Vegan on Food Stamps!! Help please!!?

Question

I was a vegetarian for 9 yrs & 2 months before making the switch to vegan. We're on food stamps. This past month we went day by day with buying our food and we still couldn't last til the end of the month. Now, I do buy LightLife Smart Dogs and I know that racks up the price. But I don't know what to buy to lower costs. We don't have a working stove because one of our cats constantly peed on it and ruined it. I know, nasty. And we can't afford to buy a hot plate. So, I don't know what I can do to cook anything and buy in bulk or any of that to lower costs and us last the month. Help me, please. We get our foodstamp card renewed tomorrow (the 8th)

Answer 1

Safeway has an awesome vegan/genetarian section, most of which can be microwaved and purchased on food stamps. Im hoping that is helpful. Good luck to you!

Answer 2

I COOK BROWN RICE IN THE MICROWAVE ALL THE TIME.

Use microwaveable container. There are rice cookers. If you don't have one or can't afford one use any suitable container that you can loosely cover. Needs to allow some steam out.

Times and power settings will depend on individual microwave and on container used. You will need to experiment a little.

3 to 31/2 cups water to 1 of rice.

On full power bring to boil. (for above amount 5 to 7 minutes for me)

Reduce power to 1/2 of maximum power level or whatever level will give a very gentle simmer.  Some microwaves will need level of 6 to 7 out of 10.

Cook until water is absorbed. Brown rice still takes a long time to cook and could take 20 minutes or more, at times over 30.

If water dries out too quickly (before rice is soft and fluffy enough) carefully add boiling water from a jug to avoid cooling rice down. Always make sure rice is covered.

When finished I find it helps to fluff rice with a fork, fully cover the container and let sit for a few minutes to become fluffier still.

Experiment a bit as rice can be cooked too fast and long and become hard but after trial and error you should become quite an expert. Salt is best added after cooking.

Some of the other grains people have suggested such as quinoa are more whole foods than rice but are quite expensive compared with rice. By the way someone suggested couscous for you but as you probably know this is a wheat product and not suitable for you.

Some people like to soak rice for a few hours or even overnight in the refrigerator and drain before cooking to speed up cooking time.

Answer 3

if you have a microwave you could cook using that.

Answer 4

dont pay for internet..

Answer 5

This is  the most simpering post I've seen here.  You have more than one cat, can't  afford a $10 hot plate, but need to buy some fake meat hot dogs?  What next? You may have to cut back on the American Spirits? Go to a d**n Salvation army and spend $5.  I've seen tons of Microwaves for $10 so a hot plate should be less.

I've been on food stamps.  You need to cook.  I had PLENTY of money for food on stamps.  No one said food stamps meant TV dinners and prepared foods(like Smart Dogs). I lived on beans and rice and veggies and actually ate healthier than when when I wasn't on stamps.   I also made a lot of homemade soup.  No job at the time so I had time to cook.    

I've known people who have really suffered real hunger and posts like this infuriate me.  People who can't afford even rice or milk.  Women who have had sell their body to feed their children.  Odd thing is, none of them had cats, the internet or a d**n microwave.

Answer 6

My suggestion would be to switch to a raw, sprouted diet. Since you can't have bread products, can you have other whole grains like quinoa? Depending on where you live, you could actually grow a lot of your own food on a back porch/window seal/sunny area of you place. Tomatoes grow nicely in window, and if you keep them in pots you can easily move them indoors during the winter. I kept my basil plant alive during the blizzard months by keeping it next to the back door. I don't know where you live, so the price of produce could be totally different than where I live, but I find that I actually spend less money when I buy fruits and vegetables fresh rather than buying packaged foods. For instance, a bag of potato chips $3.29 and a pound of potatos is $1.99. You could possibly cook rice in the microwave if you got it up to a boil and then heated it for another 10 minutes or so after its boiled.

If you can have other hearty grains like couscous, quinoa, etc, I would suggest those instead of rice. They have more protein per cup and aren't as starchy. Also, my mom's friend with celiac (can't have wheat/grains) eats a special bread called Ezykiel bread (its a bit pricey, but its a sprouted grain, so its healthier than normal bread anyways)

As for sprouting, you can buy things like dried brown lentils in bulk from the big box stores (costco, samsclub, etc) and then whatever amount you want to use during the week just soak them in water for a few days until they sprout, then mix it with some cut up veggies and a salad dressing and voila! super good healthy salad with more substance than just lettuce.