Take Out at Home

I don’t know about you but living in NYC, I find eating out quite expensive. When we first moved here, it was a common occurrence, to the horror of our wallets. After the first couple of months, we realized that the restaurants will continue to operate even if we frequent them less frequently. So now we go out to dinner maybe once or twice a week, so to compensate for the cutback, I make takeout or restaurant food at home. Turns out to be much cheaper.
Think of your favorite takeout/delivery/restaurant foods and try making one of those dishes at home. Start by doing that once a week and seeing how you like it. Next week, try a different meal from your favorite place at home. So for example, you can make pizza very easily at home with store-bought pizza dough (about 3 bucks), top it with tomato sauce or not, cheese and whatever else you want. I’d throw ham and mushrooms on there. With one pizza dough, you can probably make two individual-sized pizzas, plus toppings, your cost will be about 5 bucks or so. Plus you can reuse the left over toppings for another meal, which saves money yet again.
Let’s see, what else can you make at home? Mexican food? Check. Get some tortillas, stuff them with rice, beans and chicken strips and you got a burrito. Be creative, you can make tacos with other toppings too.
Chinese food? Check. Buy a couple of those Top Ramen packages, add extra broth, veggies and some meat if you’d like and you have something the place around my corner charges $12 for. You can make stir-frys very easily as well. Chop up veggies and one chicken breast, sauté together, throw in some Hoisin sauce and dinner’s ready.
The possibilities are endless. You can make burgers at home, udon noodle soups, fries, crepes, etc..
Just this week I made a glass noodle stir-fry and carne asada chips, which hit the spot just when I needed it.