We are vegan and committed to eating 100% organic and managed to continue to do so with just $80 per week to spend on food for the both of us.

The key was to eat extremely simply and make everything from scratch. Yes it got boring and we were sick of salad and tofu or salad and beans for dinner and peanut butter sandwiches for lunch every day, but it was organic and delicious and we could afford it.

I have had a growing interest in raw food but my husband isn’t really into it – so now I am exploring the raw lifestyle more now that our financial situation is better. We still prepare nearly all of our food from scratch.

No matter what your diet, if you’re buying the fun, yummy prepared foods especially the raw products ($8 packets of raw crackers, $20 tubs of raw nut butters, $3 cans of coconut water) you are going to spend a ton.

The key to eating all organic on a limited budget is to keep it simple and make it yourself!

Trader Joe’s for goodies like agave nectar, recycled paper products, frozen berries, tempeh, and tortilla chips.

Whole Foods for specialty items like flaxeed, hemp powder, my fave vegan burgers, and vegan makeup.

Market Basket for pretty much everything else. It’s a family owned market that is growing in Mass/NH that has the lowest prices around, especially when I can’t get to the farmers market for fresh produce. They have organic produce, and I get my frozen veggies here too.

Ask your friends if they have a juicer/food processor/blender they aren’t using anymore. I got a $100 juicer for free, almost new!

Good health to all!

We get a vegetable box delivered to our house (a bit like CSA schemes in the USA), order bulk foods through our local health food shop, and make everything from scratch.

It’s not hard, people who say it’s too expensive are probably shopping in supermarkets looking for organic ready meals or something!

maybe one day i’ll lose this sense of entitlement and get a job!

nah

peace

2. Start with 2 or 3 bananas, add juice of 1/2 lemon, about 5 sprigs each of parsley and cilantro, two stalks celery, 1/2 cucumber, 4-6 leaves of romaine.
3. I vary this sometimes by adding things like: 1/2 apple, flax seeds, alfalfa tablets (4-6) powdered vitamin C, vitamin D tablets, a days worth (I hate to swallow lots of pills) sometimes 1 spoonful of spirulina, 1 T. whole rolled oats (uncooked) 1 small potato raw. These are optional and I vary things day to day, even using brown rice protein 1 T. on some days.
4. I clean greens when I bring them home, let them drain and wrap with paper towel. I lay the parsley/cilantro bunches out on 2 sheets of PT and make a roll, they keep up to two weeks.
5. I use a citrus veg. cleaner to remove petrol smell, and greasy coating on various produce.

6. Buy the bananas, most standard greens, avocados, broccoli, carrots, etc. at Costco. Once I tried the box of mashed avocado/guacamole, that had 4 bags, and the equivalent of 14 avocados, for around 7 dollars, it was a bit less than fresh, and at a time when I had found a few black avocados. Costco’s pre-mashed avocados do have some garlic, and citric acid.

7. I find having the smoothie up to three times a day helps with regularity (sometimes the smoothie becomes like pudding, and I eat with spoon).

8. Or I might use a cup of the smoothie with some diced cucumber, cherry tomatoes, and sweet onions for a soup. (In which case I’d prefer to use avocado, rather than banana for smoothie).

9. About every fifth day, I make a fruit smoothie, using a cup of berries with the bananas, and only the 1 T. oats, unless I’ve had other grains that day.

10. I have been feeling really good with this combination, and I realize it’s a stage in my development as a raw food person. Once these things become routine for me I’ll change, and try some new ideas. Small steps.

11. When my family takes me out to eat, I box up 2/3 of my dinner (say Thai phad vegetable) and the next two days have a 2 egg Thai phad skillet dish, cooked on very low temp. covered to heat just until eggs set. Slide that out on romaine, or baby greens, top with about 8 cherry tomatoes that are quartered, add some fresh squeezed lemon juice, and there’s my gourmet breakfast!
I feel like it is anyway.

12. It’s all about color. Sometimes I’ll thin slice sweet onion and red/green bell peppers and use a pita or wrap and fill it up add a little lemon, EVOO, sea salt and pepper. I do things like this often, and maybe once a month get into superfood ideas.

13. However I don’t think I’d overdo the nuts. I have limited my intake of nuts for years, by the recommended amounts, and that’s what I am used to.

I have a limited income, there’s so much more that I do to make things stretch, and I use everything. It would sadden me to toss foods that got rotten, and this “life style” RAW, is like a solution!!!

14. I am using a standard blender right now, I think it’s a HB, and it has a tool that I use in the lid to stir the leaves and cut up stalks, etc.

15. I put 2/3 to 3/4 of the smoothie into a mason jar.

16. I just started making sprouts again.

17. At the first of the month I get some bigger, or more exotic fruits and veggies. (Kirkland EVOO, kale, fennel, potatoes, yams, bag of sweet onions, oranges, apples, romaines and celerys in multiple at Costco).

That’s some of where I am right now…