Oct 13, 2026, 1:40 AM@jnl
My best tips for cheap cooking are this: learn how to cook potatoes, rice, and beans. Potatoes will always be dirt cheap, and rice is an excellent calorie-dense food.
Between potatoes, rice, beans, and butter, you will never be hungry, and it will take a very long time to develop nutritional deficiencies if you have to live on those exclusively.
Learn a bunch of different kinds of meals that use those ingredients.
Potatoes will always be dirt cheap,
Here in BC, I have seen potatoes at $3/lb while (sale) pork was $2/lb.
More often I see chicken or pork at the same price/lb as potatoes.
It is ridiculous, and "I feel like potatoes but they are too expensive" is a weird, weird situation, but it is a real one.
Oct 13, 2026, 2:53 AM@datum
During potato harvest season, potato growers in idaho have a hard time giving away potatoes, because they have so many. I'm in Montana, and regularly see potatoes at $1.70 for a 5 lb bag during harvest season.
This might be an example of regional differences. Sounds like a lot of pork is grown in BC, and so it's really cheap to source.
@katanova We have $5 for 20lb bags sometimes too, it's highly variable. And we do grow lots of potatoes pretty close to here! I can't really say exactly why it happens but whenever I notice it, my brain and spirit hurt for a while.
Oct 13, 2026, 4:01 AM@datum I've noticed "by-the-pound" prices tend to be quite a bit higher than "by-the-bag" (5lg, 10lb, 15lb, 20lb) prices.
@katanova Typically here too, but sometimes we still get under $1/lb loose. The really good prices, when they happen, are 10-20lb bags which might go down as far as 20c/lb.