Eating on a Budget

Everybody Seems to Have a Favorite Struggle Meal

By Micah Smith, Editorial Intern

Growing up, my family didn’t have a lot of my money, but my parents sheltered me from this knowledge. The only time I ever suspected that there wasn’t $800,000 tucked away in our attic was when I’d swing open the refrigerator door. We definitely had more food than we needed to survive, but it was rarely choice cuts and salmon filets. Often it was ramen noodles, hotdogs (in a folded slice of white bread), lunchmeat, bread, peanut butter, jelly, and maybe a bag of chips and some TV dinners inside what was otherwise a pretty barren kitchen. The internet refers to these types of entrées as “struggle meals,” things you eat when you don’t have a lot of money.

I decided to reach out to members of the San Pedro community to see if we have shared experiences and what types of struggle meals they ate during times when things were tight.

“We always wanted cookies and stuff, but my mom only bought real food,” said Sheryl Cateras, whose mother followed the same pragmatic plan for buying groceries that mine did as a child.

“My mom did a lot of rice, chicken and rice, neckbones and rice,” Cateras said. “She’s from the south, so they grew up with a big family.

“We never starved, but we would open the fridge and see the same things in there and close it like, ‘Dang! It ain’t nothing here to eat,’” Cat-

Transfer the rice to a large bowl, ideally a wooden bowl. Then, with one hand fanning the rice, use the flat spoon with your other hand to slice into the rice and fluff it. Always slide it into the rice edge first, and be careful not to mush the rice. You will see the steam flying from the fan. Keep fanning until there is no more visible steam. Pour the sweet and salty vinegar over the rice, and gently slice it in with the flat spoon until mixed.

Let it cool to room temperature.

California Rolls

To roll you will need a bamboo sushi mat, available in large supermarkets, or Asian supermarkets, or online. And a sharp knife. If you want to roll it inside out, you will also need plastic wrap.

2 cups prepared rice, as above, cooled to room temperature

1 package of nori seaweed

1 12-ounce package of imitation crab, preferably in stick form

1 cucumber, peeled and cut into long, thin pieces eras said.

“Grilled cheese!” exclaimed her nephew Brandon over her shoulder.

Nineteen-year-old Carlos Murray shared his experience with struggle meals.

“Sandwiches bro. Two pieces of bread and some ham, then I’d get some chips and put those on the sandwich too,” Murray said.

“We didn’t really have anything, just eggs and bread lying around and ham, so I was just like you know what? I’m going to make some sandwiches, and I’d eat like five of those a day when I was younger,” Murray said.

I recommend putting chips on the sandwich. Nacho cheese Doritos and Jalapeño Kettle Cooked Lay’s are solid choices.

Being a child and rooting around for something good to eat due to not being able to order takeout or go to the store is revisited in university, if one chooses to take that pathway. I am a college student and work to provide food for myself. This is a big responsibility that I need to budget my money in order to maintain. I find myself in the same place when I was once a small child at times, opening the refrigerator door for the third time in an hour hoping a Wendy’s 4 for $4 will appear if I concentrate hard enough.

2 avocados, cut into long, thin pieces

Optional: mayo

Soy sauce and wasabi for serving

In a small bowl, combine ¼ cup each of rice vinegar and water. Use this to keep your hands wet so the rice won’t stick to them. Wet the end of the sushi roll to seal it, and wet the knife to keep the rice from sticking to it when you cut the rolls.

Lay a sheet of nori on a rolling mat. Spread a third of a cup of cooked rice over two-thirds of a sheet, leaving the final three inches blank.

If you want to make inside-out California Rolls, flip the riced nori onto a piece of plastic wrap, atop the sushi mat.

Pull a stick of fake crab in half, the long way along the grain. Lay the two pieces end to end across the middle of the rice, flanked by cucumber, avocado, and mayo. Carefully curl the mat around the sushi so the rice goes all around the contents, squeezing the mat as you roll it a little bit at a time, keeping everything as tight as you can.

Wet the knife with vinegar water and slice each roll into 6-8 pieces. (If you rolled it inside out, peel off the plastic before slicing.)

I’m not alone in this struggle, however. I met Richard McCarthy, a graduate college student who prioritized cost-effective eating while studying at school.

“Pasta sauce, rice, spaghetti, you can buy 50 friggin’ pounds of rice for like $14 today, so it was even cheaper back then,” McCarthy said.

In any form they come in, God’s gift of provisions is an enormous blessing. Eating rice five nights a week out of necessity is still something to be grateful for. It is just easy to lose sight of why you should be grateful while you are experiencing hard times.

“I had siblings, and my mom had three jobs, so we weren’t really starving but sometimes supplies were low,” said Shanar Williams, a man who reminisces on his upbringing very fondly.

“Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with banana, we had to get creative,” Williams said.

Regardless, though, he expressed gratitude for his upbringing and the fact that he never went without.

“Us and our neighbors were so family oriented that we could go to our neighbors if we didn’t have what we needed. I had a good childhood,” Williams said.

My heart was warmed by his appreciative-