I hope y’all are enjoying the long holiday weekend! I thought it would be a good opportunity to round up my Top 20 Recipes for Eating Healthy on a Budget. You see, it’s about this time every year that I start getting serious about eating healthy and working out. No, not because bikinis are rapidly approaching (okay, maybe a little), but because the sudden sunshine and warm air begin to energize and awaken me from the inside out. As soon as the sun starts to come out from behind those winter clouds, I spring to action like a little energizer bunny.
I went through my archives and pulled these 20 recipes (10 meat and 10 vegetarian) that you might find useful if you suddenly become a health monster every spring, like me. “Healthy” is obviously a very subjective term, so take the list with a grain of salt.
My criteria for healthy means: plenty of vegetables and/or fiber, low or no added sugar, and reasonable fat content (lower animal based fats). And of course, what do all of these recipes have in common? They’re satisfying and budget friendly. Enjoy! :)
Meat Recipes
1. Chipotle Chicken Chili
Chipotle Chicken Chili or "C3"
2. Mini Black Bean Turkey Burgers
Mini Black Bean Turkey Burgers
3. Spicy Tuna Guacamole Bowls
Spicy Tuna Guacamole Bowls
4. Curry Beef with Peas
Curry Beef with Peas
5. Slow Cooker Chicken Ropa Vieja
Slow Cooker Chicken Ropa Vieja
6. Greek Turkey Burgers
Greek Turkey Burgers
7. Chicken and Lime Soup
Chicken and Lime Soup
8. Sloppy Joes Plus
9. Sweet n’ Spicy Chicken Bowls
Sweet n' Spicy Chicken Bowls
10. Easy Oven Fajitas
Sheet Pan Chicken Fajitas
Vegetarian Recipes
11. Curried Chickpeas with Spinach
Curried Chickpeas with Spinach
12. Roasted Vegetable Baked Ziti
13. Vegan Red Beans and Rice
Vegan Red Beans and Rice
14. Moroccan Lentil and Vegetable Stew
Moroccan Lentil and Vegetable Soup
15. Spanish Chickpeas and Rice
Spanish Chickpeas and Rice
16. Hot & Sour Vegetable Soup with Tofu
Easy Hot and Sour Soup with Vegetables and Tofu
17. Chunky Lentil and Vegetable Soup
Chunky Lentil and Vegetable Soup
18. Weeknight Enchiladas
Weeknight Enchiladas
19. Vegan Red Lentil Stew
Vegan Red Lentil Stew
20. Mediterranean Farro Salad with Spiced Chickpeas
Mediterranean Farro Salad with Spiced Chickpeas
Want to share your favorites? Feel free to share your favorite recipes for eating healthy on a budget (from anywhere around the web!) in the comments below.
I dugg some of you post as I cerebrated they were handy very useful
Beth, thanks for healthy meals that a budget can handle.
I am looking forward to exploring your web sight and creating meals.
Thank you.
One of THE top posts I have ever read on suggestive recipes. My favorite is the Chic Peas with Spinach. My wife is a huge recipe fan and cook. I will be sending her the link to this post. Thanks for a well-researched and beautiful post Beth. Loved the pictures too. Made me hungry haha:)
Nice website,you can learn so many things from here.
Everybody loves good food. Thank you for sharing these recipes.
Last weekend I tried “CHICKEN AND LIME SOUP”, it was really yummy.
Cheers!!
I really love Mini black bean turkey burgers :) :) I added a few slices of tomato and made a simple avocado-sour cream sauce and I can’t believe it was really tasty awesome recipe Thanks! for sharing this waiting for some more recipes.
Thanks for sharing this amazing recipe, I enjoyed reading this helpful post.
This is a great post – thank you! I too am overwhelmed by all the healthy eating, meal planning, etc. I work full time and have 3 young children – I also don’t have time to spend hours on Sunday coming up with new recipes and a shopping list to go with it, or cook an elaborate meal on weeknights (even though I’d love to!), so I tend to stick to basics and routine dinners – although that’s getting boring even for the kids I love all of these tips – thank you, can’t wait to try them!
I like beans based vegan dishes they are healthy and on budget too. it was quite delighted Mexican food.
I like beans based vegan dishes they are healthy and on budget too. Also Mexican food is a total delight. Thank you for the post.
Once I learned that I could make food at home that was A.) Healthier than eating out and B.) tasted better?!?! welp, it was a no brainer.
Some of my favorite recipes are one pot / one pan meals that are easy, have simple ingredients, and take no time at all :) I’ve started a list of them here: https://joshmuskin.com/category/recipes-for-eating-healthy/ and can’t wait to keep adding to it!!
Very happy to have stumbled across this page so full of good sounding recipes. I’ve made my list and can’t wait to try most of them. My menu has been planned for the week. Thank you, will definately check back for more.
A lot of recipes thank you… I’m gonna live on this site!
thank you for these recipes !!
I’ll try it soon for more
thank you
Lots of new recipe, living in hostel alone, will try all of them this week. Thank you, Budget bytes reduced confusion for this weekend’s dinner :D
My favorite “healthy and cheap” meal is fried rice. You can put a ton of vegetables into it, you can put meat in if you so desire or leave it vegetarian, it doesn’t have to involve a lot of oil if you use water to “waken up” the rice when cooking, plus you get protein from a couple eggs at the end. Usually I don’t end up paying more than $2 or so for a big pan (4 servings) of fried rice.
It’s how I got through undergrad! :P
I like beans based vegan dishes they are healthy and on budget too. Also Mexican food is a total delight.
lots of recipes. i want to learn all. I will try to do all it soon. per item per day. you make me love cooking more
Glad to see the Chunky Lentil Soup on here! My wife and I have been vegetarian for about a year and a half, and I do most of the cooking. Your recipes have been a huge help. Chunky Lentil soup was such a hit, I made it once a week for like 3 weeks after introducing it. It’s gone on our personal menu.
Thank you for all your hard work!
I’ve made the chicken ropa vieja plenty of times and my boyfriend loves it as well. Love any crockpot recipe really but this one is extra special because it reminds me of something similar my mother would make :)
http://www.lacasabloga.com
I never comment on blogs… I just lurk around creepily. BUT I think I have made more recipes from your blog than any other, so I feel I must contribute my thoughts to this post. I’ve only just made your recipe for creole beans and chicken over rice. OMG. I am just a little bit, lot bit, obsessed!! I loaded it up with even more veggies, and it turned out so great! My boyfriend and I have been devouring it all week. Normally, I tap out after eating the same thing more than twice. But me thinks this will be going into the regular rotation (which says a lot because I rarely make anything on a regular basis).
As for the healthiness of it, I think it’s pretty top notch. You can load it up with veggies, fresh or frozen. You could even get away with less chicken (although my boyfriend got mad when I suggested that lol). And if you want to beef it up, serve it over brown rice or barley. Boom. Deeeee-li-cious!
Thanks for posting! It’s nice to hear feedback from a frequent flyer! ;)
I love the list, but see a lot of soups and stews – do you think a Spring/Summer highlights list might be forthcoming? I for one am a huge baby about the heat and can’t stand to add more of it to my life when it’s hot out!
Thanks for all you do!!
Answered my own question! For anyone else looking: https://www.budgetbytes.com/2014/06/hot-weather-recipe-roundup/
I made some spicy tuna guac bowls today because of this post. I had forgotten about them! I did a few little tweaks (quinoa instead of rice and I seasoned my edamame and added some toasted nuts to the quinoa and added cilantro paste and red onions to the tuna) but that is budgetbytes style. All my tweaks were affordable and took little work. These bowls are VERY versatile! I was very pleased to get my guacamole 50% off. Now I have lunch for the next four days:). I had more than enough tuna so I made a tuna melt for lunch.
Ooh thanks for sharing…been trying to eat a little healthier to gear up for a spring break trip to Mexico– so these look delicious!
These recipes sound awesome. If I ever get to live alone again I am going to try them. However I have to stick to the meat and potatoes cooking because I have challenged brothers that only ate my mothers cooking and they won’t try new things. The kids might eat them but I would have to cook something else for my brothers. Might be worth doing. Thanks for sharing all these awesome recipes.
Oh, I was happy to see some of my favorites on here. Thank you for making this post, and making a meatless section!
I really appreciate your definition of ‘healthy’–so often on the internet I feel like anything with cheese or gluten is considered unhealthy, and your site is a good reminder that everything in moderation + lots of vegetables is the key to enjoying your favorite foods in a healthy way. Thanks!
This is very helpful, thank you! <3
Kinkx
You left out one of my favorite recipes found on your blog: Stuffed Poblano Peppers
https://www.budgetbytes.com/stuffed-poblano-peppers/
I made the vegan red lentil stew with Jasmin rice a few days ago and we all loved it. Where we are now into autumn and the temperatures are fortunately a bit lower, I will be trying out more of your hearty dishes.
Hurrah for the Farro and Chickpea Salad! I think that’s just about my favorite of the recipes I’ve made from here.
I’ve only been following your blog for a couple of months but I’ve really been enjoying it, and have tried several of your recipes with great success. I just wanted to post here because I’m wildly curious about your “astronomical flop”; would love to read about a few of the ones that just didn’t work out.
But now I think I’ll go shopping for some lentils!
Hahah, it was supposed to be a pasta primavera, but I didn’t like the combo of vegetables that I chose and the cream sauce didn’t work out the way I wanted it to. ;)
I’m glad to know that even very experienced cooks like you can strike out sometimes. Makes me feel better about my own occasional kitchen catastrophes! My sister introduced me to your website a few years ago and I love it! Thank you for sharing your talents with us. My husband’s favorite recipe from your site is a skillet sausage meal with pasta. He even loves it as leftovers packed for lunch. I love that it has spinach and tomatoes so even my picky husband is getting some veggies!
Believe me, I strike out often. ;) But that’s how you learn and get better!
Looking at these recipes gives me an inspiration, since my sister wants to eat healthy and I’m determined to help her. Thank you, Beth!! :-)
your food look attractive. many dishes. I’ll try to do all. The first will be the spanish chickpeas and rice :)) because I like to eat white rice. :))