There must be some food pantries or soup kitchens you can eat at. They're usually 1 or 2 in every town or city. Good luck

I believe your definition of healthy differs slightly from the one most of us use. That crap from 99¢ stores may actually be worse than the dressing given the ungodly amount of chemicals and preservatives found in most cheap foods. Even vegetables sold in those stores are often the lowest possible quality and devoid of nutrients. Filling and capable of providing much needed calories, yes. Healthy not so much. I don't expect the OP to go without, but do yourself a favor and at least shoot for a major grocery store brand, it's (slightly) less likely to lead to your early demise

While you are saying to go for major grocery chains, I believe you are missing the point of being broke. Some stores that are cheaper or discount grocery stores offer local produce instead of imported, grown in a hot house. a discount store would provide the options for beans, canned veggies, bread, milk, etc.. Not everyone can afford to shop at Safeway, Kroger, or the sort. OP can still make good choices for a lot less money.

Agreed. Plus salad dressing, depending on the kind can be really bad for you in large quantities. Some might not be too bad, but something like ranch? Actually horrible for you. Dollar stores can mean a wide variety of things from pre-packaged foodstuffs that isn't "good" for you but will fill you and give you calories, to basics like rice and clean water, and depending on the dollar store it might even have fresh vegetables or fruit like some apples or bananas, fruit that doesnt go bad really quickly. They might not be organic perfectly cultivated for your health and enjoyment but even the cheapest apple is still an apple. Oh and if anyone wants to know one thing that will always been identical between stores and brands? Bananas. They are all genetic clones of one another and therefore cannot possibly be different.

Not gonna lie, I've made myself some pretty satisfying dinners by just adding sliced vegetables and additional spices to regular instant ramen.

Ramen is the shit. Base for a soup or boil the noodles and rain the water before adding seasonings and sautéed vegetable for pasta. Ramen should be a staple.

not everyone qualifies just because they are poor. OP could have a job that makes too much annually to be able to qualify for government aid. being poor doesn't automatically mean you qualify for food stamps or anything of the like.