Peanut butter

Hey my dude, you need some recipes and some mental health. Im happy to help on both fronts if you need.

Eggs and potatoes are easily the two most versatile substances on the planet, other ingredients to make them into things are actually equally as cheap, spices look expensive until you realize that $4 lasts up to 6 months. To add to that, I was once an incredibly picky eater and found personally and through feeding others that, outside of phobia and dietary constraints, the majority of food preferences is based on a history of bad cooking. Give me deets on your dietary limits and I'll give you every recipe I know. If there's anything you're willing to experiment with, I'll teach you everything you need to enjoy it. Anything from dry beans, to tofu, to grinding your own amaranth or acorns for flour.

If you're in the western world, mental health services are decently accessible, even in the US without insurance. Shoot me a DM me your location and situation and I'll do all the leg work, all you'll have to do is make the appointment.

As for the information provided, the recipe that springs to mind is cheese gnochi bites.

You'll need 3 large russet potatoes 2 eggs 1 cup shredded chedder or other strong cheese 1 cup flour Salt, pepper, garlic to taste Oil to fry in

Microwave the potatoes until baked, immediately shock in cold tap water and peal by hand. (fantastic trick for any mashed potatoes as it not only takes less time but does not add any moisture leading to fluffier potatoes)

In a large bowl, mash the potatoes and add the cheese, mix so that the cheese melts and spreads evenly.

Once incorporated, feel mix, if still hot, let it cool until luke warm or cool to the touch then mix in the eggs and spices.

Finally, add flour until it holds together when scooped.

Heat oil on medium in either a pot or skillet depending on oil availability and intended shape.

If using a pot with at least an inch of oil, scoop a glob of potato with a spoon and use another spoon to scrape it into the pot. Fry until golden all the way around.

If using a skillet with shallow oil, put the glob in the pan and gently press it flat leaving some thickness. Then flip like a Patty when golden.

If you have access to gallon bags, you can put the mix in the bag, cut off a corner, and squeeze the mix into the fry like a piping bag. Either making dollups for deep oil or doing a tight spiral for shallow.

Let cool on a wire rack but eat warm. Oil can be strained of bits and stored to fry with later.

You can also add extra cheese and cook in an air-fryer but the texture won't be fried so much as baked. The extra cheese gets more oil in the mix to help the exterior crust up.

Fry potatoes, boil potatoes, bake potatoes... They will taste very differently. Use seasoning. Don't be shy on salt/pepper/whatever your culture uses. Eggs can be very different too besides fried or boiled: soak bread with egg and fry it. Very tasty. Add some flour or whatever you have in the fridge to make an omelette. Not a fan of cheese, but I am sure there are many ways to use it too.

Source: I had to manage on 30$ a month and still managed to build muscles.

Lentils and rice. They are both dirt cheap. They complement each other as they have a different type of protein. If you throw some carrots in there you have a more tasty meal. Add some salt for taste.

Oil is more expensive, but a must. Oil is 9 kcal per gram, carbohydrates and protein is only 4 kcal per gram. So even if oil is twice as expensive per gram it is still cheaper. It also makes you full for longer.

Ideally if you want to actually have a healthy and good tasting meal. Then add some dry boullion and some frozen vegetables. Potatoes is also an option. It is still dirt cheap, but slightly more expensive.

Potatoes are actually super filling per calorie, one of the first and best foods I recommend for weight loss. The potatoes/eggs/cheese combo is especially filling, basically you’ve dialed into a budget conscious survival meal.

But you need to gain weight without spending much more money. What do you have to cook with? Knife cutting board pots pans stove?

First great option is soup. Pre fry aromatics directly in the pot (carrots, celery, onion, whatever you can get). Be HEAVY with oil, I recommend light olive oil. Heavier than you probably think with salt too. Then add mass (potatoes) and water. Dried lentils and split peas don’t need to be soaked overnight, just add them in and let them simmer for the last half hour. Tons of cheap calories and seasoning. Season with anything you have.

Then get into white rice. There’s a cost barrier here but if you can save up enough for a large 20lb bags the cost per meal is extraordinarily low. Tons of calories and doesn’t really fill you. Have it with the soup or as a bed under other veggies. Overdoing it with the rice can cause some health issues relating to blood sugar but it’s an extremely easy and cheap way to add 2-400 calories to a couple meals a day.

Check clearance for oily sauces. This is basically the reverse advice compared to weight loss - a lot of innocuously small jars can easily contain over 2,000 calories. If you can get them at 25% cost that’s a ton of weight gain potential and will help give you flavor variety and make your meals more calorific.

Just a few thoughts. Wish I could help, I know this situation sucks

Hi I have basically the same problem.

a) take a fucking multivitamin before you get fucking scurvy (til dv vitC of potatoes), anemia, rickets, Wernicke's encephalopathy, or some other crazy shit in 20 fucking 26.

b) find a high calorie protein shake you can stomach enough to keep down. If you're only eating like one meal a day anyway you can splurge a little on something premixed and tastier. There's a weirdly ritzy gas station chain near me that does a lovely strawberry banana smoothie that sits real well on my stomach, and I always get the yogurt scoop and protein shot.

c) start mixing your white sauces (anything that would normally have mayo, sour cream, or runny white cheese) with plain greek yogurt to give you a better fat / protein balance to all those carbs.

d) oh and you need metamucil. Desperately. Food that is both tasty and inoffensively bland is almost by definition low in fiber. And tbh you might find giving your bowels a good scrubbing may affect your appetite for the better.

One of the pillars of Spanish cuisine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_omelette

https://www.themediterraneandish.com/spanish-tortilla-recipe/

For calorie dense you can't do better than fat. Oil might be 'expensive' but it is one of the cheapest things to buy on a per calorie basis and you only need a teaspoon to fry an egg or make mashed potatoes taste half-decent. You would be surprised how much better potatoes and eggs can be with a little fresh chill pepper or coriander if you can find it. The better it tastes the easier it is to eat. One more tip... Canned condensed milk. It's cheap, calorie dense and delicious. A spoon a day will last weeks. Delicious in tea and coffee. Good luck!

Have you tried eating more butter with your bread and potatoes?

First, if you can, try eating the potatoes with the skins. Less food waste, less time peeling, and it's where most of the nutrients and fiber are.

Next, consider something like canned beans. Not "baked beans" because those are mostly sauce and honestly kinda gross. Like a can of black beans or chickpeas or red beans or black-eyed peas. You can season them however you'd like, but they're good plain too. Versatile and can pair with almost anything. High in protein and fiber. And they're affordable.

Another option is dried beans which are the cheaper option per bean but they're more work to prepare because they need to soak. Lentils don't need to soak though, and a pound of dried lentils isn't too pricey.

If you can afford whole grain bread, it really does have much more nutrients than white bread. If you have a high metabolism, your body is just going to burn off all the empty carbs from white bread. Butter can add some easy fats too.

Oatmeal is another affordable option. Not the packets. Get the giant cylinder of instant oats. It'll last you many meals, and all it takes is some hot water. You can adjust to your preferred consistency, whether you like it thick and clumpy or a bit more soupy is up to you.

If you can eat nuts, find one you like and get a big bag of them. Larger quantities are usually cheaper by weight. Walnuts are pretty affordable. Lots of omega-6 fatty acids. You can even crush them up and put them in your oatmeal if you like that.

If you're not opposed to poultry, you can get a carton of chicken broth and drink maybe half a pint of it at a time. Heat it up first of course. It's very gentle on the stomach and can stimulate an appetite. Also provides lots of good fats which are what your body needs if you want to put on weight and keep it on.

If you don't eat meat, then vegetable or mushroom broth could do for stimulating appetite, just be aware that the fat content will be lower.

That's mostly what I can think of. If you have troubles with digestion you might want to consider live foods/probiotics like yogurt, miso, stuff like that. A little bit pricier but it can make a big difference if your GI tract just doesn't feel right. And again the larger containers are usually cheaper by volume.

please buy some fruits and vegetables from time to time. Actually a lot of time. Different vegetables and fruit. Some nuts too. Eating the same meal every day is very unhealthy and can have very bad l andasting consequences for your health, especially in combination with stress (i know this from my personal experience of being poor and autistic unfortunately). And "hunger pains"? This is already very not ok.

Maybe start a gofundme campaign to at least temporarily somewhat mitigate the money problem? I'll gladly send you a few bucks, if it helps you avoid what i got through.

As someone who's been cooking every meal with what is largely the same four to five ingredients for the past six months due to the economic situation here, I can say with confidence that varying preparation methods and spice profiles is key to thriving in spite of repetition.

Potatoes like the ones in your picture? Use them to make something akin to boxty: https://donalskehan.com/recipes/boxty-irish-potato-pancakes/

Unless you're planning to make mash, though, you might benefit more from a method other than boiling your potatoes. Baking is far less effort and if you don't feel like sticking them in the oven for an hour, you can microwave them for 6 minutes or so in a 1,000 watt microwave (if theyre still not soft, use more time).

What kind of bread are you working with?

Eggs, potatoes, cheese, and "bread" (traditionally tortillas, but wheat flour is wheat flour) are primary ingredients for a breakfast burrito. Splash of cumin, pinch of paprika, garlic powder, onion powder, and salt (maybe a tiny pinch of chili powder, cilantro, oregano, annato, and coriander if you have them, or lime juice, or tomato) if you can squish the bread flat and warm it in a pan a little you can slightly crisp up one side for texture and make an improv breakfast burrito sandwich.

Polish https://eatingeuropean.com/authentic-polish-pierogi-potatoes-cheese/

Or even

Japanese https://www.kaveyeats.com/hokkaido-potato-cheese-dumplings-chizu-imomochi

Kitchens have been known to make potato cheese dumplings. Make the innards and serve as a spread on pan-fried (low heat) bread if you can't make the dumpling exterior. (Edit -- just saw that you said you're from an eastern european country and I just recommended dumplings. LOL. That's like asking an american if they've ever eaten a hot dog. I feel a tad silly. )

Italian potato frittata: https://cookingitalians.com/the-classic-italian-potato-frittata/

I'm sure someone has reccomended a Potato cheese omelette, but you can do those lots of ways, from a souffle omelete (separate eggs, whip the whites into stiff peaks, then fold in the yolks so it's super fluffy) to gyeran-mari type rolled omelette https://www.koreanbapsang.com/gyeran-mari-korean-rolled-omelette/

Got sugar? Tired of eating bread in bread form?

French Toast Casserole: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/240502/easy-french-toast-casserole/

I'll edit the post to add more if I think of them, but I'm not awake yet.

Edit -- just read your comment about the sugar tax. Boo :(

And about boiling being cheaper. (which is weird to me because boiling water is one of the most energy expensive methods of cooking when i go camping, but that might be due to wind, and as you said, circumstances are different in your area of the world, so boiling it is )

I saw rapeseed oil mentioned, got any other ingredients handy that you're willing/able to use without causing family strife?

Even seemingly minor ingredients can make a big difference.

I'll see what I can come up with for ideas.

The biggest thing you can do is to make the food you eat more enjoyable and eat more of it. I would have no appetite and starve if i had to eat your diet. The good news is that it's possible to eat a lot better, but still very cheaply. Also you really need to eat two or preferably three or even four meals daily if you want to gain weight.

I would remove eggs and cheese as they aren't a good value. Add black beans, chickpeas, and lentils, which are good over rice (very cheap, especially if you buy them dry in bulk). Pasta too. Add spices, cheap hot sauce, tomato sauce, etc and it becomes a good meal. Try oatmeal for breakfast too. I would also make sure that you are getting as many fruits and vegetables as possible (apples, bananas, carrots, lettuce, broccoli, etc. not too expensive but will complete the meals and provide good nutrition). Also consider pan frying the potatoes - it's tastier than boiling.

At risk of going off-topic, exercise?

I don’t mean run marathons, but just stuff at home. Knee push ups, sit ups, squats, standing on your toes, sitting in a chair to lift your leg with your biceps; whatever you can manage until you are little winded.

You will gain some weight, keep more of the calories you ingest, and eating will feel better too.

I’d recommend some beans too. I like black bean bowls with rice, and both are cheap.

Someone recommended you setup a donation link for a more varied diet... I second that.

Have you had your Vitamin B1 levels checked? Asking for two reasons, one is your diet seems like it would be low in thiamine, the second is thiamine deficiency can cause or exacerbate a lot of conditions that cause low or no appetite.

Like half of America is thiamine deficient, so I am sure the supplement would be helpful to you. If you DM me I would buy it for you.

cheese and joghurt is a good source of protein. try to eat a lot of protein and do muscle work out to not only gain fat mass but lean mass aswell. because if youre ana it might be that your body already "consumed" a lot of your muscle mass to retain enegery.

Have you heard of ARFID? A close family member, as well as my close friend's autistic child have this disorder. Low appetite and the visceral reactions to various food items are common with this disorder

Depends on how much you eat. If you have some idea of what your "ideal" calorie consumption per day is, your goal is to eat more than that. Bread is easier than potatoes because it's more calorie-dense, i.e. you don't have to eat as much of it.

You don't really have to "cook" as in dirtying a lot of pans to make potatoes and bread more appealing.

• Nuke a potato and add salt and butter, and maybe a sprinkle of garlic and onion powder. Only takes a few seconds more than a plain potato.
• Get a big jar of jam and have butter and jam on your bread. Minimal effort, way more enjoyable.
• Low-effort grilled cheese sandwich: Put a slice of cheese between 2 pieces of toast, nuke 10 seconds, boom.

Nicotine and Metabolism

I've known people in shockingly similar situations that turned their life around by quitting smoking. Mostly from money savings, weight gains, and they, eventually (after withdrawal symptoms went away), got a lot less irritable and felt sick less often.

How about bananas? If you can get yourself to eat a banana some time during the day separate from your main meal, that's all bonus. Plus it's got lots of vitamins you definitely need.

Corn and corn meal are also cheap and high energy. Grits are a poor person food staple in parts of the world for a reason.

Onions aren't the highest energy density veggie, but they are cheap and make other food taste MUCH better. Green onions in particular are one of my favorites. The best part is you can take the green onions and put them in a glass on your window sill with an inch of water. Trim the tops and cook with them. They will keep growing back for quite a while, so very cost effective. Just make sure you change the water every couple days so they don't get slimy.

Are you eating these unseasoned straight out of the water they boiled in or was this taken during the process of cooking? Because I'd suggest some spices. Can make potatoes & eggs taste a lot of different ways with a few spices.

Egg or potato salad is decent & cheap if you can get your hands on some extra ingredients. Egg Salad Sandwich used to be one of my go-tos and you can literally make it with just egg and mayo/mustard if you wanted to (but I'd recommend adding spices & pickle)

Would add beans to your list of things to eat since they're also pretty cheap, filling, and would help you out with protein, which from your post, it sounds like you may be lacking.

The only thing you're really missing is some pulses/beans/legumes, and some more veg.

Buy yourself some more grains (jumbo oats go well as a porridge, they go well in soups, and you can use them to make flapjack (250g oat, 125 butter, 125 sugar, 3 table spoon of golden syrup, mix flatten in a tray bake at 200c for 15-30 mins, or in a covered pan on the hob), energy dense and can have other stuff added (dried fruit, ginger, choc chips, etc))

You could also add pasta and rice as two other carbs that effectively cost next to nothing, lentils and beans can give you the protein that you need, alongside the eggs

And buy an A-Z multivitamin+mineral if you don't have them already, if you're malnourished you won't be feeling great to begin with.

Keep tins of tomatoes and beans around for when you do feel adventurous

Try lentils and Dahl if beans don't agree with you

Find a local Asian/Indian supermarket and stock up on essential spices: ginger, cumin, pepper, paprika, chilli flakes. This is how the rest of the world doesn't become bored living on potatoes/rice and lentils

I am the same as you, I eat 1 meal in the evening and don't have an appetite for the rest of the day

Tried that. Cheap beer is what finally slowed down my metabolism enough.

But peanut butter is super cheap per calorie, and is super calorie dense.