Try using these easy cooking tips to save money every day and make things easier in the kitchen! These are easy shortcuts to simplify your life! Even one good cooking tip can make a huge difference, so see which of these helps you the most!
12 Ways To Save Money In The Kitchen – Easy Cooking Tips
- If you aren’t an artist but would like to decorate a theme cake, try using your cookie cutters as a pattern. Lightly press the cookie cutter onto the frosting of the cake. You can then pipe frosting around the outline or fill in your pattern.
- Keep a couple of angel food cakes in your freezer for when you need a quick dessert. You can top them with any fresh fruit you have on hand. Add a dollop of whipped topping and you are good to go. In a pinch, you can even spread it with some fruit jam, and/or pudding and whipped cream.
- If your honey becomes crystallized, don’t throw it away. Warm it in the microwave or a pan of boiling water. Stir it until it becomes clear.
- When making gelatin salads with canned fruit, don’t throw the reserved juice away. Use part of it in place of the water you are supposed to use.
- Keep a loaf of French bread in your freezer. When you are ready to use it, just slice off the amount you need and return the rest to the freezer. It’s easier to slice and butter this way and you don’t leave any to dry out or get old.
- When making a spice cake, add a mashed banana to it for an extra moist cake.
- I once knew an elderly lady who made the most “absolutely to die for” dinner rolls I have ever tasted. When I asked about her secret, she said when she greased to bowl to let them rise in, she used bacon grease instead of shortening or margarine. I have used this for years. No one would ever guess and they all love my easy dinner rolls.
- To keep your holiday salads crisper, turn a small sauce plate upside down in your salad bowl before you fill it. All the liquid and water will run down under the sauce plate and away from the salad.
- Don’t throw out that pickle juice from the pickles you used on your relish dish. Use it to make French dressing next time instead of vinegar.
- When you need a quick garnish or topping for something, place a bag of chocolate chips in a bowl of hot water. Smash it around every couple of minutes. Then, when the lumps are gone, cut a corner of the bag and drizzle on a cake, cookies, or dessert. When the bag is empty, cut it open and be sure to lick it clean. : )
- For something different for an appetizer or finger food, make mini kabobs. Use a large toothpick or break a bamboo stick and place on it a cube of cooked chicken or ham along with a piece of dried fruit (apricot, pineapple, etc.). You could also add something like a maraschino cherry.
- Try using brown sugar instead of white sugar for a different twist on cinnamon toast to go with your hot chocolate. Just butter a piece of bread, sprinkle it with brown sugar, cinnamon, and broil until golden brown.
For lots more easy cooking ideas, tips, and recipes, check out our cookbooks:
You can make EASY and delicious meals at home in less time than eating out! You’ll save a ton of money on food and your family will thank you!
Click here to get our Dining On A Dime Cookbooks 25% Off NOW! They’re filled with tasty recipes and tips to make your life easier!
I love these ideas, especially using a cookie cutter to make an outline on frosting to decorate a cake, and the cinnamon toast with brown sugar idea. Yummy.
I like the idea of using bacon grease when you leave your rolls to rise…I make my own bread and rolls and don’t normally have to grease the bowl, but I’ll try it next time :)
Please don’t microwave honey! It will just get harder than ever. I get my honey fresh in glass quart jars from my sister’s honey farm. Take your honey out of the plastic container, put in an a glass one. If the honey is hard or gets hard after, simply turn a heat proof saucer, such as Corelle dishes, up-side down in a deep pot just big enough for the saucer to fit down into. Set your glass container of ROOM-TEMPERATURE honey onto the saucer bottom, fill the pot with boiling water and set on a burner turner to LOW. It will take a few hours, depending on how big your container is, but once it is melted back to liquid as long as you keep it covered and OUT of the fridge, it will stay liquid for weeks. Just repeat if it gets hard again.
As for bacon grease, ever wonder why Grandma’s buns tasted so good? She probably didn’t use any margarine or veggie shortening. My Grandma used lard in the dough and bacon grease for the bowl and pans. That little bit of smokey/salt flavor from the bacon grease tastes good on white bread and buns, but the ultimate is home ground whole wheat made into bread and buns with lard and bacon grease. I hand grind my own home grown grain in small batches from the whole “berry” (as you townies call the grain kernels). Grinding tip: Don’t fill the hopper full and expect to go right to flour, you can’t turn the handle (or the motor might over heat). Better to add a handful at a time and then you can go from kernel to flour. It takes me about two minutes to grind 5-6 cups of flour, enough for most of my baking. I keep my grinder clamped to the end of my counter all the time. I live in a 14 x 70 mobile (modular) home so space is at a premium. Hope this was helpful.
I’m new to all of this frugal living and loving everyone’s ideas, but how long does bacon grease last in the refrigerator?
About forever. I have kept it for a year before in the fridge. Years ago they use to keep a container by their stove and not even refrigerate it and it would last ages. I do at least keep mine in the fridge.
How do you keep french bread in freezer without it getting a lot of ice crystals on it?
I have not had problems with ice crystals on it before but you may need to wrap it well. Two things that causes my food to get ice crystals on other things is if I leave it in the freezer too long and if my freezer door accidentally got left open for a bit or if the freezer is opened a lot. Opening the freezer a lot causes humid air to get in there which freezes and causes crystals. Also check and make sure the temperature on your freezer is correct and your rubber seal is sealing properly.
Mine sometimes gets ice crystals inside the bag. I just take the frozen bread out and shake the ice crystals out of the bag over my sink then return the bread to the bag and make sure I squeeze the bag around the bread really tight by ‘hugging’ it; twist the end of bag tightly and tie with a bread tie.
I find that cutting french bread into meal sizes, wrapping in foil, then a big plastic bag works well. Seems a waste of packaging but I do find a way to reuse it. I usually buy a couple of loaves at a time for just the two of us and it keeps the freezer burn away a long time.
If you have leftover pickle juice, it make good pickled eggs as well.
To prevent it from going stale before I eat it, I freeze bread by just popping it in its bag in the freezer. for some reason this makes it a little damp so I toast it before I eat it.
Any idead for gluten intolerant? Even home made bread is expensive by the time you buy the necessary ingredients and a single loaf costs $5 on sale! Also cow milk allergy and vegetarian. School lunch is difficult. Thanks!
My brother saves pickle juice, olive juice, jalapeño juice, etc in a gallon jar in the fridge; he mixes all kinds together in the jar. He uses it to marinate chicken for the grill. It really tenderizes the meat and you also get the flavor.
I’ve never used it to marinate chicken, but I do add sliced cucumbers to the pickle juice to make additional pickles. I’ve allowed the jar to sit for a week or so – my husband loves them.
I love the idea about saving the leftover juices from olives, pickles for a marinade!
I freeze it in small containers and just defrost in microwave.