Im cutting down costs to save to buy a home. I keep reading the advice to make your own snacks for the kids instead of buying packets but I don't get how that saves you money.
For example the mini banana or choc chip muffins at Coles are $3.50 for 8.
If I made these I spend on the premade packet plus an egg plus butter and banana plus whatever gas I used for the oven. All of that would add up to a bigger cost?
Same goes for buying pretty much anything like the snacks you can get 2 for $5 normally in Wooliea or Coles so you get 5 individual packets of popcorn or pretzels and that would be less time in the kitchen and using the oven less plus any ingredients to make biscuits or muffins etc
I just don't get why ppl say making it yourself saves u money when it clearly doesn't
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11 Replies
If you use premade mixes it’s probably not cheaper.
I bake from scratch. It’s cheaper over a number of batches. I bake in bulk and freeze.
I so envy mums like you (not the op).
I wish I did that.
If you buy all the items to make them by scratch you could make a bigger lot for cheaper compared to if you just bought pre made all of the time. It's not cheaper buying all the ingredients to make one muffin compared to buying one muffin, but you can make a lot more with those ingredients and if you do it enough times it'll it'll out cheaper in the end. I hope that makes sense.
Coles mini banana muffins work out to almost 44c each. From scratch you're looking at under 30c each for a bigger batch of approx 20 or more.
A large bag of popcorn is $3. An entire bag of popping corn is less than a dollar.
Some things won't be much cheaper when you compare like for like eg, you could spend a fortune trying to make triple chocolate cookies but why not simply make a basic jam drop biscuit instead? You know what's in it, and they're heaps cheaper.
Dont buy packet mix cakes/biscuits etc.
Bake from scratch.
If you buy the cheapest flour, butter, sugar and eggs, you could make muliple large batches of muffins in comparison. I get about 24 medium sized muffins in a batch. To buy that many in store its already $10.50. With my ingredients, I could make say 4 batches. Thats 96 muffins. To buy that in store it'd cost you $42...
To buy your ingredients initially if you had no flour, eggs, milk or butter in the pantry I'd cost about $15.
Generally I always have the staples so it would cost me some squishy bananas and butter.
It all comes down to what you choose to bake at well. Anzacs, basic cupcakes, jam drops, scones, etc are cheaper than say biscuits or slices that need chocolate.
Making stuff yourself does not always mean cheaper. It depends what it is! You're right, most baking has become cheaper to buy rather than to make from scratch. Or things that are significantly cheaper to make are time consuming, so those that don't have time are better off buying. It's the way of the world and how expensive "ingredients" are right now. Everything has gone up from flour, fruit, dried fruit, oil, dairy, meat, eggs, sugar. Everything to make snacks has gone up. The big companies can make them cheaper than we can.
What? Homebrand cake mix is 75c. Add milk, eggs and butter it would make at least 8-12 mini cakes, plus the few cents in gas, for half the price of the store bought mini cakes. The HB packaged mini cakes literally use the same HB cake mix lol but honestly, homemade from scratch is just as easy and so much nicer And just as cheap
I buy the 15 packs of LCMs at woolies for $7.
A friend of mine was like 'don't buy them, make them, it's sooo much cheaper.'
$3 for the marshmallows.
$3 for the butter (I usually only buy margarine so I didn't have any butter).
$3 for the sprinkles for the top, which to be fair I did use for other things.
I already had rice bubbles but that would've been a few more dollars if I didn't.
That equalled $9 and I ended up with about 18 slices.
I paid an extra $2 for 3 extra slices, that's not even taking into account the time it took me to make them, the electricity the oven used and water/cleaning products it took to clean melted, congealed marshmallows off everything.
Some things are cheaper to make from scratch and in bulk but I wouldn't say it's an earth shattering saving. Food is just expensive, period!
It IS cheaper though if you make from scratch. The quantities and quality is so much better. I work full time and kids have activities after school and weekend and I find that I can smash out heaps of really awesome, yummy stuff very quickly and cheaply
I find it costs a tiny fraction to make muffins and slices. I bought a whole heap bananas at the market for $1. I froze heaps for smoothies, banana bread, banana piklets and muffins. Frozen berries make awesome muffins and slices. There are heaps of great site to get some ideas going like Play Bake Smile etc.
I love Play Bake Smile. My go to recipe site every time!
Easy and affordable food, that is also fun and loved by kids and adults!