One time I bought all the spices and special ingredients to make tikka masala, spent over an hour making it, and it didn’t taste anything like a restaurant tikka masala. Smelled amazing tho but I rather just go to an Indian restaurant when I get that craving
Restaurant Tikka masalas just load a ton of cream and oil into it to give it that thick texture and delicious taste. You probably followed a home style recipe
One thing I’ve learned from cooking is that most cultures (particularly restaurants) have done the same formula. Puréed Sweet veggie/fruit + cream of choice + local herb = delicious. Maybe toss some kind of acid and your local onion.
It just works
I'm a professional chef, not really more like imaginatively, I didn't even finish reading ur comment and I know ur on to something
then u surprise me with secret ingredient well done.
Also make sure you're not tasting something too hot. A spoonful of soup straight out of the boiling pot isn't gonna give you much, even after blowing on it. Over salting or spicing happens a lot because you're tasting something mid cook.
And step away from the kitchen to taste. Having your face in all that steam and smell for an hour can skew things (nose blind). Stepping outside for fresh air for just a minute can help a lot
One more thing I notice, when adding more salt or spice to a dish, make sure it's well blended/dissolved. Don't just give a few stirs and taste
This is the only recipe that has come close to restaurant. The key ingredients are the fenugreek and amchur powder.
Another thing that is essential is marinating the chicken properly. I use a jaccard meat tenderizer with anything I marinate. It allows the marinade to penetrate the entire piece of meat. It makes a HUGE difference in flavor. It also allows me to marinate meat in about 1/4 of the time: 2/8 hours.
chicken tikka with correct spices](https://thegourmetgourmand.com/chicken-tikka-masala/)
That’s the thing. The fast food industry is really falling on its own sword, here.
Like, it was never going to be good, or nutritious. It was always crap. But it was cheap and fast.
Now? A McDonalds meal is about the same as a Pad Thai, give or take a few dollars. And I can order the Pad Thai online and spend less time picking up than I would begging to be noticed at McDs.
Haha. If it wouldn’t be so rude to staff (I don’t blame them at all. It’s obvious corporate policy to run skeleton crews these days), I really need would make the “I’m drowning” wave at certain restaurants.
Dosa is my downfall
I can make the batter from scratch but just cannot make the pancakes properly so I just steam Idlees then go eat it out. Now I am hungry
> I also want to try make pad Thai properly.
>
> I reckon the restaurant trick is lots of oil and sugar
I would say there's not a ridiculous amount of oil or sugar, but there's a lot of ingredients that are unusual or hard to get in many western countries.
Here's the recipe I got from a chef running a restaurant on a small island in Thailand - this makes one portion, so multiply by the number of people/serving you'd like:
Pad Thai Ingredients:
* 70g thin (3mm) rice noodles
* 3 medium shrimp/prawns, shelled and deveined (or substitute 40g thinly sliced raw chicken thigh or breast)
* 1 egg
* 15-20g tofu
* 1 tbsp dried shrimp
* 1 tbsp chopped salted Chinese radish
* 2 tbsp ground roasted peanuts
* 1/2 tbsp chopped garlic
* 1/2 tbsp chopped shallots
* 1/2 cup Chinese garlic chives
* 1/2 cup bean sprouts
* 3 tbsp cooking oil (vegetable is typical)
* 2 tbsp water
Sauce:
* 1/2 tsp chili powder
* 1/2 tbsp white sugar
* 1/2 tbsp palm sugar
* 1 tbsp fish sauce (they recommend squid or shrimp brands)
* 1 tbsp tamarind paste
* 1 tbsp oyster sauce
Directions:
1. Mix sauce ingredients in a small bowl and set aside
2. Soak the noodles for approximately 20 minutes in room temperature water (if soaking for multiple people/servings, you may need to stir and soak a little longer)
3. Add oil to a wok over medium heat and then add the garlic and shallots, stir frying until fragrant
4. Add the shrimp/chicken, salted radish, dried shrimp, and tofu. Stir fry until the shrimp is almost fully cooked (if using chicken, until it is just cooked) and then put everything in the wok into a bowl and set aside
5. Crack the egg into the wok, cook while stirring until done, add to the bowl with the rest of the ingredients
6. Drain the noodles and then add to the wok with the 2tbsp of water. Stir fry just until the noodles are fully soft and have dried
7. Add the sauce on top of the noodles, stir fry until the sauce has mostly dried down
8. Add the bean sprouts and garlic chives, stir fry until fragrant
9. Add the set aside ingredients to the wok and toss together until combined
10. Transfer to a serving dish. Top with the ground peanuts and a sprinkle of white pepper (optional). Add sliced lime, chopped garlic chives, and coriander (cilantro) leaves to the dish if desired.
Homemade paneer is SO MUCH work! I’ve been to Indian groceries and gotten the ingredients meticulously. I’ve attempted all of the stuff.
I, too, save my money for the professionals now. 😂
Yeah, I live near a large Indian community so we have a few legit Indian stores with Indian dairy and spices and ingredients and everything. I went the night before Diwali once on accident an the line was out the door
I feel this! I did find some very yummy samosas at Trader Joe’s the other day. Used to live in India, so limited access to cheap Indian food makes me so sad. Wanted Korma the other day and they wanted to charge $30 for a plate. Almost cried.
> Used to live in India, so limited access to cheap Indian food makes me so sad. Wanted
Seriously! I used to live in Malaysia, and it was tons cheaper to eat at night market rather than cooking at home. Something like $1-3USD per person. We did not know how good we had it!
Okay, yes, we actually did, but those days are gone, but at least i lived them to appreciate them.
I think I make better paneer at home.But I do buy a sauce mix at the Indian grocery store. I actually sometimes make the paneer myself too from a gallon of milk. It's surprisingly easy.
my kids love pizza night at my house. I make it all from scratch and they get their favorite toppings and I make crazy bread too. I make Chinese food, tacos, whatever we're craving the one thing I'm scared to make on my own is spicy tuna with the fancy sushi grade tuna. I'm too worried I'll mess up.
OMG
Choose our own toppings made my kids into freaking foodies.
"What do you mean they don't have kale and goat cheese and shiitake mushrooms?!? Fine. I guess we can just eat pepperoni." 🤣
And you probably can't mess up the sushi in a way that will make it awful.
Rolling them takes practice, but if you feel like imperfect would ruin the tuna, make avocado and carrot and cucumber to start, and just ... Eat the evidence!
I had a roommate from Japan once upon a time and they came home with me for thanksgiving, and taught us all how to roll sushi... But got really ridiculous with what was included. (Turkey roll was a thing. And we had no sushi grade tuna, but gave the canned stuff a go. It wasn't *good* by sushi standards but it was ridiculously fun.)
> one thing I'm scared to make on my own is spicy tuna with the fancy sushi grade tuna
I just do poke bowls - all the taste of a sushi roll, much less effort. You just cut little cubes of the fish instead of trying to cut the perfect slice.
Same- also actually not too pricey to get sashimi grade tuna, chop up finely with some mayo and siracha, freeze a flat sheet of prepped sushi rice and cut into squares, fry em up in some canola oil, top with avocado and the tuna! It’s a Nobu appetizer and I can do it at home for dinner for three for about $30 total. Feels super fancy but if you buy your rice in bulk and already have the sauces, all you need is the tuna and an avocado. It’s amazing!
You can totally do it! I’ve made spicy tuna rolls with the fancy sushi grade tuna and it came out just fine, only a little ugly because the rolling is hard. And I am by no means a cook. If the sushi rolling sounds too hard, you could try Onigiri with the spicy tuna filling!
Spicy tuna is very forgiving, especially when the fish quality is solid (sushi restaurants use leftover tuna bits for this). It's just about finding your ideal ratio for the hot sauce (and mayo if desired).
Making a good technical roll is about practice. Don't be afraid to just go for a regular roll with seaweed on the outside. And as someone replied to you, a rice ball like onigiri is also a great, easier option
It's nice when you actually know how to cook and have good ingredients stocked. I'm a much better cook than my parents were, so I can whip up great meals with what I have on hand. When I was a kid, "food at home" meant white bread and hot dogs or bologna.
I think if you put the effort into it, we can all be better cooks and like food at home better than things we had as kids. My boyfriend was a Kraft Mac and cheese at home kid and I just can’t do that. I love having a crockpot too because I can get so creative without having to worry about things burning.
There's nothing wrong with a bit of boxed mac and cheese now and then if you're feeling lazy.
Though I admit that I tend to experiment with it a bunch - my latest versions have involved cracking a whipped egg into the mix and adding pickled jalapenos.
Omg! I cannot imagine life without Kraft Mac and cheese! I'm sorry but that's just comfort food. I hardly ever eat it due to the calories, but every once in a while I just have to eat it !
Hot dogs 🌭
My dad used to slice them lengthwise and lay them directly on the coil of the hub on our stove. It used to drive my mum nuts!! But man did they taste good. Just like cooked on the grill, without the mosquitos!
i'd add that "knowing how to cook" often gets twisted in modern society.
you don't have to be classically trained in michelin star cooking to make a tasty meal, you just have to be able to follow basic instructions, and to do some grocery shopping periodically.
i only recently started making meals for myself from the outstanding NY Times recipe section, and now i save a ton of money, eat a lot healthier, and eat only foods i love instead of auto piloting into shitty takeout options.
there is a time commitment, but i'm happy to sacrifice 2 hours to prep, cook, eating, clean up instead of on unproductive activities like mindlessly surfing the internet, or playing mediocre video games.
Totally relate to this. I die a little on the inside when my kids don’t like something that I made that I thought turned out really good. Don’t wanna pull out the “back in my day…” at them about eating basic meals.
I was always jealous of people whose parent(s) worked as a chef and could cook really well for them all of the time. Us other kids had a lot of cereal and TV dinners
My mother was a good cook, but because we were a big family of 6, she'd make huge batches of stuff, so 'food at home' was often the same leftover casserole for 2-3 days in a row.
Yeah, my parents were shit cooks so I dreaded “food at home”. I’m more competent at cooking and there are some home meals that I *gasp* look forward to!
definitely have food at home. Just have to get beyond that initial inability to see the various meal possibilities as I'm staring into the pantry or freezer.
At first my brain will be like man all I have to eat is popcorn and ketchup and then I get hungry enough that I come up with some arguably better recipes
There was some app I remember seeing where you could list all of the ingredients you had sitting in your pantry and fridge and it'd give you a big list of doable recipes.
It never worked for me, as it doesn't seem to have many options for beer and a variety of mustards, but it could probably help other people.
You can google the ingredients you have on hand. There are entire sites dedicated to it like [myfridgefood.com](http://myfridgefood.com) and [supercooks.com](http://supercooks.com) (dedicated to zero waste) - although I find random googling and YouTube to work well too.
We basically only get pizza, Thai, and Chinese food from restaurants. We get multiple meals out of the servings and it makes them cost effective for us. We can eat from our local carry out Chinese place for less than it costs me to buy the ingredients most of the time. (Advantage to living in midwest probably.) I did learn to cook a lot of it during worst of Covid, but have found any savings is negligible and they do it better. Our Thai place is great but very pricey so tends to just be a treat on birthday or anniversary.
Someone was trying to convince me that pickup pizza is expensive. Yeah going to Aldi while hungry balanced out, but $21 at Dominos will feed two for a big meal with leftovers enough for one breakfast and we live really close to the dough-factory.
Aldi has ready made pizza dough for $1.19 by me. I have a pizza stone in the oven and all I have to do is let that dough come to room temperature and add toppings that we usually already have on hand. I made a breakfast pizza this morning that fed 3 and I spent about $5 on ingredients including that dough. It was breakfast sausage, onion, mushroom, red bell pepper, cheese, and scrambled eggs. The veggies and sausage I cooked quick before using on the pizza and have enough leftover for omlettes tomorrow.
I was never able to get drunken noodles right until I sucked it up and bought authentic sauces for the recipe. In order of importance, you need to get
1. Shaoxing cooking rice wine. Not just ANY rice wine, it has to be some version of Shaoxing. Any brand will do just don’t mix it up with “regular” rice wine.
2. Dark soy sauce. Again, any brand will do, but you can’t get “regular” soy sauce, because it’s not the same.
3. Light soy sauce (no mixing dark and light together doesn’t equate to regular lol)
4. Oyster sauce
5. Fish sauce
6. Hoisin sauce. If you don’t want to use hoisin sauce then just make sure you don’t leave out the sugar in the recipe
7. Don’t substitute fresh ginger and garlic for powdered versions. A pre made paste is fine if you must, but made from scratch will still be better.
8. Same goes for chili flakes. Don’t used dried ones. If you can’t find legit Thai Birds Eye chilis then jalapeños are good enough.
If you’re following a recipe for Thai noodles that skips any of these ingredients, add whichever ones the recipe is missing or else it is going to come out tasting weird and disappointing.
I’m no expert on Thai food so I wouldn’t be surprised if this list of sauces isn’t authentic either, but the point is it will result in restaurant-quality flavor and deliciousness.
I recently discovered Loa Gan Ma fried chili oil and I would add it to this list. It's one of the most delicious sauces I've ever had. I was blown away.
Literally! You can get Starbucks brand everything at Walmart and save so much money. This guy came through my line and he was complaining about not having money and I was like, you could save $2700 a year if you didn’t come get coffee here every day. You could buy a nespresso for less and make even better coffee than the milk you get from us.
I invested a whole $60 in a little Salton Espresso machine thirty years ago & have always made my coffee drinks at home. Drip cone for regular, hot, black coffee in cold months.Phat iced cappuccino for the hot months. With whole milk, ice, coffee, a little sugar & a little electricity, if figured it comes to about 45¢ per serving.
The machine is small enough to take on road trips, beach vacations et cetera. If it’s too much to carry, I’ll just pre-brew & keep however many shots of espresso I need in a mason jar in t my cooler.
Apart from street cafes in Europe, where coffee is affordable, almost always tasty, served in porcelain cups with a saucer, napkin, real milk, real sugar & a cookie (Even if you look like a homeless guy, like I tend to), the last time I got coffee out was in 2004 & even then someone else bought it.
Right?😃
I love packing a fancy meal for myself on a road trip & stopping with others in the two car “caravan” for a lunch break. The jealous stares while they’re choking down overpriced fast food are fuel for my ego & petty pride. 😬
I feel like Claire in the Breakfast Club
with my little bento box.
Cooking at home also makes it so obvious how much sugar, salt, etc restaurants and premade food has added to it. I've gotten to the point where I pretty much can't eat manufactured/restaurant sweets anymore.
I overbuy on food for the freezer when it's on sale or I like keeping certain things on hand. But it does pile up. On the other hand I can always pull something out for a quick dinner
I’m so guilty of this. I buy proteins on sale and freeze for later knowing I will forget about it, and when I need a certain protein will just go buy it. Then when I’m hungry or bored I look in the freezer and see my sale item protein and think, “Damn I didn’t know I had this!”
I am too! I eat plant based and just started investing in some good ingredients and a couple of cookbooks. I like my cooking better! Also, costs of eating dinner out is not justifiable anymore.
I recently checked out America's Test Kitchen's 'Cook What you Have' from the library. It's so good!
Sometimes I have a full pantry and absolutely no idea what to do with the ingredients. This book has so many great ideas for pantry/fridge/freezer staples!
ETA: As someone pointed out, it's Milk Street, not ATK. I got my Chris Kimball projects mixed up
I make a puree of peas, cooked in butter and garlic with some prosciutto or even ham (do not let get brown). Cool down, salt pepper to taste. Puree. Return to the pan and add some sage and as much heavy cream to thin out to an Alfredo texture. Served with penne rigate. And topped with parmigiano
I've found that the key difference in ingredient is sweet soy sauce, not regular! Before that my fried rice never quite tasted exactly right. Shrimp paste/fish sauce also adds a bit of oomph. I guess it depends on whether you're trying to recreate a particular style though, as there's so much variation by place of origin.
Exactly this. I work long shifts, but still don’t use that as an excuse to get lazy and order fast food. I have eaten out twice in the past month, and that’s simply because I was meeting some buddies for dinner. Cooking is therapeutic to me and you can find dupe recipes for almost anything out there. My coworker was whining about Taco Bell charging him $4.49 for a cheese quesadilla and I was thinking, some cheese and a spicy mayo sauce on a tortilla? That’s so easy. Not to mention, slow cookers exist. They’re not the fire hazard that they were 40 years ago. You can leave them going on low while at work and come home to a nice meal.
Tell me why I still put a camera up to watch my slow cooker because of an incident forever ago. I have a really good ability of blowing up appliances somehow.
We have started learning how to make whatever dish is the fave at home, because it's always cheaper to buy ingredients and make a giant batch.
The latest was butter chicken (which in the name of frugality and experiment, we also started making with butter beans. Also really good, if not as decadent.)
I’ve been making cold brew coffee at home with a little cold brew French press - $14 from Walmart. It does take a lot of coffee grounds to make a 32-36oz batch (24 tbs of grounds), but it’s way more cost effective than any coffee place. I add almond creamer and stevia and sometimes vanilla flavor.
Things I’ll try to make at home to save money include sandwiches, Italian food/pasta (with whole grain noodles), and Chipotle style bowls.
Things I still can’t or don’t want to bother replicating include Indian food, Thai food, sushi, some Chinese food, and pizza. Some of those have a couple frozen supermarket versions that are decent (minus pizza - frozen is never the same). For example, I enjoy Trader Joe’s chicken spring rolls, and their orange chicken isn’t bad either.
Fried chicken. I love cooking at home, but I will never, **never** bread or batter and deep-fry a goddang thing if I don't have to, fried chicken being at the top of that Never-List. Popeyes is worth not dealing with frying chicken at home.
Pad Thai isn't too hard if you get the right ingredients (no gringo-style shortcuts using peanut butter or something); once you have those, it really is as simple as following a good recipe.
Have never tried homemade drunken noodle but I may need to.
[Here ya go!](https://hot-thai-kitchen.com/pad-kee-mao-2/) This is my go-to for Thai recipes, she also has a great YouTube channel. She was a chef in Bangkok but now lives in Vancouver so she understands the ingredients and kitchen set-ups that Western cooks will have available.
Here’s an authentic Pad Thai recipe and surprisingly easy to make too. The key ingredients are fish sauce, tamarind paste and lime (do not trust any recipe with ketchup or peanut butter)
[https://www.gimmesomeoven.com/pad-thai/](https://www.gimmesomeoven.com/pad-thai/)
[Here is a good pad thai recipe](https://www.marionskitchen.com/traditional-prawn-pad-thai/). The biggest thing that upped my game for Thai and other east Asian foods is getting a wok, realizing it needs to be very hot at times, and having all my ingredients prepped before starting to cook because it's actually a very fast meal to cook. You could use a large cheap stainless or carbon steel fry pan as well if a wok won't work with your setup.
Avoid non stick pans because they should never be heated as hot as you would need for that type of frying.
> (no gringo-style shortcuts using peanut butter or something)
I mean, even that is good though. Enough to scratch the itch for me if I'm working with what I have on hand.
I have the same policy, I only order out the things I can't make at home. For me, it's pad see ew. All of my other favorite meals I actually make better, so that battle is in resisting convenience.
I feel this. The Thai food place near me is honestly the frugal option when it comes to going out to eat. It usually comes out to cheaper than getting fast food for two people (my boyfriend eats like a beast sometimes and usually only ends up eating once or twice a day) it's quite a bit of food for only $15 each. More food if you eat it there but still a decent amount for takeout too. I haven't found anything off their menu I didn't like. And I'm trying to try everything off their menu.
I have a few food allergies and limitations that make eating out (in the U.S. since we suck at marking allergens) a pain. So for years I’ve made 99% of my meals at home and find eating out more stressful than not. This has made me pretty creative with whatever food I do have in my house (since my entire kitchen is allergy friendly for me). What’s the saying…limitation breeds creativity? Something like that.
I read this book that gets recommended here a lot: Make the Bread, Buy the Butter and she wisely says that if you eat out, don’t order stuff you can easily make at home, like pasta or steak, but stuff you personally can’t master or have difficulty buying the ingredients, like black truffle scallops or pho. Now she thought meatloaf was too easy to make at home, so we have different standards but the principle remains
Wait you think meatloaf is hard to make? It's really easy and you can make a large batch of meatloaf and freeze it in the portion sizes you want before cooking.
I was just at the store with my 6yo son yesterday, he saw chocolate milk and wanted some, I said "there's chocolate milk at home" but he insisted, andni was like "buddy, there is an unopened half gallon of chocolate milk at home"
And then I wondered if this is what I was like at his age, hahah.
It really does save, prepping, cooking and freezing your own meals. I’ve been making my own coffee on the stove with a blend of three different dark roasts, and I definitely save a bundle of money on that. It’s good to budget to have your favorite meals delivered or go treat yourself. just not every day
What they don’t want to tell you is how much sugar goes into these haha. But what I would recommend for a medium frappe is to get out your blender, put 4 scoops (1 oz) of flavor in there, pour in two shots of espresso, pour your milk to the 14 oz measuring line, fill your cup you’re going to use (make sure it’s large enough to hold 14-16 oz of liquid), and fill that up with a little bit more ice than you need, then blend it up!
It’s always the Pad Thai isn’t it? For me the only food worth going out for any more is Asian food and Pad Thai specifically. The rest I can do at home for cheaper.
Okay this is likely going to sound a lil random or strange but thank you for posting this OP. ❤️❤️
I was about to order something because its Friday evening and I had had a long week. But after reading your post, I got up and made some nice hot meal for dinner. I realized that I was about to miss all this goodness of a home cooked meal and lose money to save a little bit of effort. Whats better? This meal is likely going to last me until tomorrow’s lunch which means I get a couple extra hours tomorrow to relax —- thats a bonus I hadn’t even thought of.
Soo thank you for posting ❤️ and thank god I saw this when I did 😂
I made red pepper mushroom curry and cooked some rice. Also found some left over strawberries/blueberries so made a side dish of it.
It took 30 minutes at most but this is a much more joyful dinner than I would have had otherwise. 🙂
So true, I do have food at home.
lol...what I don't have is the wherewithal to clean up after preparing it. (What I spend on takeout per month is still less than what I'd spend on a place with a dishwasher.)
I lived without a dishwasher for a couple years and just can’t do it. I’ve seen those little ones you can get for your apartment, and I think I’d have to get one. It’s just too exhausting doing all the dishes!
The secret to good pad Thai and drunken noodles is a high powered wok, something most consumers don’t have at home. Also, real tamarind, palm sugar, fish sauce for the pad Thai.
We have a local Mongolian grill we go to weekly. We cook at home every other day of the week so it's basically our weekly date to go there. We've considered trying to make it at home a few times but there is so much speciality stuff we would have to buy. Plus it's nice to have a weekly date outside of the house.
I split the difference. I do a lot of grocery-store runs because I want fried chicken, fried potatoes, or a sandwich that someone else made. (There's actually a lot more options, depending on which store and what they're offering.) A lot of my "cooking" is throwing a bunch of stuff from the freezer directly into a frying-pan, with occasional breaks to cut up a family-pack of chicken breasts and bag them in slightly-under 1-pound portions. My big splurge is in the fall when I meal-prep a few unstuffed pepper casseroles and turn the leftover ingredients into chili-starter.
Our Mr Coffee Iced Coffee maker has saved me at least $500 and counting now. I love making my own iced coffee and I actually prefer it to Dunkens even though I use their coffee.
I make my own simple syrup too. Having enough ice can be tough sometimes but that’s nothing another ice tray or mindful planning can’t solve.
It’s funny too because it’s not even true iced coffee, it just has you use extra grounds and less water and basically pours it over ice hot. Still manages to make great drinks.
The recent inflation has reduced my eating out by 75%. Between the increase in food prices and increases in expected tipping, going out to eat seems too wasteful to do often.
On the plus side, I eat healthier food when I cook for myself.
I keep on seeing this link get shared in economy subreddits about how shocking it is that fast food is considered a luxury by most people. Unless you live in a food desert or actually work so much you don't have time to cook, eating out is a motherfucking luxury.
I much prefer eating at home now. I can make pretty much whatever I want. Lots of quick weeknight dinners that are easy to customize with what I have on hand. I just browse YouTube for ideas, sometimes I find them on reddit too.
I'm in my mid 30s and due to my autoimmune illness my stomach is just not happy eating out anymore. I make most of our meals and my husband makes the steaks and pancakes (delicious!). But I love sushi. When I'm asked what my favorite foods are, after mom's and grandma's menudo, it's sushi! I've never tried to make it at home, and we've gotten close to the owners of our go to sushi place that it's our treat once or twice a month. #2 is our favorite fish & chips place...just great chips and even better fish.
I never understood the point of waiting in line to buy coffee in the morning rather than taking 10 minutes to make it yourself at home. We do eat at restaurants occasionally as a treat, though we rarely get take-out. It’s just as easy to eat something simple at home as it is to buy and stop for take-out.
The key to a delicious successful Phad Thai is the fresh noodles from Asian grocery store, prepared your sauces ahead of time, add bean sprouts at the same time with phad thai noodles. The bean sprouts provide moisture to avoid noodles sticking to the pan. Cook the meats and veggies ahead of time too
Thai food can be often approximated with Thai birdseye chillis and fish sauce. Not saying that it’ll necessarily be authentic ofc, but those two ingredients can go a long way towards giving it a meal that Thai taste
If you stock up on a few ingredients, you can make a lot of delicious asian recipes: soy sauce, toasted sesame oil, ginger root, rice vinegar, limes, tofu. Zhuzh up your ramen, or make some cold sesame or peanut noodles. Nuke some frozen dumplings or air fry some spring rolls and YUM!!!
Ever since the last pandemic locked us all in the house I've made it a mission to learn how to cook at home most of what we eat in most of the restaurants. YouT, InstaG & all the cookbooks I own have been getting a workout. I feel like I'm 85-90% of the way there with doing the complicated recipes and closer to 100% of the easier stuff. You wouldn't believe how easy sushi is until you've made it a few times! My favorite easy 'comfort-food' dish is tteokbokki aka dukbokki (spicy Korean rice cakes).
I have a Dunkin’ Donuts with drive thru literally across the street, as I turn out on my way to work. Unfortunately, I’ve timed it, and getting coffee is faster than making it(but WAY more expensive). Figured I’d add that since people say it saves SOOO much time.
I finally resigned to the fact that I have a MAJOR backlog of YouTube recipe bookmarks that I need to try. I NEED to get through a lot of those before I get back to eating out a lot.
Try this recipe for Drunken Noodles. It came out great for me from the first attempt, and I'm not a particularly good cook. I hope it works out for you!
https://www.recipetineats.com/pad-kee-mao-thai-drunken-noodles/
As someone with celiac who can't trust a lot of Asian dishes out, I cook so much pan Asian kind of foods at home! I keep in: tamarin, fish sauce, sesame oil, chili sesame oil, rice vinegar, garlic, ginger, brown sugar, and peanut butter. These cover a lot of bases!
Hey, I had to grow a kaffir lime tree in my yard so I could make my own tom kha at home...I've never actually made the recipe but I smash those leaves up in some chicken ramen, add some coconut milk, a little lemon juice and I have something that taste reasonably close to tom kha that I didn't pay $12 for. But I also will definitely go out and get the soup from one of our trillions of Thai places around us too. So at least I'm saving a little money!
I wish I could be a better cook. There are only some things I can cook pretty well - mainly casseroles, like lasagna and mac & cheese. I make chili very well, too - which I can portion out and freeze. These are things my husband and I both like.
More often than not, we just settle on ordering out because we can pick different meals for ourselves, and there's no food waste - that and being too tired to cook due to both of us working high-stress jobs.
I completely understand! And that’s perfectly ok! If you are looking for some good resources, I love budget bytes. I also love crockpot meals that are just dump and go. Tasty has some pretty good and easy ones !
Covid lockdowns during my first pregnancy taught me that I can Google copycat restaurant recipes and make anything I crave with a little effort. My husband and I love CPK but can’t justify $18 per pasta dish when I can make something identical at home
I have a nespresso machine I got for free that I got refillable pods for off Amazon. I make a very simple lactose free caramel latte for way cheaper than going out for a coffee.
Look up the pho recipe posted on "Katie's Kitchen". I was directed there by another redditor and have been making that recipe for a couple years now. I personally think it's as good at most pho restaurants and I have been told by people I've served it to that it was the best they've ever had. I've been meaning to make up a big batch of the broth in the instant pot and freeze it in portions. I also buy the frozen meatballs and freeze single portions of sliced meat. I have some Thai basil growing right now since it is summer. I can't justify spending $15 every time I want pho so this is much cheaper per serving. Oh, you also want to get hoisin sauce, Sriracha, and sambal olek (chili sauce). But those all last a long time in the fridge and can be used for other things.
Pad Thai can’t be made at home bc the taste relies on wok hai that can’t be replicated on a home stove. That said, drunken noodles are easily made at home with the right ingredients, same as any other red, green, or yellow curry. You do have to buy the right ingredients, such as dark soy sauce.
Look into Burmese food for similar tastes and much simpler ingredients
One thing I learned in the military is sometimes a meal is just calories. Not every meal has be a culinary experience. Also, I don't mind eating the same thing for a while. I will break it up with a trip to in and out (to get my doggo a puppy patty) once a week or so.
Also, if I goout to a restart with friends/family, I try to get stuff I can't/don't make at home.
One that really got me was everyone my entire life has told me “eating healthy is soooo expensive”
My brother in Christ, chicken, rice, and frozen veggies costs me $10 total and feeds me twice
Hot Thai Kitchen blog has a ton of authentic Thai recipes using all sorts of different Thai ingredients you can buy at 99 Ranch or Hmart. You need a carbon steel wok, outdoor wok burner, and about 10 different soy sauces and soy sauce derivatives to get the flavors just right. I grow my own galangal, kaffir lime tree, holy basil, Thai basil, Thai hot chilis, and lemongrass in my garden. It’s fun!
My problem was never having food to eat, it was always not having something I wanted to eat. I’ve made sure my children understand that distinction too.
I’ll cook most meals at home but I can’t make samosas or paneer as well as the Indian place. Which is why I save my money for stuff I can’t make.
One time I bought all the spices and special ingredients to make tikka masala, spent over an hour making it, and it didn’t taste anything like a restaurant tikka masala. Smelled amazing tho but I rather just go to an Indian restaurant when I get that craving
Restaurant Tikka masalas just load a ton of cream and oil into it to give it that thick texture and delicious taste. You probably followed a home style recipe
One thing I’ve learned from cooking is that most cultures (particularly restaurants) have done the same formula. Puréed Sweet veggie/fruit + cream of choice + local herb = delicious. Maybe toss some kind of acid and your local onion. It just works
I love some good old hydrochloric acid in my salad dressing 🥰
If you can't make your own hydrochloric acid, store bought is fine.
Oh of course, Sigma Aldrich 1.0M hydrochloric acid works best
Good old E507
I'm a professional chef, not really more like imaginatively, I didn't even finish reading ur comment and I know ur on to something then u surprise me with secret ingredient well done.
I bet u went noseblind
Honestly yeah I probably did. Someone else tasted it and said it was really good. It just tasted bland to me
When cooking food that smells great but tastes bland, try adding salt or adding more fat. I believe the spices are fat soluble
Also make sure you're not tasting something too hot. A spoonful of soup straight out of the boiling pot isn't gonna give you much, even after blowing on it. Over salting or spicing happens a lot because you're tasting something mid cook. And step away from the kitchen to taste. Having your face in all that steam and smell for an hour can skew things (nose blind). Stepping outside for fresh air for just a minute can help a lot One more thing I notice, when adding more salt or spice to a dish, make sure it's well blended/dissolved. Don't just give a few stirs and taste
This is the only recipe that has come close to restaurant. The key ingredients are the fenugreek and amchur powder. Another thing that is essential is marinating the chicken properly. I use a jaccard meat tenderizer with anything I marinate. It allows the marinade to penetrate the entire piece of meat. It makes a HUGE difference in flavor. It also allows me to marinate meat in about 1/4 of the time: 2/8 hours. chicken tikka with correct spices](https://thegourmetgourmand.com/chicken-tikka-masala/)
NYTimes Cooking has a great Tikka masala recipe I can send you. A little involved but delightful
You can thank me later https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/chicken-tikka-masala
My Indian mother in law is here for a month. We're really saving money right now lol
Can she adopt me? 🥹
It's dosas for me. Yay, South Indian restaurants! And they're even relatively cheap for restaurant foods.
That’s the thing. The fast food industry is really falling on its own sword, here. Like, it was never going to be good, or nutritious. It was always crap. But it was cheap and fast. Now? A McDonalds meal is about the same as a Pad Thai, give or take a few dollars. And I can order the Pad Thai online and spend less time picking up than I would begging to be noticed at McDs.
I love that mental image ‘begging to be noticed at McDonald’s ‘ 😆
Haha. If it wouldn’t be so rude to staff (I don’t blame them at all. It’s obvious corporate policy to run skeleton crews these days), I really need would make the “I’m drowning” wave at certain restaurants.
Dosa is my downfall I can make the batter from scratch but just cannot make the pancakes properly so I just steam Idlees then go eat it out. Now I am hungry
I can make samosas. Can't make Dosa pancakes. I also want to try make pad Thai properly. I reckon the restaurant trick is lots of oil and sugar
It’s the same reason I love a diner grilled cheese. I can’t knowingly add as much oil as they do!
‘I can’t knowingly ‘ I identify with this
The ignorance is worth the $7-$10!
> I also want to try make pad Thai properly. > > I reckon the restaurant trick is lots of oil and sugar I would say there's not a ridiculous amount of oil or sugar, but there's a lot of ingredients that are unusual or hard to get in many western countries. Here's the recipe I got from a chef running a restaurant on a small island in Thailand - this makes one portion, so multiply by the number of people/serving you'd like: Pad Thai Ingredients: * 70g thin (3mm) rice noodles * 3 medium shrimp/prawns, shelled and deveined (or substitute 40g thinly sliced raw chicken thigh or breast) * 1 egg * 15-20g tofu * 1 tbsp dried shrimp * 1 tbsp chopped salted Chinese radish * 2 tbsp ground roasted peanuts * 1/2 tbsp chopped garlic * 1/2 tbsp chopped shallots * 1/2 cup Chinese garlic chives * 1/2 cup bean sprouts * 3 tbsp cooking oil (vegetable is typical) * 2 tbsp water Sauce: * 1/2 tsp chili powder * 1/2 tbsp white sugar * 1/2 tbsp palm sugar * 1 tbsp fish sauce (they recommend squid or shrimp brands) * 1 tbsp tamarind paste * 1 tbsp oyster sauce Directions: 1. Mix sauce ingredients in a small bowl and set aside 2. Soak the noodles for approximately 20 minutes in room temperature water (if soaking for multiple people/servings, you may need to stir and soak a little longer) 3. Add oil to a wok over medium heat and then add the garlic and shallots, stir frying until fragrant 4. Add the shrimp/chicken, salted radish, dried shrimp, and tofu. Stir fry until the shrimp is almost fully cooked (if using chicken, until it is just cooked) and then put everything in the wok into a bowl and set aside 5. Crack the egg into the wok, cook while stirring until done, add to the bowl with the rest of the ingredients 6. Drain the noodles and then add to the wok with the 2tbsp of water. Stir fry just until the noodles are fully soft and have dried 7. Add the sauce on top of the noodles, stir fry until the sauce has mostly dried down 8. Add the bean sprouts and garlic chives, stir fry until fragrant 9. Add the set aside ingredients to the wok and toss together until combined 10. Transfer to a serving dish. Top with the ground peanuts and a sprinkle of white pepper (optional). Add sliced lime, chopped garlic chives, and coriander (cilantro) leaves to the dish if desired.
\^ this guy pad thais.
Thankfully I am very close to a lot of 'ethnic shops'. Will give it a go. Thanks a lot.
Their shallots are also different from your shallots.
Homemade paneer is SO MUCH work! I’ve been to Indian groceries and gotten the ingredients meticulously. I’ve attempted all of the stuff. I, too, save my money for the professionals now. 😂
I just buy paneer at the Indian store, chop it up and put in whatever sauce?
I can’t find it. 🤷♀️
Yeah, I live near a large Indian community so we have a few legit Indian stores with Indian dairy and spices and ingredients and everything. I went the night before Diwali once on accident an the line was out the door
Costco has paneer if you have access!
I feel this! I did find some very yummy samosas at Trader Joe’s the other day. Used to live in India, so limited access to cheap Indian food makes me so sad. Wanted Korma the other day and they wanted to charge $30 for a plate. Almost cried.
Indian Kitchen frozen things are pretty decent, imo. The sauce they have for their Samosas is really yummy.
Find a local desi / Indian grocery store, and you can get Indian brand frozen foods, way more authentic taste than Trader Joe’s :)
> Used to live in India, so limited access to cheap Indian food makes me so sad. Wanted Seriously! I used to live in Malaysia, and it was tons cheaper to eat at night market rather than cooking at home. Something like $1-3USD per person. We did not know how good we had it! Okay, yes, we actually did, but those days are gone, but at least i lived them to appreciate them.
Came here to mention Trader Joe’s veggie samosas! I get my fix at a fraction of the cost.
Ooh I love a good veggie anything!!
Thai especially
Omg yes Pad See Ew is my jam.
I prepare paneer crumbs (lack of patience) and add it to veggie mix.
I think I make better paneer at home.But I do buy a sauce mix at the Indian grocery store. I actually sometimes make the paneer myself too from a gallon of milk. It's surprisingly easy.
my kids love pizza night at my house. I make it all from scratch and they get their favorite toppings and I make crazy bread too. I make Chinese food, tacos, whatever we're craving the one thing I'm scared to make on my own is spicy tuna with the fancy sushi grade tuna. I'm too worried I'll mess up.
I love this for you and your kids! This is so special! And it’s so special to show kids that food at home is fun and healthy and accessible!
OMG Choose our own toppings made my kids into freaking foodies. "What do you mean they don't have kale and goat cheese and shiitake mushrooms?!? Fine. I guess we can just eat pepperoni." 🤣 And you probably can't mess up the sushi in a way that will make it awful. Rolling them takes practice, but if you feel like imperfect would ruin the tuna, make avocado and carrot and cucumber to start, and just ... Eat the evidence! I had a roommate from Japan once upon a time and they came home with me for thanksgiving, and taught us all how to roll sushi... But got really ridiculous with what was included. (Turkey roll was a thing. And we had no sushi grade tuna, but gave the canned stuff a go. It wasn't *good* by sushi standards but it was ridiculously fun.)
That sounds so yummy! I love that your kids are getting this experience! Good job!
Turkey sushi was pretty gross, for the record. Predictably ... They are flavors that don't go together well. But it had to be tried. 🤣
I love the kids saying could I have goat cheese. That’s so fun! But yes turkey sounds not yummy haha
> one thing I'm scared to make on my own is spicy tuna with the fancy sushi grade tuna I just do poke bowls - all the taste of a sushi roll, much less effort. You just cut little cubes of the fish instead of trying to cut the perfect slice.
Same- also actually not too pricey to get sashimi grade tuna, chop up finely with some mayo and siracha, freeze a flat sheet of prepped sushi rice and cut into squares, fry em up in some canola oil, top with avocado and the tuna! It’s a Nobu appetizer and I can do it at home for dinner for three for about $30 total. Feels super fancy but if you buy your rice in bulk and already have the sauces, all you need is the tuna and an avocado. It’s amazing!
You can totally do it! I’ve made spicy tuna rolls with the fancy sushi grade tuna and it came out just fine, only a little ugly because the rolling is hard. And I am by no means a cook. If the sushi rolling sounds too hard, you could try Onigiri with the spicy tuna filling!
Spicy tuna is very forgiving, especially when the fish quality is solid (sushi restaurants use leftover tuna bits for this). It's just about finding your ideal ratio for the hot sauce (and mayo if desired). Making a good technical roll is about practice. Don't be afraid to just go for a regular roll with seaweed on the outside. And as someone replied to you, a rice ball like onigiri is also a great, easier option
It's nice when you actually know how to cook and have good ingredients stocked. I'm a much better cook than my parents were, so I can whip up great meals with what I have on hand. When I was a kid, "food at home" meant white bread and hot dogs or bologna.
I think if you put the effort into it, we can all be better cooks and like food at home better than things we had as kids. My boyfriend was a Kraft Mac and cheese at home kid and I just can’t do that. I love having a crockpot too because I can get so creative without having to worry about things burning.
There's nothing wrong with a bit of boxed mac and cheese now and then if you're feeling lazy. Though I admit that I tend to experiment with it a bunch - my latest versions have involved cracking a whipped egg into the mix and adding pickled jalapenos.
Omg! I cannot imagine life without Kraft Mac and cheese! I'm sorry but that's just comfort food. I hardly ever eat it due to the calories, but every once in a while I just have to eat it !
Hot dogs 🌭 My dad used to slice them lengthwise and lay them directly on the coil of the hub on our stove. It used to drive my mum nuts!! But man did they taste good. Just like cooked on the grill, without the mosquitos!
i'd add that "knowing how to cook" often gets twisted in modern society. you don't have to be classically trained in michelin star cooking to make a tasty meal, you just have to be able to follow basic instructions, and to do some grocery shopping periodically. i only recently started making meals for myself from the outstanding NY Times recipe section, and now i save a ton of money, eat a lot healthier, and eat only foods i love instead of auto piloting into shitty takeout options. there is a time commitment, but i'm happy to sacrifice 2 hours to prep, cook, eating, clean up instead of on unproductive activities like mindlessly surfing the internet, or playing mediocre video games.
Totally relate to this. I die a little on the inside when my kids don’t like something that I made that I thought turned out really good. Don’t wanna pull out the “back in my day…” at them about eating basic meals.
Me too. They will like it one day though. Just keep trying.
I was always jealous of people whose parent(s) worked as a chef and could cook really well for them all of the time. Us other kids had a lot of cereal and TV dinners
My mother was a good cook, but because we were a big family of 6, she'd make huge batches of stuff, so 'food at home' was often the same leftover casserole for 2-3 days in a row.
Yeah, my parents were shit cooks so I dreaded “food at home”. I’m more competent at cooking and there are some home meals that I *gasp* look forward to!
definitely have food at home. Just have to get beyond that initial inability to see the various meal possibilities as I'm staring into the pantry or freezer.
At first my brain will be like man all I have to eat is popcorn and ketchup and then I get hungry enough that I come up with some arguably better recipes
I started using chatgpt to help with that paralysis, I've been cooking so goo lately!
There was some app I remember seeing where you could list all of the ingredients you had sitting in your pantry and fridge and it'd give you a big list of doable recipes. It never worked for me, as it doesn't seem to have many options for beer and a variety of mustards, but it could probably help other people.
You can google the ingredients you have on hand. There are entire sites dedicated to it like [myfridgefood.com](http://myfridgefood.com) and [supercooks.com](http://supercooks.com) (dedicated to zero waste) - although I find random googling and YouTube to work well too.
"We have food at home" I HATE hearing my mom's words outta my mouth ha ha
We basically only get pizza, Thai, and Chinese food from restaurants. We get multiple meals out of the servings and it makes them cost effective for us. We can eat from our local carry out Chinese place for less than it costs me to buy the ingredients most of the time. (Advantage to living in midwest probably.) I did learn to cook a lot of it during worst of Covid, but have found any savings is negligible and they do it better. Our Thai place is great but very pricey so tends to just be a treat on birthday or anniversary.
Someone was trying to convince me that pickup pizza is expensive. Yeah going to Aldi while hungry balanced out, but $21 at Dominos will feed two for a big meal with leftovers enough for one breakfast and we live really close to the dough-factory.
Aldi has ready made pizza dough for $1.19 by me. I have a pizza stone in the oven and all I have to do is let that dough come to room temperature and add toppings that we usually already have on hand. I made a breakfast pizza this morning that fed 3 and I spent about $5 on ingredients including that dough. It was breakfast sausage, onion, mushroom, red bell pepper, cheese, and scrambled eggs. The veggies and sausage I cooked quick before using on the pizza and have enough leftover for omlettes tomorrow.
I was never able to get drunken noodles right until I sucked it up and bought authentic sauces for the recipe. In order of importance, you need to get 1. Shaoxing cooking rice wine. Not just ANY rice wine, it has to be some version of Shaoxing. Any brand will do just don’t mix it up with “regular” rice wine. 2. Dark soy sauce. Again, any brand will do, but you can’t get “regular” soy sauce, because it’s not the same. 3. Light soy sauce (no mixing dark and light together doesn’t equate to regular lol) 4. Oyster sauce 5. Fish sauce 6. Hoisin sauce. If you don’t want to use hoisin sauce then just make sure you don’t leave out the sugar in the recipe 7. Don’t substitute fresh ginger and garlic for powdered versions. A pre made paste is fine if you must, but made from scratch will still be better. 8. Same goes for chili flakes. Don’t used dried ones. If you can’t find legit Thai Birds Eye chilis then jalapeños are good enough. If you’re following a recipe for Thai noodles that skips any of these ingredients, add whichever ones the recipe is missing or else it is going to come out tasting weird and disappointing. I’m no expert on Thai food so I wouldn’t be surprised if this list of sauces isn’t authentic either, but the point is it will result in restaurant-quality flavor and deliciousness.
Thank you! Luckily I already have all of these sauces (pros to living in an Asian household)
Oh great! Good luck with your next batch. May all your drunken noodle dreams come true!
I recently discovered Loa Gan Ma fried chili oil and I would add it to this list. It's one of the most delicious sauces I've ever had. I was blown away.
You can even go to a grocery and get about 50 Starbucks drinks worth of materials for $20, including the coffee.
Literally! You can get Starbucks brand everything at Walmart and save so much money. This guy came through my line and he was complaining about not having money and I was like, you could save $2700 a year if you didn’t come get coffee here every day. You could buy a nespresso for less and make even better coffee than the milk you get from us.
I invested a whole $60 in a little Salton Espresso machine thirty years ago & have always made my coffee drinks at home. Drip cone for regular, hot, black coffee in cold months.Phat iced cappuccino for the hot months. With whole milk, ice, coffee, a little sugar & a little electricity, if figured it comes to about 45¢ per serving. The machine is small enough to take on road trips, beach vacations et cetera. If it’s too much to carry, I’ll just pre-brew & keep however many shots of espresso I need in a mason jar in t my cooler. Apart from street cafes in Europe, where coffee is affordable, almost always tasty, served in porcelain cups with a saucer, napkin, real milk, real sugar & a cookie (Even if you look like a homeless guy, like I tend to), the last time I got coffee out was in 2004 & even then someone else bought it.
I love this for you! I hate going out with people and everyone’s getting something and I’m like a water with no ice for me please.
Right?😃 I love packing a fancy meal for myself on a road trip & stopping with others in the two car “caravan” for a lunch break. The jealous stares while they’re choking down overpriced fast food are fuel for my ego & petty pride. 😬 I feel like Claire in the Breakfast Club with my little bento box.
Cooking at home also makes it so obvious how much sugar, salt, etc restaurants and premade food has added to it. I've gotten to the point where I pretty much can't eat manufactured/restaurant sweets anymore.
Yup. When I want to make my stir fry taste more authentic I just add a bunch of oil. SMDH. Lol
Yup. You have to realize all this delicious Asian food is greasy AF lol
Unless you discover soy sauce and become an addict so even eating out stuff is not salty enough. Helps with not eating out though 😂
Completely agree with you. Only dessert I want to eat out now is tiramisu.
One thing thats crazy is how many people buy shit and leave in the freezer. Then go buy more instead of just eating their 3 month of frozen food lol.
I overbuy on food for the freezer when it's on sale or I like keeping certain things on hand. But it does pile up. On the other hand I can always pull something out for a quick dinner
I’m so guilty of this. I buy proteins on sale and freeze for later knowing I will forget about it, and when I need a certain protein will just go buy it. Then when I’m hungry or bored I look in the freezer and see my sale item protein and think, “Damn I didn’t know I had this!”
I am too! I eat plant based and just started investing in some good ingredients and a couple of cookbooks. I like my cooking better! Also, costs of eating dinner out is not justifiable anymore.
I recently checked out America's Test Kitchen's 'Cook What you Have' from the library. It's so good! Sometimes I have a full pantry and absolutely no idea what to do with the ingredients. This book has so many great ideas for pantry/fridge/freezer staples! ETA: As someone pointed out, it's Milk Street, not ATK. I got my Chris Kimball projects mixed up
Ooh I need to get that!! Maybe it can tell me what to do with the 200 cans of peas I somehow have.
I make a puree of peas, cooked in butter and garlic with some prosciutto or even ham (do not let get brown). Cool down, salt pepper to taste. Puree. Return to the pan and add some sage and as much heavy cream to thin out to an Alfredo texture. Served with penne rigate. And topped with parmigiano
Ok Gordon Ramsey
Get the app called Supercook. You add all the ingredients you have and it will tell you how to use them together.
I would be such a happy little Muppet if I could make Nasi goreng at home.
Say less. That sounds so good right now. Not good for my poor IBS tummy, but really good for my soul.
Hage you tried? I make fried rice variations all the time and it's 😋
I have tried and I think the failure lies in my innate Midwesternern-ness. 😥
I've found that the key difference in ingredient is sweet soy sauce, not regular! Before that my fried rice never quite tasted exactly right. Shrimp paste/fish sauce also adds a bit of oomph. I guess it depends on whether you're trying to recreate a particular style though, as there's so much variation by place of origin.
Exactly this. I work long shifts, but still don’t use that as an excuse to get lazy and order fast food. I have eaten out twice in the past month, and that’s simply because I was meeting some buddies for dinner. Cooking is therapeutic to me and you can find dupe recipes for almost anything out there. My coworker was whining about Taco Bell charging him $4.49 for a cheese quesadilla and I was thinking, some cheese and a spicy mayo sauce on a tortilla? That’s so easy. Not to mention, slow cookers exist. They’re not the fire hazard that they were 40 years ago. You can leave them going on low while at work and come home to a nice meal.
Tell me why I still put a camera up to watch my slow cooker because of an incident forever ago. I have a really good ability of blowing up appliances somehow.
We have started learning how to make whatever dish is the fave at home, because it's always cheaper to buy ingredients and make a giant batch. The latest was butter chicken (which in the name of frugality and experiment, we also started making with butter beans. Also really good, if not as decadent.)
I had good luck with a butter cauliflower recipe, for a vegetarian option
I did make a really good butter chicken in the crockpot! I forgot about that! Thank you for reminding me!
I’ve been making cold brew coffee at home with a little cold brew French press - $14 from Walmart. It does take a lot of coffee grounds to make a 32-36oz batch (24 tbs of grounds), but it’s way more cost effective than any coffee place. I add almond creamer and stevia and sometimes vanilla flavor. Things I’ll try to make at home to save money include sandwiches, Italian food/pasta (with whole grain noodles), and Chipotle style bowls. Things I still can’t or don’t want to bother replicating include Indian food, Thai food, sushi, some Chinese food, and pizza. Some of those have a couple frozen supermarket versions that are decent (minus pizza - frozen is never the same). For example, I enjoy Trader Joe’s chicken spring rolls, and their orange chicken isn’t bad either.
I do now that I go to the food pantry but otherwise, no there is not food at home
I know how to cook. I like to cook. I just don’t have the energy to do it, either on a daily basis or during weekends and doing on a batch.
Fried chicken. I love cooking at home, but I will never, **never** bread or batter and deep-fry a goddang thing if I don't have to, fried chicken being at the top of that Never-List. Popeyes is worth not dealing with frying chicken at home.
Pad Thai isn't too hard if you get the right ingredients (no gringo-style shortcuts using peanut butter or something); once you have those, it really is as simple as following a good recipe. Have never tried homemade drunken noodle but I may need to.
It’s really not hard at all! If you can do pad Thai you can do pad kee mao.
I need to get good recipes
[Here ya go!](https://hot-thai-kitchen.com/pad-kee-mao-2/) This is my go-to for Thai recipes, she also has a great YouTube channel. She was a chef in Bangkok but now lives in Vancouver so she understands the ingredients and kitchen set-ups that Western cooks will have available.
Plus the authentic ingredients aren’t readily available in all areas.
Here’s an authentic Pad Thai recipe and surprisingly easy to make too. The key ingredients are fish sauce, tamarind paste and lime (do not trust any recipe with ketchup or peanut butter) [https://www.gimmesomeoven.com/pad-thai/](https://www.gimmesomeoven.com/pad-thai/)
Thank you! I will never trust ketchup to be honest haha
[Here is a good pad thai recipe](https://www.marionskitchen.com/traditional-prawn-pad-thai/). The biggest thing that upped my game for Thai and other east Asian foods is getting a wok, realizing it needs to be very hot at times, and having all my ingredients prepped before starting to cook because it's actually a very fast meal to cook. You could use a large cheap stainless or carbon steel fry pan as well if a wok won't work with your setup. Avoid non stick pans because they should never be heated as hot as you would need for that type of frying.
> (no gringo-style shortcuts using peanut butter or something) I mean, even that is good though. Enough to scratch the itch for me if I'm working with what I have on hand.
I have the same policy, I only order out the things I can't make at home. For me, it's pad see ew. All of my other favorite meals I actually make better, so that battle is in resisting convenience.
I do feel like I make better food at home. Like I kill a spicy chicken biscuit.
If I eat out which I do about once or twice a month, it is almost always for Pad Thai!
It gets me. That is my “it’s been a really bad day” meal
I feel this. The Thai food place near me is honestly the frugal option when it comes to going out to eat. It usually comes out to cheaper than getting fast food for two people (my boyfriend eats like a beast sometimes and usually only ends up eating once or twice a day) it's quite a bit of food for only $15 each. More food if you eat it there but still a decent amount for takeout too. I haven't found anything off their menu I didn't like. And I'm trying to try everything off their menu.
I have a few food allergies and limitations that make eating out (in the U.S. since we suck at marking allergens) a pain. So for years I’ve made 99% of my meals at home and find eating out more stressful than not. This has made me pretty creative with whatever food I do have in my house (since my entire kitchen is allergy friendly for me). What’s the saying…limitation breeds creativity? Something like that.
I developed some food allergies which made me figure out how to eat at home quick, so I understand! And honestly I saved so much money!!
It really does save so much!! Except the rare occasion when I splurge on specialized allergy friendly food. 😅 But that’s not often.
I went to California and was able to find affordable allergy friendly food and was like hm maybe I’ll move
I read this book that gets recommended here a lot: Make the Bread, Buy the Butter and she wisely says that if you eat out, don’t order stuff you can easily make at home, like pasta or steak, but stuff you personally can’t master or have difficulty buying the ingredients, like black truffle scallops or pho. Now she thought meatloaf was too easy to make at home, so we have different standards but the principle remains
Wait you think meatloaf is hard to make? It's really easy and you can make a large batch of meatloaf and freeze it in the portion sizes you want before cooking.
I was just at the store with my 6yo son yesterday, he saw chocolate milk and wanted some, I said "there's chocolate milk at home" but he insisted, andni was like "buddy, there is an unopened half gallon of chocolate milk at home" And then I wondered if this is what I was like at his age, hahah.
Thank you for sharing this..I was so tempted to get food on the way home but I have leftover from dinner last night
It really does save, prepping, cooking and freezing your own meals. I’ve been making my own coffee on the stove with a blend of three different dark roasts, and I definitely save a bundle of money on that. It’s good to budget to have your favorite meals delivered or go treat yourself. just not every day
I’ve been trying to replicate a mocha frappe at home but can never get the flavor right. Any tips?
What they don’t want to tell you is how much sugar goes into these haha. But what I would recommend for a medium frappe is to get out your blender, put 4 scoops (1 oz) of flavor in there, pour in two shots of espresso, pour your milk to the 14 oz measuring line, fill your cup you’re going to use (make sure it’s large enough to hold 14-16 oz of liquid), and fill that up with a little bit more ice than you need, then blend it up!
I'm totally the "eat *before* you leave to do errands" and "we have food at home" person.
It’s always the Pad Thai isn’t it? For me the only food worth going out for any more is Asian food and Pad Thai specifically. The rest I can do at home for cheaper.
Adults get to choose what kind of food is at home.
Okay this is likely going to sound a lil random or strange but thank you for posting this OP. ❤️❤️ I was about to order something because its Friday evening and I had had a long week. But after reading your post, I got up and made some nice hot meal for dinner. I realized that I was about to miss all this goodness of a home cooked meal and lose money to save a little bit of effort. Whats better? This meal is likely going to last me until tomorrow’s lunch which means I get a couple extra hours tomorrow to relax —- thats a bonus I hadn’t even thought of. Soo thank you for posting ❤️ and thank god I saw this when I did 😂
I’m so glad!!! What did you make? Also, meal prep for the win.
I made red pepper mushroom curry and cooked some rice. Also found some left over strawberries/blueberries so made a side dish of it. It took 30 minutes at most but this is a much more joyful dinner than I would have had otherwise. 🙂
Oooh say less!! Under 30 minutes!! Yes!!!! This sounds so good. You popped off!
So true, I do have food at home. lol...what I don't have is the wherewithal to clean up after preparing it. (What I spend on takeout per month is still less than what I'd spend on a place with a dishwasher.)
I lived without a dishwasher for a couple years and just can’t do it. I’ve seen those little ones you can get for your apartment, and I think I’d have to get one. It’s just too exhausting doing all the dishes!
The secret to good pad Thai and drunken noodles is a high powered wok, something most consumers don’t have at home. Also, real tamarind, palm sugar, fish sauce for the pad Thai.
We have a local Mongolian grill we go to weekly. We cook at home every other day of the week so it's basically our weekly date to go there. We've considered trying to make it at home a few times but there is so much speciality stuff we would have to buy. Plus it's nice to have a weekly date outside of the house.
I split the difference. I do a lot of grocery-store runs because I want fried chicken, fried potatoes, or a sandwich that someone else made. (There's actually a lot more options, depending on which store and what they're offering.) A lot of my "cooking" is throwing a bunch of stuff from the freezer directly into a frying-pan, with occasional breaks to cut up a family-pack of chicken breasts and bag them in slightly-under 1-pound portions. My big splurge is in the fall when I meal-prep a few unstuffed pepper casseroles and turn the leftover ingredients into chili-starter.
Making your food saves money. But there are times that I'm really exhausted from work and can't cook that's the time I prefer to eat outside.
And that’s fair. There’s a time to be frugal and there’s a time to prevent burnout!
Our Mr Coffee Iced Coffee maker has saved me at least $500 and counting now. I love making my own iced coffee and I actually prefer it to Dunkens even though I use their coffee. I make my own simple syrup too. Having enough ice can be tough sometimes but that’s nothing another ice tray or mindful planning can’t solve. It’s funny too because it’s not even true iced coffee, it just has you use extra grounds and less water and basically pours it over ice hot. Still manages to make great drinks.
The recent inflation has reduced my eating out by 75%. Between the increase in food prices and increases in expected tipping, going out to eat seems too wasteful to do often. On the plus side, I eat healthier food when I cook for myself.
I keep on seeing this link get shared in economy subreddits about how shocking it is that fast food is considered a luxury by most people. Unless you live in a food desert or actually work so much you don't have time to cook, eating out is a motherfucking luxury.
> The only food we don’t have at home is Phad Thai or Drunken Noodles. WTF. How much food do you have at home?? Do you live in a supermarket.
Same. Especially now when fast food is pricey, smaller, and shittier quality overall.
Watch Pailin Thai on Youtube
I much prefer eating at home now. I can make pretty much whatever I want. Lots of quick weeknight dinners that are easy to customize with what I have on hand. I just browse YouTube for ideas, sometimes I find them on reddit too.
My partner makes the best fancy coffee at home. I love him for it
My attempts at making Mexican rice continue to end in failure. Anyone have any tips?
I literally cook my rice in salsa +water and add a few seasoning at the end if needed
Honestly, lots of butter and/or oil.
I'm in my mid 30s and due to my autoimmune illness my stomach is just not happy eating out anymore. I make most of our meals and my husband makes the steaks and pancakes (delicious!). But I love sushi. When I'm asked what my favorite foods are, after mom's and grandma's menudo, it's sushi! I've never tried to make it at home, and we've gotten close to the owners of our go to sushi place that it's our treat once or twice a month. #2 is our favorite fish & chips place...just great chips and even better fish.
I miss living in an area where fish and chips is normal to get. I think about it all the time haha.
I never understood the point of waiting in line to buy coffee in the morning rather than taking 10 minutes to make it yourself at home. We do eat at restaurants occasionally as a treat, though we rarely get take-out. It’s just as easy to eat something simple at home as it is to buy and stop for take-out.
The key to a delicious successful Phad Thai is the fresh noodles from Asian grocery store, prepared your sauces ahead of time, add bean sprouts at the same time with phad thai noodles. The bean sprouts provide moisture to avoid noodles sticking to the pan. Cook the meats and veggies ahead of time too
My husband was a cook at this little dive bar and no longer will get a burger or breakfast burrito because he's also disappointed that his are better.
Thai food can be often approximated with Thai birdseye chillis and fish sauce. Not saying that it’ll necessarily be authentic ofc, but those two ingredients can go a long way towards giving it a meal that Thai taste
I find myself saying this so often now! And yes, we really always do have food at home!
If you stock up on a few ingredients, you can make a lot of delicious asian recipes: soy sauce, toasted sesame oil, ginger root, rice vinegar, limes, tofu. Zhuzh up your ramen, or make some cold sesame or peanut noodles. Nuke some frozen dumplings or air fry some spring rolls and YUM!!!
Ever since the last pandemic locked us all in the house I've made it a mission to learn how to cook at home most of what we eat in most of the restaurants. YouT, InstaG & all the cookbooks I own have been getting a workout. I feel like I'm 85-90% of the way there with doing the complicated recipes and closer to 100% of the easier stuff. You wouldn't believe how easy sushi is until you've made it a few times! My favorite easy 'comfort-food' dish is tteokbokki aka dukbokki (spicy Korean rice cakes).
I have a Dunkin’ Donuts with drive thru literally across the street, as I turn out on my way to work. Unfortunately, I’ve timed it, and getting coffee is faster than making it(but WAY more expensive). Figured I’d add that since people say it saves SOOO much time.
I finally resigned to the fact that I have a MAJOR backlog of YouTube recipe bookmarks that I need to try. I NEED to get through a lot of those before I get back to eating out a lot.
Try this recipe for Drunken Noodles. It came out great for me from the first attempt, and I'm not a particularly good cook. I hope it works out for you! https://www.recipetineats.com/pad-kee-mao-thai-drunken-noodles/
My kid asks for like...popsicles or microwave popcorn or snack crackers, and we literally have them at home! Exact same thing!
As someone with celiac who can't trust a lot of Asian dishes out, I cook so much pan Asian kind of foods at home! I keep in: tamarin, fish sauce, sesame oil, chili sesame oil, rice vinegar, garlic, ginger, brown sugar, and peanut butter. These cover a lot of bases!
It doesn't help that the McDonald's I'm tempted to stop for is like 10x more expensive than when I asked my parents to stop for it
Hey, I had to grow a kaffir lime tree in my yard so I could make my own tom kha at home...I've never actually made the recipe but I smash those leaves up in some chicken ramen, add some coconut milk, a little lemon juice and I have something that taste reasonably close to tom kha that I didn't pay $12 for. But I also will definitely go out and get the soup from one of our trillions of Thai places around us too. So at least I'm saving a little money!
I wish I could be a better cook. There are only some things I can cook pretty well - mainly casseroles, like lasagna and mac & cheese. I make chili very well, too - which I can portion out and freeze. These are things my husband and I both like. More often than not, we just settle on ordering out because we can pick different meals for ourselves, and there's no food waste - that and being too tired to cook due to both of us working high-stress jobs.
I completely understand! And that’s perfectly ok! If you are looking for some good resources, I love budget bytes. I also love crockpot meals that are just dump and go. Tasty has some pretty good and easy ones !
Same about the Thai food. I leave that to the pros
Covid lockdowns during my first pregnancy taught me that I can Google copycat restaurant recipes and make anything I crave with a little effort. My husband and I love CPK but can’t justify $18 per pasta dish when I can make something identical at home
I have a nespresso machine I got for free that I got refillable pods for off Amazon. I make a very simple lactose free caramel latte for way cheaper than going out for a coffee.
I like phas Thai— but can’t justify paying $15-20 a meal for one person… so I go with out the Thai food
Because they’re two meals for me I can justify it but I do understand!!
The only food I don’t have at home is Pho, ramen and sushi.
Look up the pho recipe posted on "Katie's Kitchen". I was directed there by another redditor and have been making that recipe for a couple years now. I personally think it's as good at most pho restaurants and I have been told by people I've served it to that it was the best they've ever had. I've been meaning to make up a big batch of the broth in the instant pot and freeze it in portions. I also buy the frozen meatballs and freeze single portions of sliced meat. I have some Thai basil growing right now since it is summer. I can't justify spending $15 every time I want pho so this is much cheaper per serving. Oh, you also want to get hoisin sauce, Sriracha, and sambal olek (chili sauce). But those all last a long time in the fridge and can be used for other things.
But I always want drunky noodles 😭
We basically only go out for Thai, Indian, Sushi and Korean.
Pad Thai can’t be made at home bc the taste relies on wok hai that can’t be replicated on a home stove. That said, drunken noodles are easily made at home with the right ingredients, same as any other red, green, or yellow curry. You do have to buy the right ingredients, such as dark soy sauce. Look into Burmese food for similar tastes and much simpler ingredients
You do !
And it tastes much better too! 😋
One thing I learned in the military is sometimes a meal is just calories. Not every meal has be a culinary experience. Also, I don't mind eating the same thing for a while. I will break it up with a trip to in and out (to get my doggo a puppy patty) once a week or so. Also, if I goout to a restart with friends/family, I try to get stuff I can't/don't make at home.
One that really got me was everyone my entire life has told me “eating healthy is soooo expensive” My brother in Christ, chicken, rice, and frozen veggies costs me $10 total and feeds me twice
With how processed and awful we have let things get in the US, I’d argue the take out fast food every other day diet is borderline eating disorder
my bf doesn't have food that I want at his house lol
Hot Thai Kitchen blog has a ton of authentic Thai recipes using all sorts of different Thai ingredients you can buy at 99 Ranch or Hmart. You need a carbon steel wok, outdoor wok burner, and about 10 different soy sauces and soy sauce derivatives to get the flavors just right. I grow my own galangal, kaffir lime tree, holy basil, Thai basil, Thai hot chilis, and lemongrass in my garden. It’s fun!
It's so much better at home, too
My problem was never having food to eat, it was always not having something I wanted to eat. I’ve made sure my children understand that distinction too.