While I can’t offer you a pretty video, I can offer you my advice from half a year of living on an extremely strict food budget in college and eating very well and very nutritiously (compared to most college students).
That advice is? Poor people Southern Food! (I would toss Indian curries into this mix, but accumulating the proper spices has taken lots of scrimping and saving, but other than that, the actual ingredients are quite cheap)
For instance, my current way to eat for a week:
Red Beans & Rice (Recipe modified somewhat from an Emeril recipe)
1lb Bag of Red Beans - ~$2.00
16oz Package of “New Orleans Style” Smoked Sausage (Andouille) - $4.00
1 tsp of Dried Thyme - a few cents, if you have some thyme handy. Otherwise, go to your “Ethnic” section and buy a baggie of cheap Mexican dried thyme for a dollar
1/2 tsp of Cayenne Pepper - a few cents, if you have some handy, $3.00 otherwise
1/2 tsp of Black Pepper - you’ve got this, right?
1 tsp of Salt - you’ve got this, right?
2 Medium Yellow Onions - $1.00
1 Green Bell Pepper - $0.50
4 Stalks Celery - $3.00 for a whole pack (eat the rest!)
3 tbsp of Oil - you’ve got this, right?
8-10 Cups of Water - Free!
1lb Bag of Brown Rice - ~$2.50
2.5 Cups of Water - Free!
1 tsp of Salt - you’ve got this, right?
1 tbsp of Butter - you’ve got this, right?
Soak the beans overnight in water–just enough to cover them by a couple of inches. Drain them before you start cooking.
Chop the celery, bell pepper, and onions–halfway between a rough chop and a dice (half inch pieces or slightly smaller). Chop the sausages into thin medallions–quarter inch, if your knife is sharp enough. If you like very meaty red beans, go ahead and use the whole package. . . but I usually prefer to use all but 2-3 sausages, then grill/saute the others and eat them on bread with sauteed onions and cheese!
Heat the oil in a large Dutch Oven.
Add the chopped vegetables, cayenne, and salt to the oil and cook over medium-high heat for 5-8 minutes, until the onions are starting to go translucent and the veggies are very fragrant.
Add the chopped sausage, black pepper, and thyme and fry for another 3-5 minutes–stir frequently so you don’t burn the thyme.
Add the beans and most of your water to the pot, stir, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer and cook, covered, for approximately 1.5-2 hours, stirring every 15 minutes. If the mixture is becoming too thick, add more of your water.
When the beans have softened, use a large spoon (wooden or metal, preferably) to mash about half of the beans against the side of the pot. A standard potato masher won’t serve you too well here–the sausage gets in the way. If you have an immersion blender, that should work, too, but be careful not to suck a big chunk of meat into the blades.
After this, continue cooking the beans, uncovered, adding water as necessary, and still stirring ever 15 minutes.
At this point, bring the 2.5 cups of water to a boil in a separate pot, adding the salt and butter. When you’ve achieved a rolling boil, add the brown rice, stir briefly, reduce the heat to very low, and cover the pot. Let the rice cook for approximately 40-45 minutes (until very nearly all of the liquid has been absorbed by the rice). When it’s finished, gently fluff it with a fork.
By the time the rice is finished, the beans should have softened almost entirely and achieved a thick, creamy texture. If you prefer soupier beans, then add more water throughout the process.
You’ll end up with nearly a gallon of red beans and several servings (about 4 for me) of rice–with plenty of rice in your bag to make more. I recommend freezing about half of the beans in ziplock bags–they thaw and reheat extremely well, and it’s doubtful that you can eat the whole pot fast enough!
Serve the beans over the rice. Optional sides include, but are not limited to, Tabasco Sauce as a topping (traditional!), cheese as a topping, and salsa and tortilla chips (the tomato’s acidity complements the dish wonderfully, while the chips add texture. If you’ve made your beans particularly thick, you can even make rudimentary sandwiches or wraps with them–these beans go great with some seasoned ground beef in a burrito!
As you reheat the beans over the next few days, obviously add water to keep them at your desired texture.
The meal is extremely nutritious, low in fat (especially if you only use half a package of sausage per batch–a whole can feel overwhelming), and most of its carbs are of a fairly complex, diabetes-friendly variety. According to Alton Brown, the dish also includes all of the essential amino acids, although his version replaced some of the sausage with hard-to-find cured pork (since the sausage is also pork-based, I assume my version provides the same proteins).
Assuming you’ve got a relatively well-stocked kitchen with the spices and seasonings, then this dish could cost as little as $14 or as much as $28 if you had to buy the oil, butter, and all the seasonings. Seeing as how you’ve got enough beans and rice to have (conservatively) 8 servings, you’re looking at somewhere between $2 and $4 per meal :)
Other “poor Southern” food options include beef stews (tough, cheap cuts of meat braised for hours on end, with starchy veggies like carrots and potatoes added near the end), gumbo (a salty, spicy Cajun soup), and chilli (catch ground beef on sale and keep a can or two of beans and crushed tomatoes on hand at all times!).
tl;dr: I really fucking love cooking. You should, too.
