Could always go out and hunt for your food. I bagged myself a moose this fall and now I have 375lbs of delicious lean meat in the freezer.
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But if you factor in the initial cost of hunting, it wouldn't be practical. If he is eating on $25 a week, I doubt that he has a few hundred dollars to get himself a decent rifle and all that. Otherwise, definitely a good option. Hunting squirrel with a .22 would be a cheap option and squirrel are pretty abundant.
That's a true point. You have to hunt enough and actually bring food home enough from it to make the expense worth it
breakfast eat oatmeal.
for supper, you want something thats heavily rice or potato based. For protein I would get meat and stretch it, also beans.
Lettuce is also cheap so a nice meal I like making is smash beans, lettuce and tomatos, throw some BBQ sauce in it, you have a filling but cheap meal.
Start a Farm ? I grew up eating steak's egg's, chicken, hog's, fresh, and canned vegtables every night far cheaper than 25 a week when you factor in selling 100 1500 lb beef head every 10 month's, or so. Started at 9 By the time i was 18 i had a hefty bank account . Don't get me wrong i still enjoyed the redneck food's like mushroom's pokeweed, squirrel brain's etc that most relate to poverty, yet is a delicacy imho. With overpopulation we are down to half an acre of arable land at best though ;-(
I did this often in college. Eggs, bananas, bread and frozen vegetables were staples - when I couldn't find them on sale locally, at Walmart (yes, evil Walmart) I could get enough to subsist about a week for under $15 and use the rest to pad with variety or baking stuff I'd run short on.
But biggest thing is look at sale flyers! Find a few grocery stores in your area, and check out their website at the beginning of the week.
I was at a supermarket once and found a receipt in the carpark for 7 x $2 noodles.
That was it. $NZ14.
But my poor people food of choice was actually canned baked beans heated up on toast.
If I wasn't feeling lazy I'd throw in an egg, and if I was feeling rich I'd through in some cancerous bacon.
Well shit, I didn't expect so many replies! Thanks for all the suggestions (and blowing up my mail box). I started today. The local supermarket had a sale on chicken breast and noodles, so I made a heaping batch of chicken and noodles seasoned with what I had lying around. Would anybody be interested in following my adventure through poorness if I were to update it every night?
I would read it. Start a blog titled "14 meals a week for $25" or something.
1lb bacon 3-4$
2 family sized packs of kraft macaroni 4$
1 large Spanish onion 1/2-1$
1 green pepper 1/2-1$
1 jalapeno pepper 25-50 cents
1/2 lb of cheese 2$
butter 1$
feed you for a week and total cost around 11.25$-13.50$. cook the mac and cheese normal. fry the bacon separate then crumble and add to the mac and cheese. fry the onion and peppers with a little butter or soy butter and add some salt, black pepper, and a little Cajun, mexican mix, and/or Cayenne pepper while cooking. add a teaspoon of sugar in the last 5 minutes of cooking. mix it all up then eat. taste as good day one as day 7 and good for you too.
also for ramen, try cooking it in a frying pan instead of a pot, add 1/2 teaspoon of soy sauce to the water, and a few drops of sweet and sour duck sauce. afetr it done remove the liquid and turn the heat to lowest setting and leave the noodles in the pan for 1-2 minutes stiring the whole time.
Bow hunt.
About the hunting; that was an option at first, but my professor killed that one outright. (He's against hunting I guess.) I have a nice rifle, and a place to clean and prepare a load of venison, but nowhere to store it.
Yep, storage is an issue, what about fishing?
I'd have to buy myself a pole, but maybe. I doubt bait is too expensive, I'll look into it.
Rope on a stick and some earth worms. You can do it.
Hell, I have seen some folks with a coke bottle, string a hook and bread
Peanut butter ($3.49 to $.5.49 CAN), bread ($2 and change per loaf) , margarine ($1.69 to $2), water, bacon (right now $1.80 to $2.49 lately on sale), processed cheese slices ($1.88 to $2.99), Minute Maid juice with 100% vitamin C (60 cents per can when on sale) ..... so liked $22.60 or less including tax for all that and it gives you some good food for a week. I would say get a bottle of ketchup though cuz you will need it for the grilled cheese sandwiches you will be eating.
If you have an area to grow some:
- install two or three tomato seedlings ($2-5ea max?)
- install several fancy people lettuce seedlings (here I can get a six for $5).
Both are easy to grow, take minimal effort, and deliver results that don't suck. Had some Flavorich tomatoes in last year, best burgers ever. Whenever we needed some, we'd just walk outside and pick off some lettuce leaves and tomatoes - no more spending $$ on lettuce that goes bad before we use it, or boring tasteless tomatoes that some kind probably rubbed his nuts on.
I've had to eat on a similar budget before, its not too bad. I ate lots of rice ($10 25 lbs), canned vegetables, potatoes, eggs(unless your in California where they're like $5 / dozen), and pasta. Drink water and tea. Budgetbytes.com is a great website for cheap recipes.
Holy shit how did you get 2lbs of beef for $6, here i pay about $13 for 1lb of beef and i live in kansas.