Easy meals you can bring to work for under $2

Image credit: Pixabay

Looking for a way to scale back on spending without cutting out on the quality of your meals during the workday. Grabbing lunch out is enjoyable and relaxing, but it also quickly puts a dent in the wallet. Plus it’s not always the healthiest option either. Instead of making a habit of picking up lunch at a local takeout or restaurant, why not try bringing in some of your own lunches? It's cheaper and healthier for you.

The best part is you can do it for under $2 a day.

Leftover dinners

Leftover dinners are a great way to enjoy a full meal for lunch at a fraction of what you'd pay at your favorite restaurant. When you make dinner in the evenings, plan for lunches too. Since you're cooking, you're using the ingredients and resources to cook it anyway, plan to make a little extra. Add an additional piece of chicken, save a square of lasagna and a piece of bread, or toss in some extra potatoes, carrots or other favorite veggies into beef stew. The possibilities are endless. Pretty much any dinner can be expanded to plan for leftovers and this can easily be done for $2 or less. Many meals will likely only cost a few cents to make an extra portion that you can bring to work the next day for lunch.

Sandwiches

Sandwiches are a great way to tap into your food preparation creativity. Even if cooking isn't your thing, there are many easy sandwiches you can prepare. For simplicity, you could purchase cold cuts and still keep it under $2 per day, but cold cuts don't hold as long and you do pay a little more for the convenience than for sandwiches you could make from scratch. Plus, they are heavily processed and typically full of sodium.

Other ideas you can try are to make the standby tuna or egg salad. These are relatively cheap when you make them yourself. Or you can save that piece of chicken from dinner and make a tasty chicken salad. Why not get a little creative and use pitas, flour tortillas or other kinds of bread? Top with some hummus, avocado, cheeses, veggies, olives, fresh spinach or leftover meats from dinner. The sky is the limit, all at a fraction of the cost you'd pay for the same sandwiches at a take-out joint. Easy peasy.

Pasta

You can purchase a box or bag of pasta for $1-$2 and have lunch for the week. There are many things you can do with pasta; you can toss it with veggies and dressing to make pasta primavera, make homemade macaroni and cheese, or you can simply top with tomato sauce and pop it in the microwave it at work. The best part is pasta can be eaten hot or cold, so you have ton of ways you experiment with it to create a well-rounded lunch.

Salads

Salads are another great opportunity to make creative lunches. You can put pretty much anything in your salads and the hardest part is cutting up the ingredients. Other than that, it's fast and easy. For variety, try different kinds of greens or veggies. You can add tuna, hard-boiled eggs, leftover chicken, nuts, sunflower seeds, croutons, beets, olives or pretty much anything you enjoy to vary your salads up a bit. Since you only use a little bit of each ingredient, you can purchase foods that fit your budget and easily keep lunches under a couple of bucks a day.

Buying lunch during the work day gets costly when you add up the money you spend daily. Lunches easily cost $5-$10 when you purchase at a local takeout place, but if you make your own lunches, you can still enjoy great taste at a fraction of the expense for under $2 a day.

Soup

If you make your own soups, the possibilities are endless. Over the weekend, plan to make one of your favorite soups, package them up for individual servings, place them in freezable containers and pop them in your icebox. Each batch of soup could easily make several lunch portions. Some ideas include:

• Split pea soup
• Chicken noodle
• Beans and veggies 
• Tomato leek

A pot of soup can easily be made for just a few dollars and, if you break it down, it will cost you $1 or less per day for a 5-day work week. This is a lot cheaper than purchasing a cup or bowl of soup for a few dollars at a restaurant or deli. Purchase a box of your favorite crackers, a loaf of bread (bread can be frozen also), or use stale bread to make your own croutons to accompany your soups; you'll have several filling lunches. A slow cooker makes it even easier (many good ones can be found on Amazon).

Even if you aren't real handy in the kitchen, you can purchase prepared soups for under $2 and then simply reheat them at work. If you buy larger containers they are cheaper than individual serving sizes. Here's a tomato soup I like to make and it carries well.

Easy Tomato Leek Soup

Soups are typically associated with hours of simmering and a hot stove going all day. Soup also conjures up visions of a cold blustery day. Have you ever dreamed about a soup which is both fast and versatile making it perfect for any season?

This version of tomato leek soup is a variation one of I read long ago in a forgotten magazine, however, the recipe has been modified a number of times over the years to make it quicker and easier. The way I make it now is different than the original.

Ingredients

• 1 or 2 cans cream of mushroom soup. If cooking for several people, you can use a 32 ounce box of mushroom soup. Note: Mostly I have switched it up a bit and I use Trader Joe's Organic Creamy Tomato soup (32 oz box - the low sodium version works nicely too - if I'm making bulk, I use one of each).
• 1 to 2 bunches of leeks, chopped to bite size pieces
• 3 or 4 ripe tomatoes diced
• 4 to 6 nice sized mushrooms (optional)
• 1 shallot, diced (optional - I haven't used it in a while and the recipe doesn't lose anything in my opinion)
• 1 small onion, diced (optional)
• 1 tbsp butter (or olive oil)
• Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation:

Preparation is easy, all you need to do is saute the leeks and onion in the butter/olive oil, and shallot if used, for a few minutes, until tender. When the leeks turn a bright green and the onions start to become translucent, these ingredients are finished in this stage of cooking.

The next step is to add the tomatoes to the pan and simmer until slightly tender. Once tomatoes are ready, add your soup choice and simmer about 20 minutes, until flavors blend. If you like your soup a little thinner, you can add a splash of milk. Additionally, this soup works well in the slow cooker, but be sure to keep it on the lowest setting you can.

Potato variation:

As I mentioned above, this recipe is a versatile one. Other variations that can be tried is omitting the tomatoes and replacing with diced potatoes (or keeping the tomatoes, but a lesser amount is good). Additionally, fresh or frozen mushrooms added to either variation of this soup works nicely.
Tomato leek soup is a great year-round meal. This recipe tastes great warm or cold so you can cozy up with a bowl in the midst of a cold winter's day or enjoy it as a cold soup on a warm summer's day for a lighter fare. Either way, it's a satisfying meal. It costs more than $2 to make, however, if you break it down by serving, it's not expensive at all.

Tip: This soup tastes even better on the day after it's made.
Confession: Sometimes I even eat it cold for breakfast.