Cooking up a Storm

Your cupboards are empty and you are trying to find recipes involving mayonnaise and half a red pepper on Google. This means you must go to the nearest supermarket and fill up several plastic bags with food to load on yourself like a camel before trekking home. As if this wasn't stressful enough, now you actually have to cook for yourself. Once your cupboards and fridge shelf are gloriously filled, you are on the road to dedicating many Instagram posts to your food you deem to be gourmet but is only really a stir fry (the meal that got me through first year). Other key meals include Spag Bol or, indeed, anything where the key ingredient is pasta.

Just a salad but look how Instagrammable. 

If you do want to cook some healthy meals, you can delve into the realms of the famed Student Cookbook that you've definitely been given by well-wishing family friends. The main problem with this is that you will never have all of the ingredients needed to make even a vague copy of the pristine picture in the book. To avoid this, you'll have to go shopping with the meal you want to make in mind which means one thing: organisation. This is something we students are not world-renowned for so unless you have a deadline you haven't planned for and will therefore organise the 24 hours before that deadline like a military operation consisting of a savage fight for a library computer and surrounding vending machines. However, unless your student cookbook is from Waitrose, none of the recipes will require anything other than essentials (i.e. no Cumin or Tarragon) so what you've managed to buy that wasn't crisps and chocolate should create some sort of meal. Your cookbook will mainly consist of stir frying vegetables with miscellaneous, interchangeable meat and many noodle dishes. Sadly, it doesn't matter how good a cook you are or how well you stuck to the recipe, you will never be able to make the food look as good as the photo even with the best choice of Instagram filter. You will also be stuck with a flatmate who is more skilled than your parents in the kitchen which you will inevitably want to avoid unless they are offering to roast plenty of food for you with minimal charge. Then they are your best friend. It is likely that this all-knowledgeable flatmate will cook with vegetables and salad which automatically makes that internet-friendly. Even a salad garnish will make any meal look infinitely healthier and therefore more Instagrammable (apart from chicken nuggets/fish fingers and chips - I'm afraid that will never look healthy). My only problem with Instagram posts of food is the accompanying hashtags (e.g. #instafood, #instagood and even #instachicken and all other hashtags starting with 'insta'). I also have the problem of eating all of the meal in one mouthful if it was worthy of Instagram because it just looks so damn good before being able to take a photo.

Don't fret if you can only cook up beans/cheese on toast or a jacket potato, Instagrammable meals will come with time and by the 3rd semester, you'll think you're Nigella/Jamie but better because you're a student and therefore cooking on a budget. My flatmate recently discovered Marmite pasta when he had bare cupboards and it's not half bad. So stock up on pasta and noodles and get creative. 

Every Little Helps: The Guide to Student Food Shopping

Gone has the hamper of gorgeous branded food your parents bought you for university which only means one thing: you're going to have to go food shopping. Luckily for me, I like shopping and my Dad hates it so I was the one that went to do the food shop on my ever-useful and ever-educational Gap Yah. However, the food shop will be trickier if you haven't been food shopping since you were younger and you used to have to hold on to the side of the trolley while your parent feared overwhelmingly that they'd lose you. But don't worry help is at hand. All you have to do is follow this guide to food shopping and you'll live through this year.

Firstly, I am in no doubt that you can and will live off food similar to that demonstrated in the photo above for at least the first semester because it's yummy and Mummy and Daddy aren't here telling you not to eat too much sugar (even though they're right) but hey, it's fun to rebel. However, at some dark time over the Winter, probably when you're at home for the holidays and you laugh at how funny a Butternut Squash looks because you haven't seen any vegetable for so long. This sad moment will spark an epiphany that you actually probably hate eating crisps and chocolate and noodles all day and need a change. This change will stem from your shopping and instead of spending all your time in the 'Savoury Snacks' aisle, you may just have to visit the 'Fresh Meat' aisle. Here, you will have ingredients for healthy meals and then you can take photos of your first roast to your doting parents. Be warned, this will now mean you're drafted in to help make the family roast whilst at home and can't have a Sunday afternoon nap anymore. You nap enough anyway, you're a student.

Anyway, key steps to saving money whilst food shopping are:
Step 1 - Write a list and stick to it (as much as possible anyway - it's only natural to lack will power when faced with a chocolate offer)
Step 2 - Make sure your list is sensible and doesn't just comprise of 'Vodka' and 'Beans'. Not a healthy combo and you will regret having empty cupboards when that Vodka bottle is empty.
Step 3 - Don't just get drawn in by huge 3 FOR 2 signs as it may be cheaper to buy things separately
Step 4 - Buy veg at a fruit and veg stall or green grocer as it's cheaper and the veg is much nicer (good for stir frying)
Step 5 - Get a Nectar/Clubcard as you save up so much money on there by the end of term (well spent on vodka)
Step 6 - Say goodbye to John West Tuna or Hellman's Mayonnaise. Basics/Everyday value produce is not always terrible, although I would avoid the Sainsbury's basics mayonnaise. You can stoop that low. And you will. Sorry.

Mainly, make sure you have a list that actually has stuff you want (and physically need) and stick to it otherwise it'll be toast and beans for supper again. That doesn't look so good on Instagram, even with a filter.

Read my Guide to Student Cooking to see what you can do with your lovely purchases.