Cheap Meals: Eating on a budget.

Burns said:

An adjustable office/shop stool might work but I generally need to stand to work a knife well because sitting at a table brings the cutting board up too high, where my elbow is at the wrong angle for it. Also for an office chair, the arm rests might be in the way.

Depending on how much room you have, you could build a small rolling island/butchers block that is as tall as you want it to be. You could easily justify the costs (probably) if you are already getting hit with back surgery and neck issues. Something like this, but taller and wider might be feasible to build yourself (edit: more at the bottom):
View attachment 528757

Otherwise get a commercial dish rack and set it upside down to work on. You could even epoxy some rubber strips to it, to keep it from sliding around, if that becomes an issue:
View attachment 528758

Edit: Found a nice enough looking DYI. Looks like it's using Kee Klamps and aluminum railing, but you could use cheaper black iron pipe and coat it with Flood to prevent rusting (there are also proper ways to paint the pipes).
View attachment 528763

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Just as a general tip - depending on the application, the type of piping, and the amount - if you have a local galvanizing company, its surprisingly cheap to get them to hot dip a small amount of shit. Granted, I havent done it since 2016 - but the structure of pipes I needed done was roughly about the size of that cutting board table and it only ran me $75 bucks and they would have done more for pennies on the dollar, its just the fee to get it all setup that was a few dollars more.

Made chicken cutlets for the week. Chicken breast on sale 1.99 a pound. Have the butcher make cutlet slices. Get Breadcrumbs, 3 eggs and I also made rigatoni. 3 days or more of dinner for under 10 dollars.

Chuk slicing the cutlets real thin

TomServo said:

Why the hell don't you butterfly then yourself?

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because i suck at thin slicing through the middle. plus the supermarket does it for you for free.

Chukzombi said:

because i suck at thin slicing through the middle. plus the supermarket does it for you for free.

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You are bad with your meat and look for large men to work it for you?

moonarchia said:

You are bad with your meat and look for large men to work it for you?

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Oldbased Hows this fit your fish value pyramid? Id actually ordered a few of those 15 oz cans. Personnaly didn't like the taste too much when just dropping in ramen etc. But a nice huge chunk of protein. Great in mayo I'm sure, but my complaint was being so finely chopped in the can, felt like in ramen etc you wasted a spoon or twos worth in tiny scattered bits everywhere.


Need costco boneless skinless sardines to go on sale again.

Sludig said:

Oldbased Hows this fit your fish value pyramid? Id actually ordered a few of those 15 oz cans. Personnaly didn't like the taste too much when just dropping in ramen etc. But a nice huge chunk of protein. Great in mayo I'm sure, but my complaint was being so finely chopped in the can, felt like in ramen etc you wasted a spoon or twos worth in tiny scattered bits everywhere.


Need costco boneless skinless sardines to go on sale again.

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Which cans did you order? I keep finding Bumblebee Tuna 12 oz cans for $1.50 or less on Amazon up to 12 can before I get a message I've never seen there before which is your quota for this month has been exceeded,. I guess it sets off some red flag when you order 10lbs of tuna a month so I switch to Abacore if needed. As far as fish goes that's all I am ordering now.I won't buy Starkist( too much metalic taste like you can taste the mercury eww )

Wild Planet is my fav but shits too high always.
Chicken of the Sea and Bumblee
Generic Kroger/Meijer/Walmart brand
Starkist

That is my order and my 12 taste testers agree, usually with a meow. Problem with the tuna industry atm is a fuckton of types of tuna quality as just tuna. Albacoremarks a good distinction but for normal canned tuna, it can be like one of 6 kinds and they are all different. Some bloody needing bled more and carefully handled, others more oily and so on. Buy a can of just plain ole tuna in water for any brand 4x a year 3 months apart then open those 4 cans and taste a bit from each.The seasons man, they fuck you up with the catch of the days.

One thing I love about Chicken of the Sea is their honesty and how the industry works.

Oldbased said:

Which cans did you order? I keep finding Bumblebee Tuna 12 oz cans for $1.50 or less on Amazon up to 12 can before I get a message I've never seen there before which is your quota for this month has been exceeded,. I guess it sets off some red flag when you order 10lbs of tuna a month so I switch to Abacore if needed. As far as fish goes that's all I am ordering now.I won't buy Starkist( too much metalic taste like you can taste the mercury eww )

Wild Planet is my fav but shits too high always.
Chicken of the Sea and Bumblee
Generic Kroger/Meijer/Walmart brand
Starkist

That is my order and my 12 taste testers agree, usually with a meow. Problem with the tuna industry atm is a fuckton of types of tuna quality as just tuna. Albacoremarks a good distinction but for normal canned tuna, it can be like one of 6 kinds and they are all different. Some bloody needing bled more and carefully handled, others more oily and so on. Buy a can of just plain ole tuna in water for any brand 4x a year 3 months apart then open those 4 cans and taste a bit from each.The seasons man, they fuck you up with the catch of the days.

One thing I love about Chicken of the Sea is their honesty and how the industry works.

Types Of Tuna: Taste, Size, Nutrition

There are 15 species of tuna. The 7 main types are Skipjack, Albacore, Yellowfin, Bigeye, Atlantic Bluefin, Pacific Bluefin, and Southern Bluefin.

chickenofthesea.com

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Yes your 12oz i guess, swore or was 15, or at least the 15oz was the best price/oz when i looked.

Cutlery said:

Still full of neurotoxins. Switch to canned salmon

https://www.consumerreports.org/health/food-safety/how-worried-should-you-be-about-mercury-in-your-tuna-a5041903086/

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I'll probably just stick to sardines for the price, just wanted a break, and bottom of food chain should be pretty decent on various levels.

Cutlery said:

It's still pretty hard to beat chicken and eggs. Every two weeks, I buy 5-6lbs of chicken, toss it on the grill, and set up 6oz portions in Tupperware. Throw 3 in the fridge, toss 7-9 in the freezer, and I'm good for 2 weeks for lunches. 252 calories, 50g of protein. Find a marinade or a rub you like and go to town. 6lbs of chicken breast is about $18 if you buy in bulk, and you're good for 2 weeks.

Everyone bitches about the price of eggs, but even at $3 a dozen, 4 eggs is still a dollar, 280 calories and 24g of protein.

Eating overly processed canned shit might be good when nothing else is available, or from time to time, but I'm gonna stick to this

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Ive been wanting to do that, but first need to clear up some of the bullshit. Even if I can't get wife on board, I'd like to do this for all my work meals. Only issue is what to freeze stuff in. I have like 10-12 plastic typical leftover plastic containers, but I've kinda bought into not wanting to microwave in them, but as a cheap bastard, I dont want to buy 2 dozen pyrex dishes not to mention space/fragility. I guess I need to resign myself to glass reheating dish packed w/ a plastic container maybe.

We got a vacuum sealer, but used once then kinda left it laying in a drawer, maybe need to get that revisted.

Cutlery said:

It's still pretty hard to beat chicken and eggs. Every two weeks, I buy 5-6lbs of chicken, toss it on the grill, and set up 6oz portions in Tupperware. Throw 3 in the fridge, toss 7-9 in the freezer, and I'm good for 2 weeks for lunches. 252 calories, 50g of protein. Find a marinade or a rub you like and go to town. 6lbs of chicken breast is about $18 if you buy in bulk, and you're good for 2 weeks.

Everyone bitches about the price of eggs, but even at $3 a dozen, 4 eggs is still a dollar, 280 calories and 24g of protein.

Eating overly processed canned shit might be good when nothing else is available, or from time to time, but I'm gonna stick to this

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There are so many options for marinating chicken, from powders to sauces. For the powders, I use the bargain basement Italian dressing as a base. With all of them, I seal the marinade in the vacuum pack with the raw chicken, then freeze, so it marinates as it thaws.

As for cooking lunches:
In the past (before I started using the vacuum sealer), when I was on the road a lot and didn't have access to a microwave, I would just eat chicken w/ peas at room temp after they sat out half the day (fridge to cooler/lunch bag to letting it sit on the console/seat before eating). Never got sick.

I'd take the chicken off the grill, put it almost directly into a plastic container, and put the lid on. The heat expands the container, but it also kills off anything lurking in it, that might grow. Once it cools, it's pretty much vacuum sealed. How quickly you put it into the container may depend on the container you use though (how much pressure it can take). At that time I was cooking a chicken breast and a half bag of frozen peas every night, then refrigerating it till morning.

Now days I cook 4+ days at a time, then freeze anything over 2 days out. I have access to a microwave though, and I love the glass containers with snap down plastic lids since I can just pop the lid off and nuke it directly in that dish.