West Virginia Sucks

[DaShi]

Paprika...

I lace everything with paprika. Even my cocaine. Especially my cocaine.

[Dinner]

And no one gives a **** what you spend on food, Marie Antoinette!

Wow, so now having a job and working for a living makes me an elitist? You really should just join your food stamp conniving friends, Al.

[Dinner]

I love how Al thinks there is a huge difference between $147 per month and $200 per month.

[Elok]

I don't think Marie Antoinette had strong feelings about "the best hot dogs." IIRC she was nowhere near as snobby or callous as she's remembered, either, but that's neither here nor there.

Forget about steak, for the moment. Just look at bread. Cheap bread is CRAP. Utter crap. Wonder bread is half air, and you can mush it around like silly putty. Even if, for some reason, you actually prefer such rubbish to good bread, food-stamp-man doesn't have a choice. He's eating the unnatural rubbish, or some equally insubstantial "whole-wheat" equivalent if you prefer, regardless of his preference. Diminished choice. Even more so with meat and seafood. And cheese. Do you like aged cheddar or American oil-based cheeselike product? Either way, you're getting the latter. If you're able to appreciate brie or bleu, ha, you can just forget it. Even milk will cut into your budget on $5.something a day.

[The Mad Monk]

I suppose it depends on how you define good bread. I'm very frugal about food I prepare myself (my rice cooker sees a lot of use), but a couple extra bucks for a tasty multigrain is always worthwhile. I think you're overestimating the cost.

[Dinner]

"Let them eat steak"

I'm comparing good food to survival food. Al seems to think survival food is high on the hog where as if someone actually gets to spend $1.11 more per meal is something I would think is good. He, on the other hand, thinks it's excessive and should be cut.

[Dinner]

Frugal living

My mother used to have these guides that were for mothers to squeeze every penny out of their activities. I read them as a younging and learned the value of frugality. Saturday used to be coupon day for my mother. She'd collect as many circulars as she could and go through them, circling the best coupons and I had to go and cut them all out and she would catalog them in her coupon box thing. From kindergarten age, I learned the importance of saving.

It served you well... Being almost 30 with no job and no apparent desire to find a job. Well, a realistic desire, I have to add in the realistic part because you seem to still believe the Marine Corp will change their mind and suddenly want you.

[The Mad Monk]

Around here you can get 5 pounds of chicken thighs for $5, not even on sale.

I love chicken thighs.

[Al B. Sure!]

I love how Al thinks there is a huge difference between $147 per month and $200 per month.

Dude, you were wrong! You also mistook the income deductions for the actual benefits. A family of four takes in a few hundred a month in stamps but you claimed it was like $150 because you're always wrong.

[Al B. Sure!]

Even milk will cut into your budget on $5.something a day.

Huh? Milk is $3.99 a gallon. Are you drinking a gallon and a quart a day or something?

I did the GOMAD (gallon of milk a day) thing before but I would never act like that's not an expensive nutrition program.

[Al B. Sure!]

Around here you can get 5 pounds of chicken thighs for $5, not even on sale.

I love chicken thighs.

The local supermarket here sells 10lbs of chicken leg quarters for $5.99

I just don't understand where Oerdin and Elok are coming from. Food is plentiful and cheap in America.

[Dinner]

I can find dog **** in every park. It's plentiful and cheap but that doesn't mean I want to eat it.

[giblets]

I can find dog **** in every park. It's plentiful and cheap but that doesn't mean I want to eat it.

Al does if it means he can afford to sit around all day smoking weed and playing Xbox, apparently.

[Jon Miller]

Depends on how you eat in the US, you can eat very cheaply or much more expensively.

I generally ate (even not eating out) for 10-20 a day.

It is possible, if you are careful, cook, and often cook the same (simple thing), to spend ~2 a day.

If you don't really cook, or don't want to cook simple things (beans/rice/etc), and and want to live on less than 5$ a day, then you are going to eat garbage.

I didn't know you could eat so cheaply until I tried this year (in Brussels, but if anything the US is cheaper for everything but bread.)

JM

[The Mad Monk]

yogurt chicken

5 lbs chicken thighs ($5)

6 cloves (or to taste) garlic, finely chopped ($1)

1 onion, quartered and sliced ($1)

1 TBSP each whole cumin and coriander ($.25) -- crack these between spoons or your palms just before use
--
1 tsp each crushed red pepper, ground ginger (can also be grated fresh, costs a little more), and ground paprika ($.25)

1/2 tsp each ground cinnamon, ground turmeric, and ground black pepper ($.15)

enough oil

2 cups plain yogurt ($1)

1 cup broth or water.

Add oil to pan, heat until spatter hot

Add cumin and coriander, stir briskly until toasted, about ten - fifteen seconds. This will be very aromatic

Add other spices, stir briskly five seconds

Add garlic, stir briskly thirty seconds. Garlic burns easily, if you see any brown go straight to the onion.

Add onion, saute until carmelized. Keep the heat up and the spoon moving, you want this fried, not steamed! You're looking for brown and translucent, not white and translucent.

Add chicken and brown the pieces. Reduce heat.

Add yogurt and liquid. Stir, being sure to coat all the pieces.

Cover and simmer on low until chicken is done.

Serve over rice. Or not.

This particular dog **** will fill your kitchen with a parade of delicious odors while cooking, and fill your mouth with a symphony of flavor when done.

About $9, but serves 5-10.