Can cooking for one make sense?

[everman]

Instead of eating the same thing every day, you can cook something that can be turned into a few different things. Like if you grill chicken you can make a sandwich, tacos, salads, soups, etc.
The food channel is one of my favorites, usually something good on

 

[badmouse]

I love cooking for one. I do a lot of breakfast-ish stuff, like omelets or pancakes/waffles or quiche. My quiche is great but it costs more to make than it does to buy one, unless gruyere cheese is on sale. I can finish a whole one at a meal - okay, I'm a pig, but it's good.

Things like one steak or one lobster (when on sale) are no-brainers.

For the rest, planning is a good thing. I don't make casseroles any more, but I do things like tuna salad with croutons & cheese thrown in & melted.

I try to follow a pattern - "chicken" night followed by "sandwich" night, then "breakfast night" and "fish night." Throw in a meat night, a vegetarian night, and a "other" night and you're pretty well set. I used to do that back in my cooking-for-the-family days, and it still works.

 

[myusername]

Originally posted by: Mo0o
What about that machine that will vaccum a plate of food in a bag and supposedly you can store it for a really long time. You can make several servings at once and then just save those for whenever you want to eat them again.

Yeah I got one of those things ... Used it once to make a half dozen shrink-wrapped meals of shrimp and rice. Now it lives under my kitchen counter. It wasn't bad, but the bags are not quite as microwaveable as claimed (they work decently, but if you cook too long, it will turn into a balloon), and the cost of the bag material is something like $1 a foot ..

Basically, if you are the type of person who will wash their bags in the dishwasher and reuse them (or the type of person who saves Xmas wrapping paper), then you could easily make it economical - but then you are already the type of person who is crock-potting and freezing large containers of food. If you are that type of person, you probably see the vacuum thing and think "meh".

If you are the type of person who really has to struggle to eat well *and* economically, and most of the food in your freezer is still in the box you purchased it in, then the vacuum is just a fancy gadget that makes you believe - just for long enough to purchase it - that you too can have an organized efficient lifestyle. Then you will use it once or twice and put it under the kitchen counter.

 

[klah]

Just buy a case of MREs.

 

[iamwiz82]

Originally posted by: SampSon

Originally posted by: iamwiz82
From a monetary standpoint, it is usually cheaper to eat at subway than to eat at home for one. Unless, of course, you ae eating ramen every day

Uh, ok if you say so. I have not found that to be true at all. You seem to speak from the standpoint of someone who couldn't boil an egg.

I cook everyday, I live alone.

I like to think that I cook very well, which is why it costs so much. I like making expensive meals.

 

[JulesMaximus]

When I lived alone I used to get the urge to make myself a nice meal every now and then, settle down in front of the TV and eat it. I found it quite enjoyable.

Now I do all the cooking for my family. My wife rarely cooks, which is a good thing. She has other virtues though.

Edit-I did most of my own cooking though and only ate out occasionally. It is cheaper to cook your own food. Trust me on this. Obviously even the fast food joints are making money, and their biggest expense is labor, so it is definitely more economical to cook your own meals.

 

[vi edit]

It's really not that bad if you are creative with what you do.

You can get like 15 chicken breasts for under $10 at Sams Club/Costco. That's easily 2 weeks worth of lunches/dinners depending on what you do with it. I can pick up a 10 pound bag of rice for $3, a bunch of spices that last me months for $5, and some sauces that I can use for flavoring for a couple bucks that lasts several meals. Throw in some onions, peppers, or snow peas for another buck or two.

For probably $2-$3 a plate you can make some really good stir fry's.

I can buy enough fixings for a salad (spinach, field greens, croutons, dressing) to cost me under $.50 a salad.

When grilling, toss on a few extra servings worth to throw into a cassarole or salad.

Crock pots are very nice too. You can make up 4 quarts worth of chilli/soup/stew for about $10 and that's easily 8 meals worth.

 

[Klixxer]

I used to cook for the entire family, making one dish for me and one for them, now i only need to do one.

I cook because i can and i often cook a lot at once, freeze it in containers and reheat it later, you just have to learn how to do it, it isn't hard and the worlds largest cookbook is available at www.google.com just do a search.

It saves money, you know what is in your food and you can prepare it anyway you like.

 

[z0mb13]

dishwasher is ur friend..

 

[b0mbrman]

Originally posted by: klah
Just buy a case of MREs.

How about I just go to work and appropriate a box?

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Pretty much if you can afford to eat 20 meals out a week you are either really well off, or eat crap.

Face it, if you are paying <$5 bucks for a dinner, you aren't getting filet mignon. More like fillet of shoe sole.

You can make something like spaghetti and meatballs, take a third out for a meal, divide the remainder into two parts, and freeze it. You then have fixings for another pasta days, and/or meatball subs.

The trick is to make enough of things you can have leftover later.

Another thing is KISS. Keep it simple.

Get a decent steak and fresh mushrooms. Salt and pepper that baby, fry it then take it out. Add the mushrooms, salt and pepper again, and sautee. Either stop there or add some sherry or port and reduce. Add a baked potato, and you have an easy meal that would cost you muchly in a restaurant.

Give it a shot