Frugal Living Helps for College Students

May 24, 2024

It is getting warmer and many of you are working outside for a large part of the day.  At the end of the day, you are tired from working your summer job, you do not feel like having to cook, and you are hungry but do not want to eat foods that will make you hot.  Fast food is an expensive option.

I am always looking for cool and quick meals in the summer time and I thought this article, 21 No-cook Dinners You'll Love from shelfcooking.com was great!  It makes suggestions on creating Wraps, Sandwiches, Salads, and a few no cook dinners.  If you made every dinner once, you would have 3 weeks worth of meals.  You will need a refrigerator to keep some of the items but many are shelf stable.  A microwave is nice for a few of the meals if you want to heat up pre-cooked bacon, warm up rice, or melt cheese.  However, this is not a necessity.

Here a few money saving hints as you do your shopping:

• You do not need to buy all of the ingredients in one trip. 
• Look at the sales at your local grocery store, Dollar General, or Wal-mart.  Plan your meals to use items that are on sale.  For example, this week Ralph's Food Fair in Grayson has canned refried beans and black beans on sale for 4 cans for $5.  That is a good deal.  I would choose to eat meals from the list that use those ingredients such as Burrito bowls, Nachos, and burritos.
• In the summer, fresh fruits and vegetables are cheaper, but there are still ways to save:
  • Eat raw vegetables dipped in ranch dressing for sides to these meals
  • Buy a head a lettuce and not shredded lettuce if you are trying to save money.  It will last longer and be available for more meals
  • Buy the type of tomatoes that are on sale - you can slice, wedge, cube, or chop a whole tomato to the size that works best for your dish.
• Think about how many ways you can use 1 ingredient.  For example, if you buy ham lunch meat, you can use it in a pizza wrap, a chef salad, substitute it for the bacon in a BLT, or put it as one meat in a sub sandwich.
• When it comes to chicken, look for what is the cheapest in terms of price per oz.  One can of chicken at $4-$5 may yield one to two meals.  A rotisserie chicken for $7-$8 may be more expensive at the checkout counter, but you may get more chicken to pull off of the bone and use in several dishes.
• Modify the recipes for what you have or what you like.  I personally do not really care for lettuce wraps, so I usually substitute tortillas for the lettuce.
• Don't forget to eat leftovers for lunch!

As you start to plan your meals, think about the flavor combinations.  For example, Burrito Bowls are Tex-Mex flavors while a Poke Bowl is Hawaiian in origin.  You may love Mexican food, but if you ate Nachos, Burrito Bowls, Burritos, and taco salad for every meal for 3 weeks, you might be a little sick of Mexican at the end of that time!  Black beans are popular in Chinese as well as Mexican cooking.  Use those cans to make the Asian Ramen salad as well as the Burrito bowl to make sure you have some variety.

Here is our suggestion of a meal plan for 1 week:

Sunday - Nachos

Monday - Burrito Bowls

Tuesday - Pizza Wrap

Wednesday - BLT sandwich

Thursday - Poke Bowl

Friday - Sub Sandwiches

Saturday - Chef Salad

Stay cool and enjoy experimenting with these "Cool Eating" ideas!