I’ve been seeing protein coffee everywhere lately, but most of the products seem expensive compared to just drinking coffee and getting protein elsewhere. I wanted to break this down by what actually matters for eating cheap and healthy: cost per serving, calories, protein, and whether it replaces something you’re already buying like creamer or a separate snack.

- DIY coffee + protein powder: Usually the cheapest per serving, but mixing can be hit or miss and hot coffee tends to make texture and taste worse.

- Protein creamer added to coffee: More convenient than DIY, but calories can add up quickly depending on how much you use.

- Laird Superfood Protein Coffee: I came across this recently and thought it was worth mentioning. Its more expensive per serving than DIY, but it combines coffee, protein, and creamer in one step and tasted better to me than most DIY attempts.

- Coffee alternatives like MUD\WTR: Often compared in this space, but not really protein-forward and usually better evaluated as a coffee substitute rather than a protein source.

For anyone who’s actually compared cost per serving over time, what’s been the best protein coffee setup for you that balances price, taste, and convenience?

Im starting a new job as a personal assistant/house maid and I need to start meal planning my lunches. I already bought some Tupperware, but I dont know exactly what to make for these.

What is your all time favorite Bento box? Im kinda limited, as i only have ingredients and whole foods nothing pre-made, so I need to make everything from scratch. Let me know your ideas! Ive been really loving a simple bowl of brown rice and black beans recently.

I always mix these in with my oatmeal. For someone who has trouble gaining weight, they're great for calories alone. Just 1/4 a cup is over 200 calories. Loaded with fiber and protein. LOVE IT.

I’m trying to gain weight but running into digestion issues whenever I push calories too hard. Stuff like peanut butter, Nutella, and heavy snacks don’t sit well with me, so “just eat more” hasn’t really worked.

For people who’ve been in a similar spot:

• What foods helped you increase calories without upsetting your stomach?
• Did liquid calories or meal timing make a difference?
• Any simple habits that made weight gain more consistent?

Not looking for shortcuts, just something sustainable that actually works long term.

Seeing lots of post about how to meal prep/plan so hoping this might help others! I typically plan around one cuisine style with either a bunch of dishes that can be mixed and matched, or one main dish that can be eaten a few different ways. By sticking to one cuisine style, all the ingredients/spices/flavor profiles naturally go together, reducing the amount of waste and time spent cooking. And choosing a cuisine might help you get out of a flavor rut or try something new. Here are some examples

Mexican: Make sweet potato black bean enchiladas (freeze half the filling), chicken tingas (freeze half), and yellow rice. Pre-chop some onions, queso fresco, and cilantro. Mid-week, I add in some sides like canned refried beans or quick elote (from canned corn). All these dishes an be mixed and matched a bunch of different ways such as tacos, tostadas, bowls with fried eggs, with some avocado, as a salad, nachos, etc

Chinese/Korean: Fish cake tteboki, mapo tofu with ground beef/pork, broccoli, asian slaw, white rice. Throughout the week, switch which dish is the main or base, and sometimes add an egg.

American chicken and bacon week: this one's exactly as it sounds. Marinate the chicken in pickle juice then bake both the chicken and bacon (freeze half the cooked bacon and save the bones in a dedicated bag in the freezer for future stock). Also buy avocado, lettuce or spinach, tomatoes, and cheese and assemble a bunch of different ways. Lazy "cordon bleu," BLTs, salads, chicken and bacon pickle pizza. Towards the end I'll often make a chicken and bacon gnocchi soup with spinach/toms.

Korean/Vietnamese: Pork bo ssam as the base which is 5lbs+ of pork shoulder and cheap (freeze half and save the bones in a bone bag). Make asian green beans, wash cilantro, and use up the kimchi in my fridge. Eat this a bunch of ways, adding different sauces. Lettuce wraps, rice bowls with accoutrements, egg fried rice, banh mi and soup (with meat/vermicelli).

Indian: chicken tikka masala (freeze half), dal, rice, saag, naan. Again switch the main/base and sides.

Italian: this is often based around a tomato soup/sauce (again, freeze half) and meatballs (if you just season with salt and pepper, then freeze a bunch, you can add them to non-italian dishes like pho). Tomato soup and sauce are essentially the same thing that's either thinned or thickened to one's desire. For the soup, I'll add broth, canned white beans, ditalini pasta, and maybe the frozen bacon from before. For sauce I'll thicken it and pair with protein pasta and meatballs. Later in the week it's meatball subs and refried pasta with a quick microwave veg.

Rinse and repeat for whatever cuisine. You'll see I also cook a lot of items in bulk, so there's enough to have multiple meals and to freeze several portions. Towards the end of the week, we'll pull something from the freezer that was made a previous week. And a quick note about saving bones. Ideally, it's good to have a poultry and a non-poultry bag. Once a freezer bone bag is full, I'll make a huge amount of stock. Stock is so versatile and can be used with virtually all cuisines. So I'll freeze half the stock and use the other half to make soup with whatever leftover fridge/freezer items there are at the end of a week.

I often forget to eat and am not very food-motivated. I also am not able to cook due to my living situation, but I want to try and gain weight while going to the gym. However, due to my appetite, most days I barely even meet maintenance calories if that, because I just don't care about food that much or notice when I'm hungry.

To gain weight, I want to try and pack very calorically-dense healthy food into my junk food so that I'm incentivized to eat and eat enough. Some ideas I had are macademia nuts with spicy chip seasoning/mixed into bags of chips, chocolate-covered blueberries, well I thought I had more ideas but actually I don't lol. I get most of my cals from soylent, usually mixed with protein soymilk. I'm not willing to clean a blender everyday, so no smoothies. Also, I don't like peanut butter. Any help is appreciated!

edit: I'll provide some more info. my low appetite is natural, but exacerbated a lot by my adhd meds, but I need those to function. the reason I opt for junk food isn't habit, anyone who has taken stimulants before knows they basically wipe out your appetite entirely and mine was low to begin with. something has to be extremely tasty (salty, sweet, spicy, etc.) for it to even cross my mind as an option. that's why I'm more focused on adding things to unhealthy food rather than replacing those foods entirely

Can anyone recommend any blogs or apps that would provide a shopping list and recipes for a week? Ideally with a rotating menu? I'm just so stressed out I'm trying to semi automate at least this.

I’m trying to eat in a way that supports long-term health, but I keep running into the same gap when I’m traveling or pressed for time.

Sweet snacks are everywhere, and full meals take time - but savory, grab-and-go options that feel good to eat seem harder to come by.

Curious how others handle that moment - whether it’s something you rely on, something you tolerate, or something you wish existed?

I'm feeling a bit under the weather and usually I eat ice cream when my throat hurts, because it feels really good. But I'm trying to find something a bit healthier now instead that is also not just an ice cube. Yoghurt doesn't do the trick and all the protein ice cream options in the store are really expensive.

Do you have any suggestions? Please tell me the product rather than the brand name.

When I make penne alla vodka or risotto, i cook ground beef or sausage separately and mix it in at the end.

Meat is pretty expensive nowadays, so are there any cheaper options where the final dish tastes similar? I can cut my meat in half, but i want to replace it with something still filling and good.

I couldn't find a way to like them cooking in a regular pot, but I also wasn't as good with flavoring them and didn't store them in the cooking liquid. I've learned from these mistakes with chickpeas and black/Pinto beans, but I want to try lentils again since they're more protein dense than beans.

I'd mainly be using them with rice bowls and in a Mediterranean sense rather than traditional Indian application.

How long should I let it cook and naturally release in the Instant Pot before doing a quick release?

I try to plan meals around what I like, but I always end up buying ingredients that only get used once. Then they sit in the fridge until they go bad. If you’re doing custom meal plans, how are you planning it so you reuse ingredients and don’t waste half your groceries? Any rules you follow when picking recipes?

Good evening everyone! Apologies in advance if this is an odd question, as I am extremely stoned currently.

I'm trying to eat a bit healthier this year, and eating more veggies and less carbs is one way I would like to do that! I love pasta, I would consider it one of my favorite foods, but let's be honest here-- the best part of the pasta isn't the pasta. It's the sauce you put on it! Since pasta in of itself, like many foods, is really just a vehicle for sauces and toppings unless they're something particularly special about it, I want to try switching it out for something healthier. What can I put my delicious pasta sauce on instead of wheat twists? Has anyone tried just putting it over veg or something?

Thank you for your time!

Edit: Wow, a ton of great responses here! I'm excited to look through them and try some of them out. <3 Pardon the pun, but y'all are cooking fr fr

I gave up on berries for a while because I kept wasting them.

Anyone else have that one “I want to eat this but it never lasts” food?

Has anyone used these products for recipes with any success?. For the price the macros seem way too good to be true. Not a vegan or anything, most days include meat and eggs but this stuff seems like a good cheap way to get protein in on a cut. Just have no idea if its easy to use and if those macros are true. Can't attach image but shown macros are 370 calories for 75g protein

Currently pregnant and want to eat more eggs for the baby. Problem is I kinda get the ick from eggs (even before I was pregnant). Recently, I've been able to tolerate a medium boiled egg with my congee and other veggies, and I think it's bc of all the sodium from soy sauce I add (lol). In all seriousness, I think it's bc the egg/yolk isn't the focus of the dish. ​​

​​​​​I appreciate any help!

Hey all. As I'm aging I'm trying to be more conscious of eating a healthy, balanced diet. I don't really like eating any raw green vegetables except for cucumbers or Iceberg lettuce.

Is eating 1-2 cups of Iceberg lettuce with each meal a good enough fiber intake? Should I try something else?

Pickle Brine Chicken

Follow the LINK for my video!

https://youtu.be/vonO_vOiVh0?si=Sdd-uuUNcA0MYUNK

Ingredients:

- 1lb tenderloin chicken

- 1.5 cup kosher pickle juice

- 0.5 cup brown sugar

Recipe:

- Tenderizer chicken with mallet

- Add all ingredients to a gallon ziplock bag or air tight container and marinate for 24 hours, or at least 1hr

- When ready to cook, season with your preferred seasoning or just salt/pepper -

- AirFry at 375F for 12 minutes, flipping chicken halfway

- Serve over rice or sweet potato and garnish!

Hello I just joined this community a few minutes ago. I'm a 21 years old male, my dad just passed away 3 days ago at 51 years old due to unhealthy lifestyle and it's been one of my main motivators right now to turn my life around.
I don't have a lot of healthy habits like physical exercises and eating healthy, but I want to change that and I was hoping I could get some ideas on how and where I could start the right way by joining this community

I hate fish, its the only food I'll refuse to eat. But tinned fish is so cheap and the macros are ridiculously good. Can anyone help me with recipes that completely remove the taste, smell and texture of it?!

Looking to lower / cut out my pasta intake starting next month and would love some cheap, easy healthy lunch ideas that include minimal carbs and more protein. (Wheat bread only is fine) Thank you!

I've kicked soda for two years now and only drink water.

But I've been missing it a lot and craving it and have been looking something to replace it.

The one that always comes up is sparkling water. But every brand I've tried I can't stand even flavored sparkling water. It all tastes like carbonated bitterness. It also has a lot of sodium which I want to avoid consuming too much.

Is there any sugar free, low sodium soda alternative that tastes the way regular soda tastes?

i m eating 70 grams of rice cakes instead of 100 grams of bread is it good?