Super Quick and Healthy Dinners on a Tight Budget

Super Quick and Healthy Dinners on a Budget

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Ever have those times when you are not able to spend much on groceries, but you also don’t have much time to cook? And you want to eat healthy? Here are some meals that are cheap, healthy, and super quick!

1. Grilled Cheeses and a Frozen Vegetable

The classic grilled cheese sandwich can be a very cheap meal. Even with high quality bread like Dave’s Killer Bread, each grilled cheese will cost only about a $1 (My local grocery store sells Dave’s Killer Bread for around $5.00.) Serve with a non starchy vegetable like frozen broccoli. Boil the broccoli and add some high quality butter. Super easy and good!

2. Eggs for Dinner

Fried Eggs

Fried eggs are very quick. We love ours fried in coconut oil. Sometimes, I heat up some rice in a little coconut oil using the same pan we used for the eggs. Here are the steps I follow to cook the eggs and heat up the rice quickly and to not have to dirty another pan:

Before adding the eggs to the pan, heat the pan until it is starting to get hot, then add the oil. (A hot pan and cold oil help to make stainless steel pans more non stick.) Once the oil is melted, I add the eggs.
After I have taken the eggs out of the pan, I add a little water to the pan if there is any stuck on egg, and heat up the water and scrape out the pan.
Then, I pour the water out of the pan and set it on the heat for a minute to dry out the water. (Never leave the pan when you do this-don’t ask me how I know!)
As soon as it is dry, melt some coconut oil in the pan and some leftover rice. Cover the pan and cook on medium or medium low. In a few minutes you will have some yummy rice to eat with your eggs!

I usually throw some leftover vegetables in the toaster oven to reheat while I am cooking the eggs and rice. Eggs are a super cheap main dish, so this whole meal is under $3 for a family of four.

Scrambled Eggs

Another super quick way to get a meal on the table is to scramble eggs. Scrambled eggs are super quick and can be eaten with toast.

If you have some leftover rice, scrambled eggs can be made into a stir fry.

3. Cheese Biscuits and Roasted Vegetables

These Cheddar Cheese Biscuits with Yogurt and Almond Flour are full of protein and can work as a meal with some simple roasted vegetables. Each biscuit has almost 8 grams of protein and only 3 grams of carbs. Eat 2-3 of these biscuits with the vegetables and you have a well rounded meal. (It is hard to eat to many vegetables :))

The whole meal is around $2.00 per adult serving. (You can get a cheap block of Walmart cheese to make the biscuits. Almond flour is available here.) The biscuits freeze well so you could save the rest for another meal.

If you wanted you could even double the recipe, so you would have lots of biscuits to freeze. Then you would only have to roast the vegetables and reheat the biscuits-bam-supper! My sister uses the word bam all the time and I have always wanted to use it. 🙂

This meal is paleo, and full of healthy fats and vegetables!

4. Precooked Chicken

One way to make quick, healthy, and cheap meals is to precook a whole chicken. Simply cook a whole chicken in water and remove the chicken from the broth to let it cool. (Make sure you skim the foam off and turn down to a simmer once the chicken starts to boil).

Once the chicken is cooled off, debone the chicken and freeze the chicken in portions (1 cup is a good size, but you can use whatever size fits your recipe and family). You can shred the chicken or cut it into small pieces.

How to Use the Frozen Chicken

The cooked chicken and can be used in many ways-use it in any recipe that calls for shredded chicken, chopped chicken, cubed chicken etc. Since the chicken is precooked dinner can be made very quickly.

One way to use the frozen chicken is to make chicken taco filling and serve tacos. This chicken taco filling recipe gives directions for cooking the chicken. But you can also just defrost your frozen chicken and make the recipe with your precooked chicken. (You may need to cook a tad longer to allow any extra water from the frozen chicken to evaporate.)

Another way to use frozen chicken is to make a stir fry with rice, chicken, soy sauce, oil, and some vegetables. This fried rice recipe uses eggs, but you could omit the eggs and just use your precooked chicken instead. (Warm up the chicken in the pan first and set aside just like you would if you were using eggs.)

Precooked chicken and broth can also be used to make chicken soup.

How to Use the Broth from the Chicken

The chicken broth can also be frozen in recipe size portions. The broth can be used in many recipes including soup. You can also replace water in recipes for more added flavor. For example, you could cook your rice in it. Remember that whenever you use the broth in your meal, you can use less chicken and still get enough protein for a healthy meal. This makes the meal a lot cheaper. Here is a recipe to use both the chicken and the broth-White Chicken Chili.