Quote:
Originally Posted by Shoe
What will it take to convince you that eating at home is cheaper than going to a restaurant? Are we REALLY arguing this?
I think for a family of four this is obviously true. For a single guy I think it might still be true but that the difference is not as much as people believe and that when you calculate time and effort even using minimum wage that restaurant might actually be less expensive.
You have to take into consideration that unless you do a lot of planning there is going to be a lot of waste when cooking for one.
The reason people think it is cheaper is because they make big batches of stuff and then eat multiple times which is a lower standard of living. I don't want to have spaghetti in meat sauce five times in one week.
They are comparing different qualities of food. While there are a lot of horrible restaurants that charge money for basically heating up and assembling prepared food eating at those is a waste of money and stupid. Yet when people cook at home that is exactly what they are talking about. I've actually had someone tell me that taking a processed frozen chicken burger and covering it in Ragu and mozzarella is cooking chicken parm. Well obviously that is going to be cheap to make but also rather disgusting to eat.
Chicken Parm would cost me about $8-10 to make at home. I can get it downstairs homemade quality for $7 at the food court and at a reasonably decent restaurant for $13-18. If you assume it would take me at least an hour to make it and the minimum wage is $10.25/hr it is less expensive for me to go to a restaurant.