Pricing Homemade: Bread

Hello! I have decided to start letting you all know (just in case you haven’t set down to do the math yourself) of making some things homemade. Somethings it is more expensive to make homemade, but a lot of times it really pays off with making it yourself.

Today I am going to do the math for you when it comes to making bread. There are so many different options out there for ingredients, but I am going to choose two recipes that I make weekly and show you the cost of those recipes.

I am going to price the bread from Wednesday Baking – Whole Wheat Bread and Homemade Crusty Bread.

These are the ingredients and the prices that I bought them for, therefore what I am basing my information on. If I have made a huge mistake please let me know

I bout Gold Medal Unbleached AP Flour from Walmart at $2.14

I’m pretty sure I bought this at Kroger for about $5 so that is what I will be using. Also this comes in whole wheat which I just ran out of the day before yesterday.

I will admit that King Arthur Flour is my favorite. It is really expensive in comparison to others, but it bakes really well, and they don’t bleach any of their flours. It comes in Bread Flour, White Whole Wheat Flour, Whole Wheat Flour, and All Purpose Flour. So when I have wiggle room in my budget I grab a bag of it.

Kroger Value Pure Honey I bought at $5.57

Bought this from Sam’s Club so long ago, but I’m pretty sure it was about $7 so that is what I am using

Kroger Active Dry Yeast bought at $2.59

I buy this in a 4lb pack at Sam’s Club for $9.98 so that would make one pound for about $2.50

Okay. Whether you wanted to know all of this or not here it goes…

For Wednesday Baking – Whole Wheat Bread:

$0.56 for honey (1/4 cup)
$0.31 for butter (4 Tbs)
$0.29 for yeast (1 1/2 Tbs)
$0.05 for salt (1 1/2 tsp)
$0.63 for Gold Medal Flour  OR $1.44 for King Arthur Flour (5 3/4 cups)

Total for 2 loaves of bread made with Gold Medal Flour = $1.84 OR $0.92 per loaf.

Total for 2 loaves of bread made with King Arthur Flour = $3.05 OR $1.52 per loaf.

So cheap, right?!?!?!

 

Okay, now for Homemade Crusty Bread:

$0.14 for yeast (3/4 Tbs)
$0.04 for salt (3/4 Tbs)
$0.41 for Gold Medal Flour OR $0.94 for King Arthur Flour

Total for 1 loaf of bread made with Gold Medal Flour = $0.59 a loaf

Total for 1 loaf of bread made with King Arthur Flour = $1.48 a loaf

Isn’t it amazing?!?!

Hope this can encourage you to start making your own bread! Even if there is only two or three living in a home, you can make 2 loaves and freeze one. When you are about out of the first loaf, take out the second one and set it out to unfreeze. Still tastes delicious!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shopping: Budgeting for Groceries

Shopping on a budget can be very stressful for  most people. In today’s world we are taught that credit is a good thing, therefore we need to use it in everything, because we can always pay it back later. NOT GOOD!!!! If you have been raised in that mind set, I challenge you to try a cash only policy.

Having a budget seems silly to a lot of people. One will say, “oh yeah,I have a budget,” (meaning they think they have an idea of how much they want to spend a month) or, “I’m a smart shopper.”

Let me tell you a little secret….if you don’t have a written budget, you will over spend! My hubby and I have had a month like that. We used to always have a budget and stick to it, but we had one month where we didn’t sit down and make a budget because we were too busy. We thought we could just do it on our own seeing how we were ‘good with money’ and we ‘knew how much we want to spend.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA……………….that is about all I can say, because we ended up spending about 150% OVER our regular budget. Yes, I did say 150% OVER!

So we wrote down our next month’s budget and decided never ever to go without a budget again!

Alright, now about my groceries. Last year, I decided to give myself a challenge. I could only spend $50 a week for groceries for my family. That is challenging to do, but not impossible. I stuck to it, but in December, I realized that, though we weren’t ‘bad’ eaters, most of the items I was purchasing were very processed (ex: Hamburger Helpers). I was caught in a trap. These processed foods were the items I could get coupons for and stay within my budget!

So new tactic. Raise my weekly budget $15. Okay, done. Now I have $75 a week to spend for two adults and an almost 1 year-old. Buy mostly fresh food, and try to make as much of items I can.

I go shopping on Saturdays with my hubby, because it is always nice to have an extra adult there to entertain the little one. Also we count it as a fun “date” type of outing…yes, we are so a married couple!

Also, I only shop with cash. I have in my hand how much I am wanting to spend, therefore when that is spent, I can’t spend any more. I also encourage anyone who does have spending issues to only bring in cash, after you have made a budget. Leave your credit/debit cards at home. Challenge yourself to only spend what you plan on spending. Know where every dollar is going!

Another thing I want you to know, I didn’t use one coupon for this trip. So it is possible to be on a tighter food budget without coupons!

So this is my shopping trip for this week:

What I purchased:

Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Milk                              Plain Soy Milk

Home Maker Orange Juice                                               3 cans of 28 oz Diced Tomatoes

5 lb bag Unbleached AP Flour                                       Bag of sweet peppers

1 1/2 lb Bananas                                                                  6 Avocados

3 Mangoes                                                                              Moore’s Buffalo Sauce (super bowl Sunday!)

1 Cantaloupe                                                                         10 oz box plain Couscous

1lb sliced mushrooms                                                       2lbs Campari Tomatoes

2, 32 oz Swanson Vegetable Broths                             2 Green Bell Peppers

2 cups quesadilla cheese                                                 set of 2 Wire Drying Racks

Hair Conditioner (not pictured)                                   4 pack of 1 lb Salted Sweet Cream Butter

Mission Tortilla Chips

And here are my receipts:

Walmart –  $49.96

Kroger – $10.19

Sam’s Club – $17.36

Total: $75.51    okay, so I went $.51 cents over budget, but that is pretty good!

Meals I plan on making this week:

1. Homemade Pizza – Recipe from A Journey to Becoming
2. My Homemade Tomato Soup and grilled cheese (will post recipe on another day)
3. Cuban Black Beans and Rice with mango – Recipe from About.com Vegetarian Food
4. Flat Bread Pizza (minus the chicken) – Recipe from Lulu the Baker
5. Buffalo Cauliflower (super bowl Sunday!) – Recipe from Daydream Kitchen