great ingredients for the types of comfort-food soups and stews that can last a whole week if made in a big pot, Eddy said.
In a pinch? Eddy recommends some flash-frozen veggies, especially when not in season.
"I would say always buy broccoli, peas and corn fresh because they never get that expensive, even when out of season. But something like the bell peppers can go up to $3.99 a pound in winter."
One of her class recipes even uses a bag of frozen veggies added to other pantry staples: a rice casserole with milk, eggs, rice and herbs.
What's in storage
Eddy's other big recommendation for trimming the fat in your grocery budget: the "shopping the closet" method of scouring the freezer. Not only is it a form of cleaning, it also saves time: She estimates one could save a trip to the grocery store and up to a week's food budget.
In the end, trimming the fat in your grocery budget may be just as much an exercise as training your stomach and your brain.
"This class is not so much about recipes, though we do cook," said Eddy. "It's more about how to make your kitchen a lot cheaper."
You might also be interested in reading:
Healthy Foods for Healthier Recipes
