I have found that a poached egg is the key to transforming a plate of cooked vegetables or a plain salad into a satisfying meal. Simply slide a tender, gooey (or not, depending on how you like your eggs), freshly-poached egg atop a pile of something green and suddenly, it’s enough to keep you full until the next mealtime. Here, the egg’s base is garlicky, buttery kale, seasoned simply.

I’m not even going to try to tell you how to poach an egg, since Deb of Smiten Kitchen does such a thorough job here. Just follow her directions and you’ll be as golden as a runny yolk.

Meatloaf has never been my favorite, but it’s just so damn inexpensive to make, I was determined to find a way to like it.

Here, I stirred moisture-preserving extra virgin olive oil into lean ground beef and loaded the whole thing with fresh vegetables. The meatloaf that resulted was juicy, tender and incredibly flavorful. Feel free to get creative with the vegetables you use. Also, I opted to skip the breadcrumbs, but you could certainly stir in 1/4 cup (Panko would be great) when you mix up the meat.

Note: I highly recommend brushing this with BBQ sauce after baking.

That's a lot of dough to be plunking down for coffee infused with what is essentially nutmeg-scented, artificially-colored-and-flavored high fructose corn syrup.

Ahh, Fall. Season of color-changing leaves, crisp mornings and the ubiquitous pumpkin spice latte. It's an oft-yearned-for treat when September finally comes around and local coffee shops finally roll out their strictly seasonal pumpkin-flavored coffee drinks.

But if you're buying them daily or even every other day, at nearly $4 a pop, it can add up to a lot of dough to be plunking down for coffee infused with what is essentially nutmeg-scented, artificially-colored-and-flavored high fructose corn syrup. But don't worry, there is a BrokeAss solution: make them at home with high-quality ingredients, obvs.

This freshly-brewed, wildly cheap version of the pumpkin spice latte can be warming your hands and your spirits any time you please--even after the coffee shops close, and without an espresso machine. The directions below are for one latte, but the ingredients priced out will make about a week's worth of homemade lattes. And best yet, you likely have most (if not all) of the ingredients at home already.

If you like your lattes straight, feel free to omit the spices and/or sweetener.

Note: The ingredients listed are for just 1 latte, but the total cost is enough to make at least 10 of them.

Something magical happens when tiny tomatoes are cooked whole. Their skins become soft and their insides become incredibly juicy and sweet. When bitten into, they release a nectar that tastes like a bite of a fresh-off-the-vine tomato in the peak of its season. I learned this when I first made yesterday’s tomato-studded frittata.

In this burger recipe, I employed the same technique by tucking whole grape tomatoes into 1/4 lb beef burgers along with herbs, olive oil and fresh garlic. The resulting burger features an incredible combination of charred tomatoes on the outside and ready-to-burst ones on the inside. I served these without buns, and with the addition of a generous smear of creamy goat cheese and a shower of fresh herbs. Good aioli or mayonnaise would also be lovely, as would a crusty sourdough roll.

On Saturday mornings, I like to sleep in and then laze in bed with coffee and back issues of The New Yorker. Eventually, I’ll get out of bed and make breakfast. During the week, I usually dive right into the day with nothing more than coffee, but on Saturdays, I take my time with a nice breakfast. Lately, this frittata has been my go-to Saturday morning breakfast (though I’ve also served these for lunch or dinner to great response), due to its combination of ease of preparation (so, um, it’s also hangover- friendly) and satisfying deliciousness. It puffs up into a filling and protein-rich bowl of savory egg-iness and the grape tomatoes turn very sweet and juicy, thanks to their being left whole. The frittata is great with toast, but it doesn’t need it. This is also an easy recipe to reduce (I usually make just one or two at a time), or multiply. Additionally, all the ingredients can be poured into a greased cake pan or casserole dish and then cut into wedges or squares after being cooked.