Low cost healthy food ideas?

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Sounds like your diet is really high on meat, fat and processed carbs, which means you'll need to replace a lot of it with vegetables and some fruit. The challenge is really learning your vegetables and how to prepare them.

As someone mentioned, stir fries are excellent. You can stir fry just about any vegetable, and in my experience, stir frying reduces the need for meat, for some reason. Eating brown rice with it makes a big difference from eating white rice. If you can afford it, quinoa is really excellent for keeping you blood sugar stable.

One thing you might have to keep an eye on is cravings. If you are used to having a lot of fast carbs, and you suddenly cut them out, you can get some serious cravings that can manifest as a wish for alcohol. Since that is something you struggle with, you need to be mentally prepared for it. Once it passes, you'll feel a lot better. Also, eating a varied diet reduces cravings.

Don't be too hard on yourself if it isn't perfect from the start. Some people function better with making dramatic changes in their life, others need to change one habit at a time.

Making my own granola helps me start the day in a good way. This recipe is full of nuts and seeds, which give you lasting energy and minerals. I cut out the dried fruit (too sweet) and use olive oil instead of coconut oil (cheaper and healthier): http://www.cannellevanille.com/gluten-f ... la-recipe/ It of course doesn't need to be gluten free.

This blog has very good and reliable recipes. The blogger used to be a vegetarian, so she's got good recipes with vegetables. She also focuses on using normal equipment and ingredients, so that the recipes are possible to make in a small kitchen. http://smittenkitchen.com/

This blog is a real gem. The blogger posts very seldom. She seems to be a mad perfectionist. However, her recipes are excellent and focus on a lot on vegetables that grow well in the US, so they might be cheaper than imported or California-based vegetables. You can get a lot of food from squashes Also, the roasted cabbage salad is simple and cheap: http://casayellow.com/

Sorry if I go on, as you can see this is a special interest . That said, I know quite a few people who wanted to start cooking, and they all said the same thing; they didn't know where to start.

Bon appetit!

There is nothing wrong with meat and fat, provided it's healthy fat. Fat isn't the enemy of health, in fact your body needs fat for proper hormone function. Processed carbs are a problem however.

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I seem to thrive on quality protein and fat, with carbs only from veggies and some fruits (mostly berries) and no gluten. My doctor keeps marvelling at my annual blood test results and says they show me 20 years younger

For me, eliminating gluten really did wonders for both mental and physical energy.

I actually heard that animal organs are very healthy to eat, not that I'm going to eat a cow heart anytime soon.

I seem to thrive on quality protein and fat, with carbs only from veggies and some fruits (mostly berries) and no gluten. My doctor keeps marvelling at my annual blood test results and says they show me 20 years younger

For me, eliminating gluten really did wonders for both mental and physical energy.

Any tips on how to overcome the texture of some veggies? (Also how to just eat more veggies?) For example, I want to eat salad... But, the texture. I can't do it, and it makes me want to puke.

Deconstructed salad