One Snarky Chica with Issues

An easy way to be more health conscious and money conscious is to make your food at home instead of buying food from a restaurant. Sure, sometimes we get home and think we deserve to go out after a long day at the office or maybe we don’t want to deal with washing dishes or even actually cooking. Of course, by going to a restaurant not only will we end up paying more for something that we can probably make better ourselves, but we have no control over what goes into the food. That means we have no control over what is going into our bodies. Looking at almost any restaurant’s nutritional info tells us what we’re putting in our bodies when we dine out - crap. And lots of it.

A couple of weeks ago someone wrote in to The Simple Dollar to see why people say it is cheaper to eat at home instead of eating off of the dollar menu at McDonald’s.  Healthy eating was cleary not the issue here, but it is still an interesting case study. Trent, the author at The Simple Dollar, went so far as to actually compare a homemade double cheeseburger to the McDonald’s double cheeseburger. Take a look at the photos of the two. Wow, those homemade ones look much better. And so much better for you. He added in a tomato slice instead of ketchup.

Important takeaways from the article:

First, the homemade burger was healthier. It was grilled, and thus much of the fat dripped out of it. The nutrition facts numbers above consider only a broiled burger, not a grilled one.

Second, the homemade burger had leftovers. That cost per burger assumed no leftovers, but I had most of a diced onion, almost all of a jar of pickles, six slices of cheese, and three hamburger buns left over. Without much more, I can make another meal out of these ingredients - just give me some cold cuts, for instance.

Third, the homemade burger had many more options. I can do whatever I want with my homemade burger in terms of options - for example, I made the audible switching the ketchup for a tomato slice.

Lastly, the homemade burger was far, far tastier (at least for me). I tasted them side by side and it wasn’t even close. Of course, this really is a matter of opinion.

So, there you have it. I am a big proponent of cooking at home versus dining out. I would much rather put in the time making my own food and save some calories so that I can indulge on a dessert afterwards. No chance in doing that when dining out cause the calorie content is just too high.