PASKETTI !!
I've been on a tight budget for most of my adult life. Upon leaving the dorms and having to prepare my own food, I quickly discovered the utility and appeal of spaghetti with red sauce, tuna, and parmesan cheese. That was a workhorse dish for many years.
Eventually, the tuna began to lose its luster and I upgraded to my dad's famous secret spaghetti sauce recipe, handed down through oral tradition to generations of Lord Esquires in a Guatemalan Igloo near the border of Lithuania. The ingredients are none too surprising...tomato sauce and paste, ground beef, onions, garlic, herbs and spices...mushrooms when I can get 'em. But there are some secret ingredients, and of course the proportions are important.
The resulting dish is so hearty that even the cheese isn't necessary, which is good because right now I can't afford to buy it. One batch makes five to six huge-sized entrees, or ten smaller portions, so it lasts for a few days. I jar it, so, even without preservatives, it will keep in the refrigerator for...actually I don't know the upper limit. A week, anyhow. It freezes well, too.
There's nothing quite so nice as being increasingly hungry all day and then all of a sudden being stuffed to the gills full. =)
