How do you keep your food bill low if you can't eat carbs

[EveryDayImHustling]

I'm diabetic so can't eat bread, rice, pasta, potatoes, sugar etc

I have €100 per week to feed 2 adults and 2 dogs.

For the dogs each week I buy:
6 500g bags of porridge (Can't find a bulk supplier, not even amazon) - these have gone up to €1 a bag
4 1kg bags of mixed veg - 99c/€1/1.20 in some places
2x 2kg chickens - €6-7 each
24 eggs (we eat these too) - €4.25

Prices can change from week to week, recently the eggs jumped from 3.70 to 4.25.

We won't be putting the dogs on cheap biscuit so their food is non negotiable.

That leaves €71.75 for breakfast, lunches and dinners that need to be low carb. Anything else needed has to come out of that too, toiletries, cleaning products etc, except petrol. All other bills are accounted for, this is just the living money for each week.

What would your menu be?

I like to cook big batches and eat that for a few days, so soups, stews, curries, a lasagne etc.

I ate a lot of tinned fish when skint and eating low carb. Sardines are especially cheap. Tesco do frozen swede / turnip / carrots which are really good value and can be roasted or mashed.

This is a god idea to cut down the amount of lentils, thank you.

I'm already trying to lose weight, thanks for your input though.

So, you aren't actually diabetic, presumably it's been suggested that even a small weight loss,can remove the pre stage. How can you feed dogs on porridge?

Go to somewhere like Farmfoods or Iceland & buy their ready chopped & frozen veg for anything you need cooked veg for, just buy fresh veg for anything you need raw, you can get a kilo of chopped onion or broccoli, carrot & cauliflower mixed for £1 at Farmfoods, these are ideal for cooking no carb & will save you prep time. Have you got a slow cooker or Ninja type cooker? You could make something in there, bulk it out with lentils or Qourn, buy the cheapest tins of tomatoes, beans & herbs & spices, a chilli, veg curry, casserole, do you make stir fries? Use your frozen veg, you can buy frozen stir fry veg & just add meat or other protein, look for large packs of chicken thighs, meat packs from a butchers, yellow label stuff from the supermarket that you can freeze, frozen fish. Do you have a market nearby? You could save by buying anything fresh there.

Its a complete protein and better than the shite in biscuit.

My numbers are diabetic if I eat carbs, my hab1C shoots up if I don't stay low carb.

I'm not in the UK and we don't have such cheap offers.

It's going back to the begining and testing after every meal to see what you can tolerate again. 😩

I can manage 1/3 cup porridge made with water with added peanut butter. Cheap breakfast sorted. I also buy chia seeds in bulk £8/kg and make it overnight 2 tbsp with 175ml soya milk and then add double cream in the morning. Slightly pricier but super low carb.

Lunch is lentil and tomato soup. Onion, butter, tin toms, 1 cup red lentils, veg stock. Cook, blend, does 4 portions. Chunk of cheese to go with it.

Dinner is vegetarian. Chick pea or paneer curries sometimes with yoghurt or coconut milk sauce. 3 bean chilli just keeping the wholemeal rice small. Butter bean stew or mushroom stroganoff served with quinoa (bulk buy) crustless quiche bulking out the eggs with cottage cheese. I also don't find that Quorn products spike my sugars, although cheaper than meat I still consider them a luxury item compared to whole foods.

I know what you mean with meat and green veg being the easiest way to manage your sugars, but it can be done it just requires a bit more planning and creativity.

Seems totally bonkers that your pets eat better than you do.

Lentil Dahl with quinoa or wholegrains doesn't make my blood sugar go crazy and it's cheap and delicious.

For example,
An 85g tin of sardines is €1.20
400g mince - €3
Eggs (in lidl, cheapest and best value) - €4.25
A 2kg chicken is €6-7
Red bell peppers were 3.00 a Kilo the other week

They don't eat better than us. We eat unprocessed fresh food, batch cooked from scratch

Make your own yoghurt. It's so easy and you can either eat it plain or flavour it with fruit and nuts. From a litre of milk (cows' or soya) you will get 8 x 125ml portions.

Thanks, yes I'm going to have to test with beans and lentils. I will make a lentil dhal soup tonight.

Thanks! I've been meaning to try this, and make my own butter, thanks for remindin me of this.

You can add tinned kidney beans to lentils, soups, baked beans etc. Healthy way to feel full.

Think about your own health before your dogs. If you aren't around for them, it will be worse for them.

EverydayImhustling I try to not buy much bread & pasta but there are times only bread or pasta will do I spiralise veg for spaghetti & use cauliflower rice sometimes even though I can eat ordinary rice. I'm disabled & can't stand for very long to prepare much fresh so rely on preprepared stuff & occasionally ready meals for when I'm not well, bread & pasta do fill me up sometimes when I'm really hungry. I have trebled the amount of veg I eat, I always have 60% of my plate in veg at every meal.

2 adults should be able tolive off €75 a week, with batch cooking and a few more recipes in the repetoire. I See peopel on here all the time saying they feed a family on less.

I have 500 for the month, so it can be split with bulk buying at the beginning of the month and topping up as we go along. We have a good cash & carry here too.

Where are you?

Can you get cheap cabbage and similar veg?

When I make a frittata, it has as much veg as will fit in the frying pan, not just an onion and portion of cauliflower.

Cheap low carb means a good mix of veggies and a certain amount of lentils / beans. 400g of mince with 200g lentils will stretch things out, half a cup of lentils will give you soup more fibre.

Tinned sardines
Frozen veg
Mushrooms and shredded cabbage both great as low-carb bulk
Turnips (Conservative party recommended)

Don’t listen to anyone recommending you to ditch low-carb, whole foods in preference for processed shite and medication 🙏

Porridge isn't pure protein it's slow release carbs and fibre. As for biscuit or complete dog food being "complete shite". My last dog was PTS last month at almost 18. The previous dog 2015 was 17. I do add both raw and cooked veg to their diets. Vet of 25 years, said what ever I'm doing, keep doing it because it obviously works. If the Dr,nurse or dietician are you under agrees, intermittent fasting or 800cal diet would be beneficial. What country are you in?

I am low carbing and try and get salmon etc when it’s on yellow sticker

omelettes are what I am eating a lot of

as you say .. soups etc or stew

Join "giving up the game" on Facebook. You can get venison for almost nothing, often nothing if you're prepared to prep it yourself. A lovely community of people who are prepared to share and teach skills to those interested.