It’s really not about the money.
We started our journey into homemade not for financial reasons, but because we wanted to eat better. It was also a challenge – can we make this ourselves? How far down the production ladder can we reasonably go? We’re certainly not diehards and, whilst we don’t buy pre-prepared or packaged food if we can help it, we’re still happy to eat out at restaurants and purchase spice mixes and condiments.
So it was never really about the money. But the unexpected bonus is, over the past few years, we’ve saved a fortune. Our food costs are about half of what they used to be, despite the substantial improvement in the quality of our meals. We regularly cook more than we can eat – because it’s fun to do, and we love to share – but also because it seems so easy to have an abundance when you’re cooking from first principles.
There are many articles written about frugal living, but they usually tout the same (albeit sound) advice – eat seasonally, pack your own lunches, make use of your leftovers and so forth. I’ve been trying to identify the things that really save us money, and thought it might be nice to blog about these over the next few months.
So here is our first suggestion – the one that started the ball rolling for us:
Bake your own bread and buy your milk in bulk.
We started baking bread in January 2007 and have never looked back. As I’ve mentioned before, apart from the health benefits (no additives, lower GI), it costs us about 65c per loaf for good sourdough, which is a huge saving over even the cheapest commercial bread.
We also buy our milk in bulk – easy to do here in Australia because UHT milk is both readily available and economical. Our boys are more than happy to drink it, and it’s perfect for cooking and making yoghurt. I know many people are quite particular about their milk and won’t touch UHT, but it certainly suits our lifestyle – we buy 48 litres at a time, which will last us for several months unrefrigerated. In general, UHT is cheaper than fresh, because it’s made in batches whenever the dairies have surplus milk.
Now, while homemade bread and bulk milk purchases save us money, the real reason it’s our top tip for frugal living is this: when you take away the need to buy bread and milk twice a week, you also remove the need to go to the supermarket every few days.
We buy our meat from the butchers, fresh produce from the markets and deli goods from a specialist supplier – which means we only need to go to the supermarket about once a month, if that. This single change to our shopping routine has saved us a lot of money – it’s surprising how much we used to spend at the supermarket, on items which were both frivolous and unnecessary. But more importantly, when freed from the “supermarket mindset”, we started to seek out specialised and passionate food suppliers, and the quality of what we were eating improved dramatically.
If you’d like to give breadmaking a go, you might find this tutorial useful. Be warned though, once you start, it’s hard to go back to boring commercial bread. And when you’ve mastered the basic techniques, you’ll be able to create everything from your own sandwich loaves to pizzas. Have fun!
. . . . .
Hi, You guys are now my source of good cooking information. Carried away by the thought of fig jam I bought a large tray of figs, yummy, and now I want to make fig ice cream, Problem is that I do not have a machine. Can you help? Any way keep up the good work. Dottie
Hi Dottie, thanks for stopping by. A tray of figs…yuuuummm… :)
I’ve never made ice cream without a machine before, but David Lebovitz has written a nice tutorial on how to do it here. Hope that helps!
Cheers, Celia
Hi Aunty Celia!
Haha buying milk 48L at a time – that’s quite impressive..!!! Glad to see you’re enjoying the espresso cups =)
Laugh now, dearheart, but in a few years’ time, you’re going to realise that buying in bulk is a family trait… :)
You hit the nail on the head there when you talk about cutting down visits to the supermarket … that’s where I make my impulse buys or so called ‘too good to miss bargains’.
I’m lucky enough to have a butchers shop in the family … mum and brother own run it. I would never dream of cooking supermarket meat for mum – she’d know in an instant! I would be disowned!!
Looking forward to Tip #2!
How nice to have access to the best fresh meat, Gillian! There’s something extra special when it’s produce from friends and family, isn’t there? I know how excited I am to be able to buy my friend Diana’s garlic and cousin Andrew’s extra virgin olive oil. It makes me feel like we’re a step closer to a self-sufficient community! :)
Fantastic Celia. Most things taste better homemade. I still haven’t made my Apple Pectin but if ever there was a big hit for me in 2009, it was discovering that you could make your own. Love XXX
I am glad you added the word of warning about the addictive aspects of making your own bread….look what you did to me!! One of the first things I had to do when I got back from three weeks of holidays was to inspect and feed my sourdough starter (which came from you a few months ago)…and then try and revive it and mix up a batch of bread (in between sleeping and trying to recover from flights)!
The tip to cut back on supermarket visits is good. I just need to send Sam over to live at your place for a week so you can convert him over to UHT and then we would be set to go…
Ozoz, couldn’t agree more – homemade really does taste better!
Spice Girl, welcome home! It’s been quiet without you around…hope the starter survived (it should have)!
Cheers, Celia