Eating cheaply and healthily

As a travelling, freelance chef, I suppose its a tad easier for myself to know and understand all the different combinations of fruit and vegetables and what goes with what and so on. But that is the great thing about cooking, its all about experimenting with different herbs and spices and tailoring it to your specific tastes as the consumer. For example, i’m a bit of a chilli freak! I sautee chilli with garlic, onion in olive oil and serve the concoction spooned over my poached eggs!! I love a fiery start in the morning that really gets the endorphins racing!! Everybody has a different and unique pallet though and there is no harm in being a little adventurous with your cooking. This also goes with your shopping too!! I completely understand that peoples lives in todays modern world are very fast paced and eating on the go has slowly emerged into that lifestyle. This however should not affect the food that we eat. Its very easy nowadays to just nip to the local supermarket and pick up a packaged lasagne, bang it in the microwave and 5 mins later, hey presto your tea is ready. But how about if people changed their thought process? How about if the customers spend that extra 5 minutes around the fruit and vegetable section perusing the produce and more importantly the price. Instead of whizzing around the super market grabbing that packaged cannelloni, which i hasten to add will be high in calories and E numbers. This in writing, is easily said than done i know!! So what i’m trying to say is, eating is not just a source of energy to keep us on the go 24/7 its also an education.

In the past, i have been there myself and i’m completely guilty of living that lifestyle whilst working a desk job. Its just so easy to nip out get a quick butty and eat it on the go or bring it back to your desk. But what really hit home was one of the first trips backpacking the far east and Australia. I suddenly realised the cost of certain products and the price i was willing to pay. I had to figure out quickly of how i could stretch my budget and feed myself in order to carry on travelling. One way to do this, was to visit the local markets, buy all the produce myself and open the laboratory (which i call the kitchen) and start making dishes which i could stretch to 3 days. This way i was saving so much money by not purchasing a ready made sandwich and at the same time having fun messing about in the kitchen. In many hostels, backpackers and home stays that i have stayed in around the world, the kitchen becomes a focal point, a social place and gathering of fellow travellers to meet each other and swap stories, ideas and advice.

Please do not get me wrong i absolutely adore going to restaurants and eating out, fully absorbing the atmosphere and having somebody cook for me for a change. But a life on the road, going to a restaurant and lets say splashing out $60 can not frequently happen. For example if you were to dine out for sushi at a Japanese restaurant, you would be expected to pay a considerable amount of cash, for a measly amount of well presented and lets say it amazing tasting sushi. On the other hand if you actually delve in a little deeper and sourced all the produce yourself, watched a youtube video on rolling sushi, you will find that its very satisfying learning how to prepare it for yourself. You will roll almost triple the amount of sushi and for half the price!! Not to mention learning something new and educating oneself at the same time. The left overs can then be consumed the day after for lunch saving more pennies or dished out to visiting friends with a glint of self pride and showing off!

So being on the road i find this way of shopping and cooking a real benefit to myself. It stretches my imagination of what i can do with the ingredients, it saves me a few pennies here and there and brings people together in a social enviroment. Winning all round really!!

In my repetoire of recipes one really does stick in my mind though. Although not everywhere you stay has a spiralizer, there is nothing better than getting some cheap veges from the market and producing spaghetti like raw vegetables. I normally use 1 courgette, beetroot, and a couple of carrots. That will probably cost you about 50p totalled up. How mint is that!!! Then for an extra 80p i use a can of chick peas. Wack a load of garlic and half an onion in a pan, sautee with some spices of your choice, i normally use cumin and corriander seeds, tumeric, cayenne pepper, and fresh chilli. Start to crisp up the chick peas and incorporate all those lovely spices then right at the end add your spiralized vegetables and some chopped herbs of your choice, basil or corriander for example. Then praise the lord because you have just made it all for about a quid and fed your self a big healthy meal for next to nothing with left overs ready for the next day!!!

It really is a no brainer if you spend that little extra time in the supermarket, choosing to buy fresh produce instead of a ready meal and putting just a little time and effort in at home. Creating and cooking that dish should take you know more than 10 mins and then 5 mins to gobble it down. The health benefits are substantially better than the crap out of a packet and is so good on the wallet too.

Health is wealth and you are what you eat!! Plus it passes for vegan too!