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Comment by alberth | Hacker News Reader

> I was scratching my head at how so many people in the thread could possibly believe this, until I realized that they’re probably not actually cooking, but rather buying prepackaged meals and heating them up.

I don't think that's the case.

When a person can have an entire dinner meal at Taco Bell for less than $5, or jumbo hot dog + drink at Costco for $1.25 ... cooking at home is definitely more expensive.

https://www.tacobell.com/food

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Our household spends ~$670/month cooking for two adults, two children, and an infant (all meals). [1] That's $5.50/person/day ignoring the baby, and we're not trying to minimize costs (fresh fruit and veg, meat, etc). Cooking at home is more expensive if you count the time of the cook, sure, but not if you just compare dollar costs.

[1] https://www.jefftk.com/p/spending-update-2022

Yea I'm not sure how someone can claim "$5 for a meal for one" could possibly be cheaper than cooking unless you're deliberately cooking something expensive?

Now maybe I'm missing some cultural context for the price of produce in the US but for €5 per person here in Ireland I could make an absolute feast. Say I make a ragu for 4-5 people, here's what my shopping list might look like (checking prices on tesco.ie):

- Pasta 500g (€0.65)

- Ground pork 400g (€3.50)

- Bag of onions 1kg (€0.60)

- 4 bulbs of garlic (€0.80)

- Bag of carrots 500g (€0.60)

- Celery 450G (€0.79)

- Tinned Tomatos (€0.45)

So for €7.39 I could feed 4-5 people and have most of the onions, garlic and celery left over for another dish.

If I had the budget to get 5 people Taco Bell at €5 a head, I could cook that recipe twice over and have enough left over to buy a half-decent bottle of wine.

I know scale changes if you live on your own say, but that's when you save stuff for lunches, make smaller recipes etc. And I live in one of the highest cost-of-living countries in the EU - is the situation really so dire in much of the US as to be drastically different?

Those vegetable prices are very cheap compared to a US supermarket--like maybe 1/3 or 1/4 the price?

Checking on Instacart and so including their markup, our local Market Basket has, for the veggies:

* Onions: $1.59 for 2lb

* Carrots: $0.89 for 2lb

* Garlic: $1.89 for 5 heads

* Celery: $3.09 for a bunch (~1lb)

The carrots are cheaper, and everything else is more expensive but mostly the celery. This "basket" of fresh vegetables is $6.67 vs €2.79 (2.4x). Exclude the celery and it's $3.55 vs €2.00 (1.8x)

They look about right from the UK (I'd pay more for the tomatoes and pasta in particular, personally, but certainly available that cheap) - but that has been my experience in US/Canadian supermarkets, that groceries seem expensive.

Those prices seem very low for the US (except for the pork). I also see you're leaving out the salt, pepper, olive oil, red wine, Parmesan, and spices/(dried) herbs. Yes, all the things you left out will last for a long time (except the 1/4 bottle of wine) but they are a huge upfront cost for a single meal.

Cooking is a financial commitment.

I'll also say the first recipe I found suggested 1kg of pork to go with that much pasta and vegetables.

A woman I knew way back when said that when she cooked for her ex-BF at his place, it always cost her a fortune because he had very few pantry staples. You don't need to go crazy but it's probably a few hundred dollars to setup for reasonable cooking from square 1.

Exactly. And if you aren't used to it, you can easily mess it up. You get things that don't last as long as you expect, or too much of an ingredient.

Once you have a decent set up and pantry, it's not bad. But if you need 5 spices to try a recipe, you're looking at at least a $15 home cooked meal. For one person.

Your prices are in the same range I'd see here.

Buy ground beef, beans, rice, and tortillas in bulk (or even cheaper, make them yourself—it’s not hard!) and be smart about planning to use vegetables and other perishables efficiently across multiple dishes, and you’re going to be making Taco Bell menu items at home that are far superior to Taco Bell for much less than $5.

Buying hotdogs, buns, and soda in bulk will probably cost ~$1.25 per meal, if not less. You can freeze the dogs and buns; the latter will still taste great after a light toasting.

There's the opportunity and comfort cost as well though. I can definitely see how one could see spending $5 on a box they can grab from the drive thru and immediately throw away is a better choice than going to the store, meal planning, ensuring there's proper refrigerator and freezer space, making sure the perishables are used, and then also taking the time to clean the dishes used afterwards.

$5 for a few minutes of effort vs spending slightly less for usually at least half an hour to an hour when off hours during the work week are at a premium can make that extra spend very attractive, especially if they're single

I can really see that, $5 gets you a LOT at Taco Bell (funnily enough, they refused to load any images till I switched my IP to a USA one O.o). I’m actually shocked how much you get. Here in Germany, McDonalds / Burger King (not sure what other fast food places we have) are disgusting AND expensive :D

Cheap (and even not so cheap) "Mexican" food in particular is a great opportunity for the restaurant to bulk up a little protein with lots of cheap filler like rice and beans. With a burger, you have a floor set by a certain weight of ground beef. And, yes, while I very rarely go into a McDonald's or Burger King, my sense is that they're not a particularly cheap meal. And the better "fast casual" burger chains certainly are not.

> bulk up a little protein with lots of cheap filler like rice and beans

Rice and beans make a complete protein. You're writing as if people are getting less protein than they expected, but the inclusion of beans means they're probably not.

You're right of course. I'm just using protein in the sense that restaurants often do to mean x grams/ounces of meat, chicken, pork, or fish. But there are obviously other sources of protein.

We do cook at home a lot, but genuinely, if I have a lot of work of just have activities with kids outside of home, it adds overhead I don't want to deal with. I am not even sure it is more of mental overhead or time overhead, but the more I am stressed at given period the less I want to deal with counting and "being smart" about buying perishables.

This is roughly what I do (in the sense that I buy in bulk and freeze stuff), but note that it essentially requires you to not only purchase an extra freezer, but also run it and have the extra space for it. So this strategy does require some capital investment. It's not much, but I have friends that just couldn't do this. (Not necessarily because of the capital required, but because there is just no space for a freezer.)

You really don't need an extra freezer to buy 3/5/10 pounds of chicken instead of 1/2 pound.

Oh okay, you surely know what's in my freezer. I guess my stuffed freezer wasn't actually stuffed and I didn't need to buy the extra freezer.

Maybe, you know, chicken isn't the only thing in my freezer.

So you extrapolate, to the general population, your need for an extra freezer as an obstacle to reducing the cost of buying in bulk but your objection to my comment is that it is not relevant to you in particular?

I didn't extrapolate anywhere. You're making shit up and reading things that aren't there.

And my objection to your comment is I think pretty universally applicable.

The savings really add up at that 10 pound level. Chicken quarters are still under a dollar a pound at Walmarts in that quantity.

No doubt. But in the context of this discussion, it sounds like, for even that size package, the target audience could make room in the freezer they already have by consuming and not replacing their existing stock of frozen tacos, waffles and corn dogs.

in Ireland, as someone living alone, I spend close to 40 euros a week. 4 euros for a kilo of ground beef 4 euros for a kilo of whole chicken 7 euros for a kilo of pork and 4 to 5 euros for fish and 2 to 4 euros for rice and wraps. onions, garlic, fresh tomatoes are around a euro for a pack that's enough for a week. 5 to 10 euros for spices but they last for atleast a month. I throw in a few frozen veggies into rice which again is euro or two. I dont order or eat out, I generally do this to eat clean healthy food but the addon benefit is I notice I save a lot more when compared to my colleagues and I generally look healthier even though I eat a lot more.

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