When I went to Trade School in Toledo I lived on Kraft Mac n cheese with salsa mixed in. I did work at Wendys though so I had creative license at the end of my shift to make whatever I wanted to take home. I'm pretty sure I invented the baconator

Getting older is terrible isn't it? :D:D:D

I have many go to’s like PB&J (whole grain bread, chunky, blackberry), but one of my favorites is a boiler bag of rice and a can of Bush’s baked beans w/onions and some hot sauce. Mix it all together in a Jethro bowl and it is food nirvana! Damn, I want some right now!

My buddy Louie would heat tortillas by laying them directly on the electric burner of the stove and stuff them with chopped up hotdogs and canned corn. It was tough being poor!

Yep, sounds familiar, especially the EL Cheapo frozen burritos!

You Boyz sound like you ate high on the hog haute cusine....

I am wondering if you Boyz ever thought of where you could get Squirrel meat in Tijuana to make a stew?

hahah..

mac and cheese with salsa is actually very good.

luxury!


<iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ue7wM0QC5LE" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>

I know! My wife (girlfriend at the time) thought it was gross.

If I wasn't feasting on burgers and chicken sandwiches after work at Wendys, or eating Mac n Cheese with Salsa I was eating spaghettios or beef ravioli from a Chef that put stuff in a can at grocery stores. Boyardee is a funny last name.

You can do a lot with a baked potato

I still love Chef Boyardee Ravioli! Mom never bought it, so when I got older, I bought it myself, still do. In my younger days, I would eat that, vienna sausage and rice, and vienna sausage with pork and beans.

Sardines on saltines!!!

One of my all time fav winter time bachelor meals was a hot bowl of Campbell's Chicken Noodle soup, added a cut up baked potato, and a few large clumps of Cottage Cheese.
Yum!!!

I was a "latchkey kid" for two working parents so I would come home from school and put together the traditional family dinner roast, meatloaf, turkey, starch, veggies whatever but that did not translate at all to cooking for one in college while poor. it was like starting over.

Worst thing I did was stay with my widowed grandfather in the summer who barely cooked. I learned steakumms on waffles, frozen burritos and carried that into college. When especially poor I would microwave a potato and put mustard on it or cook white rice and sprinkle bacon bits on it.
I knew how to cook a shrimp stir fry but seafood and veggies were expensive and cooking for one went hand in hand with poverty for me.

I was a bachelor for most of my life and developed a few go-to "no cook" cooking recipes.

Cut couple of pieces of bacon into 1/4 wide strips, fry until crisp. Take all but about a tablespoon of the grease out of the skilled. Add 1/4 cup of diced onion and fry until they start to get soft. Dump in a can of Campbell's pork and beans, add the bacon back in, season with a little bit of mustard and Worchestershire sauce.

Kraft macaroni dinner with a can of tuna added.

Cook two cups of penne pasta. While it's cooking put some olive oil in a skillet. Add half a chopped carrot. Dump in a can of diced tomatoes. Dump in the pasta, add some parmesan, eat it out of the skillet.

Browned hamburger with pork and beans dumped on top. Add a little barbeque sauce if it's a special occasion.

Avacado stuffed with tuna salad.

^^^
Yes.
Avocado stuffed with Cottage Cheese. ;)

I did not meet my wife until my late 30s and I got married at age 38 so I had a long period of bachelorhood.

After I bought a house on a single income I realized I was "married" to the house. Most of my income went to house payments, and household expenses. I stared shooting weddings as a second income and that helped a ton.

Anyway, I learned a cast iron dutch oven with a small cheap rump roast and lots of taters and carrots cooked for hours made the carrots and taters and onion darn tasty. Eat all the carrots and taters, add more carrots and taters and onions, cook again with the same roast. After all that, the meat was tender and pretty good.

One of my favorite go to cheap meals was a whole chicken. I used my large Green River Works knife to slice the chicken in half. Every chicken I got had that gross colostomy bag inside the chicken that I just threw away. Throw the halved chicken on the outside gas grill with the burners on low, and the chicken on the other side so the flames are on the side with no chicken dripping on it, no flames. 20 minutes turn, 20 minutes turn, 20 more minutes. EAT. Chickens were under 3 bucks back then.

'twas a time when peanut butter on toast was my idea of a hot meal. In college Raman or spaghetti were the staples.

Cooked and plump Costco deli chicken is $5.
Notice cooked supermarket chickens in the same packaging for $7...
they look like they died crossing the finish line.

Pasta and ground beef.
Then get creative with whatever else you want to throw in.