Healthier on a Budget - What It Is

When I first started couponing, I threw myself into it and picked up every free or ridiculously cheap thing I could get. I ate plenty of frozen meals, pasta, and white rice. As I learned more about healthier eating, I cringed at the amount I was paying, but I've had to rework my way of thinking. The amount I was saving in food costs, I made up for with the money I spent on medicines and time out of work when I was sick. I've decided I'd much rather go ahead and spend the extra on good food.

So I'm going to start a series about healthier eating on a budget. But first, what is considered "healthier"?
In Genesis 1:29, God said "See, I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food.” After the flood, He told Noah every animal was for food as well. He also adds every green herb, not just ones that yield seed.

Red #3 (or any other articial color), partially hydrogenated oils, and artificial flavors are not listed. For the sake of simplicity, let's say "healthier" is natural foods - ones that have been altered in a kitchen instead of a laboratory. It's foods that do not have to be tested on animals to make sure they are "safe." That leaves fruits, vegetables, other herbs, nuts, seeds, whole grains, and animal products. I won't be getting in to the arguments of traditional vs. vegetarian vs. vegan or of cooked vs. raw. I'll be sticking to ways to afford the food, no matter what your diet is.

In the meantime, here's my article with printable coupons for natural/organic foods: "I Can't Afford to Buy Healthier"

PB & J Without the Sugar

Lately, I've been trying to find good replacements for the foods that typically have added sugar. My latest accomplishment is Peanut Butter & Jelly. I didn't have any gluten free bread here, so I just mixed the 2 in a bowl and savored every single delicious bite.

I've tried a few natural peanut butters (nothing but peanuts), and they've been too thick, too gritty, or too overwhelming to make a decent sandwich. On a whim, I bought Crazy Richard's natural peanut butter. Crazy Richard's? Seriously? It didn't sound like a "natural" item, but I'll admit I've been wrong before. Ingredients: peanuts. The oil had separated, but after a good stirring it was smooth and creamy, and it mixed deliciously with Smucker's Simply Fruit. Fruit spreads are sweetened with concentrated fruit syrups instead of regular sugar. So far, I've tried blueberry and raspberry and have loved them both.

Related article: Sugar, Sugar Everywhere

Stepping Stones: What Worked For Me

When I first started limiting sugar-laden junk food and overly processed meals, there were certain foods that helped curb cravings. Many of these are not foods or drinks to be consumed on a regular basis (mostly because of sugar content from dried fruits or concentrated fruit juice), but I still think they are healthier than sodas and 3 Musketeers and do not seem to be nearly as addictive. I've listed the food I craved or missed and what I consumed instead.

Soda: R.W. Knudsen Spritzers. Black Cherry is my favorite, but Red Raspberry is good as well

Candy bars: KIND bars, especially the Walnut + Date. These are really sweet and oh so good!

Gatorade/Powerade: Water with Crystal Light Pure Fitness. I wanted a drink without artificial color, but most of the water flavorings have aspartame, which I'm also avoiding. Crystal Light Pure Fitness is the first one I found without aspartame.

Hard Candy: Yummy Earth Lollipops. They are still pure sugar, but there's no artificial colors or flavors.

Snack Cakes: Larabars. It's hard to go wrong with flavors like peanut butter cookie, pecan pie, and coconut cream pie, especially when they really do taste like the baked goods they're meant to imitate. The bars are sweetened with dried dates.

I was not compensated in any way for this post. I'm just giving my opinion of what worked for me.

Just the Basics: Fajita Seasoning

I glanced at a package of fajita mix from the store recently...and immediately put it back on the shelf. Well darn. What's a girl to do when she's craving quick fajitas? I've made a fajita mix recipe from scratch before, but it came out fairly gross and had WAY to many ingredients so I was reluctant to try again. Buy try I did and it was a success!

I used this recipe for fajitas from NOME_ on Sparkpeople to fix dinner for my family. The seasoning is not sweet like a typical store bought mix, but it's still delicious and my family gave rave reviews. As the picky 12 year old said, "My fajita was AWESOME!" I wasn't in the mood for a tortilla, so I put the whole mixture over lettuce for a southwestern salad. To accomodate the size of my family (and hopefully have leftovers for lunch), I upped the recipe to 3 chicken breasts and 2 bell peppers (1 red, 1 orange). I also left out the coriander just because my family is not a fan of it.

For the full fajita recipe, see here. Below is the recipe just for the dry seasoning mix. Next time, I'm going to try tripling the batch and storing the extra in a bag with my other spices.

Fajita Mix
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/4 tsp chili powder
1/2 tbsp ground ginger
1/2 tbsp ground cumin
1 tsp oregano, dried and ground
1 tsp coriander leaf, dried and ground

Sorry - no pictures tonight. We had to eat on the run in order to make it on time to a Baptism.

Rotation Diet: Millet

This post if from Nikki, the ever-amazing other part to this healthy endeavor:

3 years ago, my knowledge of grains was limited to processed wheat, oats (usually as granola bars), and white rice. Then around a year ago, I learned about the importance of whole grains and began the switch to whole wheat products and whole grain rice. I even tried quinoa and liked it!

Cereal is one of my absolute favorite foods - I can eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner if it weren't for the fact that I know I need a few other food groups. So Kashi quickly became my new whole grain favorite...until there was the mold issue. Now I suddenly have a sensitivity to corn, wheat, and oats (among plenty of other things). I can include small amounts of each of these on a rotated basis, but there are some days that I can't handle any of them. My doctor gave me a cheat sheet of food groups that looked promising until I actually read it...Teff? Millet? Tapioca? Buckwheat? What in the world do I do with these???

I was longingly going down the cereal aisle at a local grocery store, looking for a decent rice cereal, and tucked away on a bottom shelf was Arrowhead Mill's Puffed Millet cereal. Ingredients: Puffed Millet. It sounded flavorless and unappetizing, but I grabbed a bag out of curiousity. Ready for the surprise? I was right! It tastes just like cardboard with a slightly chewy texture.

Remembering the research I did for an article on Helium about sugar-free cooking, I got to work experimenting in the kitchen and came up with Toasted Millet & Pecan cereal. Ahhh (that's my contented sigh) My beloved crunchy cereal that I can eat on wheat-, corn-, and oat-free days!

Toasted Millet & Pecan Cereal

3 cups puffed millet

1/3 cup chopped pecans

1/2 cup coarsely pureed pear or pearsauce*

2 tbsp honey

1/2 tsp vanilla

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/4 tsp cloves

1/8 tsp salt

*For the pureed pear, I put 1 medium pear in the food processor. This recipe is very forgiving, so it doesn't have to be exactly 1/2 cup. You will just need to adjust the cooking time if you have a bit more or a little less liquid.

Cover a baking sheet with foil, leaving the dull non-stick side of the foil facing up. (You'd be surprised at how many recipes I've accidentally put the shiny side up and had everything stick.) Preheat oven to 275. In a small bowl, stir together pear, vanilla, and honey. In a large bowl, combine the pear mixture with all of the other ingredients. Stir until well combined. Spread the mixture onto the baking sheet and bake for approximately 1 hour, stirring the mixture every 20 minutes. Remove pan from oven when cereal is almost completely dry. It will harden as it cools.

Variations: For a fruity flavor, use pureed peaches, diced strawberries, or some berry fruit spread in place of the pears. Other combinations of spices work well too, such as 1/2 cup of pureed pumpkin with 1 1/2 tsp of pumpkin pie spice instead of the pears, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves.