The Tightwad Gourmand Philosophy

These are the basic principles of The Tightwad Gourmand:

1. If you want to eat well on a budget, you have to make some stuff from scratch.  Convenience food is really expensive for what you get.  For example, you can get prepackaged real guacamole (you know, the kind made from avocados, not soybean oil and green food coloring) for about $3.50.  Or, you could make twice as much yourself for around the same price, and it's fresher and probably tastes better.
2. Anyone can cook.  If you can follow directions, you can cook.  I don't know if people think that following recipes doesn't count, or what.  I've been cooking for as long as I can remember, and I started out by following recipes.  You might make mistakes (I still do), but that doesn't mean you're a failure as a cook.  It's a skill that needs to be practiced, like playing the piano or making jewelry.
3. Shop smart!  Go to the grocery stores with the best prices.  I live near Portland, Oregon, and I like to shop at Winco.  They have bulk bins with great deals.  For example, you could buy a 1-pound bag of beans for around a dollar, which is incredibly cheap, but a pound of beans from the bulk bins is only $0.59.  The biggest score is the cake flour.  A box of Softasilk cake flour costs around $3.00 and only has 2 pounds of flour in it.  In the bulk bins, cake flour is only $0.18 per pound.  Aside from the bulk bins, their regular groceries have the best prices in town.  If you can make it out to a grocery store like this once a month and stock up on essentials, it's probably worth it.
4. Have fun.  Cooking for me is a joy, not a chore.  I love that I can whip up delicious things and not have to pay through the nose to have them.  I love smelling what I'm cooking.  I love eating what I cook.  I love it when other people say, "Oh man, this is delicious!"  I don't really like doing dishes.  I wish there was something I could do about that.

If you can shop smartly and cook from scratch, you're golden!  Happy cooking!