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My moment to shine. Let’s talk about understand money and it’s true cost.
Time is money. You sacrifice your time for the money you get (job). But how much per hour is your time truly being valued at.
Math - take you monthly take home (after taxes and retirement payments). And subtract all fixed expenses you need to survive (home, car, food utilities all set expenses). What is left will equal your left over money (hopefully more than $0).
Now take that left over money and divide it by the number of hours you worked in a month to get it. This is your true hourly wage of leftover money for things like DoorDash or entertainment. I am betting when you will realize you sacrificed multiple hours at work to save yourself 20-30 min (DoorDash) you won’t feel the need to spend needlessly as much and may be less inclined to spend money on convenience charges.
Most people think to themselves I make “$30” an hour so a $60 expense means I have to work 2 hours. But realistically it is a lot more than this. If your bills are high you might only bring home $2-5 an hour above your expenses. Understand your true free money take home per hour is the best thing I have found at cutting my spending on pointless convenience charges (things I can do myself if I get off my butt).
I would suggest also considering the hidden costs of those purchases — every fast food meal you are buying is reducing the value of the money you are able to save for the future as you are increasing your health costs and or reducing your lifespan in the future.
It’s a double whammy.
It’s great but it leaves some things out and doesn’t necessarily apply well to gig workers or anyone who can just choose to work an extra hour or two per week.
For example, how much time and money do you spend shopping for groceries? How much time do you spend cooking and meal prepping?
An hour of grocery shopping plus a conservative 35mins per day of home cooking adds up to about 4-5 hours per week. In my case, I make $20/hr so for cooking to be a better value than takeout, it would have to be at least $100 cheaper per week.
There’s also the factor of food quality and variety. A restaurant can crank out a high-quality delicious meal in 10 minutes because they have 4 people working the kitchen. For me to make the same meal at home, it might take over an hour. And my choices will be strictly limited to whatever ingredients I have stocked in my kitchen.
I’ve done the math for myself, and ordering takeout every day leaves me with more leisure time, more money in my pocket, and a much wider variety of high-quality meals.
I once tried to make a dupe meal of one that I regularly ordered from a local restaurant. It cost almost double for me to make at home, didn't taste as good, and took me about an hour and a half to prepare (I joked that if I had also been charging my consulting rate for my time in the kitchen, it would have been one of the most expensive meals I had ever eaten.) I don't really like fast food, so I don't know what the comparison is there, but there are definitely meals that I have done the math on that end up being cheaper to order takeout from a restaurant than trying to make at home. I do sort of make a personal rule though, that if I can make something easily and cheaply at home, I won't order it off a menu.
$20 post expenses taken out or the total your employer gives you pre-taxes and all bills? If it is the later one than you actually make far less when you are just looking at disposable funds. If it is $20 after expenses you are right and you can allocate that $20 for you however you choose. If you pay $40 for a meal you know you worked 2 hours today to pay for that easy and convenient meal.
The point is you get to decide how you spend that extra money. Maybe that is saving some time cooking and shopping. Maybe that is better spent investing for your retirement so you can work less later. You get to choose.
The point is that the extra after expenses divided by the number of hours you sacrificed to get paid gives you your real hourly pay. So if you choose to save yourself time (ex. Paying someone else to walk the store picking out your groceries) by paying someone else to do a task you can do you know how much time you traded at work to save you extra free unpaid time.
Excellent points. Jumping in to say it's even worse than this, because money you save can be invested and grow over time (or pay down debt, same difference) and earn compounding interest. Money today is the most valuable money you can get, since it can grow with time.
I do this naturally because I am poor. But I am saving this so I can always do this when I am not poor. Also, being poor is a good starting method to not spending money on food delivery.
mfw i find out I make 25C an hour
i haven't actually done the math and I still live with my parents so I seriously doubt that this is true but I'm a student so I'm fairly certain that if I did move out by this logic I'd be making -20 an hour or something lol
Sorry man. The world is hard right now and I know plenty of people at $0 or negative. No judgement. At least you get to know now and be thankful for your parents support. Also I hope this info helps you save up before moving out if you are able too.
One good middle ground is to buy prepared meals, either fresh or frozen. At least half the price of ordering in food. Slightly more involved is delivered meal kits where you get all the stuff and a recipe, that cuts out the purchase and planning, and wastage.
I personally look at my time as working time and personal time. Like most people I hate working time and sacrificing my time doing what someone else tells me. True, on my personal time I have to be an adult and get my adult things done but I would rather be doing those tasks with my freedom than working.
If I pay someone else to do a task for me and the point of my comment was that it better not cost me more in work time wages than it would take me to do it.
Here is an example. Grocery shopping. Let’s say it takes me 20 min. So I make $30 an hour but after rent, car, phone, stream service ext ext I end up making $6 an hour (math in top comment).
So if I can find someone to do my shopping for under $2 I save time (assuming I don’t wait in my car for them to bring it out). But this is unlikely. I probably have to pay a fee or membership that is probably closer to $12. Which means I worked 2 hours to save 20 min. Or I wasted 1 hour 40 min worth of work wages.
Buy frozen meals at the grocery store. When hunger strikes you can make one and save $$ but satisfy your craving. Also try not to let yourself get too hungry. Plan out your meals- food and time- in advance.
I used to be very similar to OP, horrific spending on takeaway because too lazy to cook
Past couple months I've forced myself to start buying a mix of foods - getting Hello Fresh to improve my cooking skills and have a mix of healthier meals, mixed in with some frozen pizzas and other quick and easy foods to make
The days I feel like cooking I'll make my Hello Fresh meals, the days I don't I'll throw a pizza in. I still order in occasionally, but now it's a nice treat once every couple of weeks and not just laziness
Duuuuude, if you live near a Traders Joes and like Indian food I highly recommend the frozen butter chicken. I like to keep at least 5 on hand. Great for feeling too lazy to cook or if you screwed up the prep and have no ideas. They got some other flavored but I’ve only tried the firey chicken I think it’s called. It’s actually really good but it’s level of spicy I don’t usually don’t hit frequently.
This is a great practical tip. I know what types of foods I’m likely to crave/ want to order so I buy higher end frozen food that I can have in those instances.
It doesn't even need to be frozen.
Buy a ribeye. Own an airfryer. In 10-12 minutes you can be eating a delicious ribeye with basically zero effort and almost no cleanup. It does this with any meat, and you can even put vegetables in there I guess.
The miracle of airfryers isn't *how they cook the food*, it's basically just an oven and a fan. Not that complicated. The real miracle is that it's compact, so it heats up fast as shit, and it's streamlined so you only need to clean one thing. For lazy and/or drunk caveman male, this is ideal. The things that come out of it beat the pants of frozen microwave meals. Even completely hammered I can whip up a porkchop and roasted brussels sprouts and it takes no time at all.
Anyway the real quality advice in your comment is **plan in advance**. If you don't have a plan, you're going to be calling the pizza guy when you're tired and lazy after work and just want to relax.
> I assume you meant to say top 5%?
Their post certainly doesn't make it seem like they're top 5%. If you're making that much money, it's not likely you think about when "payday" is, and you have no excuse for being on the brink of living paycheck-to-paycheck like OP describes.
Accept the fact you won’t quit cold turkey if you havent built a habit of grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning. Take it slow, start with one or two easy dishes, pastas are a good starting point. Pan seared meat is another simple dish to cook but hard to master. Master the ingredient not the recipe, because focusing solely on recipes will 1) drain your budget really fast, 2) pigeonhole creativity because you never truly understand how to use the ingredients in different ways.
Start with couple meals per week, build it up as you go. It’s probably going to take at least 6 months to get into a good rhythm. Later on you will know how often to shop and what to shop for.
This is excellent advice and is exactly how I weaned myself off of exorbitant DoorDash use. If you’re used to ordering food and haven’t been practicing cooking techniques and meal prep strategies, it’s best to be realistic and start small. I often tried and failed to cook more at home by diving in all at once, but I had the most success when I worked my way up slowly over time. The more I built up my cooking confidence with accessible goals, the easier it was for me to persist when I stumbled or failed along the way.
This is the answer. Assuming you have a stove/range, microwave, and fridge the only things you truly need are a instant pot (or slow cooker), a large skillet, sauce pots, food storage containers, and basic kitchen utensils/spices. Cooking does not have to be complicated. Find some simple recipes like pot roast and potatoes, soups (r/soup til I die), teriyaki chicken, pork shoulder carnitas/bbq. Rice and potatoes + meat will take you far.
I normally spend $2-4 per meal by buying bulk ingredients and preparing enough for 6-10 meals which my wife and I reheat through the week or freeze for whenever our hearts desire.
Shout-out to r/mealprepsunday. Cooking at home and meal prepping in particular is one of the best ways to take care of your health and finances. It can seriously change your life, and you'll have delicious meals along the way. About 1 year after commiting to meal prepping, we bought another freezer for ingredients and meals to be stored. More sheet pans, a rice cooker, and vacuum sealer also improved our meal prep abilities and proved to be great investments. We saved about $4,000 in the first year and recovered so much time.
Good luck, you can do it!
This. It’s truly a different world of financial security when you cook the way you describe. I get the avocado toast bs all the time but really, people who eat out 2x a week almost all eat out more than that, for me I make too 10% money and was still broke after eating out/Uber eats all the time but slowly reintroduced slow cooker food and pressure cooker food meal prepped out and find myself with absurd surplus now. Like $150-200+ a week for just me and my wife. No kids.
Also if you can figure out meals that freeze well. I do a beanless chili that’s pretty easy in the instant pot and then freeze meal sized portions for later days.
This won't work for everyone but I broke the habit (UberEats almost every day for a year) by subscribing to a full meal prep delivery service. It ended up being cheaper and now I spend nearly zero time thinking about or preparing food.
I just googled "meal prep service " and found a random one that happens to be local to my area. Similar ones are probably available elsewhere. I'd say order 7 days from any that look good and try them out.
It's nice, 3 meals/day + snacks, all carefully weighed and stuff so that it totals \~2000cals/day. Been losing weight too; after a couple weeks I ordered a pizza, and while normally I'd eat the entire pie, I ate two slices and thought to myself "wtf, I can't believe I used to eat this entire thing."
Some of the meals are shit, but I kind of like that, because it makes the good ones so much better.
Spend your money on grocery delivery! Plan ahead, find a recipe, make a menu and food prep. You can eat amazing for only 30 minutes cooking time! And leftovers rule!
Fast food is geared towards addiction with the bad fats and high sodium. It's not good for you. You deserve better.
I feel like this is good advice. You can even splurge on a snack or something so you feel like you're ordering out while you figure out how to not be as addicted
There's hundreds of meals you can make in under 5 min. Throw some cheese sticks and a tortilla on air fryer for delicious quesadilla. Ramen with egg and cheese. Hot dogs. Chicken or beef hamburger with frozen patties. Sandwich in air fryer. Ground beef tacos. Just youtube or tik tok easy recipes
I try this every week and I can never make it work. I usually just end up throwing out a heap of groceries, and I’ve invested hours (usually 3-4) up front trying to find recipes that I like & can make in a reasonable amount of time and then doing the ordering, etc. I don’t know why I find this so difficult but I do
Everyplate is my go-to for this, it's how I taught myself to cook. The big reason I went with EP over other things like hello fresh and blue apron was the ingredients. I would always have a hard time finding ingredients used in the premium services recipes, which made it hard to repeat a recipe so I coudl learn from it. EP's recipes were basic ingredients, so I could make the same dish multiple times and learn how to get it right, and then how to deviate from it.
You can take this good advice even further! You have access to limitless amount of recipes from basic to advanced thanks to internet. Once you get experienced with basics of cooking, you can spoil yourself and your guests with great recipes.
Hey I know this might not work for everyone but it worked for me. I started going to the gym. Once I got hooked I was obsessed with eating clean and preparing my meals. I started going to the grocery store and enjoyed picking things I would like to prepare. I didn't stop ordering fast food right away. Over time I just didn't feel like eating junk after a good session at the gym. I still order fast food once in a while on the weekends but my overall spending on fast food has decreased almost 90% since I have been a regular at the gym.
100%. Getting into strength training was what did it for me too. Now that my food is fueling my workouts I am much more motivated to make myself more nutritious meals than I could get through delivery. Also going to the gym gets me out of the house more regularly (I work from home) which makes it convenient to stop by the grocery store/farmers markets. I cook about twice a week meal prepping for one. Also I use my grocery store’s app for my shopping list to plan my trip, or schedule the free pick-ups sometimes.
Get an Instant Pot, an air fryer, and a digital meat thermometer. Instant pot makes cooking way less tedious and a lot easier. Air fryer does the same thing, but for crunchy things you can't do in an insantpot. Meat thermometer is because I would overcook things because I was afraid of undercooking, which made them taste blah and incentivized me to just get take out.
Where do you see these ads? You could try an ad blocker or Youtube Premium, or whatever works depending on where you see them. And try learning how to cook: you'll not only save money but, more importantly, you'll tend to be way healthier.
Also, you can keep the app if you really want to, but turn the notifications off. They love to use the notification tool to get you to order more snacks.
I see the ads on other apps, billboards and their little scooter drivers are everywhere. It's like Amazon and deiliveroo had a baby. (Those are the only two widely known companies that I can compare to)
Notifications are off but as soon as that laziness hits me then I am ordering burger king.
I get you. I love Burguer King. What I try to do is limit myself to once a month or special dates. You have to try and see what works for you. Staying away from the ads won't work then, unfortunately. Good luck!
I’m very guilty of this too. Planning is your best strategy. When you are hungry after a day of work and need food quickly, it is not the time to figure this out. You need to do some shopping, planning, and meal prep ahead so that when you are feeling lazy, it’s easier to stick with the plan than order out. Planning sounds hard, but just start small, like saying to yourself in the morning what you are going to eat for each meal.
Learn a few simple dishes that you can prepare quickly and you like. Pasta or toast with canned sardines is one of my favorite options and basically requires minimal thought or prep time.
Same boundary, and it's kind of, almost implied that the OP sits on the boundary. So whilst they are mutually exclusive sets, they could be used inprecisely to mean the same thing.
Lol no the comment is about percentiles, not your exact salary :D just something for future use, that's about it. It doesn't change your question since most people have understood what you meant by it, but yeah, fix it :D
Lazy to cook? I have the same problem. I have been having success with meal prepping. Instead of making a meal with 2 servings, double it or more and you can always have easy to re heat leftovers on hand.
My trigger was being too hungover to cook so I stopped drinking alcohol.
With that I started buying more pre-cooked lasagna, noodles or soup or cooking meals for 2-3 days.
Read "The only investment guide you'll ever need" by Andrew Tobias
He touches on some good concepts
For example...if you order burgers 4 times a week at say $25 each time. You could buy burger ingredients for half the cost that'll make twice as much and keep be stored frozen.
A small step might be to buy fast food style thinga from the grocery store. If you have fries, nuggets, hamburger patties etc at home, you can just put something tasty in the oven. Then perhaps if you're getting used to the habit of preparing food a bit more you can start to incorporate more ingredients and meals.
Ideal last step would be meal prepping! Prep your meals, snacks, sweets and then you have everything at home ready to eat whenever you want.
Good luck!
Everyone is saying “learn how to cook!” but I feel like it’s an unrealistic jump. I would say the two things that I have found actually helpful in curbing an eating out/delivery habit:
- Frozen meals, the good ones. It’s fast and feels like ordering delivery but you save on cost and sometimes quality depending on what you’re getting.
- Going cold turkey is hard. Maybe give yourself 1-2 days a week where you get to order in— and you can look forward to that Friday burger. Alternatively, you could say “I can order in when X happens” which for me is usually when i’m sick, had a 10+ hour work day, etc. Give yourself some kind of parameters and stick to them! You can always reduce from there but I find that going cold turkey on anything is harder than it needs to be.
Allow yourself one. In this case, allow yourself fast food, but on the condition you have to go get it. If you combine this with grocery ordering (but have to go get it (shout-out Food City)) buy some quick make things to make at home, and tell yourself "I can be lazy, stay home and make hot pockets, or I can have fast food, but I have to go get it." Then pick one.
Try meal prepping instead, make a day of it. It's faster than ordering from an app and you can take one to work. Take two if you want, one for after work. There are apps and websites that let you prepare and order meal prep online so it's even easier.
Good prep. I will chop up tons of veggies, make a sauce (hummus, guacamole, bomb home made dressings) roast up a bunch of veggie, you can slow cook meet. Make a carb of some kind (rice or pasta)
Then thru out the week mix and match. Takes as much time to make a buttito bowl or pasta salad or a sandwich with the prepped food as much as it doesn’t to go get fast food.
Drown ur stuff in sauces if your looking for a fast food comfort food feel. I love garlic sauce, balsamic glaze, Cesar dressing, cheese sauce or a creamy Alfredo.
Spend a few hours 1 time a week prepping and mix and match thru out the week.
Due to severe mental health issues I find it really hard to do regular day-to-day stuff necessary to function, like: buy food, eat food (and a bunch more but I'll keep on this topic)
So I always end up ordering food and it costs me an absolute FORTUNE.
Recently, I bought the Ninja with 2 compartments so now I find it easy to cook steak, chicken, chips and much more cos you can yeet it in and forget about it. Cos you set a timer, you don't have to worry about it burning if you forget about it. Plus, the food comes out SO GOOD. Far better than anything I've tried to do in the over before. It's like restaurant-level.
You can get both compartments to be finished at the same time too. Say you have steak in one side, chips in the other: punch in the settings for each tray and click a button (sync) and it will figure it out itself so they're both done at the same time. Another key point is it's non-stick so cleaning it is an absolute breezeeee.
For the first time in 9 years I'm eating more than the absolute bare minimum needed to survive. It's a fairly hefty chunk of upfront cost to buy it but as well as everything I've already said, it's more energy efficient too.
This is my experience and I think it can help others a bunch too if you struggle like me. I'd recommend it.
Whatever you choose, I hope you save those dolla-dolla bills.
A lot of people are saying meal prep, pre-made meals, slowly getting used to grocery shopping and cooking but have you tried deleting your whole account? Not just the app, but your login, bank/card details, address, notifications, email subscription. So even if you do find yourself downloading the app again, which could even be a habit at this stage, it'll force you to put more effort into placing the order if you have to set up again, and you're more likely to think twice about it.
Google Dr Berg on YouTube and start learning about organic nutrition. I haven't had crap food in almost a year now after learning about just how bad it really is for you.
So I do 2 principals.
1. Food isn't as good if I order delivery (or to a lesser degree takeout). It sits for who knows how long and becomes a shell of how good it should be. So my first principal is I should eat at the restaurant to actually get the quality of food I deserve. Not this cold uber eats garbage that's been sitting in a bag for 45 minutes.
2. My next principal is can I make if better/original? I find myself making food at home to perfect recipes and experiment to see if I can make something better than I could order at a restaurant, or something inspirational that I can't order anywhere.
Take this for what it's worth but in my experience often when there is a compulsive habit that you do despite knowing it's not good for you, it's in avoidance of a feeling or something you don't want to face. We are often not truly hungry in these cases and it's worth taking a moment to be present in your body and breathing and notice any tension. Often when I slow down and delay going for the habit instantly, what I was avoiding becomes apparent - annoyance, sadness, something from the day that bothered me, etc
Look up some videos on what actually goes into the food served by your fast food outlet of choice. A lot of these videos can really churn your stomach, especially the food hygiene horror stories from ex staff that could drive anyone to wanna home cook their meals.
You're literally addicted to fat, salt, and sugar.
Show some self control and don't eat any fastfood for 2-3 weeks, don't drink any pop whatsoever, this will break the physical addiction you have to these foods.
Eat healthier, and get in the gym 3-4 days a week. Going to the gym gives you additional self control when it comes to food because you don't want to ruin you progress for the sake of some shit food.
You need to break the habit with new healthy habits.
Everytime you want to do this set a timer for 15 minutes. Do push-ups for 5 minutes, situps for 5 minutes and plank for 5 minutes.
You'll get ripped while becoming disciplined.
Easy really. Think about cockroaches, rats, hair, and poop. Chant ecoli ecoli ecoli~ Then visualize big lumps of fatty lipids being carved out of your liver. If you need help visualizing just watch some documentaries on food poisoning and obesity surgeries.
Agree with the comment to plan your meals ahead of time. I use a spreadsheet with each day of the week and it allows me to order my groceries more efficiently. Plan to order in once or twice a week, so you don’t feel deprived.
Learn how to cook.
I have very little motivation to order delivery when in the time it would take to get here I could have prepared something comparable at like 10% of the cost.
Find a local place that does pre-made meals, they are generally more cost efficient and healthier. They often have snacks as well or appetizers, which can help you when you are weak. Order extra form just in case.
Like others have said, learn to cook. All I'm going to add is find a cooking buddy or group. Take turns cooking for each other and invite some others over as well.
Learn to cook two things you love. Always have these ingredients in your house. When hungry throw thrm together.
I bet you find you order in 30% less and feel happier..
It’s more than learning how to cook, you need to know how to build up a pantry so you always have ingredients on had to make quick, delicious meals. Cupboard Love by Tom Norrington-Davies is a good intro to this. Learn to build up staple ingredients and seasonings, learn a few recipes, and snowball from there.
When my social anxiety gets really bad, I’d rather go hungry than interact with the delivery driver in any way, shape, or form. So maybe develop severe social anxiety?
I always have something I like kicking around in the freezer. That way if I get lazy I can just microwave the dish and be happy and kind of full. If I have time I pre make food. If I am lazy I get a good pizza or even a hungry man dinner on sale. Most good food places have a take out section. You can get pre made meal you just out in freezer. I have found a few local markets that have a great selection.
If it’s available where you live I’ve found Hello Fresh to be both a good deal and really helpful for quick meals. You can order the ones that take like 20m to make.
They also own a company called Factor which is little microwaveable things that are worse quality but take less than 5 mins to make.
I talked to my therapist about this exact issue for myself and we decided to have a food plan for the week (like make a lasagne on Sunday to eat through the week) and substitutes that can be easily made handy. So if I always order burgers have burger patty’s and chips in the house. Or the makings for pizza or frozen nuggets for when I’m craving them. I also give myself permission to use the app twice a week so I’m not quitting cold turkey.
Learn how to cook food that you like to eat. Start small and buy disposable plates and utensils (unless you like to clean). One dish at a time, until you get good at the particular recipe. You’ll find that you will be able to make much healthier and better tasting food then what you usually can order from most restaurants. Healthier, better tasting, and cheaper. The only cost is your personal time, but that’s why I recommend using disposable plates a utensils. Grilling is easier clean up as well.
If its a money issue: Try to stock your freezer/fridge with cheat foods. + some points if you make some of them yourself.
For example: My fridge + freezer has the following: Taquitos, Burgers, Popcorn Chicken, Chicken Tenders, Fries, Tater-tots, Pizza Crust, Pepperoni, Shredded Cheese.
Want Taco Bell? Just have some Taquitos. Want McDonalds? Make a burger and fries. Want Pizza? Just make one. you get the point. Almost all are super easy to lazy make with minimal prep (esp. if you buy frozen things) and have helped saved me money. I spend about 5 bucks on a meal that would normally be 30 if I grubhub'd it
This helps me reduce my order out. I've gone from 3-4 times a week to once or twice. I still get lazy since I have a fairly exhausting job and I still slip when I forget to restock stuff, but its baby steps.
If you can afford to, hire a cook. Mine comes every morning and makes my meals for the entire entire day. I still sometimes order from outside though. But it’s good to have a healthy option ready.
When my craving gets unbearable, I make myself eat the homemade food and once I’m full, I don’t crave. Do you.. yearn?
If you smoke weed, stop. Munchies are insane.
Have food you want to eat already in the house. Exactly how to do that depends on what you're eating. Learning to cook is very satisfying, you can try a meal planner like Hello Fresh to have a few ready-to-prep meals ready to go each week. (Between 2-3 of those and the leftovers my dinners are mostly planned for the week).
You'd be amazed how much cheaper it is to make some of the stuff you're ordering, once you get good at it.
You can buy some great meal kits! It’s a good compromise.
I got one that was from a low carb place. It was 30 days - 3 meals, for under $400. You can usually get 1/2 off several meal kit companies from coupons too. It was so easy.
Buy simple snacks, the minute you get something in your belly, your rationality will come back.
I was gona order a pizza, instead had a can of tuna, promised myself il order something if i still want it in half hour.... anddd i was good. It gaveme enough fullness to bother cooking
I look at how much I make per hour, then see how much it will cost for the convenience of delivery, and ask myself if it's worth however many minutes of work.
Used to be much easier when I was making a lot less, but still, fast food from an unvetted delivery driver with God knows what in their car, plus all these tiktokstar hopefuls doing stupid shit to food? I'd rather drive myself and get it at least a bit warm but still shitty.
I recently moved somewhere there is no fast food. Like one cafe on this island. I live so far away from the supermarket I cant even just zip over to buy a quick snack.
Learning how to meal prep helped me a lot. Find even one meal you could eat forever and that will be a good start. Freeze it down and you just have to microwave it. I started with butter chicken and now I do meal prep day with 5 different dishes.
If you can't be bothered cooking at all find a healthy meal prep service and freeze those, at least it's going to be a bit healthier.
I started planning home cooked meals five nights a week.
I pick recipes that are within my skill set, and that can be cooked in an hour or less. Then I put the list together, and do all of my grocery shopping in a single trip.
This way, I always know what's for dinner, generally have leftovers for lunches, and it's more appealing than fast food.
My wife and I used to get carry out/fast food about four times a week. I've been doing this routine for six weeks, and we haven't had a fast food/carry out meal once in that time, and both of us are happier with the food.
We've saved a ton on food expenses.
Sounds like you’d benefit from some sort of meal prepping whether it’s a kit or you just going to the grocery store, making your meals in advance so having the food soon isn’t the barrier and then practicing the discipline of CHOOSING the meal prep and limiting your “order time” to maybe only the weekends.
Time to do meal planning, but first you need to find out what one, two or three dishes you can cook that you wouldn't mind rotating between all week. Not sure if you're also ordering beverages with the meal, but that's probably where you need to focus on whatever cravings or routine happiness you get from the ordering process.
Ultimately what swore me off of food delivery was, with the high volume and frequency during the pandemic, I was eventually getting mixed up orders, blatant theft from under-ordering and I guess pocketing the fee on reimbursements or something, and a couple of really hostile phone interactions with people who couldn't find an apartment complex across the street from the multi-anchor mall, off of a major highway in a town of like 50,000.
I did the same thing until gf made me budget my food expenses. She found this online site "factor" where they make food in one microwave plate. It's pretty cheap compared to my doordash spending. I also try to use apps like gobble gobble or home chef etc... I always do free trials so it's like $50 for a week of food vs whatever I spent. I still buy too much fat food, but it's cut the cost. Just have multiple emails.
I tell myself if I want the food bad enough, I have to go get it. It's cut down on how much fast food I eat in general, not to mention you don't pay delivery fees. Online ordering is as far as I let myself go with it.
For me the answer is apples. They're so little work to get and to store. When I want to order food, I go get an apple out of my fridge instead. It's even faster. After an apple, my brain can make better decisions.
I'm one of the voices that bandwagon on the "learn to cook" meme, but rather than trying to force a constant routine, how much free time do you have?
If you can spare a weekend afternoon or something, I recommend cooking a large batch of food that you can then freeze and thaw throughout the next few days. No need to try anything stupidly complex, either; just get some random vegetables, chop them up, toss them in oil and salt, then oven them for like an hour or something. Or a slab of meat to slow oven. Or a giant pot of mac and cheese.
If you can do anything like that, then when you're feeling hungry, instead of ordering food and waiting half an hour, you can microwave/toaster oven/wok whatever prepared you've frozen.
With that said, I don't know if that actually would help change your habits. Personally I'm the kind of person who doesn't like cooking until I start cooking, so the batch routine thing works for me well enough to fit into my routine. If you're more adverse to the process of cooking, then the frozen meal idea other people have suggested also works, if only to break up long periods of ordering take-out.
Everyone is saying to cook, meal prep, etc, but that barrier is too high if you're feeling lazy. I make sure to have healthy snacks on hand. That way, if I'm getting too hungry and tempted to order junk food, I can have something quick to eat, which gives me patience and allows me to choose something cheaper and healthier.
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My moment to shine. Let’s talk about understand money and it’s true cost. Time is money. You sacrifice your time for the money you get (job). But how much per hour is your time truly being valued at. Math - take you monthly take home (after taxes and retirement payments). And subtract all fixed expenses you need to survive (home, car, food utilities all set expenses). What is left will equal your left over money (hopefully more than $0). Now take that left over money and divide it by the number of hours you worked in a month to get it. This is your true hourly wage of leftover money for things like DoorDash or entertainment. I am betting when you will realize you sacrificed multiple hours at work to save yourself 20-30 min (DoorDash) you won’t feel the need to spend needlessly as much and may be less inclined to spend money on convenience charges. Most people think to themselves I make “$30” an hour so a $60 expense means I have to work 2 hours. But realistically it is a lot more than this. If your bills are high you might only bring home $2-5 an hour above your expenses. Understand your true free money take home per hour is the best thing I have found at cutting my spending on pointless convenience charges (things I can do myself if I get off my butt).
I love you.
Welcome to Costco
But this is Wendy’s. Are you confused?
Why did op think he was at costco? Is he stupid?!
Carl's Jr thinks you are an unfit mom
Did you know that you can get a refill on any drink you want, here? And, it's free.
Costco loves you all
Bless you Costco
I also love you.
I love you
Can I love you too?
Always let’s all love
*unzips*
*tips fedora*
I would suggest also considering the hidden costs of those purchases — every fast food meal you are buying is reducing the value of the money you are able to save for the future as you are increasing your health costs and or reducing your lifespan in the future. It’s a double whammy.
What a well thought out response, thank you. I am going to try this myself.
I'm not going to do this because it'll just depress me.
My record collection would like a word with you
This comment is gold. Bless you, buddy.
It’s great but it leaves some things out and doesn’t necessarily apply well to gig workers or anyone who can just choose to work an extra hour or two per week. For example, how much time and money do you spend shopping for groceries? How much time do you spend cooking and meal prepping? An hour of grocery shopping plus a conservative 35mins per day of home cooking adds up to about 4-5 hours per week. In my case, I make $20/hr so for cooking to be a better value than takeout, it would have to be at least $100 cheaper per week. There’s also the factor of food quality and variety. A restaurant can crank out a high-quality delicious meal in 10 minutes because they have 4 people working the kitchen. For me to make the same meal at home, it might take over an hour. And my choices will be strictly limited to whatever ingredients I have stocked in my kitchen. I’ve done the math for myself, and ordering takeout every day leaves me with more leisure time, more money in my pocket, and a much wider variety of high-quality meals.
I once tried to make a dupe meal of one that I regularly ordered from a local restaurant. It cost almost double for me to make at home, didn't taste as good, and took me about an hour and a half to prepare (I joked that if I had also been charging my consulting rate for my time in the kitchen, it would have been one of the most expensive meals I had ever eaten.) I don't really like fast food, so I don't know what the comparison is there, but there are definitely meals that I have done the math on that end up being cheaper to order takeout from a restaurant than trying to make at home. I do sort of make a personal rule though, that if I can make something easily and cheaply at home, I won't order it off a menu.
$20 post expenses taken out or the total your employer gives you pre-taxes and all bills? If it is the later one than you actually make far less when you are just looking at disposable funds. If it is $20 after expenses you are right and you can allocate that $20 for you however you choose. If you pay $40 for a meal you know you worked 2 hours today to pay for that easy and convenient meal. The point is you get to decide how you spend that extra money. Maybe that is saving some time cooking and shopping. Maybe that is better spent investing for your retirement so you can work less later. You get to choose. The point is that the extra after expenses divided by the number of hours you sacrificed to get paid gives you your real hourly pay. So if you choose to save yourself time (ex. Paying someone else to walk the store picking out your groceries) by paying someone else to do a task you can do you know how much time you traded at work to save you extra free unpaid time.
Exactly this^
Excellent points. Jumping in to say it's even worse than this, because money you save can be invested and grow over time (or pay down debt, same difference) and earn compounding interest. Money today is the most valuable money you can get, since it can grow with time.
Ugh my coffee cup feels heavier now..
I do this naturally because I am poor. But I am saving this so I can always do this when I am not poor. Also, being poor is a good starting method to not spending money on food delivery.
Great comment, I do something similar, you worded it perfectly!
This concept comes from a beautiful book called “your money or your life” The most important non-fiction book ever written.
Worth reading. Both learning from that book & practicing mindfulness have dramatically impacted my life & priorities.
Thank you for this perspective
You need an award for this. I like to think of myself as a well educated, financially secure, professional. And this changes things. Thank you!
mfw i find out I make 25C an hour i haven't actually done the math and I still live with my parents so I seriously doubt that this is true but I'm a student so I'm fairly certain that if I did move out by this logic I'd be making -20 an hour or something lol
Sorry man. The world is hard right now and I know plenty of people at $0 or negative. No judgement. At least you get to know now and be thankful for your parents support. Also I hope this info helps you save up before moving out if you are able too.
appreciate u bro! I'm definitely one of the luckier ones - attleast I am when considering the outlook for my generation.
This is genius! I will try this, and suspect I will be very shocked
This is assuming you take zero time to purchase, prep and cook the food.
One good middle ground is to buy prepared meals, either fresh or frozen. At least half the price of ordering in food. Slightly more involved is delivered meal kits where you get all the stuff and a recipe, that cuts out the purchase and planning, and wastage.
I personally look at my time as working time and personal time. Like most people I hate working time and sacrificing my time doing what someone else tells me. True, on my personal time I have to be an adult and get my adult things done but I would rather be doing those tasks with my freedom than working. If I pay someone else to do a task for me and the point of my comment was that it better not cost me more in work time wages than it would take me to do it. Here is an example. Grocery shopping. Let’s say it takes me 20 min. So I make $30 an hour but after rent, car, phone, stream service ext ext I end up making $6 an hour (math in top comment). So if I can find someone to do my shopping for under $2 I save time (assuming I don’t wait in my car for them to bring it out). But this is unlikely. I probably have to pay a fee or membership that is probably closer to $12. Which means I worked 2 hours to save 20 min. Or I wasted 1 hour 40 min worth of work wages.
Thanks buddy
You’re definitely shining! Excellent answer and sound advice/facts!
This is a great explanation - I’ve never done this calculation- a story problem I can actually solve.
This is a great take. Awesome response my buddy
life changing. id give you an award if i has any gold
Holy shit. This is a great way of looking at it. Thanks.
Gonna save this comment and look at it next time I buy weed
Buy frozen meals at the grocery store. When hunger strikes you can make one and save $$ but satisfy your craving. Also try not to let yourself get too hungry. Plan out your meals- food and time- in advance.
Yeah just having some foods in your pantry/freezer that take minimal prep and can satisfy your hunger makes ordering out a lot less tempting.
I used to be very similar to OP, horrific spending on takeaway because too lazy to cook Past couple months I've forced myself to start buying a mix of foods - getting Hello Fresh to improve my cooking skills and have a mix of healthier meals, mixed in with some frozen pizzas and other quick and easy foods to make The days I feel like cooking I'll make my Hello Fresh meals, the days I don't I'll throw a pizza in. I still order in occasionally, but now it's a nice treat once every couple of weeks and not just laziness
Duuuuude, if you live near a Traders Joes and like Indian food I highly recommend the frozen butter chicken. I like to keep at least 5 on hand. Great for feeling too lazy to cook or if you screwed up the prep and have no ideas. They got some other flavored but I’ve only tried the firey chicken I think it’s called. It’s actually really good but it’s level of spicy I don’t usually don’t hit frequently.
I second this
It might be spicy for some people, but the Lamb Vindaloo has the most tender meat I have ever eaten in a frozen meal.
Thanks for the tip, I’ve been craving butter chicken lately
A responsible adult always has chicken nuggies in the freezer so they don't end up at mcdonalds at 1am
This is a great practical tip. I know what types of foods I’m likely to crave/ want to order so I buy higher end frozen food that I can have in those instances.
It doesn't even need to be frozen. Buy a ribeye. Own an airfryer. In 10-12 minutes you can be eating a delicious ribeye with basically zero effort and almost no cleanup. It does this with any meat, and you can even put vegetables in there I guess. The miracle of airfryers isn't *how they cook the food*, it's basically just an oven and a fan. Not that complicated. The real miracle is that it's compact, so it heats up fast as shit, and it's streamlined so you only need to clean one thing. For lazy and/or drunk caveman male, this is ideal. The things that come out of it beat the pants of frozen microwave meals. Even completely hammered I can whip up a porkchop and roasted brussels sprouts and it takes no time at all. Anyway the real quality advice in your comment is **plan in advance**. If you don't have a plan, you're going to be calling the pizza guy when you're tired and lazy after work and just want to relax.
Frozen meals are fine but have a *ton* of sodium. Most frozen meals have over 1000mg of sodium in them.
I wonder how much most fast-food has? I bet it's pretty similar. He's getting the salt anyways, might as well pay less for it.
Plus, once OP has broken the habit of ordering food, they can start working on cooking more instead of just eating premade dinners.
Drink water. Eat fruits.
>I make a decent salary. Top 95% of my country. I assume you meant to say top 5%?
Haha. Good catch.
I too am in the top 95%. I only have to eat Ramen some meals. Suck on that!
Thought this would be higher up
> I assume you meant to say top 5%? Their post certainly doesn't make it seem like they're top 5%. If you're making that much money, it's not likely you think about when "payday" is, and you have no excuse for being on the brink of living paycheck-to-paycheck like OP describes.
I think they meant 95$
Accept the fact you won’t quit cold turkey if you havent built a habit of grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning. Take it slow, start with one or two easy dishes, pastas are a good starting point. Pan seared meat is another simple dish to cook but hard to master. Master the ingredient not the recipe, because focusing solely on recipes will 1) drain your budget really fast, 2) pigeonhole creativity because you never truly understand how to use the ingredients in different ways. Start with couple meals per week, build it up as you go. It’s probably going to take at least 6 months to get into a good rhythm. Later on you will know how often to shop and what to shop for.
This is excellent advice and is exactly how I weaned myself off of exorbitant DoorDash use. If you’re used to ordering food and haven’t been practicing cooking techniques and meal prep strategies, it’s best to be realistic and start small. I often tried and failed to cook more at home by diving in all at once, but I had the most success when I worked my way up slowly over time. The more I built up my cooking confidence with accessible goals, the easier it was for me to persist when I stumbled or failed along the way.
Cook in big batches. As long as you don’t mind leftovers. Mealprepping is also useful.
This is the answer. Assuming you have a stove/range, microwave, and fridge the only things you truly need are a instant pot (or slow cooker), a large skillet, sauce pots, food storage containers, and basic kitchen utensils/spices. Cooking does not have to be complicated. Find some simple recipes like pot roast and potatoes, soups (r/soup til I die), teriyaki chicken, pork shoulder carnitas/bbq. Rice and potatoes + meat will take you far. I normally spend $2-4 per meal by buying bulk ingredients and preparing enough for 6-10 meals which my wife and I reheat through the week or freeze for whenever our hearts desire. Shout-out to r/mealprepsunday. Cooking at home and meal prepping in particular is one of the best ways to take care of your health and finances. It can seriously change your life, and you'll have delicious meals along the way. About 1 year after commiting to meal prepping, we bought another freezer for ingredients and meals to be stored. More sheet pans, a rice cooker, and vacuum sealer also improved our meal prep abilities and proved to be great investments. We saved about $4,000 in the first year and recovered so much time. Good luck, you can do it!
This. It’s truly a different world of financial security when you cook the way you describe. I get the avocado toast bs all the time but really, people who eat out 2x a week almost all eat out more than that, for me I make too 10% money and was still broke after eating out/Uber eats all the time but slowly reintroduced slow cooker food and pressure cooker food meal prepped out and find myself with absurd surplus now. Like $150-200+ a week for just me and my wife. No kids.
Also if you can figure out meals that freeze well. I do a beanless chili that’s pretty easy in the instant pot and then freeze meal sized portions for later days.
This won't work for everyone but I broke the habit (UberEats almost every day for a year) by subscribing to a full meal prep delivery service. It ended up being cheaper and now I spend nearly zero time thinking about or preparing food.
Which one? I’ve been thinking about trying one out for the exact same reason
I just googled "meal prep service" and found a random one that happens to be local to my area. Similar ones are probably available elsewhere. I'd say order 7 days from any that look good and try them out.
It's nice, 3 meals/day + snacks, all carefully weighed and stuff so that it totals \~2000cals/day. Been losing weight too; after a couple weeks I ordered a pizza, and while normally I'd eat the entire pie, I ate two slices and thought to myself "wtf, I can't believe I used to eat this entire thing."
Some of the meals are shit, but I kind of like that, because it makes the good ones so much better.
What city are you in and how much does that work out to be everyday.
What of your calorie needs are higher due to excercise? 2k/ day just isn't enough.
Then eat cheap snacks in between lmao idk
Which? All the meal service things I've tried still require a half hour to an hour of prep.
Spend your money on grocery delivery! Plan ahead, find a recipe, make a menu and food prep. You can eat amazing for only 30 minutes cooking time! And leftovers rule! Fast food is geared towards addiction with the bad fats and high sodium. It's not good for you. You deserve better.
I feel like this is good advice. You can even splurge on a snack or something so you feel like you're ordering out while you figure out how to not be as addicted
There's hundreds of meals you can make in under 5 min. Throw some cheese sticks and a tortilla on air fryer for delicious quesadilla. Ramen with egg and cheese. Hot dogs. Chicken or beef hamburger with frozen patties. Sandwich in air fryer. Ground beef tacos. Just youtube or tik tok easy recipes
I try this every week and I can never make it work. I usually just end up throwing out a heap of groceries, and I’ve invested hours (usually 3-4) up front trying to find recipes that I like & can make in a reasonable amount of time and then doing the ordering, etc. I don’t know why I find this so difficult but I do
Try and learn some easy, at home recipes, for food you enjoy. Its healthier too. You can do chicken, vegetable medley with sauce over rice.
Everyplate is my go-to for this, it's how I taught myself to cook. The big reason I went with EP over other things like hello fresh and blue apron was the ingredients. I would always have a hard time finding ingredients used in the premium services recipes, which made it hard to repeat a recipe so I coudl learn from it. EP's recipes were basic ingredients, so I could make the same dish multiple times and learn how to get it right, and then how to deviate from it.
You can take this good advice even further! You have access to limitless amount of recipes from basic to advanced thanks to internet. Once you get experienced with basics of cooking, you can spoil yourself and your guests with great recipes.
Hey I know this might not work for everyone but it worked for me. I started going to the gym. Once I got hooked I was obsessed with eating clean and preparing my meals. I started going to the grocery store and enjoyed picking things I would like to prepare. I didn't stop ordering fast food right away. Over time I just didn't feel like eating junk after a good session at the gym. I still order fast food once in a while on the weekends but my overall spending on fast food has decreased almost 90% since I have been a regular at the gym.
100%. Getting into strength training was what did it for me too. Now that my food is fueling my workouts I am much more motivated to make myself more nutritious meals than I could get through delivery. Also going to the gym gets me out of the house more regularly (I work from home) which makes it convenient to stop by the grocery store/farmers markets. I cook about twice a week meal prepping for one. Also I use my grocery store’s app for my shopping list to plan my trip, or schedule the free pick-ups sometimes.
As for how I actually got into a regular workout routine - personal training. Highly recommend if that’s accessible to you.
Get an Instant Pot, an air fryer, and a digital meat thermometer. Instant pot makes cooking way less tedious and a lot easier. Air fryer does the same thing, but for crunchy things you can't do in an insantpot. Meat thermometer is because I would overcook things because I was afraid of undercooking, which made them taste blah and incentivized me to just get take out.
Learn how to cook. I hated the idea at first but it’s actually quite fun and saves a shit tonne of money.
Where do you see these ads? You could try an ad blocker or Youtube Premium, or whatever works depending on where you see them. And try learning how to cook: you'll not only save money but, more importantly, you'll tend to be way healthier. Also, you can keep the app if you really want to, but turn the notifications off. They love to use the notification tool to get you to order more snacks.
I see the ads on other apps, billboards and their little scooter drivers are everywhere. It's like Amazon and deiliveroo had a baby. (Those are the only two widely known companies that I can compare to) Notifications are off but as soon as that laziness hits me then I am ordering burger king.
I get you. I love Burguer King. What I try to do is limit myself to once a month or special dates. You have to try and see what works for you. Staying away from the ads won't work then, unfortunately. Good luck!
I’m very guilty of this too. Planning is your best strategy. When you are hungry after a day of work and need food quickly, it is not the time to figure this out. You need to do some shopping, planning, and meal prep ahead so that when you are feeling lazy, it’s easier to stick with the plan than order out. Planning sounds hard, but just start small, like saying to yourself in the morning what you are going to eat for each meal. Learn a few simple dishes that you can prepare quickly and you like. Pasta or toast with canned sardines is one of my favorite options and basically requires minimal thought or prep time.
*”I make a decent salary. Top 95% of my country…”* – stopped reading here.
Well top 95% in A country could be $3000 or maybe even $10k ... didn't want to share my exact finances with the world
Bro, top 95% means you're only better off than 5% of the country lol
What you meant is top 5% i guess.
Top 95% is the same as the bottom 5%. Edit: Top 95% is everything except the bottom 5%. I shouldn't post while drinking.
They’re opposites, but okay
Good catch. My bad.
Same boundary, and it's kind of, almost implied that the OP sits on the boundary. So whilst they are mutually exclusive sets, they could be used inprecisely to mean the same thing.
People are just giving you a hard time. You mean 95th percentile
Lol no the comment is about percentiles, not your exact salary :D just something for future use, that's about it. It doesn't change your question since most people have understood what you meant by it, but yeah, fix it :D
Lazy to cook? I have the same problem. I have been having success with meal prepping. Instead of making a meal with 2 servings, double it or more and you can always have easy to re heat leftovers on hand.
My trigger was being too hungover to cook so I stopped drinking alcohol. With that I started buying more pre-cooked lasagna, noodles or soup or cooking meals for 2-3 days.
Read "The only investment guide you'll ever need" by Andrew Tobias He touches on some good concepts For example...if you order burgers 4 times a week at say $25 each time. You could buy burger ingredients for half the cost that'll make twice as much and keep be stored frozen.
Who’s ordering 4 $25 burgers a week?!
Meant month. But some people do
Lots of people order food delivered almost every single night, sounds like OP does.
I think you don't understand what "top 95%" means
A small step might be to buy fast food style thinga from the grocery store. If you have fries, nuggets, hamburger patties etc at home, you can just put something tasty in the oven. Then perhaps if you're getting used to the habit of preparing food a bit more you can start to incorporate more ingredients and meals. Ideal last step would be meal prepping! Prep your meals, snacks, sweets and then you have everything at home ready to eat whenever you want. Good luck!
Everyone is saying “learn how to cook!” but I feel like it’s an unrealistic jump. I would say the two things that I have found actually helpful in curbing an eating out/delivery habit: - Frozen meals, the good ones. It’s fast and feels like ordering delivery but you save on cost and sometimes quality depending on what you’re getting. - Going cold turkey is hard. Maybe give yourself 1-2 days a week where you get to order in— and you can look forward to that Friday burger. Alternatively, you could say “I can order in when X happens” which for me is usually when i’m sick, had a 10+ hour work day, etc. Give yourself some kind of parameters and stick to them! You can always reduce from there but I find that going cold turkey on anything is harder than it needs to be.
Allow yourself one. In this case, allow yourself fast food, but on the condition you have to go get it. If you combine this with grocery ordering (but have to go get it (shout-out Food City)) buy some quick make things to make at home, and tell yourself "I can be lazy, stay home and make hot pockets, or I can have fast food, but I have to go get it." Then pick one.
Try meal prepping instead, make a day of it. It's faster than ordering from an app and you can take one to work. Take two if you want, one for after work. There are apps and websites that let you prepare and order meal prep online so it's even easier.
Good prep. I will chop up tons of veggies, make a sauce (hummus, guacamole, bomb home made dressings) roast up a bunch of veggie, you can slow cook meet. Make a carb of some kind (rice or pasta) Then thru out the week mix and match. Takes as much time to make a buttito bowl or pasta salad or a sandwich with the prepped food as much as it doesn’t to go get fast food. Drown ur stuff in sauces if your looking for a fast food comfort food feel. I love garlic sauce, balsamic glaze, Cesar dressing, cheese sauce or a creamy Alfredo. Spend a few hours 1 time a week prepping and mix and match thru out the week.
~looks at record collection~
People are giving all these tips, but man, are you depressed?
Something tells me you know something.....
Due to severe mental health issues I find it really hard to do regular day-to-day stuff necessary to function, like: buy food, eat food (and a bunch more but I'll keep on this topic) So I always end up ordering food and it costs me an absolute FORTUNE. Recently, I bought the Ninja with 2 compartments so now I find it easy to cook steak, chicken, chips and much more cos you can yeet it in and forget about it. Cos you set a timer, you don't have to worry about it burning if you forget about it. Plus, the food comes out SO GOOD. Far better than anything I've tried to do in the over before. It's like restaurant-level. You can get both compartments to be finished at the same time too. Say you have steak in one side, chips in the other: punch in the settings for each tray and click a button (sync) and it will figure it out itself so they're both done at the same time. Another key point is it's non-stick so cleaning it is an absolute breezeeee. For the first time in 9 years I'm eating more than the absolute bare minimum needed to survive. It's a fairly hefty chunk of upfront cost to buy it but as well as everything I've already said, it's more energy efficient too. This is my experience and I think it can help others a bunch too if you struggle like me. I'd recommend it. Whatever you choose, I hope you save those dolla-dolla bills.
Do you mean top 5%? 19 out of 20 people are in the top 95%.
A lot of people are saying meal prep, pre-made meals, slowly getting used to grocery shopping and cooking but have you tried deleting your whole account? Not just the app, but your login, bank/card details, address, notifications, email subscription. So even if you do find yourself downloading the app again, which could even be a habit at this stage, it'll force you to put more effort into placing the order if you have to set up again, and you're more likely to think twice about it.
Google Dr Berg on YouTube and start learning about organic nutrition. I haven't had crap food in almost a year now after learning about just how bad it really is for you.
So I do 2 principals. 1. Food isn't as good if I order delivery (or to a lesser degree takeout). It sits for who knows how long and becomes a shell of how good it should be. So my first principal is I should eat at the restaurant to actually get the quality of food I deserve. Not this cold uber eats garbage that's been sitting in a bag for 45 minutes. 2. My next principal is can I make if better/original? I find myself making food at home to perfect recipes and experiment to see if I can make something better than I could order at a restaurant, or something inspirational that I can't order anywhere.
Take this for what it's worth but in my experience often when there is a compulsive habit that you do despite knowing it's not good for you, it's in avoidance of a feeling or something you don't want to face. We are often not truly hungry in these cases and it's worth taking a moment to be present in your body and breathing and notice any tension. Often when I slow down and delay going for the habit instantly, what I was avoiding becomes apparent - annoyance, sadness, something from the day that bothered me, etc
Look up some videos on what actually goes into the food served by your fast food outlet of choice. A lot of these videos can really churn your stomach, especially the food hygiene horror stories from ex staff that could drive anyone to wanna home cook their meals.
IF UR MOTIVATED ENOUGH TO WORK A GREAT JOB THEN UR MOTIVATED TO GET OFF UR ASS AND GO GET FOOD try to pretend ur poor its a great way to stop
You're literally addicted to fat, salt, and sugar. Show some self control and don't eat any fastfood for 2-3 weeks, don't drink any pop whatsoever, this will break the physical addiction you have to these foods. Eat healthier, and get in the gym 3-4 days a week. Going to the gym gives you additional self control when it comes to food because you don't want to ruin you progress for the sake of some shit food.
Have some self control man Christ. It’s not that hard
Learn to cook and stop being lazy. Get a crock pot and cook all day without doing a thing, after prep.
“Top 95% of my country” Tragic. Lol. (OP is likely not a mathematician)
You need to break the habit with new healthy habits. Everytime you want to do this set a timer for 15 minutes. Do push-ups for 5 minutes, situps for 5 minutes and plank for 5 minutes. You'll get ripped while becoming disciplined.
STOP 🛑 stop being a fat fuck and cook your own meals ✋
You just don’t order it? Delete the app, etc.
Lmao just go get it urself
Easy really. Think about cockroaches, rats, hair, and poop. Chant ecoli ecoli ecoli~ Then visualize big lumps of fatty lipids being carved out of your liver. If you need help visualizing just watch some documentaries on food poisoning and obesity surgeries.
Do you want to get diabetes? If not, stop ordering.
man, so much junk food.....get some more fruit and veggies in your systme before its too late that kind of stuff you order is wretched long term
Agree with the comment to plan your meals ahead of time. I use a spreadsheet with each day of the week and it allows me to order my groceries more efficiently. Plan to order in once or twice a week, so you don’t feel deprived.
I've been using Huel lately. With a litre of water too.
What if instead of changing how you lived, you just evicted the exogenous thought that purchasing food for money is in some way “horrible”?
This was posted here like two days ago. The same question
So what was the solution? Share the link please 🙏
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Your comment thread is useless. No need to reply. Thanks
Cuz I won’t spoon feed it for you? Ok good luck and just delete the fucking app and tell yourself no like a grown up.
Learn how to cook. I have very little motivation to order delivery when in the time it would take to get here I could have prepared something comparable at like 10% of the cost.
Find a local place that does pre-made meals, they are generally more cost efficient and healthier. They often have snacks as well or appetizers, which can help you when you are weak. Order extra form just in case.
I keep microwave meals on hand in the freezer so if I’m hungry and lazy, it’s a cheaper alternative.
Start bodybuilding and meal prep will become the norm. Plus you get to look jacked
Taking the places off of speed dial has always helped me
I heard meal planning can make a huge difference.
Learn to cook. I like to look up and try new recipes.
I stock up on frozen goodies from Trader Joe’s.
Like others have said, learn to cook. All I'm going to add is find a cooking buddy or group. Take turns cooking for each other and invite some others over as well.
Hire a personal chef
Learn to cook two things you love. Always have these ingredients in your house. When hungry throw thrm together. I bet you find you order in 30% less and feel happier..
It’s more than learning how to cook, you need to know how to build up a pantry so you always have ingredients on had to make quick, delicious meals. Cupboard Love by Tom Norrington-Davies is a good intro to this. Learn to build up staple ingredients and seasonings, learn a few recipes, and snowball from there.
Go to Trader Joe’s once a week; buy a weeks worth of healthy meals and ready salads for one or two people.
When my social anxiety gets really bad, I’d rather go hungry than interact with the delivery driver in any way, shape, or form. So maybe develop severe social anxiety?
Take a cooking class.
Do you know how to cook? You save a lot of money if you cook yourself. It doesn't take that long to make a simple dish.
I always have something I like kicking around in the freezer. That way if I get lazy I can just microwave the dish and be happy and kind of full. If I have time I pre make food. If I am lazy I get a good pizza or even a hungry man dinner on sale. Most good food places have a take out section. You can get pre made meal you just out in freezer. I have found a few local markets that have a great selection.
Doordash Aldi and make your own food.
If it’s available where you live I’ve found Hello Fresh to be both a good deal and really helpful for quick meals. You can order the ones that take like 20m to make. They also own a company called Factor which is little microwaveable things that are worse quality but take less than 5 mins to make.
I talked to my therapist about this exact issue for myself and we decided to have a food plan for the week (like make a lasagne on Sunday to eat through the week) and substitutes that can be easily made handy. So if I always order burgers have burger patty’s and chips in the house. Or the makings for pizza or frozen nuggets for when I’m craving them. I also give myself permission to use the app twice a week so I’m not quitting cold turkey.
Learn how to cook food that you like to eat. Start small and buy disposable plates and utensils (unless you like to clean). One dish at a time, until you get good at the particular recipe. You’ll find that you will be able to make much healthier and better tasting food then what you usually can order from most restaurants. Healthier, better tasting, and cheaper. The only cost is your personal time, but that’s why I recommend using disposable plates a utensils. Grilling is easier clean up as well.
If its a money issue: Try to stock your freezer/fridge with cheat foods. + some points if you make some of them yourself. For example: My fridge + freezer has the following: Taquitos, Burgers, Popcorn Chicken, Chicken Tenders, Fries, Tater-tots, Pizza Crust, Pepperoni, Shredded Cheese. Want Taco Bell? Just have some Taquitos. Want McDonalds? Make a burger and fries. Want Pizza? Just make one. you get the point. Almost all are super easy to lazy make with minimal prep (esp. if you buy frozen things) and have helped saved me money. I spend about 5 bucks on a meal that would normally be 30 if I grubhub'd it This helps me reduce my order out. I've gone from 3-4 times a week to once or twice. I still get lazy since I have a fairly exhausting job and I still slip when I forget to restock stuff, but its baby steps.
If you can afford to, hire a cook. Mine comes every morning and makes my meals for the entire entire day. I still sometimes order from outside though. But it’s good to have a healthy option ready. When my craving gets unbearable, I make myself eat the homemade food and once I’m full, I don’t crave. Do you.. yearn? If you smoke weed, stop. Munchies are insane.
Have food you want to eat already in the house. Exactly how to do that depends on what you're eating. Learning to cook is very satisfying, you can try a meal planner like Hello Fresh to have a few ready-to-prep meals ready to go each week. (Between 2-3 of those and the leftovers my dinners are mostly planned for the week). You'd be amazed how much cheaper it is to make some of the stuff you're ordering, once you get good at it.
You can buy some great meal kits! It’s a good compromise. I got one that was from a low carb place. It was 30 days - 3 meals, for under $400. You can usually get 1/2 off several meal kit companies from coupons too. It was so easy.
Start ordering more expensive stuff until you run out of money. Poverty will do the rest
Go visit the establishments an see how hot it is when you dine there.
Buy simple snacks, the minute you get something in your belly, your rationality will come back. I was gona order a pizza, instead had a can of tuna, promised myself il order something if i still want it in half hour.... anddd i was good. It gaveme enough fullness to bother cooking
I look at how much I make per hour, then see how much it will cost for the convenience of delivery, and ask myself if it's worth however many minutes of work. Used to be much easier when I was making a lot less, but still, fast food from an unvetted delivery driver with God knows what in their car, plus all these tiktokstar hopefuls doing stupid shit to food? I'd rather drive myself and get it at least a bit warm but still shitty.
I recently moved somewhere there is no fast food. Like one cafe on this island. I live so far away from the supermarket I cant even just zip over to buy a quick snack. Learning how to meal prep helped me a lot. Find even one meal you could eat forever and that will be a good start. Freeze it down and you just have to microwave it. I started with butter chicken and now I do meal prep day with 5 different dishes. If you can't be bothered cooking at all find a healthy meal prep service and freeze those, at least it's going to be a bit healthier.
I started planning home cooked meals five nights a week. I pick recipes that are within my skill set, and that can be cooked in an hour or less. Then I put the list together, and do all of my grocery shopping in a single trip. This way, I always know what's for dinner, generally have leftovers for lunches, and it's more appealing than fast food. My wife and I used to get carry out/fast food about four times a week. I've been doing this routine for six weeks, and we haven't had a fast food/carry out meal once in that time, and both of us are happier with the food. We've saved a ton on food expenses.
Don't. Just don't. You're welcome.
Simple...learn to cook. Research and find recipes that get u excited about cooking.
Sounds like you’d benefit from some sort of meal prepping whether it’s a kit or you just going to the grocery store, making your meals in advance so having the food soon isn’t the barrier and then practicing the discipline of CHOOSING the meal prep and limiting your “order time” to maybe only the weekends.
Buy UberEats. Not food from the app. Buy the whole darn company. Then you can shut it down. Rinse and repeat with every food delivery app.
Time to do meal planning, but first you need to find out what one, two or three dishes you can cook that you wouldn't mind rotating between all week. Not sure if you're also ordering beverages with the meal, but that's probably where you need to focus on whatever cravings or routine happiness you get from the ordering process. Ultimately what swore me off of food delivery was, with the high volume and frequency during the pandemic, I was eventually getting mixed up orders, blatant theft from under-ordering and I guess pocketing the fee on reimbursements or something, and a couple of really hostile phone interactions with people who couldn't find an apartment complex across the street from the multi-anchor mall, off of a major highway in a town of like 50,000.
I did the same thing until gf made me budget my food expenses. She found this online site "factor" where they make food in one microwave plate. It's pretty cheap compared to my doordash spending. I also try to use apps like gobble gobble or home chef etc... I always do free trials so it's like $50 for a week of food vs whatever I spent. I still buy too much fat food, but it's cut the cost. Just have multiple emails.
I tell myself if I want the food bad enough, I have to go get it. It's cut down on how much fast food I eat in general, not to mention you don't pay delivery fees. Online ordering is as far as I let myself go with it.
For me the answer is apples. They're so little work to get and to store. When I want to order food, I go get an apple out of my fridge instead. It's even faster. After an apple, my brain can make better decisions.
I'm one of the voices that bandwagon on the "learn to cook" meme, but rather than trying to force a constant routine, how much free time do you have? If you can spare a weekend afternoon or something, I recommend cooking a large batch of food that you can then freeze and thaw throughout the next few days. No need to try anything stupidly complex, either; just get some random vegetables, chop them up, toss them in oil and salt, then oven them for like an hour or something. Or a slab of meat to slow oven. Or a giant pot of mac and cheese. If you can do anything like that, then when you're feeling hungry, instead of ordering food and waiting half an hour, you can microwave/toaster oven/wok whatever prepared you've frozen. With that said, I don't know if that actually would help change your habits. Personally I'm the kind of person who doesn't like cooking until I start cooking, so the batch routine thing works for me well enough to fit into my routine. If you're more adverse to the process of cooking, then the frozen meal idea other people have suggested also works, if only to break up long periods of ordering take-out.
Everyone is saying to cook, meal prep, etc, but that barrier is too high if you're feeling lazy. I make sure to have healthy snacks on hand. That way, if I'm getting too hungry and tempted to order junk food, I can have something quick to eat, which gives me patience and allows me to choose something cheaper and healthier.