I switched to mostly cooking for myself sometime last year, really just trying to save money, but I feel significantly less fatigued day to day and more focused and don’t wake up with random stomach pain anymore.
Honestly, it’s been a great help reducing take out. It’s such a gamble, I’d rather spent nothing on a sure thing (even if it’s boring) than nearly $40 for a meal I may not even finish.
I’m a spreadsheet nerd. Not a guru by any stretch, but I love to make spreadsheets. They help me plan and organize things in a way nothing else does. Despite all the websites and apps out there that make budgeting simple, I do ALL of my budgeting and spend tracking in an odt file. It’s been a rolling development for the last five years and I think I’ve got it to its ultimate stage. I’m really proud of my work.
I think what’s really helping me stay on top of it this year is the fact that in December, I spent about a week planning the year in painstaking detail. I built a whole paycheck estimation tool that automatically calculates tax withholding. I cross-referenced employee handbooks to determine pre-tax withholdings like retirement and insurance. I found the 2025 tax brackets and standard deduction. I understand now how our taxes are withheld for the state side. I actually determined my wife is taking out way too little for tax. January is an awesome time to make that catch. By the time I was done, I determined four paycheck numbers we might experience in the year based on various circumstances. I planned out how much I think each of our 26 paychecks will be, when they will occur, and how we will spend them with a high degree of confidence. I gave us a set amount of fun money each time. Most importantly, I found a way for us to make regular deposits into our savings account. I have a plan in place to save $2,000 and pay off a couple of credit cards this year. It ain’t much, but it’ll be a start. And if something goes wrong, having some money stashed away will be a huge help.
So far, I’ve squirrelled away 300 bucks. I feel really good about that.
I also track all of our spending in that file. I spend 5 minutes each night before bed reconciling it to the bank. That’s been a major step forward, too.
More to your point, eating out is hella expensive. I opened a second checking account to give us that kind of money. We buy books and music and games and makeup and food from out on that. If that card runs out of money, it ends. Full stop. At least, it should. I got lazy the last few months of last year and we spent way too much on takeout. But I’m motivated to be better this year. I make myself go grocery shopping. And then I make myself cook even when I don’t wanna. And I put the dishes away and clean the laundry, even when I don’t wanna.
I know that’s just regular adult shit, but I’ve been a hot mess for a while lol
- Bump up your employer’s withholding by 5%
- Get that overpayment back from the IRS
- Immediately dump that into a retirement thing that reduces taxable income; like, same-day
- Next year you have another 5% windfall and a little more back from the retirement contribution. Put both back into same deal
- Repeat forever
- Slow win
That’s an impressive level of financial responsibility, nice job
The dude that never went to in-n-out
Behold the superior hamburger, ye mighty, and despair:
In-n-out is mid and their fries are like cardboard.
Hey now, those poor businesses need to make up for their profit situation! Even though they have all made record profits year after year… After year…
We will be in a recession once they decide it’s time for one.deleted by creator
“What’s the deal with fast food? It isn’t fast, and it isn’t food!”
Get this person a ten-year sitcom deal!
Sorry, I’m more of a Michael Richards type myself
Is there a country that uses the dollar sign that puts it after the number?
So many lol. There’s lots of ways numbers are formatted across locales https://cldr.unicode.org/translation/number-currency-formats/number-and-currency-patterns
Not a country, but Quebec does place the dollar sign after the amount.
That’s so stereotypically French.
I got a double cheeseburger platter from a BBQ place with 2 sides for $10. Better burger than fast food and I got fries and collards.
That’s a great find!
BBQ places in my area have gotten really expensive. Sides are like $5 each now for a small container.
Fucking Applebee’s is right now cheaper than all of them with $10 for a burger and fries.
Around these parts we have a couple of more affordable options but most of the big fast food chains have become $10+ meal bullshits. If the meal is over $10 I might as well go pay the same in a non-fast-food restaurant with a pick up order. But Jack’s (burger/chicken store) and Taco Bell still have meal deals for $7 or less.
Fountain drinks are a big ripoff, so you can save a bit by not ordering a drink if you have your own already.
Instead of a burger meal for $11 from bullshit fast food places I can buy a large entree of Mexican food for $8 to $9 before tax from a real restaurant. Chinese restaurants locally are similarly priced. I can get Mexican or Chinese takeout to feed the whole family for under $50
Sure, but then the wait staff expects you to tip at least 20% for simply being given one, and if you don’t you’re an asshole.
Sure, but then the wait staff expects you to tip at least 20% for simply being given one, and if you don’t you’re an asshole.
That’s the neat part about affordable food, 20% on $10 only means you tip $2.
They bring you the food, refill your water, and serve you on ceramic plates with metal silverware then take your dirty dishes away, no trash. The burger and the fries are way better than McD.
IMO The only FF place you still can’t touch is a $6 Taco Bell with the cravings box. It’s a huge amount of shitty food for a total of $6, it is super fast and it runs through you super fast.
I have a Taco Bell addiction. Its my comfort food. I can’t even feel guilty about it anymore, its so cheap.
my bombass lunch today for ¥616 (~US$3.94)
3.94? lies /s, at least $30 USD here
That’s not gonna work in the US.
Japan is a cheat code for healthy cheap meals.
Looks very soupy.
Me, limping my ass into a McDonalds for the first time in forever: “I’ll have 20 nuggets, no meal.” (expecting 5$, or something close to it since it had legitimately been a while)
“Yeah, that’ll be 12.47”
The fuck???
And the lines show it. I remember the single drive-throughs being backed up around the building and them putting in the dual-ordering drive-throughs to handle the traffic. There are never more than 2-3 people in line these days and there’s almost no one inside. I get it, they’re property banks these days.
Don’t forget about the “meat” wafers on the “burger”.
I don’t go to fast food often, I walked into a McDonalds for the first time in maybe 1yr +? They had the kiosks for self ordering, I looked at the prices and “deals” and decided that the cost/experience ratio was just not worth and just left. I can go to a restaurant or cook myself for those prices (and I did, cooked enchiladas).
It doesn’t seem affordable/worth it even for a one-off now
$17.99 for the 20 pc. In Canada. $10.79 for a 10 pc. I about shit when I immigrated here and realized nuggets were off the table. I can’t imagine ordering that and picturing one dollar every time I pop one into my mouth. My wife buys me a ten piece for my birthday every year since I won’t buy them myself out of protest. Also, my kid is old enough now to finish her 4 pc. Happy Meal, so I don’t get to scavenge for uneaten morsels like I did before. It’s tragic.
RIP Stalinwolf
The fuck
deleted by creator
Now please tip 200% for the garbage
Dude it’s insane. I don’t understand how the hell these places stay in business anymore when the quality still sucks ass and it’s all so expensive now. Like even taco bell, who used to be the king of cheap, costs a fuckton these days.
It’s an addiction for a lot of people.
deleted by creator
It’s become a habit for many people. Cooking is a really difficult habit to (re)learn. It’s possible though and good meal prep is very convenient on long days at work.
I just hate cooking. I cannot stand it. It takes so much effort and you have to clean all the mess you made (even cleaning as you go sucks). And then you end up with something that may or may not pan out. And if you’re trying to meal prep then you have to eat the same meal for the whole week which I hate also.
If this was the only thing you’d ever have to do, fine. But the majority of the rest of our time is spent at work or sleeping. We have few precious hours where these things aren’t the case. I hope this doesn’t make me sound too much like an asshole, but I’m fortunate enough to purchase things like pre-prepared foods and get takeout a couple of times per week. So I take advantage of that because I don’t want to spend my few moments of free time slaving away over a stove or cleaning the mess of pots and pans and cooking utensils.
Another this about cooking when you live alone…a lot of perishable foods can only be bought in somewhat larger quantities and then they go bad before you use them all up. I tried to make a recipe out of a cookbook several months ago and I was frustrated at how many things I had to buy a large thing of when I only needed a very small amount for the recipe. Ended up with a lot of food waste.
You can always ask the butcher to get you a smaller piece of meat. You can also separate pieces of meat and freeze part.
If produce is by weight, you can break the package to be smaller. Even things like squash can be cut in half (ask the produce people, places like Aldis will not do this).
Buy canned and frozen veggies as much as possible, they last longer. They won’t be as tasty, but will reduce your food waste.
Cook larger portions and freeze the leftovers and eat them in a week or two.
As far as spices, dishes, etc. look at them as “investments” cause you won’t be using them all on one meal…
Meat is actually the easiest one because you can just freeze it like you said. Powdered spices are also a complete non issue. It’s fresh produce that I struggle with.
But for example, the recipe I tried called for…
Jasmine rice - could only find it in a whopping 5 lb bag which was ridiculous for a solo person who rarely ears rice. I know rice keeps, but since I don’t at all like to cook, it was very excessive. Even if I were to have made a larger quantity of the meal or make it multiple times, I still would have an insane amount left over.
A clove of fresh garlic - I know you can get powdered garlic or garlic in a jar, but people seem to say that it doesn’t at all work the same, so I wanted to try it the way the recipe wanted you to. So I had a shitton of cut up garlic left over because I could only find whole garlic bulbs at that particular grocery store if I didn’t want to go canned or powdered. Can you even freeze a portion of garlic?
A portion of whole fresh ginger - again same issue as the above problem I had with fresh garlic. Only this one was even worse because ginger rarely present in any of the foods I eat
Etc. for a lot of the ingredients for that recipe.
Yes, I get that you can do some complex puzzles and math to figure out how to use all of these ingredients in different meals without wasting the excess, but that is absolutely NOT for me. That’s a whole additional ordeal and one of the many reasons I hate cooking. I don’t want to have to perform an elaborate game of ingredient/meal chess to avoid significant food waste when I’m grocery shopping. I do enough work at my job and there are still plenty of other annoying tasks to keep up with like cleaning and laundry.
The point is I don’t want to look at any of these as “investments”. That is is an insane amount of work to put into something I hate.
None of these problems mean you have to resort to buying fast food though.
You can buy things like crumbed chicken tenders that last over a week in the packaging and take 15 mins to cook in an air fryer. Mix some mayo and hot sauce, steam some veg and you’ve got a cheaper, healthier meal than most fast food, in about the same time it takes to drive through and order.
That actually makes up a decent amount of what I eat already. The majority of my diet comes from the frozen food section at the grocery store. I get both the prepackaged dinners and also the precooked meats and “steam in bag” veggies you’re talking about. But on days where I don’t want that, I get takeout as a treat. Most often, I actually order food delivery instead of fast food, but I get fast food now and then too. I’ve actually got into the habit of going to the chick fil a near me because it’s literally a 5 minute walk and they have a good salad. McDonald’s seemed like they stopped selling salads some years back for whatever reason.
One of the points of my previous post is that I don’t care about the cost though because I’m fortunate enough to not be scraping by. I don’t get this takeout or fast food every day, but it doesn’t bother me financially to do it a couple times per week. Plus, sitting in your car listening to music and browsing your phone while someone prepares food for you is hardly a comparison to putting together something yourself. The time might be the same, but the effort is significantly lower which is the point.
Yes, I fully relate with this as if you spoke from my heart. Agreed on all points, haha.
I do cook, kind of have to when you have kids. But I definitely do not enjoy doing it. Especially because I’ll slave over a new dinner idea and my kids will just refuse to eat it.
My friend with kids also talks about this. She is like I work so hard to cook and even make it simple for them but they still refuse to eat it half the time lol
I don’t mind cooking, I just hate coming up with a dinner plan for the whole week. I’ve begun watching cooking videos on instagram to help motivate me. I do wish there was an alternative to instagram, but so far it’s the best.
Learn to cook. Honestly. When you know what you’re doing you can make simple and nutritious meals for a fraction of what you’d pay for this junk food.
This was my exact thought. If you frequent fast food 2-3 times a week, you can substitute meal kits and have fresh cooked food for the same cost and time it takes to leave the house. Once you’ve mastered kits, everything becomes more apparent in recipes, and the world is your oyster.
+ it doesn’t need to be complicated. You only need a few ingredients and can buy certain pre-made things like crumbed fish or chicken. If you do it right the first meal takes 30 mins, then eating the same thing again in the next few days should only take 5-10 mins.
Exactly. Take three main ingredients and use that as a base, or keep it like that. For example: rice + tofu + tomatoes. Another: couscous + chickpeas + green beans. Simple, quick, easy, and nutritious. Add some more flavour with herbs, spices, soy sauce, etc
I got a bacon double cheeseburger, large fry, large drink at a Hardee’s this week and it cost damn near $18. It was “okay.”
And half the time it’s not even that fast anymore either.
Might as well order a burger from an actual restaurant, to go, for the same amount and pick it up on the way. Half the time they’ll even bring it to you curbside.
The Burger King closest to me once had a 20 minute line to wait another 15 minutes for the food.
“Fast food” is still relatively cheap in Japan, and me and my son like the taste of Burger King, but that was ridiculous.
And it wasn’t even a staff issue, there were eight people back there running around like chickens with their heads cut off.
double 1/3rd pound burger? off the regular price menu, upsized with curls. ya. that’ll be pricey for what you get.
next time do the ‘little’ double cheese in the ‘bag’ special. 2 burgers, fries, drink for like six and change.
