This is my current groceries list after re-iterating it to be more less intensive in general while keeping most of the nutrition. The cost is around 200 Euro per month and works well to help maintain my current weight and muscle. The extra costs from the purchase of monthly items lie within this cost.

f/m alt means there could be cheaper/healthier alternatives at the farmers market or the smaller groceries stores. The idea is to make curries and eat with rice. I dont know a better alternative than rice for the high energy requirements of a student but it is possible to adapt this plan this plan to make it oven-based (with more vegetables), and/or with bread (like tortillas) and also with less spice.

This is my father's version of the recipe for the famous dish of biriyani from India. It is a one pot recipe of curry base mixed with rice pressure cooked in spices and ghee that also includes mutton or chicken. Vegetarian alternatives include subsititing the meat with soya chunks or vegetables.

Here is a playlist of cooking recipes that consist of recipes from a wide range of cuisines that I have collected over the years. There are also some videos about kitchen skills in there.

This curry is the version made from my city in India. It uses a curry powder that is a mixture of ground coriander seeds, cumin, a little bit of ground rice. All the ingredients can be cheaply obtained and are good for gut health. It can also be cooked/pressure cooked in a single pot with all the combined ingredients following the biriyani recipe.

The key ingredients can be switched with suitable alternatives based on experience to form different curries/sauces. For example, caramelizing the onions and using cream instead of tomato and mushrooms and switching the spices results in a nice pasta sauce.

This is a highly effective and completely natural weight gainer shake that I used daily during my weight gain journey and helped me complete it without any supplements.

Here are photos of recipes that I have documented over a few years.

The essentials include a wok, cutting board, cutlery, baking dish, pressure cooker, sauce pan and a frying pan. All these can be bought for cheap. I am thankful to my old housemate Yuting for selling me her instant pot and blender for a total of 20 euros. Its actually crazy how one instant pot and a bag of rice is enough for you to survive during those busy exam periods. These are literally all the equipment I needed to gain 12 Kgs of muscle in two years.

A good cook is a great multi-tasker. His equipment should work in harmony to allow him to simultaneously cook multiple ingredients that can be be coalesced finally to form the final dish.

A cooking schedule works well to help with allocating time for the cooking process. Atmost an hour a day spent cooking is sufficient to maintain good health and to reach intermediate fitness goals. With time, the cooking time gets shorter as the process becomes second nature to oneself. It took me 45 mins to meal prep lunch and dinner everyday and 15 mins to make something for breakfast usually. These times included cleaning as well. Both cooking and cleaning are equally important, in my opinion.

The cooking schedule shown here was more intense during my weight gain journey and got tiring to do on busy days so I have since then readapted it to include easier recipes with less prep times overall.

I am grateful to my neighbour Saikat for helping me form this daily schedule, when I was struggling in my early days in Delft. It helped me immensely to organize my day and to live upto some standards. It involves a circle divided into parts by lines starting from the time you wake up, and ending at the same line when you sleep. Each part then represents the time you spend doing an activity.