I HAVE MOVED

http://allergies4less.wordpress.com/ Find the extended beauty at Wordpress. Sorry Blogger, I just felt we were growing apart. Nothing personal, these things just happen.

Not Your Average Tesco

• Lets get dirty and talk about Shopping and Money.

Income may be incoming from all sorts of places: parents/work/grant/savings/cheeky steal.

Whatever the source and whatever the amount, you always have to eat. And plan to eat. You may think the cheapest 

option is a two euro deal from King of Burgers but really the fat is addictive so in about an hour you’ll want another or something sweet. 

The cheapest way to feed yoself is doing A Shop. Weekly, so stuff doesn’t have to chance to go off. The cheapest places I have found in Dublin are Lidl, Aldi, Asian Markets (for certain things) the fruit &veg market on Moore St. and the fruit&veg market just off Capel street for bulk buying. 

Asian Markets.

Useful :

- Rice Noodles -

A tasty alternative to pasta that has the consistency of pasta. Under a euro for five to six servings. Choice between sizes. Always check the ingredients just in case.

- Spices and dried herbs-

 Large quantities for 2 to 8 euro. Spices are, I admit, kind of still a mystery to me. I know everything taste better with cumin and cjilli flakes. I know sage is nice with lamb and cinnamon is tasty with porridge. Basically everything is better with spices once you (and I) know how to use them. It also makes you look very professional and chef-like if you add a ‘dash of this’ and ‘a dash of that’ while cooking.

- Chickpeas -

 Great source of protein for veggies or for people having a meatless dinner. Handy if you want to whip up some hummus for snacks (warning: involves a blender/soup smusher). Get the tinned rather then dried as they are ready to use straight away and the dried require soaking. In the Asian Market on Mary street you can buy a regular tin for 49 cent.

- Rice - 

My flatmates and I bought a bag the size of a baby for a fiver in September and are still using it. I advise jasmine rice, brown rice or pilaf rice over plain white as they’ll fill you for longer and they’re more nutrilicious. Also, microwable packet rice is gross. Don’t do it unless you’re sure you won’t remember it the next day.

- Lentils -

 Good for soup or a bake, bit of a drag to cook. Under 3 euro for a medium sized pack. Long-lasting.

- Dahl - 

Very filling, apparently easy to cook although the last time I tried the apartment smelt like feet.

- Sweet Chilli Sauce -

Cheap. Authentic. Boom.

- All variations of bombay mix -

The ultimate nibbles, stave off your guests/your own hunger while you’re cooking with these slightly spicy snacks. Involves gram flour (from chickpeas), sometimes lentils, sometimes peanuts, rarely any wheat or dairy.

I have yet to buy any meat or fish from an Asian Market. The chicken feet and jellyfish look  delicious. I’ll let you know when I do.

List of Asian Markets

Asia Market

                   18 Drury St.                     

Dublin 2

asiamarket.ie

Asian Food Co.

54-55 Mary St.

Dublin 1

Tel: 01 878 1099

asianfoodco@gmail.com

Asia Supermarket

59 Capel st.

Dublin 1

Tel: 018729766

So you're a student ...

You are excited, nervous, CANNOT WAIT to have your own place, own room, free of like rules and restrictions and stuff, y'kno?
Firstly. Well done on filling out the form / writing the paper all about how great you are. Well done for studying/cramming/cheating your way in. Well done for the gap year and those roads/walls/ huts you built and that piercing you got or for the LC holiday you organised and that piercing you got. Well done for packing your bags, buying the plane/train/bus ticket and moving out (or not).
Well done on arriving and realising shit. You have to clean. You have to wash your dishes. You have to ... cook.

I can guarantee this won't be realised until the first alcoholic haze is passed. This could last for anywhere between two weeks to two months to, in some cases, never. During this fun and memorable (yeh...) period, starch, fat and sugar will feature heavily in any respectable student diet. By this I mean Take-out. Take-out. Take-out. Oh, and caffeine. This is a grim time. You come out of this initial party haze disorientated, failing and grey. Simultaneously jittery from the sugar consumption and sluggish from the massive kebab you ate last night, college is looking up.

Lets add to this the awkward detail of allergies and it gets a whole lot more complicated. Sadly all our cheapest eats involve two of the most common killas: dairy and wheat.

Typical Student Diet (alco haze and beyond).

Breakfast/Snack

cereal (wheetabix, krave, cookie crisp, shredded wheat, shreddies)
+milk.
toast.
Some brunch variation.
The Fry.

Lunch/Dinner/Snack 

pizza (take-out/eat in)
pasta (many take great pride in the fact they can cook pasta. Invited over for dinner at your mates?   You're eating pasta, probably bolognese.)
Sandwiches, toast, bread plain (flavoured with mould)
ice cream, yoghurt,
chocolate bars, bars of all sorts.

(The headings are just aesthetics. There is no real mealtimes in Student Life. You eat when you are hungry or when you are hungover. End of. One of the joys is finding out that noone will frown at you when you take an overflowing bowl of crunchy nut to bed with you. They might never want to get into said bed with you but who cares, you're living the crunchy nut dream.)

As you can see, not much room for wheat free or dairy free (or fruit and veg).

Also, not much room for anything that takes over fifteen minutes to prepare or any meal that costs over a fiver.

So, I'm here to solemnly pledge to you that I, me, will do my very bestest to MAKE ROOM.

I'll try those weird looking recipes, I'll buy that odd looking cereal, I'll read boring books and skim other peoples blogs (and steal all their design ideas), I'll eat the questionable thing on the menu and be that girl who asks for the gluten free option, All for You, All so You Don't Have To. 

I'll do the hard stuff so you can live and eat like a student: cheap, easy and allergy happy.