Someone on a FORUM website requested me for a cheap but tasty and nutritious recipe of mine for dinner or lunch.
You see, she is a teenager on a limited budget.
So i figured that i must post my own recipe here for the benefit of all the vegan beginners—esp the teenagers on a tight budget.
Here goes my recipe.
Cheap vegan recipe tips—Tomato olive pasta
Since you are on a budget-I am trying to give you this recipe.
You get four small bags of pasta for a dollar at walmart.Try to look for offers and pick them up.Each bag ends up being 25 cents and then each bag makes atleast 2 decent servings.Thus one serving of pasta will cost you around 10 cents.
Now for the other ingredients.
Buy around four medium sized roma tomatoes—Again might cost you around a dollar.When you make this recipe for one person and one serving, you end up using one medium sized tomato.I would suggest using 2 medium sized tomatoes for that extra vitamins and carotene .So tomato cost for one serving would end up being 40 cents.
Buy one very large onion(white or yellow or even spanish red would do) Might cost you 50 C .Again, you can use just half the large onion, use the rest for another salad or stir fry.onion cost for this single serving would end up being 20 cents
Buy a few jalapenos(3 large firm ones) might cost you around 30-50 cents.For one serving of this pasta , you might end up using just one large firm jalapeno.Thus jalapeno cost for this recipe would end up being 10 cents
Buy a can of green or black olives in oil or brine(Again they have offers where they sometimes sell it for four cans a dollar and such.Each can of olives contains around atleast 25-35 olives in number.So if you end up buying 4 cans of such olives for a dollar , you end up getting 100 olive fruits for a dollar..EAch olive ends up costing 1 cent-I LOVE OLIVES.so I end up using atleast 10-15 olives per serving, olive cost for one serving would then be 15 cents)
Salt-This is cheap.Buy an iodinized/iodized salt .One large sprinkler comes at 50-70 cents.The cost of salt in this recipe almost comes to nothing especially if you are using olives in brine.
Sugar-Again, you might get the smallest size of bag for a dollar and few cents.(Remember that once you buy this sugar bag-it will last you for a month-so worth the purchase.)Each bag ends up containing atleast 20-30 teaspoons of sugar for a dollar.Each teaspoon ends up being 5 cents.and thus sugar cost for this single serving ends up being 5cents
Dried Italian herbs/Dried mixed herbs-This small bottle might cost you two dollars or so ..Again, you are going to use the herbs only sparingly(a pinch each time),So a bottle can last you anywhere from a month to three.20 pinches of herbs for 2 dollars..EAch pinch of herb=10cents.Herb cost for this single serving 10 cents
A Small bottle of cayenne pepper(Again 2 dollars).Again, Single half tsp=20cents=cayenne pepper cost for this single serving
One bulb of garlic.=70cents...You end up using 3 cloves of garlic.So garlic cost for this single serving=30cents
So you can shop everything for a good dollar ten and this purchase will make you at least ten or more servings of pasta with the sugar , salt and herbs left out for future use.
Yeah, buy oil—Don’t buy corn oil/soybean oil.Choose sunflower or saffflower or peanut oil.Again a small bottle will last you a long time.Use an oil with a high burning point and lots of POLYUNSATURATED FATTY ACIDS....I prefer sunflower oil.It has a NEUTRAL TASTE.Most other oils have their OWN TASTE and thus might interfere with the taste of other ingredients in the recipe.
A 1000mL of oil can cost you 2dollars.Use 15ml or a tablespoon of oil for a single recipe.Oil cost for this single serving=15-20cents
METHOD
Chop up two of your tomatoes into the smallest bits.with the seeds and all.
Wash the jalapenos and the cut them length wise, de-seed, then chop into very fine bits.
Take around ten olives, wash them, drain them squeeze out slightly all excess water, then chip into fine bits.
Now, peel two large cloves of garlic and then chop into fine bits.
Chop the large onion into fine bits..Use quarter portion of the chopped onion.
Now first , take 1 table spoon of oil in a pan(nonstick pan)
as it starts to heat, add garlic first, then onion and jalapenos,toss around for half a min, then add tomatoes and toss around for 2 min, then finally add the olives and take a pinch of the dried herbs and macerate in the palm of your hand so that you can smell it and then add it to the still cooking mixture.Add a teaspoon of sugar and salt to taste.
now set this sauce aside.
now take a handful of dry pasta or a handful and half more of pasta, Boil in salted water as per instructions . drain and immediately add to you sauce and toss around.
voila ! pasta ready.
NUTRITIONAL INFO about this recipe
Tomato=carotene,vitamins B,C.Energy in the form of fruit sugars(IF YOU COOK THE HELL OUT OF THE TOMATOES, ALL WATER SOLUBLE VITAMINS WILL BE LOST)
Pasta=Carbohydrates and proteins(wheat contains wheat protein),Carbohydrates are energy giving,Proteins help repair body tissue and also give energy when they can undergo protein metabolic processes in the body.
Oil-source of energy,and also fat soluble vitamins and polyunsatuated fatty acids
salt-replaces the sodium and chloride loss that might have occured in our body
onions-energy source from its glycerine and such.
olives-fair source of plant fat.
( I COULD GO INTO SERIOUS DETAILS OF NUTRITION, BUT DON'T WANT TO.I want this blog entry to be about the recipe,focusing on the cost and simplicity of the filling pasta recipe)
FINAL COST OF A SINGLE SERVING OF TOMATO OLIVE PASTA
tomato cost for one serving would end up being 40 cents.
onion cost for this single serving would end up being 20 cents
Thus jalapeno cost for this recipe would end up being 10 cents
olive cost for one serving would then be 15 cents)
sugar cost for this single serving ends up being 5cents
Herb cost for this single serving 10 cents
Single half tsp=20cents=cayenne pepper cost for this single serving
garlic cost for this single serving=30cents
Oil cost for this single serving=15-20cents
TOTAL COST OF ONE SERVING OF TOMATO OLIVE VEGAN PASTA=
$1.80
IF YOU LIKE THIS RECIPE AND WOULD LIKE MORE RECIPES OR IF YOU WOULD LIKE ME TO MAINTAIN A FOOD-BLOG WITH RECIPES, PLEASE MAKE A REQUEST .
HUGS AND CHEERS.
Email me with your list of ingredients or your budget for cooking and I shall figure something out for you.
If you are a group of teenagers or fresh in college kids and need help with making healthy balanced vegetarian meals that are cheap at the same time,email me with a request
Also, if 12 of you are ready to take instructions and cook , i can do a free weekly vegan class on the blog for ya..k?
Tight hugs!
