quote:

Originally posted by MoosehornMan:
That's it, just stay home, the plan is working, My neighbors will be on the unemployment line and local small business will close leaving it to the large corporations selling beyond meat food like objects.
I am a tightwad too, but just go out less and suck it up.

I'm not going to drain my bank account to keep some business or other afloat, and I didn't ask for your opinion in the first place. If you don't like me letting members know that I have seen/heard enough of a particular subject, that's just tough shit. Don't like that? That, too, is tough shit.

"Two hundred bucks for dinner? Sure, keep this business afloat, but fuck ME!" What horse shit. You had better get your priorities in order, before you're "supporting local businesses" from a cardboard box on the side of the road.

And I'm not a tightwad, smart guy. I've just got the common damn sense to not throw my money down the toilet.

Anything else?

quote:

Originally posted by xd45man:
Single Whataburger combo medium sized = $11.25

I'm going to buy a big freezer and a side of beef from a guy I know.

Locally, our Whataburger from has the same meal for $8.79. A Chick Fil A sandwich meal is $8.95. At In N Out, a Double Double meal is also under 9 bucks. Inflation pricing depends where one lives.

We still eat out maybe once a week, pretty much focused on Thai, Chinese, Tex Mex, and BBQ. All of the places have raised pricing in the last couple of years, but in accordance to current inflation, maybe a 10-20% increase. For a typical Tex Mex meal at our favorite place, we can get two meals, two beers, free chips and salsa, 20% tip and tax for less than $50.

Given the price of rent, property and other taxes, labor, utilities, not to mention some of the food prices that restaurants must be paying Cisco, U.S. Foods, etc, it's no wonder restaurant prices have really increased.
We still eat out maybe once every week or two weeks as a get together with our friends but we cater to restaurants that offer value and hold down cost. To be honest we both enjoy cooking good food which is why we eat at home 90+% of the time. Plus it's FAR cheaper.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: ridewv,

I'm not going to stop eating out but what used to be a regular event is now more reserved for special occasions.
What amazes me the most is the ordinary-not-so-special eateries are out of control.
If I pay more, I expect more in the way of service, food quality or atmosphere.
Can't live my life under a rock but certainly not going to just throw money out of a moving car to the wind ether.
Besides, I am getting better at cooking anyway.

We eat at home, don't go out as much as our kids do, however, it's expensive that way as well, for the two of us it's gone from $120 to $200 a week for groceries, same stuff as before

Family Birthday out Sunday brunch wife, me and daughter was $45 plus tip, that's one waffle, two coffees, one dish of Eggs, bacon, sausage and a bowl of grits. This is the new normal

We don't out that often, mostly order out, which I guess is the same but without the tip. Sometimes it's just nice to leave the cooking to someone else, as I am the primary "chef" in the family and I enjoy a break.

This isn't just a restaurant thing, but a business thing in general. Most who have never run a business have no idea what is involved, especially the overhead.

The truth of the matter is that local businesses will begin to close at a higher rate, which will have ripple effects throughout your local economy. Options like Amazon are great, but they aren't paying local taxes.

Although I have slowed eating "out" since ~2019 due to other considerations, the almost exponential price increases since 2021 have almost completely killed it for me. Quality has gone down as well.

My wife mentioned that Checkers / Rally has bacon-cheddar burgers for $1.99 this week.

I'll grab a couple to bring home, while I'm out running errands today.

The Burger King up the street does offer a senior meal (full-sized Whopper, small fry & drink) for $4.29 Wednesday evenings. I sometimes avail myself of that. Not the greatest burger, but it's cheap and makes a turd.

quote:

Originally posted by a1abdj:
This isn't just a restaurant thing, but a business thing in general.
Most who have never run a business have no idea what is involved, especially the overhead.

The truth of the matter is that local businesses will begin to close at a higher rate, which will have ripple effects throughout your local economy.

Pretty sure we all know that.
Previous gripes aren't aimed at the business's but the state of the economy.
Everyone is affected, in case you didn't know?

quote:

Originally posted by sreding:
If we cook (for three) with fresh ingredients we're looking at $40 on average per meal. If it's beef - it'll be nearly 2x that (and that's with choice ribeyes at $17/lb)

Either groceries are drastically more expensive in Minnesota, or you're doing it wrong. Because I could cook several days worth of freshly-made dinners for three with $40.

Hell, I spent less than $40 making a traditional Thanksgiving dinner spread for 5. (So a lot more food than is usually served in one meal, with days worth of leftovers.)


A big 6 pound family pack of chicken breasts or thighs is about $15, which leaves around $25 for fresh produce and other ingredients and extras. You can make that go really far for several meals, especially if made into stuff like pasta and soup. For example, I just made a big pot of Chicken Parmesan Soup today, which makes 6 servings using $3 worth of chicken breasts, $1 worth of onion and garlic, $2 of chicken broth, $2 worth of crushed tomatoes, 50 cents worth of pasta, $3-$4 in cheese, and a little salt, pepper, and italian seasoning. Then make some breadsticks for ~$1 to go with it if you want. Call it $14 in total ingredients for a full 3 person meal, with leftovers. You still have most of the family pack of chicken, and most of your "other ingredients" budget, left for another 2-3 meals - plus the soup leftovers for lunch.

Or you can turn something relatively cheap like a whole chicken into 3-4 meals for three, with roasted or barbequed chicken one night, then shred the remainder of the meat for tacos the next night, then use the carcass to make a big pot of chicken veggie noodle soup. A 7 pound whole chicken is like $8, so that's plenty of room in the budget for other stuff.

Tired of chicken? Smoke a pork butt, which will run you a bit under $20 for a 7-8 pounder, which means you have a bit over $20 left for sides and extras. That gets you pulled pork BBQ sandwiches one night, then pork tacos or quesadillas the next, then have pulled pork baked potatoes the third night. And you'll probably still have pulled pork left over for night 4 or maybe even 5.

Meat is the biggest expense in a meal, but as shown above it shouldn't cost you nearly $40 per meal, unless you're going with something like steak. From there, sides are cheap. Bake some rolls or garlic bread with less than $1 worth of flour and yeast. Make a big salad with $4 worth of produce. Potatoes are around $1 per pound. Rice is stupid cheap. Fresh veggies like carrots or green beans are inexpensive, and can be prepared in any number of ways. Etc.


Want to mix things up in the middle of the week? On any of the above $40 grocery trips, you can have dinner for three for another night with $10 worth of ingredients for supreme pizza: <$1 worth of flour, yeast, and olive oil for the crust, a $2 block of mozzarella cheese, $1.50 worth of tomato sauce and paste and seasoning for pizza sauce, a $0.50 can of mushrooms, $1 for a bell pepper or onion, and $4 for a pound of italian sausage. Any of the above options has $10 of wiggle room in the remaining "extra ingredients" fund to afford that, on top of whatever else you need for the other three primary meals.

So now you're pushing anywhere from over half a week to nearly a week worth of dinners for 3 on $40 or less. And you're eating well... It's not like you're having to resort to rice and beans, beanie-weenies, and ramen noodles for dinner.


Hope this helps cut down on your $40 per meal grocery bill.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: RogueJSK,

I quit buying ribeye altogether. Which sucks, because that was a once a month treat, but it’s gotten to be not worth it, or it’s cut too thin.. still buying chicken, though, and looking at the mngr specials.

Oh, I miss ribeyes. We get NY Strips for $10/lb.

quote:

Originally posted by tatortodd:
Rule of thumb for a restaurant to be profitible is they have to divide food cost (i.e. actual per hoagie food cost) by 0.32. This covers taxes, rent, wages, utilities, modest profit, etc. Nominally, this means a $16 hoagie cost them $5.12.

The 0.32 is an older rule of thumb and I'm not sure if the Bidenomics has ruined it. For instance, I recently priced Starbucks beans at the grocery store, compared to a Venti Starbucks black coffee, and it came out to be 0.19.

Another restaurant cost that shocked me recently was a franchise fast food restaurant went out during COVID, and they were in a 2-year old building. The normal fast food size restaurant with both seating and a drive thru went back up for rent at $30k per month. If it were a hoagie restaurant, that's 2757 sixteen dollar hoagies just to pay food cost and rent, but you'd have to sell more to cover wages, utilities, and taxes.

.32 doesn’t sound anywhere close to working out but I would have no idea.

Where I worked (not food related) it was always 6.2x the cost or the owner thought he was losing money.

I am a senior widower. The only time I go out for a meal is if a date (rare these days) wants to have a restaurant lunch or dinner. Otherwise, I eat at home where I can not only control the costs but also the ingredients. While I am empathic to the positions of those who own restaurants and their employees, if direct/indirect taxes make business difficult to sustain, complain to the politicians and their supporters, not assume you can just pass along " your costs to the consumer, especially through inflated "tips" because you do not want to pay your employees a living wage. I agree completely with Para's position.

quote:

Originally posted by 2000Z-71:
L&L Hawaiian BBQ opened up here in Anchorage and I was all excited. Ordered a BBQ combo plate and a Coke, &45, it's good it ain't that good.

How much are the Pizza’s at “The Moose’s Tooth” going for these days? We were there in 2020 and they were excellent!

I know this isn’t the entire reason but this seemed to be the beginning of it…
Time goes fast, at first I was thinking it was 4-5 years ago but now I think this was during the Crimson Kenyan’s administration -
Remember all the SJWs clamoring for minimum wage at Fast Food restaurants, $15-20 or more? If those unskilled laborers are making that I’m sure your marginally to much better restaurant workers demanded more yet. Tack on incredible inflation on everything else from farm machinery to taxes/permits etc and it’s a perfect storm.

Those fuckers got what they wanted but it came at an incredibly high price tag to all Americans whether they eat out or not. We all saw it coming but I don’t think we new how bad it would really be.

Typing this after getting home from Costco and dropping $415 on essentials. You know, like those giant bags of Doritos and jug of chocolate covered almonds.

Like Rogue said above, meal prep. When I cook I always make more, into the Tupperware it goes. Even groceries, I’m being more careful, and focusing on it for 2024. Not some New Years bullshit, just in general due to inflation. Like Rogue also said, protein is the most expensive thing on the plate but there are so many ways to get that meat down in price. Costco has $5 birds that you can rip apart and make many meals out of.

I honestly think I’m done with anything “city” for the rest of my life. I’m talking restaurants, fast food, bars, sporting events. Just not interested in any of it anymore.

I eat a lot of Pork, it is still a bargain.
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