Essential Ingredients For Your Credit Crunch Cupboard!

Every health magazine I look in and website I look at these days dseems to stress that it is important to eat healthily, which is an obvious fact given that over 50% of people in both the UK and US are considered obese. This is obviously in line with height and weight and so is clinically defined rather than by common sense! As you can tell, I do not agree with the way that someone is defined as obese but at the same time we need to maintain our health, especially in these testing times, and there are some essential ingredients that can help you to do that.

There is a danger that more and more people will start choosing convenience foods in the near future because they are cheaper and undoubtedly easier to prepare given that many people will be working as many hours as possible to make ends meet. However, with just a few essential ingredients, you can transform quick and easy foods into tasty meals without resorting to convenience foods and avoid breaking the bank as well.

Black Pepper - Black pepper is an excellent ingredient because it is a thermogenic and will speed up your metabolism, thus burning more fat, but add a lot of flavour to any dish. I love the coarse ground black pepper... delicious in everything from pasta to meat dishes!

Garlic - Garlic has so many benefits that I could not name them all here... the post would be too long! It is extremely healthy and again can add a lot of flavour. Whole cloves are inexpensive so it is a cheap ingreidient but you do not need to use a lot to flavour dishes so it will last a while.

Fresh Fruit And Vegetables - In some shops, fruit and vegetables are expensive but if you try the supermarkets or even grow your own then you will find them incredibly cheap. We grow our own potatoes and onions, and carrots and cabbage are being added to that this year. Dirt cheap, literally! And extremely heathy as well. You will certain get the vitamins and minerals you need. Try Dobies and Suttons for affordable seed and starter kits if you want to save money into the future by growing yor own.

Pasta & Rice - Absolute essentials. You can use both to make standalone meals such as risotto and pasta bakes as well as adding them to full meals. If you have nothing else just make sure that you have these two because they will sustain you and are incredibly cheap. In tough times, it matters not that they are carbs but that they will feed you and your family for next to nothing.