Dearest readers, I'm sure that no matter your income level, expenses are piling up this holiday season. There's work, parties, shopping trips, social obligations and all of it is costing money and time. Yeah, sadly, there's a downside to everything good and fun in life. I, on the other hand, have set aside some time during my hectic holiday schedule to hear the good word about making things better. No, it's not about a religion- it's about food, health and happiness. There's a movement out there (started or at least boosted by the infamous Instant Pot) that is trying to get both men and women back into the kitchen! Companies like Blue Apron are offering home cooking meal kits, supermarkets are making it easier to buy groceries online then just pick them up, and there's a slew of cooking appliances coming out at lower and lower prices that promise to make it all easier, even if your stove and oven are woefully underpowered and outdated (or non-existent). Intrigued, I did some reading and found an interesting study by Forbes that figured out how much more dining out costs versus making the same dishes at home. Before you click here to read it, let me save you time. I'll go over the most important points, and then go over why people of all income levels should ditch their local food swamps (Google the term) and go back to the kitchen! :)
The Forbes article laid out the study as follows.
"We analyzed data from Priceonomics customer wellio, a platform that breaks down millions of recipes into single ingredients and matching those to grocery items from local stores. That allows us to measure the ingredient cost for a wide variety of recipes. For 86 popular dinner recipes, we decided to look at the average cost per serving of cooking from scratch and compare it to the cost per serving of ordering from a restaurant or a meal kit delivery service."
This seems to me a great approach because it includes both alternatives to cooking from scratch the "traditional" way. I also like that they took as many as 86 typical recipes into account. The findings were as follows.
"We found on average, it is almost five times more expensive to order delivery from a restaurant than it is to cook at home. And if you’re using a meal kit service as a shortcut to a home cooked meal, it’s a bit more affordable, but still almost three times as expensive as cooking from scratch."
So, dearest readers, dining out is typically five times more expensive than cooking from scratch! How crazy is that! I'm not going to say that we get ripped off because restaurants have to profit and thrive and it's our own choice, but damn it all if convenience, resorted to too many times, does not end up costing us a fortune in the long run! This, to me, was completely insane! Also, we seem to look for amazing deals in all other aspects of our expenses, yet we readily accept paying five times more for our meals! I just don't get it and fail to see wisdom in any more delay with staying away from the kitchen.
Let's look why this makes sense for the average income and those who are well-off.
If you have an average income, paying five times less for your meals is a great way to make money by hiring yourself and consequently paying yourself to do something. For example, if you buy a ready made meal once per day at 15 dollars a pop, and you could make the same one for 3 dollars, you're paying yourself 12 dollars to make it. If you can make it in half hour, that's effectively a wage of some 24 dollars per hour! It may beat driving Uber eh? Multiply that by 365 days, and you are effectively paying yourself $4,380 extra per year! So, if you make 50K per year, now you're making $54,380 per year versus the version of you that doesn't make that one meal at home. Now let me ask you. What do you have to do to get this sorta raise at work?! ;) Exactly.
If you're well off and you don't think this is worth the trouble- think again! Unless you're going to the finest restaurant, the quality of oil, the freshness of meat, the nutritional balance of the restaurant version of the meal and the cooks' skill level are average or sub-par at best! With a little bit of practice, you could make your favorite meals just as well at home, if not better. Also, instead of cheap oil resoutaurants use, you can use cold-pressed avocado oil. You can use your instant pot to make slow cooked dishes in a fraction of the time and they'll still be super tender. Also, you can use special grills (I got one for $30 at a liquidation store, originally $99.99) that will grill your meat by searing it on the outside, and leaving it medium on the inside with no juices lost! ;) How cool is that? So yeah, as a well-off person, you may care more about time than money, but what may push you in this direction is quality control and your desire to stay younger and healthier longer so you can enjoy the fruits of your labor as long as possible!
There you have it, dearest readers. Consider this article well. I did, even before I wrote it and it changed my life for the better.
Cheers! :)
The Forbes article laid out the study as follows.
"We analyzed data from Priceonomics customer wellio, a platform that breaks down millions of recipes into single ingredients and matching those to grocery items from local stores. That allows us to measure the ingredient cost for a wide variety of recipes. For 86 popular dinner recipes, we decided to look at the average cost per serving of cooking from scratch and compare it to the cost per serving of ordering from a restaurant or a meal kit delivery service."
This seems to me a great approach because it includes both alternatives to cooking from scratch the "traditional" way. I also like that they took as many as 86 typical recipes into account. The findings were as follows.
"We found on average, it is almost five times more expensive to order delivery from a restaurant than it is to cook at home. And if you’re using a meal kit service as a shortcut to a home cooked meal, it’s a bit more affordable, but still almost three times as expensive as cooking from scratch."
So, dearest readers, dining out is typically five times more expensive than cooking from scratch! How crazy is that! I'm not going to say that we get ripped off because restaurants have to profit and thrive and it's our own choice, but damn it all if convenience, resorted to too many times, does not end up costing us a fortune in the long run! This, to me, was completely insane! Also, we seem to look for amazing deals in all other aspects of our expenses, yet we readily accept paying five times more for our meals! I just don't get it and fail to see wisdom in any more delay with staying away from the kitchen.
Let's look why this makes sense for the average income and those who are well-off.
If you have an average income, paying five times less for your meals is a great way to make money by hiring yourself and consequently paying yourself to do something. For example, if you buy a ready made meal once per day at 15 dollars a pop, and you could make the same one for 3 dollars, you're paying yourself 12 dollars to make it. If you can make it in half hour, that's effectively a wage of some 24 dollars per hour! It may beat driving Uber eh? Multiply that by 365 days, and you are effectively paying yourself $4,380 extra per year! So, if you make 50K per year, now you're making $54,380 per year versus the version of you that doesn't make that one meal at home. Now let me ask you. What do you have to do to get this sorta raise at work?! ;) Exactly.
If you're well off and you don't think this is worth the trouble- think again! Unless you're going to the finest restaurant, the quality of oil, the freshness of meat, the nutritional balance of the restaurant version of the meal and the cooks' skill level are average or sub-par at best! With a little bit of practice, you could make your favorite meals just as well at home, if not better. Also, instead of cheap oil resoutaurants use, you can use cold-pressed avocado oil. You can use your instant pot to make slow cooked dishes in a fraction of the time and they'll still be super tender. Also, you can use special grills (I got one for $30 at a liquidation store, originally $99.99) that will grill your meat by searing it on the outside, and leaving it medium on the inside with no juices lost! ;) How cool is that? So yeah, as a well-off person, you may care more about time than money, but what may push you in this direction is quality control and your desire to stay younger and healthier longer so you can enjoy the fruits of your labor as long as possible!
There you have it, dearest readers. Consider this article well. I did, even before I wrote it and it changed my life for the better.
Cheers! :)