College Meal Ideas?

[Becksabec]

I was hoping to get some meal ideas. I'm living on-campus, and although I have a full kitchen in my dorm, I'm looking for suggestions for things that are both easy to make and budget-friendly. When I first went gluten-free, I was all about the gluten-free breads, pastas, etc but I'm finding it gets kind of expensive and Whole Foods isn't as close to where I'm at now. I'd like to stick to more foods that are naturally gluten-free, that I can just get at the regular grocery store.

By the way, I'm also casein-free.

[Glugle]

I like nuts, myself. Especially almonds. Elana's pantry has some great recipes using almond flour. She suggests ordering it online. I made choc chip cookies the other day with just almond flour, butter (she has a way to sub grapeseed oil), vanilla, baking powder, and dark choc. I really liked them. her website is just elanaspantry.com. She also has a cookbook. Maybe ask some relatives to go in on a bread machine. Lots of homemade recipes for that. Do you have a csa delivery near you? Maybe others could go in on it? I love ours. Farmer's market near? Also, a crockpot might be good. Ours saves us a lot of money, and it was really inexpensive at costco. Really great if you have a freezer and/or a lot of people to split cost of food. You can also use the more inexpensive meat, since everything just turns out very tender in a crockpot.

There are also a tons of blogs with great recipes. I have found quite a few that are also casein free. Made gluten/casein free cream puffs with coconut milk last month. Tasted great.

I hope this helps.

Tia

[summerteeth]

Buying some products online (especially at that river-in-So.-America website) is cheaper -- at least compared to the stores I went to college near so look into that.

I agree that eating more simply is cheaper all around, though. A seasoned protein, a vegetable, a salad, and maybe rice or beans would be a good meal. Beans are super cheap, as is rice. And I always buy meat on sale. The problem I had in college was not having a lot of space to store leftovers. Maybe get a really small slow cooker (like a Little Dipper) and you can make chilli, soup, pretty much anything on the cheap, and a lot of slow cooker recipes are inherently gluten-free.

Look into the website 'a year of slowcooking' if you are interested. A lot of her recipes are super easy and can be made quite inexpensively.

Also befreeforme.com offers coupons for gluten-free foods.

[GlutenFreeManna]

Will you have a freezer? Those frozen steamer packages of vegetables are convenient and not very expensive, just pop them in a microwave for 5 minutes and you have steamed vegetables. You can cook rice in a microwave too if you have to, or get a rice cooker if you have the space for one. Baked potatoes and chicken breasts are other easy foods to microwave. For the chicken, you just have to cook it at half power, instead of high (look up cooking instructions for your particular microwave). If you can store things in the fridge, season and cook several chicken breasts in one day. Also cook a big batch of rice. Then when you want a hot meal, steam a bag of frozen veggies, reheat the rice and chicken and mix it all together in a bowl. Add some sesame oil or garlic oil or gluten-free soy sauce if you can have it for flavor and you have a meal.

[Becksabec]

Will you have a freezer? Those frozen steamer packages of vegetables are convenient and not very expensive, just pop them in a microwave for 5 minutes and you have steamed vegetables. You can cook rice in a microwave too if you have to, or get a rice cooker if you have the space for one. Baked potatoes and chicken breasts are other easy foods to microwave. For the chicken, you just have to cook it at half power, instead of high (look up cooking instructions for your particular microwave). If you can store things in the fridge, season and cook several chicken breasts in one day. Also cook a big batch of rice. Then when you want a hot meal, steam a bag of frozen veggies, reheat the rice and chicken and mix it all together in a bowl. Add some sesame oil or garlic oil or gluten-free soy sauce if you can have it for flavor and you have a meal.

Yes. I have a full-size refrigerator that I only share with one other person, so plenty of refrigerator/freezer space.

[tarnalberry]

Senior year, my friends and I started doing more cooking. I wasn't gluten free at the time, but most of what I cooked was gluten free anyway. Buy yourself an electric skillet and a rice cooker, and you can make just about anything. I would make a lot of stir fries or sautees and have it with rice. You can also make soups and stews in a skillet like that, or ... well, a lot of different dishes. If you get a second pot, it'd make things like pasta easier, but you can still do it with just one (it takes longer though). Then you just cook yourself naturally gluten free meals of meats, produce, and grains (if you want them).

[Juliebove]

You can get precooked rice (various brands) in pouches. This is more expensive than buying dried rice, but certainly more convenient! My daughter often makes a quick meal of this with a can of chicken poured over it. Another quick meal is a green salad with some black olives, a can of chicken and some sesame dressing that we buy at Costco.

Hummus is another popular food in our house. We buy it premade. You can also get the instant (dried) kind or make your own from scratch. This is good with raw veggies or rice crackers/cakes.

I made a tuna salad the other night that was really good. I used tuna in a pouch but you can use canned. I added all kinds of chopped vegetables such as green onion, tomato, red bell pepper, and celery. Cucumber and radish are good in this as well. Really any vegetables that you like. I then added salt, pepper, parsley and a splash of olive oil and lemon juice.

We also eat a LOT of popcorn. I pop it in a pan with coconut oil. But you can get some microwave popcorn that has no butter in it. There are some organic brands that have no oil at all. And I just bought a case of some kind...I think it was Orville Redenbacher?...at Costco that has no butter. Not sure if you can get it at other places or not. Daughter often has popcorn for breakfast. It is a whole grain!

Two produce items we are never without are apples and carrots. They keep well and are cheap. We also use a lot of onions and potatoes. I tend to put onions in almost everything I cook. And a baked potato can make for the base of a filling meal if you add some protein and another veggie or some fruit.

[sb2178]

I was a huge fan of making two pots of food/week and just eating those and then I generally had toast & PB for breakfast. Usually one soup and one thing based on rice (or you could use quinoa, millet, amaranth, etc). The rice takes a while to cook, but it's not labor intensive and it freezes well. You can mostly chop up a few things then sit there and read while it cooks.

- Rice with two cans of black beans, chopped carrots, some type of green, sauteed onion and garlic, and then you can add tuna or cheese if you want more protein.

- Rice with tuna (chicken), peanut sauce, carrots, broccoli, etc

- Rice with curry spicing, chickpeas or lentils, cauliflower, and occasionally other vegetables.

- Risotto

There are masses of soups. Message me if you want ideas.

[RideAllWays]

Lots of rice, beans, nuts, rice cakes, veggies! I am able to live off $100/month (yay to being a student, eh..). I eat lots of no-name products from superstore, they are always way cheaper and I've never had a reaction to the ones that are naturally gluten-free. Salads are great, you can add a chicken breast as well. If you have a costco, buy a huge box of frozen chicken breast at the start of the year and keep it in the freezer, it lasted me almost two semesters. You can also buy big bags of frozen veggies usually pretty cheap and make stir-fries. Grocery shopping is a skill, you'll get the hang of it! Sign up for a club card at whatever grocery store and you usually get discounts, use coupons like crazy, and some student cards from unis get you discounts as well.