Baking

I think store bought is possibly cheaper at the moment depending on what you are making but I'd love to know if anyone has actually sat down and worked it out.  The price of butter is a bit restrictive for me.  Having said that, I have a great little fudgy chocolate chip biscuit recipe that doesn't have butter in it so that gets made all the time.  I also make a gingerbread (loaf rather than biscuit) recipe a bit.  Homemade baking doesn't tend to last as long in our house so what I'm trying at the moment is having things like a packet of malt biscuits and some cruskits for the children (which they both think is great!!) and then using the home made stuff as a bit of a treat, and something to take for my work lunches.

happymumma DH opened the fridge the other day & said you have about $10 worth of butter in here, lol...hmm been stocking up for baking & at $4+ when not on special it does not take long to add up.

By the time you add up ingredients, power, time it does not make it worth it unless you love to do it. I don't enjoy standing in the kitchen for ever backing, then cleaning... then to have the family polish it off in no time.

I have a yummy quick recipe for rum balls & found another one for white chocolate balls so may make them for xmas prezzys.

Bizzy what is your macaroon recipe?

I don't make cookies cause its cheaper to buy them. I'll bake gingerbread (as in the loaf), sometimes a slice or muffins or lollicake. If a recipe doesn't have much butter in it it works out cheaper to bake but if its got lots then I think its cheaper to buy

Each week I make a museli slice for DH and I, muesli bars for the boys (although Bizzy's macaroons look easier), often biscuits and then a gingerbread loaf or a sultana cake

If butter is the expensive part, why not use margarine. Admittedly it doesn't work for everything, but going dairy free, I've been forced to try it and it works in an whole lot of things, and you can usually find some on special for $2 or so I think. I just used to stock up big time whenever I found the dairy-free marg on sale.

I bake. I like knowing what is in things, and I enjoy baking, and it tastes better. Plus I want my kids growing up knowing how to bake.

I find baking way cheaper than buying direct from the shop.

For the price of a packet of biscuits you can make triple the amount. You only get about 10 biscuits in a packet these days lol.

Muffins are definately cheaper. You can make half a dozen large texan sized muffins for less than the price of one decent one (not including those teeny ones you get in the supermarket)

Simon Holst has a fabulously easy chocochip recipe that takes on 75gm of butter, they spread heaps so they seem a decent size to everyone.

I find store boughpacket biscuits so unfulfilling and nothing to eat. We cah chow through a packet of "fancy" biscuits in one day in our house and at $2.50 plus it is an expensive habbit.

I like to bake:
Chocolate chip cookies
Peanut Brownies
Chocolate slice (my mums recipe and very similar to weetbix slice)
Scones

Have tried a few other things lately too. I made a great brownie that dh and I adored - way better than anything in any cafe and saved us so much on cafe treats (which i usually get for myself at least once a week - with having it at home I don't feel the need so save heaps of money in that area)

happymumma i would love that cookie recipe if you are happy to share it!
I bake 2 batches of something every week for hubby to take for lunch (and for me and DD to have a wee treat each day). It varies depending on what I feel like making, but I agree that the price of butter (and cheese, for savoury things) has me seriously checking all the recipes before I make them. I find it very disappointing that in this country it is far more expensive to eat healthy than it is to eat junk (that goes for all food, im not just talking biccies - the price of broccoli this week means we have had only leeks or frozen peas to choose from for veggies!). Coming from england where everything is sooooo cheap it really sucks! Ok, rant over lol

Here you go Muppets Mama...

Fudgy choc chip cookies

2 eggs, 1 cup lightly packed brown sugar, 1/2 cup olive oil (though I use rice bran and it's just fine), 1 tspn vanilla essence, 2 cups self raising flour, 1/2 cup cocoa, 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips.

Preheat oven to 180. Line baking trays with baking paper.  Beat together eggs, sugar and oil.  Add vanilla, flour and cocoa and beat to combine. Stir through choc chips.  Roll teaspoonfuls of mixture into balls, flatten slightly.  Place on trays.  Bake 10-15 mins.