Student Special: How To Eat Well On A Budget

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”

So said one of the most influential 20th-century modernist authors, Virginia Woolf, who features prominently in both UCD and Trinity’s English Lit courses. She’s right of course, with good grub a priority for all students who, with a bit of organisation and some handy apps, can eat well on the tightest of budgets.

If you haven’t been able to get to your fave budget supermarket, the Too Good To Go app lets you know which cafés, restaurants, bakeries and stores in your ‘hood have fresh surplus food, which you can snap up at the end of the day for half price or less.

We’ve used the service multiple times and never been disappointed…

We’re also big fans of UNiDAYS, a one-stop student discount site which was recently offering 25% off deals at the likes of Domino, Yo!, Krispy Kreme, Milano, Apache Pizza and Protein Works…

Talking of protein, Protein Pilot, ProteinPic and Protein-X are three of the apps which can instantly estimate protein, calories, carbs and fats from a simple snap of your meal…

Of course, the best way to ensure a healthy diet and save money is – and this might blow a few teenage minds who’ve always had mammy to do it for ‘em – to cook your own meals!

We swear by Charlotte Pike’s The Hungry Student Cookbook which has sage-like advice on stocking your cupboard and making everything from soup, casseroles and fajitas to curries, lasagna and Baileys cheesecake for mere euro.

If the €7.47 Amazon asking price is too rich for you, BBC Good Food's Student Recipes features 118 free to access meal ideas, including a (metaphorically) killer Bean & Haloumi Stew…

When they decided to attend a meeting of Trinity College’s social entrepreneurship society, Enactus, Iseult Ward and Aoibheann O’Brien had no idea that thirteen years later they’d be running FoodCloud, which takes surplus food from over 600 Irish donor businesses and makes sure it gets to people who really need it.

With support from the AIB, their kitchen in Tallaght aims to deliver 200,000 meals every year, rescue 100 tonnes of surplus food and support community organisations nationwide.

If you’d like to help out – and, at the same time, enhance your CV  – hit up food.cloud/volunteer…

We’re not sure who’s behind the Dublin-based @thestudentscoff Instagram account but, sir/madam, your Top Lunch Spots Around Trinity Campus list is the bomb…

Hot Flavours is also enormously admiring of the UCC, UCG and TU Dublin student union food pantries which can help with essentials…

Donut coffee mornings, a guest restaurant series featuring the likes of Tula Mexican Grill, Camile Thai and Fired Up Pizza, and guest speaker events are some of the perks – and, indeed, percs – if you join ucdsocieties.ie/food...

Not to be outdone, UCG’s Organic Gardening Society allows members to grow their own fruit ‘n’ veg on campus in a sustainable manner.

Credit: universityofgalway.ie

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