LPT: Tips for saving money on cooking

1. Purchase rice and beans in bulk. Costco sells 20lbs+ bags for $20.

Basmati rice has the best glycemic index, tastes great, and toasts well. Get a couple of different beans for variety.

2. Freeze every meat bone you have. You can make a bone broth out of it later, letting the remainder of the meat fall of the bone for soup.

The bone broth can be turned into soup or boil with rice for a casserole.

3. Freeze every scrap you have. It too can be turned into a casserole or soup. Every little thing. Combine all the ingredients once each month to make something interesting. Worst comes to worst, buy a bottle of bbq sauce or something and another your weird mixture with. Cheap week!

4. If you have drippings from cooking meat, refrigerate them! You can use it in savory dishes to save on butter and oil.

5. Buy other things in bulk, like meat, veggies, anything on sale. Once the initial supplies are bought, it's cycling through them on a normal budget.

6. Be diligent about using every scrap. Really diligent. Throw nothing away.

7. If you can't afford a Costco membership, join with family, friends, or roommates, splitting the membership costs.

8. A turkey goes a long way. You get dark meat for a week. Sliced breast meat for a week, and the carcass makes two soups if you cut it in half! That's 4 weeks of one meal with a turkey! Of course, you need veggies and such for a balanced diet. The rice and beans has much of that covered!