What I Ate on Food Stamps: Week 1

If you've been keeping up with my posts lately, you'll know that I recently began receiving food stamps. I am documenting my grocery hauls and meal plans here, partly to keep notes for myself and partly to inspire anyone else who might be eating vegan on a budget.

Friendly reminder: If you need a helping hand, please reach out to the resources in your community. Social services offices and food pantries welcome everyone -- including you. Nobody should have to struggle alone.

Let's get into my meals!

Day One

• Coffee and a bagel with cream cheese
• Pasta and wilty cabbage left over from last week, and some grapes
• Vegan Orzo Verde

 

 

Day Two

• Coffee and a bagel
• Instant ramen with peanut butter and sriracha
• Leftover orzo 
• Non-dairy Oatmeal Cookie Ben & Jerry's
  

Day Three

• Coffee and a bagel
• "Spaghetti," which was actually just random pasta shapes from my pantry and some leftover sauce
• The weather was nice, so my roommate made "cookout food": grilled hot dogs, fries, and macaroni salad
• Lemon bars

 

 Day Four 3/5

• Coffee and a bagel and grapes
• Instant ramen with some Daring wings left over from the Super Bowl

 

• Baked chickpea and spinach rigatoni (it's this recipe, but instead of stuffing shells, I just stir it all together with regular pasta and throw it in the oven)

 

Day Five

• Bagel with peanut butter
• I had planned to get Chinese food with a friend, but that got postponed at the last minute, so I grabbed a bag of "Sweet Kale Salad with Poppy Seed Dressing" at Aldi ($3.29) and made boxed mac and cheese

• More ice cream
  

Day Six

• The last of the lemon bars
• Leftover rigatoni
• Tacos with homemade nacho cheese

I have started making my nacho cheese with canned potatoes and carrots. It's not as good as making it from scratch, but once it's mixed into everything else, it's pretty good. I always keep this stuff on hand, and as you'll see in next week's grocery haul, I replaced the cans I used.

Also, my favorite vegan yogurt is the Kite Hill plain almond one, but that's not available at any of my grocery stores in town, so I used the So Delicious plain coconut yogurt I found at Walmart. Makes a pretty good sour cream stand-in.

Day Seven

No photographic evidence from this day, but I believe I ate: 

• Bagel and peanut butter
• Leftover taco fixin's
• Pizza