My wife and I rarely choose to dine out – instead fixing the majority of our meals at home to eat with our children. This is one of the many expenses that we cut from our monthly budget in order to live within our means from a single income. Saving money in areas like food and entertainment expenses allow my wife and I to raise two young boys with one parent staying at home.
While we do dine out every once in a while, we limit ourselves to spending less than $50 per month in this category – which usually includes a few trips to a couple fast food restaurants for the kids and that is about it. Comparing our $12.50 weekly expenses with other families of four who spend a conservative $50 per week dining out – we are saving around $2,000 per year by choosing to eat at home!
Saving money by NOT dining out has it’s obvious advantages to put cash back into your pocket. But what are the other benefits of making a choice to cook at home instead of paying a premium to eat at a restaurant. Here are 8 side benefits that my family has witnessed as a result of eating at home.
- Healthy Lifestyle – After saving money, the greatest benefit from dining in compared to eating at restaurants is promoting a healthy lifestyle. Overall, cooking at home is much healthier than dining out. While some restaurants now offer healthy entrees and choices, the options are limited. Food consumed at restaurants typically has a lot more calories and fat than food you have prepared at home.
- Lower Health Care Costs – Going a step further on promoting a healthy lifestyle – eating in can lower your overall health care costs. Consumption of fatty and high caloric foods overtime can lead to diabetes and heart disease, among other health issues. If you can eat meals at home and adopt a healthier lifestyle, you are less likely to develop health conditions. Reducing the risk of developing diabetes or heart disease will actually save you a lot of money in the future on health care related costs and prescriptions!
- Family Time – An important benefit for any family with children. Eating at home instead of at a restaurant gives the entire family time to talk about their day. If you are constantly on the run and are always eating out – you lose that quality time to communicate with your loved ones. Cooking at home gives you a chance to connect and talk about school with your children and discuss your days events with your spouse.
- Knowing What You Eat – This is a big one for my family as my oldest son has food allergies. Do you ever get worried about who is cooking your food and are they doing something with it they shouldn’t? Maybe it is just the conspirator thinking in me – but I really get concerned about what I am eating. As I stated before, raising a son with food allergies can be difficult. Even if you can find something on a menu that does not contain peanuts, eggs, or milk – the food still has to be handled and prepared by humans. Humans make mistakes and they also do things they shouldn’t sometimes. Cooking your own food at home alleviates any doubts as to what you are truly eating!
- Reducing Temptation – Anyone on a diet dreads dining out with family and friends. The temptation to order fried or high caloric foods is outstanding when you eat at restaurants. There is just something about eating out with others and the atmosphere at most restaurants that makes it difficult to eat healthy. While many people on a diet are able to avoid these temptations, it is better to avoid the situation entirely. Eating at home more reduces these situations where you may be tempted to order something unhealthy!
- Increase of Energy – Another result of living a healthier lifestyle – eating at home can increase your overall energy levels. Since you are eating healthier foods, you are likely to be more active and have more energy compared with a sedentary lifestyle.
- Education – Eating at home is an excellent opportunity to educate your children on topics about saving money and eating healthy. If you raise your children in an environment where most of their meals come from a restaurant, more than likely they will end up living that way. As mentioned earlier – dining in promotes a healthier lifestyle which is another important thing to teach your children.
- Make Money – Not only will you save money by eating at home, you can actually make money! I mentioned earlier that we save at least $2,000 every year by eating at home compared to other families. If I took that $2,000 and invested it into a high yielding savings account or certificate of deposit – I would be earning income off of the money I saved!
I am not saying that you should never eat out at restaurants. My wife and I like to go out every once in a while for a nice relaxing meal that we don’t have to cook. However, there seem to be a lot more benefits from eating at home which always seem to win out in our household.
What other side benefits can you think of from eating at home compared to dining out?
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You covered all the benefits pretty well. Eating out is my main waste of money right now. That picture is making me hungry for In-N-Out. Too bad I don’t live in an area with them any more.
Andy Hough’s last blog post..The Crossover Point
@Andy – Thanks. I have actually never eaten at an In-N-Out but I liked the picture.
pfincome’s last blog post..Recession in America – Building Your Savings
I think along with your education for the family, there is also education for the cook. Cooking at home can allow the experimental chef the chance to learn new skills. For example, I love Indian food. I used to frequent my favorite Indian restaurant quite a bit, but then I began learning how to make it myself. Those techniques have allowed me to make other ethnic foods I like. Speaking of which, I firmly believe that food cooked at home almost always tastes better than eating out – it has to do with the quality of ingredients and the fact you can customize food to your own tastes.
Dawn’s last blog post..A Spring Update and Looking Ahead
@Dawn – Any good Indian recipes you can offer up? I like to cook but don’t have a lot of time but always look to try new things.
pfincome’s last blog post..Recession in America – Building Your Savings
Dude, I LOOOOOVVEEEEE IN-N-Out!
Now that my wife and I finally have our own place, we’re trying our best to eat at home together. Cooking together is lots of fun, and it can be pretty romantic too!
Pat with SPI’s last blog post..How to Publish an Ebook Series – Part 5 – Tools and Automation
@Pat – Yeah, those romantic days for us are over with two little monsters running around while we are cooking. Most of the time diner is more stressful than fun!
pfincome’s last blog post..Recession in America – Building Your Savings
Trying to eat at home is a challenge but once you succeed, the rewards can be felt in the wallet and you feel much better mentally.
Vik Dulat’s last blog post..10 things my parents taught me about money
@Vik – I agree. It is kinda like being on a diet of sorts. At first it is hard but once you get use to it, it becomes much easier. Thanks for stopping by!
pfincome’s last blog post..Recession in America – Building Your Savings
I’m doing a speech on Eating at home, and your article helped me out alot. Great Advice and thank you!!
I love your article & agree with you wholeheartedly! In fact, I am an Independent Consultant for Homemade Gourmet. It is an amazing company based in Texas, and our mission is to help families eat at home more often. Our focus is to help families save time by getting quick, delicious meals on their dinner tables using fresh ingredients & our seasonings. We offer free meal planning services with our mixes as well as mixes that whip up meals under 30 minutes.
@Valerie – Thanks. I would much rather eat at home, other than the prep time and cleanup.
Eating out has always been fun for me and my family. We normally eat out one time each week and order in another time each week. and the rest of the time we cook ourselves.
One of the reasons that we stopped eating out so much wasn’t because of the money, but our favorite restaurant made it a requirement to tip 30% of the bill, that just didn’t work with us so we stopped eating out for a while and it just stuck with us.
@Adam – Wow 30%??? I have never heard of such a thing. That would make me not want to come back.
Thanks for the great article,
It’s not about only saving money, i mean that too (# 1 factor) but i’m paranoid about how my food has been cooked, cut, dealt by whom before it leaves the kitchen and comes on my table. Also, it’s a great way to approach a healthy lifestyle as you already mentioned. I’m also a very picky eater, and it’s very difficult for me to eat from anywhere because it lead me in the past to have a food poisoning.I find home cooking not healthy but creative at the same time and you know what you are adding to your dish and it’s not a mixture of some leftover. # 1 approach to cut down your weight starts from here because you’d be cutting down buffet and deep fried meals. Plus points, who doesn’t like to have few bucks save at the end of each week, huh!
I tend to eat out frequently but I really don’t like wasting money on it either… so I’m a member of usadvantageplans.com .. they have this savings plan that allows me to purchase restaurant gift certificates for less.. I typically pay $17.50 for a $25.00 gift certificate. It’s really not a bad deal. I get other savings but this is my favorite. ever tried to stop eating?
There are so many healthy reasons to eat home cooking. I also love to eat well and save money. There is such an abundance of information – recipes and ideas on the internet and tv that has given us the ability to learn how to make things easily. Preparing meals with whole ingredients is the way to go. Never buy processed or prepared packaged foods.