Inexpensive, low-calorie foods keep your diet and food budget on track. Fast foods and sugary and salty snacks add too many calories and not enough nutrition for your food dollar. The truth is that when you shop for low-priced foods, you often get less fat, sugar and salt than you find in more expensive packaged brands.
You can find low-cost snack, grain, fruit, vegetable, dairy, meat and fish products that have about 100 calories or less per serving. Eat smaller portions of those that tip the calorie scales and buy larger amounts of foods that are cheaper in bulk. You may be surprised to learn how many low-calorie foods are within your means.
Plant-Based Foods
Some low-priced, generic ready-to-eat cereals, including puffed rice (56 calories per cup) and puffed wheat (44 calories) are much lower in calories than brand names, but check the package labels, because many are not. Bakery outlet and homemade bread-machine breads (one slice cracked wheat, 65 calories) beat store prices and provide low-cal toast or open-face sandwich ingredients. Tortillas (one large, 100 calories) can also be bought with volume discounts.
Canned tomatoes (1 cup, 41 calories) are bargains; peanut butter (1 tbsp., 94 calories) provides a cheap alternative to deli meats; and popcorn purchased in bulk makes a very low-cost snack (1 cup air-popped without butter, 31 calories). Lettuce (1 1/2 cups without dressing, 105 calories) costs little year round, and fresh low-cal apples, blueberries, strawberries and blackberries are cheap in season, especially when picked yourself.
Dairy and Drinks
Dry milk (1 cup, 83 calories) costs little and is easy to keep on hand. String cheese sticks (1 oz. mozzarella, 86 calories) are low-cost snack alternatives to fatty chips and beef sticks. Store-brand cream cheese (1 tbsp., 50 calories) can also be low priced.
Inexpensive lemonade mix, reconstituted (1 cup, 72 calories) has half the calories of carbonated cola drinks. Frozen fruit ices (one popsicle) cost little and only contain 47 calories. Sparkling water or club soda costs less than flavored soda pop and contains no calories.
Animal-Based Foods
Low-priced breakfast meats and eggs (one poached, 71 calories) have few calories when eaten in limited quantities. Bacon (three slices, 103 calories), pork sausage (one patty, 92 calories) and Canadian bacon (two slices, 86 calories) can also be used to flavor main dishes.
Chicken hotdogs (one without bun, 100 calories) and chicken drumsticks (one leg, 76 calories) can create less expensive meats. Canned tuna and fresh sole (3 oz., 99 calories) represent cheap, low-calorie food sources of protein. You can buy canned shrimp and fresh perch, haddock, pollock, cod and orange roughy when on sale and enjoy inexpensive entrees that contain under 100 calories.
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