For many people today, there are two factors that go into the decision to cook from scratch: health and price
There are so many unnecessary or unhealthy ingredients added to our food
And the price of everything is insanely high right now
In general, cooking from scratch is healthier and cheaper than eating out. This can be because there are fewer ingredients in homemade food and fewer costs such as labor to add to the price. Sometimes higher quality ingredients will make this cooking from scratch more expensive.
Many times, if cooking something from scratch is more expensive, the quality of the food is way higher than the food we get when we eat out
There are three different ways of getting food that I am going to focus on
But none of them are black and white
You can buy some things and cook others
That is what I do
But for the sake of comparison, I am going to keep each category separate
We will discuss:
- Cooking from scratch
- Eating out
- Convenience food at the grocery store
There are exceptions, but I will try to compare from the perspective of a mom who is trying to feed her family the best she can with as little money as possible
Prices will vary depending on where you live so I will just be using my local prices as an example
Is cooking from scratch healthier than eating out?
In general, cooking from scratch is healthier than eating out
But it also depends on where you are eating out
Fast food restaurants use premade foods that they fry in oil that they rarely clean or change so it is pretty obvious that cooking from scratch is healthier
While restaurants are better quality than fast food, most restaurants have higher sodium, saturated fat, total fat, and overall calories than homemade food
Some of this is likely to reduce costs so restaurants make more profit
And you are able to fully control what is used when you make food from home
Cooking from scratch is often healthier than eating out because:
- You control the ingredients
- You can control your portions more easily
- You tend to be more mindful after putting in the effort
- You know that the ingredients are clean or fresh ( like frying oil)
- And you have more options to add variety to your diet
Is cooking from scratch cheaper than eating out?
Theoretically, we know that cooking from scratch should be cheaper than eating out
But there are so many options for eating out to test
So let’s start with pizza
The average cost between four pizza shops in Eugene, Oregon for a 10-12 inch pepperoni pizza is $21.25
The prices I found were between $17 and $30
Or you can go to Papa Murphy’s and get a $12.50 pepperoni pizza that you have to bake at home
OK! We know the cost of eating out on pizza night
How much is it to cook pepperoni pizza from scratch?
Let’s look at my sourdough pizza recipe
Each ingredient for two pizzas at Walmart in Eugene, Oregon are:
Sourdough discard: $0.18
Instant yeast: $0.63
Honey: $0.08
Flour: $0.18
Warm water: $0.05
Olive oil: $0.54
Salt: $0.01
Tomato sauce: $0.50
Seasonings: $0.25
Cheese:$1.41
Pepperoni: $0.81
Total for two pizzas: $4.64
One homemade 10-12 in pizza is $2.32
For me, it is even cheaper since I get several ingredients in larger amounts so the price per oz is lower
But if you get the smaller packages for everything, one pizza is $2.32
| Restaurant Pizza | Papa Murphy’s | Homemade |
| $21.25 | $12.50 | $2.32 |
So making pizza at home is WAY cheaper
Of course, this doesn’t include your time
But pizza really doesn’t take long and can be made in batches and frozen
Not everything will have numbers this crazy right?
The only way I can think of to get a lot of food for less per serving is by getting catering meals and portioning them out
Even then, you have to pay for someone else’s time, materials, supplies, and more
Is cooking from scratch cheaper than the premade meals at the grocery store?
It is clear that making food from scratch is cheaper than eating out, but what about the premade meals at the store?
This was a lot closer to what I needed to know in the beginning because we never ate out often, but I did buy a lot of premade meals when I went grocery shopping
Is there a big budget difference between cooking from scratch and meals at the grocery store?
The average cost of frozen pizza at the Eugene, Oregon Walmart is $5.21
The cheapest pizza is $3.86 and they do not taste very good
My husband’s favorite is $6.96 for a pepperoni pizza, but it does go on sale for 2/$5 at Fred Meyer every few weeks
Even the cheapest pizzas or the ones on sale are more than my pizza recipe on sale
My recipe can be fresh pizza, frozen pizza, or microwave pizza
The toppings are changeable too.
I just stayed with pepperoni pizza for easier to-compare numbers
When I started cooking from scratch instead of buying premade meals at the grocery store, our monthly budget decreased a lot!
My examples have been pizza, but this is true for most food
Even more true if you master shopping the deals and sales
Before cooking from scratch, I was spending between $1000 and $1200 a month on food in 2022
Now I spend about $500 a month and food has only gotten more expensive
This is because I make most of our food from scratch including breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks, desserts, and breads
I have a goal to batch-cook one thing per day and then make dinner
This adds many things to our freezer and keeps our dinners homemade every night
The only exception I can think of is foods like cheese it’s that use real cheese or the cooked chicken from costco
How can you make cooking from scratch easier and more convenient?
I have shown that pizza from scratch is healthier and cheaper than eating out…
The main difference is the time
It takes about 30 minutes more time and the dishes to make pizza
More time if you don’t have a stand mixer
And you still have to cook it when you don’t need to when eating out
My recommendation for that is to make two or three times the recipe and freeze the extra
When I make pizza, I double the recipe
Two pizzas get cooked for that dinner, and two go into the freezer
It doesn’t take that much more time to make extra, then you have a no-time pizza from scratch next time!
What are some benefits of cooking from scratch?
Aside from the benefits of budget and health, there are a few more reasons to cook from scratch
My kids have a developmental delay and cooking has helped them connect with me
They practice counting while I am measuring ingredients and they love to get involved with anything that has dough
They see me cook every day and I am slowly teaching them how to do it too
Cooking from scratch is an amazing skill and very important since I am working on building a homestead
There are a few things that are required if you want to be self-sufficient
Knowing how to feed your family is one of those required skills
If you want to know more about the benefits of cooking from scratch, read my article on that here!
