2 answers
Steven’s Answer
Hey Luis, I know the struggle of deciding what you are going to eat every day, whether you should go out or stay in. Either one can be time consuming, especially if you use big equipment that take long times to heat up. During my college time, I lived in the dorms, at a student cooperative housing, and in a studio apartment, always while being an avid cooker. I found a couple ways to spend less on food while eating healthier meals.
When you say how to make food in a better way, I either think you are referring to making food taste better, or how to eat better food in your situation. Ill tackle both of these issues
If you are looking to make food taste better, I would recommend having a variety of your favorite spices and a few of your favorite sauces to add to any foods. Some of the favorites spices that I add to almost anything include: salt, black pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, and paprika. Ketchup and soy sauce are two very versatile sauces to use. Adding one or more of these into your everyday meals can add variety in flavors in what you eat on a daily basis.
Now, if you feel like being a student has forced you to start relying more heavily on processed and preserved foods that are less healthy and contain lots of sugars, there is a simple fix for this as well. Fresh vegetables cost less and are often more filling than other processed foods in similar caloric amounts. Some cheap and nutritious produce I would recommend is eggs, broccoli, carrots, and potatoes. Look online for what vegetables and fruits are in season in your state to find the best deals and tasty produce. Although meat can often be expensive, especially when deciding on what type some good value meats for college students include chicken breast, frozen shrimp, and ground beef. Make sure to add your spices to add extra flavors to the meals. Cooking with as many items that came directly from the ground will make your food taste better and will nourish your body and brain with the correct nutrients it needs to continue. Microwaving vegetables are an easy way to cook them, just throw a tablespoon or two of water in a covered bowl and boil the water. Additionally, get a rice cooker, it does way more than just cook rice, and there are lists and pages on cooking websites online dedicated to meals made in rice cookers specifically.
Kamalesh’s Answer
1) Preparing nutritious, tasty, home-cooked meals can be fast. Preparation is key! Planning out in your head what you want to cook, including what ingredients you need and what needs cutting/chopping/steaming/etc. beforehand, will save a lot of effort. You can even meal-prep on the weekends or off-days. Labeling ingredient containers and consistently keeping them in the same places helps too, to not waste time looking for things you need.
2) Preparing said meals can be cheap! If you go to the mainstream grocery stores, vegetables and spices can be quite expensive, but don't be afraid to venture into large vegetable/fruit markets and ethnic markets (saying you're a noob who's enthusiastic about their cuisine often flatters them and they're happy to help!), as they often sell the same or better-quality produce for substantially less $ than the mainstream stores do.
3) Gathering and storing the ingredients seems a daunting task at first, and may take two to three off-days to build up the store of items you need, but once that's built up, it's mainly about hitting the fruit/veg market and grocery store once/week to replenish the regularly-used ingredients. Based on what you want to make (Youtube's a great helper here!), you figure out the ingredients you need, and slowly build up the stores over time!
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