How often do you take the family out to dinner?
Joe
and I'm wondering what other frugal families do. Do you just budget an
amount per month and see how many dinners/lunches/breakfasts you can
squeeze in or do you just say 4 or 8 times per month and whatever it
is it is?
skar...@gmail.com
week. We don't cook at home everyday, but may be twice a week. We
still have to do dishes everyday... it is really lot more work than
eating out.
Let us just estimate the cost of eating out every day. Let us say it
costs about $25 (including the tip) to eat out every night for a
family of four. That is $9,125 per year. If you reduce the number of
trips by half, you would save about $4k. For a busy family (both
working with little children), that is probably a worthy expense in
return of a peaceful evening (especially if the couple doesn't share
the work).
What about the health consequences of eating out everyday? Also,
people that eat out every night are highly likely to eat out lunch
also. I don't think that is good for the health.
Rod Speed
> Frugality aside, for health benefits sake, we eat out about once a week.
That health benefits claim is completely silly.
> We don't cook at home everyday, but may be twice a week. We still
> have to do dishes everyday... it is really lot more work than eating out.
Much cheaper ways of fixing the amount of work involved than eating out.
> Let us just estimate the cost of eating out every day. Let us
> say it costs about $25 (including the tip) to eat out every night
> for a family of four. That is $9,125 per year. If you reduce the
> number of trips by half, you would save about $4k.
And you would say much more than that if you dont eat out at all.
> For a busy family (both working with little children), that is probably a worthy expense
> in return of a peaceful evening (especially if the couple doesn't share the work).
Mindlessly silly. There are much cheaper ways of fixing that problem than eating out.
> What about the health consequences of eating out everyday?
Depends on what you choose to eat out.
> Also, people that eat out every night
Hardly frugal.
> are highly likely to eat out lunch also.
Not necessarily, I dont bother with lunch myself.
> I don't think that is good for the health.
Again, depends entirely on what you choose to eat out.
Winston Smith, American Patriot
The problem is less of /where/ you eat than /what/ and /when/ you eat.
If you are talking about obesity-is-now-a-crisis U.S.A., then the American
diet is beyond poor. I just repatriated after years abroad in a culture
and society where fresh fruit and vegetables are the main staple, and I
have never felt healthier in my life. It is a well-known fact that
components of fruit and vegetables inhibit metabolic processes (such as
the action of liver cytochrome P450 enzymes) which actually modify
ingested substances to make them more mutagenic/carcinogenic. Americans
do not even begin to eat the amount of fresh fruit and vegetables they
need to. If you go out to eat, and they don't allow you to fill your
plate with uncooked fruit and vegetables, cross that place off your list.
And hold the ranch/french/roquefort: if you need to dress up the taste of
a vegetable mix, the squeeze lemon and pour on a little olive oil, like
the rest of the planet does.
As to when you should eat, if you are over the age of 40, it should be
apparent to you that your biggest meals should be in the morning and just
past mid-afternoon. The evening "meal" should not even come close to
filling your plate unless it is mostly fresh fruit and vegetables, and it
certainly should not be the biggest meal of the day. If you get up from
the table with a I'm-stuffed-to-the-point-of-sickness-or-not-being-able-
to-get-up feeling, you have violated every rule in the healthy eating
book. You should instead feel just-this-side-of-sated feeling, and some
would say you should push away from the table with a slight appetite. Our
mammalian ancestors ate---what? once every 3 or 4 days? No reason for
us to moan about needing 3 loaded meals a day.
skar...@gmail.com
I agree with both of you that one could eat at home and still eat
unhealthy. However, I still believe it is hard to influence a child
into what (s)he should order at a restaurant.
Rod, could you please elaborate on your "much cheaper ways?"
Joe, I didn't really mean to hijack your thread and lead into a
discussion of a different topic. Hopefully more people will answer
your particular question.
Rod Speed
> Rod and Winston,
> I agree with both of you that one could eat at home and still eat unhealthy.
And plenty do just that.
> However, I still believe it is hard to influence a
> child into what (s)he should order at a restaurant.
Yeah, that can be a problem, but since its a child, you
can just tell it what its allowed to order in that situation
and you get to choose where to eat out as well.
> Rod, could you please elaborate on your "much cheaper ways?"
If you dont like the amount of work that eating at home involves, the obvious
approach is to get a dishwasher and eat pre prepared food at home and
cook more than you need for a particular meal and freeze an microwave
the extra for other meals. It isnt much effort to cook a decent curry and
its trivial to cook say 5 meals worth, freeze the extra and microwave that.
for the 4 extra meals. That involves very little work for the extra meals
and doesnt even require any washing up when a dishwasher is used.
I do the same thing with a roast leg of lamb. The first time its roasted
the work is marginally higher, but mostly its just waiting for it to roast.
Then I slice off slices and microwave a potato and veg and have the
meat cold on that hot plate with the potato and veg and that minimal work.
I eat quite a bit of chicken as kievs, cordon blue, parmigiana, baugettes etc which
I buy in bulk and freeze and cook in the oven for 30 mins with potatoes and veg in
the microwave. Very little work at all involved, just a minute or so per meal. In fact
much less time that it takes to eat out in fact.
Ward Abbott
>I'm trying to set my budget and I've been taking them out once a week
>and I'm wondering what other frugal families do.
This must be an issue for you. If you can't afford it....you eat at
home. Period.
Bernardo Gui
We eat in restaurants only rarely. Our home cooking is better than the
average restaurant, and far healthier and economical. The one key
factor to the effectiveness of our choice is that we enjoy cooking.
Having a short commute to work and keeping stress at bay makes the
evening meal a joy.
BG
Rick
If you are trying to be frugal about it you have to set a dollar amount
and stick with what your budget allows. Using an "x times a month"
approach makes no allowance at all for costs. McDonald's the first time?
Outback the next? A high end Chinese restaurant next time? The amount
you spend could be all over the place and out of control, depending on
what restaurant(s) you pick any given time.
If you want a rude awakening, keep track of this stuff for one month and
see how much you actually spend. Sure, it's only a buck fifty here and a
buck fifty there for those 5 days a week you get take out coffee at
work. (And that would be the cheap take out coffee at that if you can
still find it anywhere for only a buck fifty a cup.) Oops - get it twice
a day - that's sixty bucks right there. And you haven't even bought any
food yet. Cheap lunch at work every day? - if you can get away with
seven bucks a day - that's another $140.00 a month. 2 coffees a day plus
lunch - you are now up to $200.00 in take out food a month. For only one
working member of the family. And you haven't even taken anyone out to
dinner yet...
If you can afford it - fine. If you need to cut costs do the reality
check on how much you spend on take out food and restaurants and see if
you are happy the figure. It adds up to a lot of money real fast when
you aren't paying attention to it. Personally? I can live without take
out coffee. I can't get beyond the outrageous pricing for the lousy
quality. That's all the budget motivation I need for that one item.
Rick
Lee K
<skar...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1187291497.7...@g12g2000prg.googlegroups.com...
>
> Let us just estimate the cost of eating out every day. Let us say it
> costs about $25 (including the tip) to eat out every night for a
> family of four.
!!! $25 for a family of four? Do you eat at McDonald's ALL the time?
Bill
I used to go out more often and this was to get foods I did not know how to
cook. Then I learned to cook these things myself, so no need to go out.
I look at the price of some things in restaurants and think of how far that
same amount of money would go at home. Seems silly to be wasting it. Plus I
do a better job at home with many things. And I can use low cholesterol
cooking oil, etc. when cooking at home.
The only reason to go out now is just for a treat every now and then. Also
to go to a buffet. I'm not going to cook up all that food that a buffet has
so I can have a little of everything!
Dennis
wrote:
My family of 5 had dinner at a local mom'n'pop sitdown cafe last
night. Four of us ate dinner, my son had already eaten and only had a
drink. Total tab (minus tip) was US$24.95.
Dennis (evil)
--
My output is down, my income is up, I take a short position on the long bond and
my revenue stream has its own cash flow. -George Carlin
hchi...@hotmail.com
>On Fri, 17 Aug 2007 03:05:27 GMT, "Lee K" <lee_k...@hotmail.com>
>wrote:
>
>>
>><skar...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>>news:1187291497.7...@g12g2000prg.googlegroups.com...
>>>
>>> Let us just estimate the cost of eating out every day. Let us say it
>>> costs about $25 (including the tip) to eat out every night for a
>>> family of four.
>>
>>!!! $25 for a family of four? Do you eat at McDonald's ALL the time?
>
>My family of 5 had dinner at a local mom'n'pop sitdown cafe last
>night. Four of us ate dinner, my son had already eaten and only had a
>drink. Total tab (minus tip) was US$24.95.
>
>
>Dennis (evil)
DW and I had breakfast of bacon and eggs at a local spot that normally
just serves lunch. Our cost for the two of us was $3.00.
Joe
> Joe, I didn't really mean to hijack your thread and lead into a
> discussion of a different topic. Hopefully more people will answer
> your particular question.
I don't mind, both topics are of interest to me. I'd appreciate the
people that answer your question at least preface it with how often
they eat out per month
Rod Speed
> skark...@gmail.com wrote
I dont eat out at all in that sense, just due to some event like
the last time when one of the people at work retired and we
had a big pissup since he had been there for 39 years.
I agree with whoever it was that said that I eat better at home
than I do out, and I now have the eating at home down to such
an efficient operation that its actually easier than farting around
going out, so I only really eat out when away from home now.
timeOday
I think feeding my family at Wendy's costs pretty close to what a
home-cooked meal costs. They have a lot of things on their dollar menu.
A dollar burger and a dollar potato is a filling meal. For dessert I
get a large Frosty and split it 6 ways. And what you pay is the total
price - unlike at home where you clean out your fridge once every other
week and toss a lot of food down the drain (I guess you'll say you don't
do that, but most people do - look at hotdogs, you can't even buy the
right number of buns for the dogs).
Of course home cooking wins hands-down for taste and health. But give
credit where it's due, the American fast-food vendors have cheap eats
down to a science. I don't know how they can serve a burger for $1.
(And no, the answer is not "sawdust").
throwitout
>
> >>I'm trying to set my budget and I've been taking them out once a week
> >>and I'm wondering what other frugal families do.
>
> > This must be an issue for you. If you can't afford it....you eat at
> > home. Period.
>
> I think feeding my family at Wendy's costs pretty close to what a
> home-cooked meal costs. They have a lot of things on their dollar menu.
> A dollar burger and a dollar potato is a filling meal. For dessert I
> get a large Frosty and split it 6 ways. And what you pay is the total
> price - unlike at home where you clean out your fridge once every other
> week and toss a lot of food down the drain (I guess you'll say you don't
> do that, but most people do - look at hotdogs, you can't even buy the
> right number of buns for the dogs).
Learn to buy and store the right amount of food. If I know I won't
finish something before it goes bad, I will place it in the freezer
ASAP. One example is hamburger buns, and it would work for hot dog
buns as well. When you get home put the bloody bag in the freezer
(along with the wieners), then just take them out as you need them. If
it's something that doesn't freeze well, buy a smaller package and
learn to plan your meals.
Also here you can buy buns in either 8-packs or 12 (usually labeled
"New England style"), as well the wieners can usually be bought in 8
or 12 packs.
I guess if you throw out half the food you buy then it might be
cheaper to eat out. It's also cheaper to not throw money in the trash.
And if you "toss a lot of food down the drain", you're being tough on
your municipal sewer system.
> Of course home cooking wins hands-down for taste and health. But give
> credit where it's due, the American fast-food vendors have cheap eats
> down to a science. I don't know how they can serve a burger for $1.
> (And no, the answer is not "sawdust").
Mealworms.
tom_sa...@yahoo.com
> Let us just estimate the cost of eating out every day. Let us say it
> costs about $25 (including the tip) to eat out every night for a
> family of four. That is $9,125 per year. If you reduce the number of
> trips by half, you would save about $4k. For a busy family (both
> working with little children), that is probably a worthy expense in
> return of a peaceful evening (especially if the couple doesn't share
> the work).
>
Can you define what you mean by "eat out." Are you talking McD's, or
a mom/pop, or some other restaurant? Are you talking an egg or two
and some bacon and a biscuit, or a dinner? At a 15% tip rate on $25,
you would be spending roughly $5.43 per plate. Outside of dollar
menus, here in the suburbs of a modest city (within the top 60-70 by
population in the US) there's not a restaurant that we have found that
serves a dinner entree for less than $5.99, which does not include a
beverage (they even charge for water now). Not burgers, salads, nor
even an appetizer, if you wanted to get by on one given the size of
them today. We could probably do it by buying a pizza, but that may
be about it.
At a restaurant, I guess we could share a drink, plates, and skimp in
every way possible, but that worry/concern basically negates any
enjoyment that we wish to find by eating out. Today, most restaurants
do not give free refills and by the time we pay for beverages (even
water), tax and tip, we're looking at almost 30% of our bill total
before we even look at the menu.
I don't know about your lifestyle, but obviously with you both working
you've expressed time sensitivity issues. However, you might be able
to resolve the time issue without infringing on your day. In the time
to travel to/from a restaurant, waiting on service, etc., you could
probably prep for the entire week. We take a half hour on Sunday
afternoon and prep veggies and side dishes, including lunch options.
This half hour, invested once, saves us much more than that time
during the week, as you're only washing the prep materials once and
you can do things until they're complete rather than piecemeal, per
recipe, per night. We cut up munchies (carrots, celery) as well, so
that when my daughter complains that she's hungry, I have an array of
fruits/veggie snacks readily available. Portion out spices or group
spice/recipe packages so you don't have the search each night. While
it's less expensive to cook larger portions (generally speaking) at
once and have leftovers, if you don't like leftovers then simply
portion the meals in bags or containers so that they're ready to cook
when you're ready to eat.
As for a peacful evening, I've found that the peace is more likely
inversely correlated to the price of the meal (buffets and cafeterias
are less expensive, but less peaceful than nicer restaurants).