Fall in these parts is one of the most flavor rich times of the year. There’s parties and festivals with pies, cakes, cookies, cobblers, and breads. Buying these scrumptious desserts pre-made in stores and bakeries can eat up your weekly grocery budget in the blink of an eye.
What’s a mom on a shoestring budget to do? Investing in baking staples and whipping up yummy homemade goodies the day before will not only impress your fellow party goers, but can taste better too. The cakes in the grocery store are filled with preservatives and could have been sitting on the refrigerator shelf a week or two. To make matters worse they could have been baked several months beforehand, frozen, and recently have been thawed and decorated. Sounds yummy right? Your fresh made with love cake can beat out a store bought cake any day!
Even buying baking mixes can be costly. You can find cookie mixes on sale for $1, but how many cookies do you get? The package may say 36 cookies, bat that’s if you make teeny tiny cookies. In “real life”, you can get 12-16 regular size cookies. The refrigerator cookie dough is almost $4 and you get to break apart dough to make 12-24 depending on cookie size. Spend $5-10 on cookie ingredients and you can fill your kitchen with cookies again and again.
Baking recipes typically need the same ingredients. Some recipes will take almost every item from this list and other more exotic recipes may call for more exotic ingredients. Traditional baking items include:
- -Flour
- -Sugar
- -Brown sugar
- -Eggs
- -Butter
- -Salt
- -Shortening
- -Milk
- -Evaporated milk
- -Vegetable Oil
- -Baking Power
Most of these items you may already have. The ones you have to buy can be used repeatedly for many desserts and breads. If you end up spending $10 on ingredients, that’s okay. If stored properly ingredients other than milk and eggs can last quite a while and bake you up a kitchen full of goodies. Always check store sales ads and try to use coupons to get your costs as low as possible. Store brands are also just as good as name brands.
When planning your desserts and recipes you can also substitute in healthier options. Some people use apple sauce to replace sugar, while others use sweeteners such as Splenda. The sites listed above also have healthier options just a search away.
If you know of any other great baking recipes websites please feel free to help others out and list them in the comments. Do you have any baking tips? If so feel free to share those also, as we LOVE your comments!
