Much as I appreciate this is old news and feel more than sure that almost everyone is aware that if on a budget brown bag lunches are the way to go. As home-made packed lunches are not only healthier and way cheaper than anything that you can buy from a restaurant or a store and often much more filling and substantial too - especially as you are not restricted to just eating sandwiches and can make tasty easy to eat - rice, pasta, potato or bean salads as well as quiches, tortillas or mini pizzas too and even turn the left overs from your previous nights dinner into a tasty lunchtime meal with the addition of a few extra ingredients. If you haven't yet tried home-made packed lunches or are like me and always looking for creative easy to make cheap, healthy portable lunch ideas in order to avoid them getting boring - I can highly recommend having a browse through the following site - as not only is it packed full of healthy nutritious brown bag lunch ideas for well under $3 - but the recipe book is free to download too Log In along with this one - which I have found to be a great aid when having to deal with picky, fussy eaters and those with different dietary needs - as well as for ingenious ways of using left overs from the previous night - especially as - just by clicking through the links - you'll find literally hundreds and hundreds of appetizing inexpensive ways to make home-made packed lunches - healthy, interesting and filling - but most of all budget friendly Log In all of which I hope will be as helpful to you as they are to me - but that said - even though there is a huge amount of choice here for every budget as well as every taste - if anyone has any favorite recipes or valuable tips they would like to share - please feel free to do so - as I'm sure they would be more than welcome.
One thing that I liked to take when I was brown-bagging was one pouch of boil-a-bag rice. I got brown rice and brought along some salsa to top it. This was healthy, cheap and somewhat filling. Sometimes I like those tuna kits but these days, I eat at home.
This is one instance in particular, where it does come in handy if you have a membership to places like Costco or Sam's Club,or even have access to a local restaurant food distributor which sells food in bulk - because you can save a lot on lunch meats, which can add up quickly if you are packing your own lunches. Many lunch meats at local grocery stores sell for upwards of $8 a pound, and when you consider that often times a lunch meat sandwich will contain close to a 1/4 pound of meat, that comes out to about $2 a sandwich just for the meat itself, before you even start factoring the cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, rolls or bread, etc... By the time you add everything up, even making it yourself can become expensive too. In contrast, I've seen places like GFS sell entire *loaves* of chicken lunch meat for $20, and they will even offer to slice it for you for free. Similarly, I can buy common cheeses at these places for half the price of what I would pay at a grocery store. Giant Eagle would want like $5 for a pound of provolone, but I can get a 2 lb pack at GFS for $3.99. You can of course also take things a step further and make your own lunch meats from cheap roasts. It's not necessary to purchase your own meat slicer, but it's convenient if you have one, and I've seen them sell for as little as $40.
Well yes ohiotom76 - doing as you described would obviously help keep the cost down - but heres the thing - there really is no need to go to those lengths, spend that much money or be restricted to eating sandwiches only - unless of course you wanted to - which is why I included the links - as they contain literally thousands and thousands of different ways in which to make healthy, filling, interesting and tasty brown bag lunches to suit every taste and every kind of diet - much more economically than you describe
At work I have access to a microwave, so my brown bag lunch is usually leftover past or stir fry and a piece of fruit and some fresh veggies, yogurt and a granola bar. I find that bringing a lunch from home more nutritious and definitely cost savings. I try and make my dinners for under $6.00 for a family of 4. I always cook extra pasta, rice or potatoes and can stretch out that spaghetti dinner for a lunch of two. I find that some meals like soup, chili or stew taste better the next day! I also always bring in coffee or tea from home rather than buy a drink at work. I love the idea of buying in bulk to save money as well. You can buy a large bag of buns, butter them and freeze them so they are easy to grab and go.
