Nothing makes you feel more American than spending your $4.50 a day food budget on one iced latte. In the states, that barely makes a dent. But when you are on the World Race, make sure you appreciate that drink because it just became your breakfast, lunch, dinner, brunch, linner, dessert, and a midnight snack. That is obviously a bit dramatic considering I have used my personal money to eat and drink out on the race, but some people make the choice not too! Look at that amount of self-control I will NEVER have. If you are trying to budget or even eat healthier, check out what my small team did this month to properly utilize our funds and make it fun!!
Pick your proteins and make them universal
This one is huge, but pick your staples and base your meals around them. Rice, Peanut Butter, Eggs, Butter, then for your proteins, we stuck to chicken and ground beef. We made BBQ Chicken, Meatballs with pasta, grilled chicken, burgers, etc. and when people did not want to eat that meal, they took their portion of the meat since we split the cost and made whatever they wanted! It was perfect because everyone had a say and it was meals most people can get behind and enjoy.
Buy fruits and veggies cheap and locally
We had a local market but usually, in the states, organic market fruit might be more expensive unless it’s changed since I have left! But in Africa and in different countries, it is crazy cheap! For the people who wanted to go in on fruits and veggies, we would buy in stock to even get a discount. Bananas, apples, oranges, carrots, onions, peppers, and all the good things. Try that out before going to the grocery store.
Find your food buddies
We might have the craziest group of eaters in my small team. One of us is dairy-free, gluten-free, tree nut-free, and egg-free. One of us is just gluten-free, but joined in on team dairy-free as well. Then another one of us decided to join in on anything to live a healthier lifestyle. Then we have people who eat whatever and prefer Pringles and Pizza (which is totally cool but imagine trying to find a restaurant to please everyone?!). So the three of us who decided to cut basically everything out went in on different stuff together, will split different meals, and go out together to the same restaurants. Try to find your buddies so you can save some of your budget. If you and your friends are big on popcorn or whatever, buy in bulk and split the cost.
Plan and Participate
Another thing we did well was discuss what each meal would look like. We would make enough for one meal to last two meals then plan at least two meals in advance. We made a bulk order on our meat and everyone paid for that then discussed the little things after the fact. We would decide, “okay let’s do BBQ chicken then meatballs so we need BBQ sauce and pasta sauce, what sides does everyone want?!” I loved having the conversation and feeling like it was a team effort because someone may have an amazing idea that could be more affordable, so listen up!
Divide and conquer
We were also very good at separating and making each person’s portion a fair amount. Since we bought rice in bulk and it was cheap, we always added that to a meal to fill people up more in case the meat wasn’t completely doing it which will happen on a budget like this. We get like a bowl of food then we can add whatever else like rice to it! Be respectful of your team and they will respect you too!
This made me fall in love with cooking again because it was fun, easy, and it was stuff people actually enjoyed. We bonded a lot through this, even though the beginning was stressful. It is possible to live off this budget each day if you decide to go on the World Race, but allow yourself a latte every once in a while too.
