Advertisement

7 Convenience Foods You Can Totally Make Yourself (and Save Money)

Mid-afternoon coffees, guacamole, sliced ham - how much could you save if you just DIY?

So you’re on your lunch break and pick up a pre-packed sandwich. And then a single ready-cooked and peeled hard-boiled egg (you’re being healthy, after all). And why not pick up a coffee on the way back to work? All these ready-made, handy foods are convenient, but it all comes at a price. We find out how much you could really save by making them yourself…

Guacamole

[Jo Romero]
[Jo Romero]


So guac is probably the easiest dip you could ever make - you just smash up a peeled and pitted avocado with a fork and squeeze in a bit of lime juice and salt. Add in some chopped coriander and maybe some chilli flakes and you’re done. Easy. But in the shops you’d pay around £1.40 for a small pot of the stuff. Make it at home with one avocado and you’ll save around 10p, after taking into account the other ingredients, too. Not a huge amount, you might argue, but your green dip will taste fresh, zesty and it’s ready in about 2 minutes. And surely that’s quicker than a trip to the shops?

Pre-cooked Chicken Drumsticks

[Jo Romero]
[Jo Romero]


These are handy if you’re going out for a picnic or to stock up for the week’s packed lunches. But what’s the real cost of buying chicken drumsticks ready-roasted and chilled? When we compared the cost of roasted vs raw drumsticks (being careful to choose chicken that was like for like) it worked out that roasting them ourselves the night before and cooling in the fridge gave us a saving of 35p per 4 drumsticks. Of course, we haven’t added on the energy that 30 minutes of cooking takes up. If you’re buying them as the odd time-saving fix, then it doesn’t work out too badly, but if you’re feeding a lot of people, you might be best off roasting them yourself.

Hard-boiled Eggs

[Jo Romero]
[Jo Romero]


Is it really too much bother to hard-boil a few eggs, let them cool and then peel them and store in a cling-filmed bowl in the fridge? But yep - it’s often too easy to rely on a pre-packed egg in the fridge of a high street shop where someone else has done all the work for you. Buy a pack of raw eggs to hard-boil yourself and you’ll save around 60p per egg. And that’s free-range, too. Top tip - chill the egg in the fridge before peeling to make it easier.

Coffee

[Jo Romero]
[Jo Romero]


We all know that buying coffee while you’re out and about is a tad pricey. You pay for the cup (or the washing up), the friendly service and the special blends, of course. But if that little cup of espresso can wait until you get home from the supermarket, you’ll save yourself quite a bit of money. And if you don’t have a coffee machine at home, check out some of the instant espresso powders that are about. They’ll set you back the equivalent of just 7p a cup (plus the hot water from the kettle).

Pre-packed Sandwiches

[Jo Romero]
[Jo Romero]


The ultimate on-the-go lunch. We bought a £2.99 pre-packed BLT and then made one ourselves cooking the bacon from scratch, and we found we’d saved £2.07 buying the ingredients. It cost the equivalent of just 92p to buy everything needed to make one BLT sarnie with streaky bacon, a sliced tomato and lettuce with mayo on two slices of granary bread. That saving will add up over a year, won’t it?

Sliced Ham

[Jo Romero]
[Jo Romero]


So someone sliced our ham for us, and that little time-saver costs us something like £2.79 for three slices. To cut a bit off your shopping bill, why not buy a ham or gammon joint and slice it up yourself? We picked up a small, 750g gammon joint from the supermarket for £3.75. It spent 5 hours simmering away in the slow cooker and then we cooled it and sliced it, ready for packed lunches. For every three slices we carved, we worked out we’d saved just over £2 against the pre-packed ham. And you’ll get more for your money, too - our gammon joint cut into 12 fairly thick slices.

Potato Wedges

[Jo Romero]
[Jo Romero]


They’re one of the ultimate freezer standbys: frozen potato wedges seasoned with garlic and herbs. Someone’s already washed and peeled the spuds, seasoned them and frozen them for you. But does it pay to actually buy your own potatoes and make them yourself? You bet it does. We compared frozen wedges which cost £2.66 per kilo with buying the potatoes, fresh garlic and parsley to make potato wedges ourselves - and managed it for £1.05 per kilo. That’s a saving of £1.61. Chop up the garlic and the parsley and chuck it in with the spuds once they’re cooked and hot - the garlic will soften in the heat.

Got any more money-saving shopping tips? Share them with us…

[Superfoods: The Facts You NEED To Know]

[All-In-One Dinners You Didn't Know You Could Make In A Frying Pan]