Try premade meal replacements like huel lol.
Here’s a tip I learned so very long ago: Never shop hungry.
That being said, I’m really careful about what I buy anyway and plan my purchases so that I end up using everything. Fresh foods can still spoil because I didn’t spot a moldy spot, but that’s pretty rare. Dried foods are great.
Honestly I have little good advice to give aside from awareness and planning, since I am by nature perfectionist about my food and budgeting and can’t relate to the meme.
Bulk make your food. I find that making cooking an “event” you do every week or so is much more manageable than trying to cook your own food each night.
I’m a big fan of soups, stews and chili. I have a large stock pot and I’ll basically make one of those to where it’s almost full. It can take a long time to cook that much food, but it makes tons of servings. Then I’ll freeze 1/2 to 2/3 of it for future meals. I actually find these types of dishes are even better once you thaw them out. Nutrition wise it’s basically a ton of veggies/beans and some meat, so fairly cheap per meal made and super nutritious.
Bodybuilder style “meal prep” is also awesome if you don’t mind having the same meals multiple times a week. I like bulk making brown rice in a rice cooker along with some kind meat or fish and finally then adding in a microwave steam pack of veggies. If you have an Aldi available to you their California blend is awesome and fairly affordable for the convenience of just popping it in the microwave. Shout out to Sam’s Club and Costco who both have bulk packs of frozen meat and veggies to help on cost.
It can get more complicated if you live with others who have different tastes and preferences from yourself. Another hurdle is having the ability to freeze all the excess foods. But when I was single living in my own apartment I don’t think I ever ate more simply and affordably than that. Sprinkle in the occasional “treat” of some kind of takeout and you’re living the good life!
E: This is obviously from a US perspective, but I’m sure my non-us counterparts can substitute in their equivalents where needed.
Planning.
This is actually a real issue for a lot of people. The solution that I found is that you should sit down and write out a meal plan for the upcoming week. Like actually sit down and plan out your every meal and include snacks as well. Then write down the things you need to buy for those meals and snacks. Make sure you only put down things that you actually like eating.
When you go shopping take that list with you, and only buy the things you wrote on there and only buy amounts for the meals you’re planning for. If by the end of the week, you bought too much, then that means there are meals in your planner that you don’t really like. From there, you can refine your list and make improvements every week.
This is probably intended to be tongue-in-cheek, but meal planning is the answer. Block off some time (Sunday evenings are popular), to figure out all your meals for the week, make a list of everything you need to make all the dishes on the menu, go to the store and buy all that stuff and nothing else, make ahead and freeze any meals that you can and do any prep work ahead of time that you can.
Viola: intentional eating, less waste, and always something on hand to eat.
It changed my life in a lot of positive ways.
A slow cooker helps. You can use random ingredients before they go bad easily enough, and you will have left overs so cooking one time results in not having to cook for multiple meals.
- Get a big freezer. It’s really surprising how much delicious stuff you can make just from frozen stuff that can last you forever. Frozen food is also often more fresh and with microwave and air fryer the prep of anything frozen is actually not very difficult.
- Outsource as much as possible. Often it’s really hard to outcompete efficient kitchens. I don’t mean order Uber eats or something but there’s likely a place in your vicinity that does food prep where you can take your food containers and stock up for 2-3 days. You can even freeze some dishes.
Wife and I really did the math because we feared of becoming lazy and it makes absolutely zero economic sense to cook everything at home right now unless you want to treat yourself or live in a very economically unusual places where #2 is not accessible.
Only buy stuff you’re excited to eat
That’s how you get diabetus
Meal planning is number 1.
Being strict with what you buy then so you don’t buy something you have no plan for.
Learn a couple of meals that you can throw anything into so you can use up veg that are just about to go off. Eg ratatouille, stew, curry, etc.
Buy a recipe book with easy one pot meals for inspiration. I find the Internet just has too much and you need to know what you’re doing, plus there’s just too much distraction. Sitting with a recipe book and a pen and paper to plan is way more relaxing, IME.
Buy freezer or shelf-stable microwave meals? You have food that way but it shouldn’t really just “go bad”. At least, not quickly.
Alternately: I can cook 4 iems at once and have a weeks worth of food!
Day 2 update: I ate it all.
Due to a health diet issue I’ve only been buying food I can freeze. Nothing goes bad.
Consider cooking it, then you have something to eat.
I love cooking, just can’t ever get motivated to do it
A couple of strategies depending on the problem you’re dealing with:
- if you don’t have time, make simple meals that minimize prep. There are cookbooks dedicated to this concept and highly recommend picking one up. “30 minutes or less” meals were a god send for me in college.
- if you don’t like the food you’re eating, explore new types of food. This is often a more expensive endeavor as it may require you to buy new spices, cookware, etc. again, cookbooks are a great help here. Most Americans eat a combination of Italian and Mexican food. Try making your own Chinese or Indian food.
- if you are lazy, consider a food prep day. I do food prep on Sundays and makes cooking through the week much faster and easier. Also helps to cook large batches that can refrigerate and reheat in the microwave or toaster oven. Make dishes that taste better with age. Chili, marinated dishes, etc. fall into this category.
- if you’re too lazy for that, then eat out and don’t cook. If you value not wasting food over your money, then this is the best choice overall. It’s the most expensive option but if you’d rather not cook and have the resources to just eat out, then do so.
Lack of motivation (assuming you’re not neurodivergent) often is a result of not having a plan or you find the activity tedious. If it’s the latter, I’d go the simple route and try to keep your cooking as easy as possible. This is essentially true if you’re new to cooking.
If it’s the former, consider meal planning. I plan my meals a week in advance, taking into account left overs I already have, left overs I’m planning on making, food I need to buy, and other factors.
If you’re neurodivergent, I’m hesitant to provide advice as I am not a doctor but I suggest talking to your therapist about it and seeing if they can help you.
Have you considered cooking simpler dishes that require far less work?
Here’s a simple one:
- Brown one 1lbs of ground beef (takes about 10 minutes) in a skillet
- pour off the excess liquid fat (not down the drain of your sink. Put it in a container and throw it in the trash if you don’t plan to use it for another recipe_
- Add 3/4 cup of water to the meat in the skillet
- one pouch of this:
Stir the contents of the pan on and off for about 2 minutes.
You now have a 1lbs of taco meat.
Empty a bag of lettuce into a bowl. Scoop out the taco meat and put it on the lettuce.
Sprinkle cheddar cheese on top of it.
You’ve got taco salad and it took you a bit less than 15 minutes.
Sounds like you have an answer.
I finally found the answer to all problems in my life: just be motivated to do things. I’ll start tomorrow…well, next week at the latest.
I only buy fresh stuff if I’m going to cook it that day, otherwise frozen or canned. Then I also always buy food that takes little to no preparation and/or make a lot of anything I’m making when I have motivation and freeze that for the days (which are most days for me) when I’m stuck with no motivation. So I always have some food that’s easy to make or just heat up that won’t go bad (at least within a few days). I can’t say how it is where you live, but here in Sweden there’s been a great increase in the variety of frozen veggies etc. Stuff I’ve never seen before like many kinds of beans, mushrooms, avocado, some salad types etc. which is awesome since they keep for much longer.
We cook and eat the food.
Go away, you tankies with your common sense
