I used to hate baking. With cooking, my method involves adding dashes of different ingredients until I reach perfection and dislike following recipes religiously as baking seemed to require. I’m glad that I, not only overcame my aversion to baking and have even learned to love it.
Baking your own breads and cakes cuts costs at the bakery but often comes along with other expenses. If you bake thriftily though, you win all around.
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Top 7 Money and Time Saving Baking Tips
- Bake many things at once. By doing this, you’re reducing the time the oven is on, and will be saving money on electricity.
- Freeze. If you have stuff in the freezer, it’ll stay fresh longer, reducing food wastage from spoilage.
- No need to wash bowls between batches; if you’re making bread and cookies, its OK if a bit of the dough from the bread gets mixed into the cookie batter. Just make dark colored dough or batters last. This saves both time and water.
- Make mixes. If there are things you bake frequently, consider keeping the dry ingredients premixed so you have the ease of mixes without the added cost.
- Stick to recipes that call for ingredients you have in stock. Cheap item bought for a recipe that sit around and expire waste money. When you make that grocery run, you’re more likely to add extra, unnecessary items to your cart and overspend.
- Use tried and true recipes. When getting recipes online, use sites with ratings such as Allrecipes.com so you don’t waste ingredients on terrible recipes.
- Repurpose the dough. You can bake bread, pita, pizza, and rolls with the same dough. Vanilla and chocolate cake can be made with the same batter with the addition of cocoa to half. Soft pretzels, calzones and pizza use the same dough. This may not necessarily save you money, but saves you time.
While time does not always equal money, when it comes to baked goods, I feel that time does equal money. Less time spent baking means less electricity cost for the baking, and less likelihood that you’ll splurge on the convenience of store bought goodies.
What baking tips do you recommend for saving?
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