Can you go an entire month without going out to eat? What about a week or a day? Can you cut your dining out bill by 20%, 50% , 75% or more? That is what I challenge you to do!
At the end of the 30 days, I will choose one winner who will get $50 to spend at a restaurant(s) of their choice!
The rules:
1. You must challenge yourself. Try to spend less than you spend now. If you don’t go out to eat at all, challenge yourself to try new meals this month. As long as you are challenging yourself when it comes to your family’s eating habbits, you can participate!
2. You must comment on at least 10 days worth of the discussion posts in order to be eligible to win the gift card.
3. The winner will be chosen at random. It won’t matter if you have been 100% successful or not.
4. You are allowed 1 freebie meal that you don’t have to count or report back to us about. Please report on everything else though so we can encourage and support one another!
5. Free meals do not count against you. This is a challenge to spend less money going out to eat than you usually spend. If someone else is paying for the meal or you have a coupon to make it free, great!
6. Here is a thought… consider keeping a tally of what you would of spent this month. For example, if you really want to go out for breakfast this morning and you resist… write that down! You could then donate that money to a food bank or save it for a goal you are working towards (like a trip to Disney World!).
7. Be sure to check out our list of casserole recipes here and the crock pot recipes here and the under 6 ingredient recipes here.
My progress:
My husband went out for lunch at Zaxby’s. He spent $7.
How are you doing?
Leave a comment and let me know!
{ 48 comments… read them below or add one }
No dining out yesterday. We had the last of the chicken, fresh rice and fresh squash/potato/onions for dinner. Yum!
So ended up going out last night but my aunt paid so still free and today I am taking my little man out for our free meal at IHOP but still free. You know things taste better when they are free :)
Did good yesterday except for at supper. I am in school on Tuesday and Thursday evenings after work and normally my husband cooks but since my sister-in-law meet me at school with my oldest daughter after spending the week at the beach I treated her to Chick-fil-A. Turned it into some much needed mother-daughter time.
I think we did well yesterday, (not sure what the DH did for lunch). We had skirt steak, portobello mushrooms and veggies on the grill. And I did it!
Another good day of not eating out. We’ll be having leftovers for dinner tonight so as long as we don’t stray from that plan we’ll have another day under our belt.
I agree…free does taste better! :) We had leftovers for dinner…good to clean out the fridge so I can go grocery shopping today. Will probably get to go out sometime over the weekend for my birthday…am soooo looking forward to that!
We have stopped eating out almost completely. I just read about this challenge. So, I’m in it for the rest of the month! I think I can do it. I’ll just need to come up with a menu for Father’s Day. If I can get past that I’ll be on the home stretch for the rest of the month. Thanks for the challenge!
I ate lunch with my mom and nephew at Chick-fil-a.
We didn’t eat out yesterday. I really really wanted to go out for dinner and skip swim lessons since my daughter hated it so much, but DH wouldn’t let me. So swim lessons instead. She did better with him at the helm.
My husband went to Starbucks to study yesterday. When he told me this I immediately looked sad, but he cheered me up when he then said he didn’t buy anything! :) He thought it was too hot outside to be drinking coffee, and even HE didn’t want to pay $5 for a cold drink.
No eating out for us yesterday. Bean burritos for lunch. Baked potatoes, carrots, and chicken/veggie chicken for dinner.
Lunch for me was my “allowed” day out…good to get out of the office during a 12 hour shirt!
I went biking with friends last night and we had dinner out. The boyfriend took my leftovers for lunch today so not too bad for $9 bucks.
no eating out yesterday. my mom brought me breakfast this morning when she brought her dog over (I’m dog sitting). I’ll have leftovers for lunch. we shouldn’t have any problem not going out tonight.
Ate bacon sandwiches at home…not gourmet, but got the job done. =)
once a month my three friends left from h.s. and i get together for dinner or breakfast. last night we went to TGIfridays and had a great time laughing at our lives. we each take turns treating and last night was not my night to treat (next month is..) so we had a 4 hour dinner and we laughed so hard we were crying. nothing like a great night with friends and free food. i’m signing off for the weekend. we are heading up to my parent’s cottage in wisconsin. that means no eating out for us…mimi will be cooking all weekend!
I did good yesterday. Had poptarts for breakfast, leftover pizza for lunch, and cooked fried port chops for dinner.
No dining out yesterday. Grilled burgers for dinner.
We’re doing good. Problem is that I woke up with a cold I hope my husband will step up and make dinner otherwise I don’t know.
My mom bought me & my son lunch so I cbought dessert. It was $6. That’s all that was spent yesterday.
My daughter came to work with me yesterday, so we did eat out for lunch.
Thursday was a $0 day!!
We did our eating out for the month last weekend while we were busy with soccer. Cooking at home for the rest of the month! Tonight is Trout and tomorrow ribs on the grill for dinner – its going to be too hot too cook inside!
We had a GC for Wendy’s so we grabbed that for lunch while running yesterday, and breakfast for dinner last night. YUM!
We did good yesterday. Last night I did spend $5 on egg rolls to go with the chicken fried rice DH made for dinner. Tonight DD has a soccer game so I dont know what we’ll do.
I was good yesterday! I really wanted to go out after a hot day of having a yard sale but I made a quick pack of that new Kraft Mac and Cheese (really good by the way) and we had some Veggies and Fruit so it easy without having to spend money.
We feel so bad. Our lunch did not show up yesterday so I got a pizza from Pappa John’s however I was able to get a $10 pizza for $6 (they have a neighbor discount). I then had my hubby go and get me a milkshake from Zaxby’s because my throat was hurting so bad. My total for yesterday $9.16:-(
No dining out for us yesterday. We went to Trader Joe’s yesterday so we bought some easy to prepare foods for the weekend. Yesterday we grilled chicken so we didn’t have to heat up our house!
My husband and I have made a commitment to do this. Right now we are saving up for an exercise bike, so money we “save” from not eating out, will go towards that! :) Tonight we get a treat – we’re having Papa Murphy’s, since I won a free pizza from there!
Did great yesterday! I made a whole chicken, sweet potatoes, and rolls for dinner. It was so yummy! I ate leftovers for lunch today.
It’s pretty bad when you can’t remember what you had for dinner, just last night! Hmmm….must have been pretty uneventful. Oh yes, we had bbq ham sandwiches and potato spears. Neither of which was really great. I hate it when my meals don’t work out! Tonight HAS to be better! lol
I did good yesterday. We had Tuna Helper last night and I had the left overs for breakfast this morning.
We have company arriving today so last night was mostly leftovers. I did make homemade french fries to go with. :)
I made spaghetti w/meat sauce last night. Yum! And that also means left overs for today’s lunch too. :)
No eating out for us yesterday. We had breakfast for dinner, complete with made-from-scratch rolls. It was the first time I had attempted the rolls and was very happily surprised with the results since I’m not known for being good in the kitchen! :)
All homemade here yesterday!! Eggo Waffles for bfast, sandwiches for lunch, and spaghetti for dinner! Nothing fancy, but I’m 9 months pregnant so it’s gonna be quick and easy meals for us for a while!!
DH is out of town and I’m going crazy with kids, so it’s each for him/herself tonight, LOL!
Still hangin’ in there…lets see yesterday-oh yea we had veggie rice, mac’n’ cheese, cornbread, and roasted potatoes and green beans. We got our garden in late so we won’t have fresh veggies for a while, but the first of our apples trees is ripe. Will be picking and canning, freezing, etc this weekend!
Slipped up today…Breakfast at chick-fil-a $4.44….Still, it’s seldom that I’m away from the kids for a relaxing breakfast like that!
The homemade pizzas from Wednesday night sure did last us. Yesterday, DH had a free afternoon meal with some colleagues so the kids and I had leftover pizza for dinner with a side salad. They didn’t seem to mind that they’d had pizza in their lunchboxes already that day. :) Today’s lunch was the rest of the pizza and since DH had a free meal again for work today, we’ll probably have a simple dinner at home tonight, frozen fish fillets with homemade tartar sauce, french fries, and some sort of veggie.
We went to a Reds game and bought some food there. I had planned on buying food there and took it out of our spending money.
Leftovers from last night. I love it when some is still left the next night.
Almost ordered pizza tonight but didn’t! I love pizza on Fridays. This was a tough one to pass up. Instead we had quesadilla’s with spinach and chicken and fresh homemade salsa! yum :) And some ice cream for dessert to replace that usually friday pizza treat
Still going strong this month — haven’t eaten out yet. Had brats, fried cabbage and potato salad for dinner last night, and a stir-fry made from leftover smoked pork loin the night before that. Now I’m gonna try and make sauerkraut from my leftover cabbage — it’ll be good with some more brats in the next couple of weeks!
I even satisfied my fruity drink craving (I get those so bad during the summer) with a free fruitista drink at Taco Bell with the coupon from Sunday’s RP. Yummy!
We are still doing great (which has to be some sort of record for us)!!! We even spent the afternoon at the pool and didn’t get home until 6:45. But luckily, we had leftovers from last nights dinner (grilled chicken, sweet potatoes and baked beans). So, we’re still no dining out for us. Tomorrow, i work at the farmer’s market, so I’ll get some fresh veggies (FREE) to last us the week and then we have our Cub Scout camp out that night so we’ll be having hot dogs and the like for dinner. So, tomorrow will also be a no dining out day!!! :)
No eating out today. Well, actually we did, but my husband’s uncle bought our supper. We were introducing him to our new baby boy.
Quesadillas again last night. We do that way too much. I need to buy more steamable veggies …
We’ve been eating our “old reliable”-spagetti!