# The cost of cooking/baking from scratch



## Joyfullyplain (Jun 18, 2008)

Hi everyone,

I was wondering, with rising food prices, if we could save money by cooking and baking as much as possible from scratch? We buy some stuff in bulk and we could buy 25 lb bags of flour, sugar, etc. We sometimes pay over $3 for a loaf of bread or a bag of rolls. Does anyone else make their own bread? What about hot dog/hamburger rolls? I'm hoping that we can plant some veggies in my parents' garden this year and then I can can beans, tomatoes, etc. I was also thinking to make some big batches of soups and pasta sauce to can. 

How much could a family save by baking their own breads and cooking from scratch? We have a new baby and I will not be working full time for a while so I'm trying to find ways to save money wherever I can. Thanks for your input!


----------



## marinemomtatt (Oct 8, 2006)

We don't buy bread/rolls/cake mixes/biscuit mixes/pasta sauces/rice mixes...
We cook from scratch!
Look at 10# of flour, I pay $3.59, my bread recipe calls for 4 cups of flour, I figure I get about 7 to 8 loaves of bread out of 10# of flour (I also add some homeground wheat to some of those loaves). My bread recipe also makes buns and rolls.
(store bought bread gives me the willies)


----------



## upnorthlady (Oct 16, 2009)

Cooking from scratch is what generations of women have done to save money. Our grandmothers knew what to do with a little flour, potatoes, and a few onions, etc. With careful gardening, shopping, and planning, a person could save probably hundreds of dollars a month (depending of course on what your former shopping habits were). In the few cases where a person *could* buy something cheaper than making it, you have to take into consideration quality. Sure, I could probably go to the dollar store and buy some package of cookies for a dollar. But the quality would be zilch. 

I have been baking all the bread we eat for the past 40 years. I have been canning for the last 20 years. My husband and I are currently living on about $600 a month, so you know we are not rich. I firmly believe in making a nice pot of a whole meal soup (something thick with a little meat in it or beans, and plenty of veggies). That, plus a couple slices of homemade bread, and a simple fruit dessert can really fill you up and it's nutritious, too. 

You must be young since you have a new baby. I'm 63, but when my twins were babies, I made all my own baby food using a blender. It is so very encouraging to someone my age to read that younger ladies want to cook and can and garden. It makes me feel that perhaps life will go on! It is discouraging to me to read how so many women today don't like to cook, and fast food is the norm. Good luck to you, joyfullyplain, and yes, I KNOW you will save lots of money! If you read some of the Depression Era cookbooks, you can get lots of great ideas. There are delicious eggless, milkless, butterless, cakes, and lots of ideas for using beans and cheese as meat alternatives. Gardening is a must if you have the room for it. I can up salsa, spaghetti sauce, veggies, fruits, potatoes, and jams and jellies and pickles. Other things I freeze, like carrots and corn, and onions and green peppers. Keep on cooking from scratch!!


----------



## WildernesFamily (Mar 11, 2006)

Your biggest cost for making bread is going to be the yeast. Make sure you buy bulk (from Costco or Sams if you have a membership or can get someone who has a membership to buy it for you) or at the very least from Amazon where you can buy a 2 lb block of instant yeast for under $9. At Sam's or Costco the cost will be under $4 for a 2 lb package of yeast. We put some in a jar in the fridge and put the rest in the freezer. It keeps well.

We bake two loaves of bread everyday. Not only is it cheaper than storebought, but the end product is much nicer! We also buy unbleached flour at Costco as well as butter in bulk. The thing they DON'T have though (our Costco anyway) is bulk wholewheat flour.

We use a recipe on the allrecipes site called "Tasty Buns" they are great for everything from dinner rolls to hamburger rolls.

Using the prices I paid and this website for conversions, and this website for recipe cost calculations, I worked out that our two daily loaves of (white) bread cost us $1 to make, not including the cost of baking the loaves though.


----------



## sticky_burr (Dec 10, 2010)

idk 19.99 50# of stone ground whole wheat 7$ for 2 pounds of instant yeast .99 / # for dark brown sugar how many to die for loaves of fresh home made bread idk .. but its price less .. you cant get great bread for 3$ a loaf maybe the mystery bread with gypsum and who knows what else


----------



## upnorthlady (Oct 16, 2009)

WildernesFamily said:


> At Sam's or Costco the cost will be under $4 for a 2 lb package of yeast. We put some in a jar in the fridge and put the rest in the freezer.


This is exactly the yeast I use and the way I store it, too. I use a locally ground North Dakota wheat flour here in MN and buy it in 50 lb bags for about $20. Bread is cheap. As for garden veggies, I buy seed packets on sale at the end of the season, save them for next year, and save some of my own seeds. I also start most of my plants indoors in a sunny bay window. Last year my two gardens cost me less than $15. One garden is 50 x 150 and the other one is 20 x 120. So, veggies are cheap, too. The biggest cost was actually the electricity I used while canning. I also make my own sauerkraut, using the cabbage I started from seeds from a 10 cent package of seed. I made 50 pounds of kraut for 10 cents plus the cost of canning electricity and new lids. The salt used for the kraut was minimal, too. Not sure how to figure the cost of 12 T. of salt.


----------



## ne prairiemama (Jan 30, 2010)

We grind up the what and make bread, even my older kids know how to make it now grinding and all  You can do it and you WILL save $$!! No one taught me when I was younger so I had to teach myself but it's not so hard once you get started. You can do it and it can be fun!! We got a canner this year so I can't wait to learn how to use it too!!


----------



## oregon woodsmok (Dec 19, 2010)

The bread my family likes costs $4.50 a loaf and weighs 1 1/2 pounds. 1 1/2 pounds of good flour costs about 50 cents. That's all that is in that load of bread: flour, water, and a teaspoon or so of dry yeast. Yes, I can bake bread for cheaper than I can buy it.

Some of my baked goods that I make are pretty spendy, but you couldn't even buy them for any price, unless maybe you have an extremely high priced luxury specialty bakery in your area.

If you pay even minimal attention to nutrition, your food made at home will be much healthier. The manufactured stuff is full of salt and sugar and cheap fats. Cheaper ingredients instead of real healthy food.


----------



## sewsilly (May 16, 2004)

Making things from scratch is certainly cheaper, and if for any reason, it was possible to make something from scratch that was MORE expensive than a processed item, then I'm game to pay the difference for the quality and the nutrient difference.

Welcome to a world where many of us do this for our families for reasons of health and frugality and simply better living.

dawn


----------



## Raven12 (Mar 5, 2011)

I have saved a lot of money by growing my own vegetables. They can be very expensive to purchase in this region.


----------



## SFM in KY (May 11, 2002)

Joyfullyplain said:


> I was wondering, with rising food prices, if we could save money by cooking and baking as much as possible from scratch? We buy some stuff in bulk and we could buy 25 lb bags of flour, sugar, etc. We sometimes pay over $3 for a loaf of bread or a bag of rolls. Does anyone else make their own bread?


I've been baking my own bread for about a year now, sourdough bread, so the only thing that actually has to be purchased is the flour ... no yeast, etc. ... use the sourdough for all of our bread, the occasional pan of cinnamon rolls and pancake supper as well.

I buy flour in 25# bags, one lasts about a month, give or take so it's a lot cheaper than buying bread, even the cheapest kind.


----------



## Evons hubby (Oct 3, 2005)

Baking and cooking most anything from scratch will save you plenty of money. I have been baking our breads... including dinner rolls, hamburger buns, hot dog buns, and numerous varieties of bread for quite a few years. I figure I save somewhere in the 500 dollar per year range with the baked goods alone. Then when you figure all the other cost savings by raising the garden...... thats at least another grand.... shopping for meats on loss leaders.... another grand easily. Being disabled I am only able to "work" an hour or two per day so cannot generate very much income but I figure by doing what I can with the gardening, canning, freezing, careful shopping and the like, I can save several thousand bucks a year over just going to the store and buying prepared foods. Pennies saved add up to thousands of dollars earned over the period of a year. Not only is it saving precious dollars needed for other things, we like the flavor and quality of home grown, home baked, cooked from scratch meals much better than the stuff you buy already prepared.


----------



## Sonshine (Jul 27, 2007)

SFM in KY said:


> I've been baking my own bread for about a year now, sourdough bread, so the only thing that actually has to be purchased is the flour ... no yeast, etc. ... use the sourdough for all of our bread, the occasional pan of cinnamon rolls and pancake supper as well.
> 
> I buy flour in 25# bags, one lasts about a month, give or take so it's a lot cheaper than buying bread, even the cheapest kind.


This is what I do. I even make sourdough biscuits. Just recently bought a grain mill and wheat berries, so I'm back to the learning process, but even with me not getting a good rise on my bread with the fresh ground wheat, the taste is wonderful!


----------



## Sonshine (Jul 27, 2007)

I also make our own pasta. Getting milk from the goats we make our own dairy products. With our chickens we eat a lot of eggs, plus the meat from the chickens we butcher. I raise our own herbs, which can be a big expense, since I use alot of herbs when cooking. Raise all of our own vegetables and most of our own fruit. We only go to the grocery store every few months to get things like salt, sugar, etc that we can't raise here. For those items we try to buy them in bulk.


----------



## newfieannie (Dec 24, 2006)

most everything from scratch here. as UPN said. our grandmothers and mothers did this. all i ever knew. once in a while i buy a 4-grain bread. use to i should say. yesterday i saw them 4dollars. i draw the line there. i made 6 loaves day before yesterday, 2 cheese,2 white, 2 rolled oats and molasses. sure it's spendy but there is no comparison. i bake something every day of my life. today i made cheese scones. tomorrow i plan a lemon roll for easter supper dessert. it's actually a hobby for me.

i'm alone but i can always count on my son carrying it off every 2 weeks. he loves his mothers hobby. i spend quite a bit ,yes i do, but i look at it like this. most people have a hobby and probably spend a lot more than i do. like maybe model trains ,antique cars etc. it also saves on a therapist. nothing better than pounding it all out on bread dough.(instead of your husband's head)(i dont have a bread machine) ~Georgia.


----------



## libby (Feb 27, 2011)

In addition to baked goods, learning to make basic gravies and bechamel (white sauce) will save you tons! Any basic cook book (like Joy of Cooking) can teach you how. Instead of canned soups or powdered glop, you can make a yummy sauce to go with anything out of flour, butter (or lard) and liquid. I make casseroles and 'help myself' stovetop meals out of whatever is on hand, and a quick gravy pulls it all together. Yum!


----------



## beaglebiz (Aug 5, 2008)

We like to make Auntie Ann's style pretzels too. those are a nice treat..
here is the recipe I use
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Mall-Pretzels/Detail.aspx

dont forget to freeze your yeast


----------



## Kimberly N (Apr 12, 2011)

I'm also a new mom (8 month old daughter!) and am interested in making my own breads instead of buying loafs at the store. 

SFM in KY- Can you recommend a good starter and give a few tips on how to take care of the starter? I've never made sourdough before!

And to anyone--Can you give some good tips on what pans I should have on hand for the basics? I've made rolls from scratch but never tried to do loaf bread. Luckily, I do have a Costco membership, so buying yeast and flour in bulk would be easy to do. Hopefully they have whole wheat flour as well but I've honestly not looked closely at that section before because it always seems like the quantities are too big for me and my husband.


----------



## dragonchick (Oct 10, 2007)

For basic baking pans, a 11 x 13 roasting pan can many duties as a roasting pan, a cake pan, and for cooking a dozen large homemade biscuits or rolls. 9 x 5 loaf pans can be used for bread and meatloaf, also for breads like banana nut and zucchini or pumpkin. The round cake pans get used for round cake layers, rolls or biscuits. Muffin pans for muffins or cupcakes. I have 2 of each except the roasting pans of which I have 4. I like the Onida professional series from Walmart because they cook evenly and are heavy weight. The price is very affordable.

If you buy the large size flour bags, be sure to have a way to put it in the freezer at least over night. Very often you find weevil larvae and you don't want them to hatch out into little black bugs that invade EVERYTHING.


----------



## Laura Zone 5 (Jan 13, 2010)

http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/self-reliance/cooking-from-scratch/

www.breadbeckers.com


----------



## whodunit (Mar 29, 2004)

White sauce is simple and can be flavored with herbs of your choice:

2 T butter (or other fat such as meat drippings)
2 T flour
1 C liquid such as stock or milk to make a creamy gravy

Melt fat, stir in flour to make a paste, add liquid, add herbs, salt, pepper and cook until thickened.

If I have stock, I like to use maybe 2/3 stock and 1/3 milk.

This is great for sausage gravy for biscuits or you can add cook ground beef or cooked shredded chicken and spoon over any starch such as rice (brown is healthier), potatoes (mashed or boiled), egg noodles, etc.


----------



## beaglebiz (Aug 5, 2008)

I like making cornbread and pineapple upside down cake in my cast iron skillet
I have also found the best places for baking pans to be thrift stores or estate sales...better quality for less $$...I personally dont use non stick


----------



## beaglebiz (Aug 5, 2008)

whodunit said:


> White sauce is simple and can be flavored with herbs of your choice:
> 
> 2 T butter (or other fat such as meat drippings)
> 2 T flour
> ...


My grandma (now deceased, born in 1906, and died at the age of 100) used to make a white dessert sauce, similar to this, but a bit of sugar and vanilla as a topping for shortcake and such..like a thin vanilla pudding (she was depression era, no whipped cream)


----------



## newfieannie (Dec 24, 2006)

that dessert sauce goes back a long ways in my family. i still make it and serve with cottage pudding .that's the way grandmother and mom used it. ~Georgia.


----------



## Sonshine (Jul 27, 2007)

beaglebiz said:


> I like making cornbread and pineapple upside down cake in my cast iron skillet
> I have also found the best places for baking pans to be thrift stores or estate sales...better quality for less $$...I personally dont use non stick


I've been gradually replacing my nonstick pans with cast iron. I really want to get some cast iron bread pans.


----------



## cygknit (Apr 8, 2011)

I'm a single mom of two little people (ages 3 and 22 months) and have found making as much as possible from scratch has saved me more money than I could have imagined. Here's some things I do:

I'm currently using the Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes A Day recipe for bread. There's a big article in Mother Earth News online with the recipe, and it's way easier than it looks. I injured my hand a few months ago and I LOVE having a no-knead recipe.

Can fruits and jams. The peaches I picked last summer from a pick-your-own place were way cheaper than the store, and they taste way better right now than any canned ones.

Drying. I've made some easy fruit leather with things I've bought that are in danger of not being eaten in time. Then, I have a snack for the kids that I know doesn't have added sugars of fillers or heaven knows what else.

Experiment! I've just made a super-easy basic white cheese from buttermilk. For that $2 plus a little dill and garlic, I got a fancy cheese that would have been $6 at the store--and I'd never have paid that. Instead of replacing something I've added a luxury food I'd never have added, at a fantastic price.

I've made some dud casseroles and bread loaves before, but they're mine, you know? To me, it's better than trying some new packaged food that turns out to taste like the cardboard it was packed in. And the strawberry jelly that never set is a huge hit with the kids on pancakes, so some things can be salvaged.

Good luck!!

ETA: I didn't make my changes all at once. First, I picked one thing to try (bread, I think) and then when I was happy with that I picked another thing I wanted to try from scratch and went from there. A lot of this is overwhelming to think of as a destination, but pretty easy step-by-step.


----------



## highlandview (Feb 15, 2007)

I cook from scratch. Homemade bread baking can really save money. Take quality into consideration as well as nutitional value. You can buy a lot of cheap food but it is poor quality. I make a lot of ingredients from scratch - sour cream, puddings, cream soups, etc. My blog linked below has a lot of from scratch cooking ideas.


----------



## Joyfullyplain (Jun 18, 2008)

Thank you all for your replies. I feel more encouraged to start baking my own bread. My husband likes Portuguese rolls so I hope I can find a recipe for them and also bagels. I have a Kitchen Aid mixer and some bread recipes that came with it so I think I'll try making bread that way first. I hope my baby left me have some time to try baking! I am hoping that I can plant some veggies in my parents' garden for us. My father planted almost 50lbs of potatoes so I'm sure he'll offer some to us. I want to save my family money because we're trying to save for a house.


----------



## lathermaker (May 7, 2010)

I can remember years ago when I was just learning to make bread from scratch. I dug out a bread cookbook, followed the recipe exactly (anyone that knows me, knows that's NOT the norm!) and baked my first loaf of whole wheat bread....hockey puck.... I took said hockey puck down to my wonderful neighbor who used to teach Home Ec. 

She took one look at the loaf and asked to see the recipe..Well, guess what? The recipe was WRONG. It didn't tell me to let the loaf raise for the second time. Florence (in true teacher mode) commanded me to go home and do it again with the correct procedure.
I did....and the rest is history. So, every time I would make a batch of bread I would make an extra loaf for the neighbors....and occasionally throw in a half-pint of homemade preserves.


----------



## marinemomtatt (Oct 8, 2006)

Joyfullyplain, If your Kitchen Aid is a newer one keep an eye on it, the motor just isn't as good as they used to be (burn out easily), so if it starts getting HOT where the motor is, turn it off and allow to cool.
Good Luck and don't forget that Batter Breads are good too (in our home a loaf of Batter Bread is gone by bedtime).


----------



## Packedready (Mar 29, 2011)

I burned my kitchenaid out years ago and bought a Bosch, it is a work horse. I make my whole Wheat bread using Wheat Montana's Prairie Gold Hard White Wheat. I grind the wheat using my K-Tec grinder, my recipe is easy using a 1 raise and everyone loves the bread. My equipment is 25 years old and working strong.

I love the Wheat Montana because it makes a really light loaf. I buy 50 lb bags.


----------

