Standing at the Trailhead of Winter

Salisbury Steak, Garlic Mashed Taters, Tossed Salad, and Homemade Bread As I stood at the meat cooler, trying to find the grass-fed ground beef (which there was none of), Hubby goes into his shocked mode that he does when I want to buy the more expensive options. Yes, grass-fed beef is $6.99 a pound where the grain fed, pumped full of antibiotics, standing knee deep in mud and feces along with hundreds of other cattle crowded in a feed lot beef is $1.99 a pound. I'll buy the grass-fed all day, every day. Unfortunately, the store was out. I had to settle for the next best option: "all natural," whatever that means. It was $5.99 a pound. That "all natural" ground beef became our Salisbury steak tonight. It, along with the leftovers, brought tonight's dinner cost to around $15.00 (not including the red wine I used for the sauce--but again, I only used part of it for the meal; some I drank while cooking, which is why my math is fuzzy at best right now, and...

My whole cooking at home and keeping track of just how much I'm spending per serving is becoming an obsession. Now, not only am I obsessed with calories in and calories out, but I'm obsessed with money in and money out. I truly had no clear idea just how much eating out was costing us until I began keeping track of what I'm buying and how much that breaks down when examined through the perspective of per serving. Let's take last night's dinner of homemade tomato soup with grilled cheese and this morning's breakfast of french toast topped with bananas foster. The bread used for the sandwiches and the french toast cost $2.99. Five sandwiches were made for dinner and three servings of french toast were made for breakfast, giving me a 37 cents per serving cost. The tomatoes, leek, and onion for the soup cost $11.75, and from that I got four servings, giving me a $2.93 cost. While that's significantly higher than just buying a can of tomato soup, I have the com...