The house grocery budget won’t count a restaurant meal, but it will count the food you eat at home because you didn’t go out to eat.
I didn’t run the numbers, but I believe that the total “house grocery budget + restaurant means” is much lower these days for me. Like, instead of eating alone in the restaurant for 5 €, I can cook for my entire family for 2-3 €. The total savings are not this dramatic, because only the cooked meals are cheaper; things like cheese and chocolate cost the same as before.
It is interesting when I look at costs of individual food items. Things that I eat in order to not be hungry, most of them are quite cheap (if I cook them at home). Things that I eat only because they taste good, they actually make most of the budget. Eating outside home means everything tastes very good, and everything is expensive.
Looking from the opposite perspective: if instead of going to restaurants you start to eat at home, you may or may not save lots of money, depending on how much you cook.
In our case, some of our housemates were eating out reasonably often but our family wasn’t. I think my wife and I ate at a restaurant we paid for maybe twice a year on average?
Not trying to count things like when my work brought my team out for a celebratory lunch, on the company card. since the not eating at restaurants is mostly about us trying to save money.
I didn’t run the numbers, but I believe that the total “house grocery budget + restaurant means” is much lower these days for me. Like, instead of eating alone in the restaurant for 5 €, I can cook for my entire family for 2-3 €. The total savings are not this dramatic, because only the cooked meals are cheaper; things like cheese and chocolate cost the same as before.
It is interesting when I look at costs of individual food items. Things that I eat in order to not be hungry, most of them are quite cheap (if I cook them at home). Things that I eat only because they taste good, they actually make most of the budget. Eating outside home means everything tastes very good, and everything is expensive.
Looking from the opposite perspective: if instead of going to restaurants you start to eat at home, you may or may not save lots of money, depending on how much you cook.
In our case, some of our housemates were eating out reasonably often but our family wasn’t. I think my wife and I ate at a restaurant we paid for maybe twice a year on average?
Not trying to count things like when my work brought my team out for a celebratory lunch, on the company card. since the not eating at restaurants is mostly about us trying to save money.