Healthy food Low budget? TryPulses

So, do you want to eat healthy food on a low budget? Well, who doesn’t? – But in these difficult times that is not so easy, is it? If money is tight and time to prepare nutritious meals for the family is limited, it’s all too easy to fall back on buying unhealthy, high-fat prepackaged foods. These often seem like the cheapest option, but is this really the case and what is their true cost in terms of our overall health and well-being?

Legumes are an excellent way to improve the quality of our diet, and the good thing is that they also save us money. Legumes are the family of foods that include dried beans, dried peas, and lentils. They’re high in fiber, protein, low in calories, and can help lower cholesterol, so all in all, they’re just a great healthy food that’s also satisfying and inexpensive.

But surely dry beans take an age to prepare with all that soaking and boiling. – That is certainly true, but nowadays all good supermarkets have a wide range of canned legumes that are equally nutritious, still very cheap and also very quick to prepare. For example, my own Easy Bean Stew Recipe, from prep to table, takes me no more than half an hour (see link below).

However, it would be a mistake to discard dried beans and legumes just because of prep time—after all, they’re so cheap I always keep a stockpile of several kinds in my store pantry for when I have time to plan meals with anticipation. . Planning is the key point here, if I know I’m going to make a bean dish tomorrow, I just put the beans in a bowl of water before I go to bed. As soon as I get home from work the next day, I change the water, bring them to a boil in the pot, and they’re ready to incorporate into my meal when I’m ready to start the main prep. Really easy, but just needs a little thought.

Aside from their inherently healthy properties, legumes also improve our diet in other, more subtle ways. Legumes are generally very filling, so to balance that out, we’re generally inclined to need less meat in dishes we create with legumes. This can reduce the overall amount of bad cholesterol in the food, but also by bulking up casseroles, soups and casseroles, legumes can also make the same amount of expensive meat fill up more plates, which isn’t a bad thing either. Taking this a step further, legumes have traditionally formed the base of some of the best vegetarian dishes, so if you’ve been looking for a way to reduce or eliminate meat altogether, legumes are the way to go. to achieve this.

If, like many of us, you’re currently struggling to make ends meet and the weekly shopping budget never seems to fill the shopping cart, why not let legumes help you out a bit? Your family probably already loves a good chili con carne packed with nutritious kidney beans, so you’re halfway there. Why not try my easy bean stew recipe or experiment with different types of beans and lentils and some herbs and spices. With a little effort, you could easily add a new repertoire of tasty dishes to the familiar menu. They don’t even have to know that you saved a ton while providing them with healthy food on a low budget!