Pizza delivery, iced lattes and countless amounts of bottled water are growing fast. At $20 a pop in most places, a big family pie can be key when there’s no time to cook, but start relying on these food and drink shortcuts on a regular basis and your wallet will start to feel the pinch.
Your local cafe and corner restaurant are quietly winning the war against your savings. Meal by meal, drink by drink, the habit of eating out costs more people each year than they care to admit.
Not all kitchen splurges are created equal, but the right appliances — think coffee machines, water filters, and soda makers — don’t just save you one trip out; they can recoup their purchase price within months and continue to save for a long time.
We’ve done the math to determine which kitchen investment offers the best financial return, taking into account upfront costs and projected annual savings. The most surprising example we found? Switching from visiting the coffee shop every day to brewing at home can save you over $1,000 a year.
1. Pizza oven
A home pizza oven can be had for a few hundred bucks and will save you from the rising cost of take out.
Making pizza at home isn’t just fun; it can save you a lot of money if you swap homemade pizza nights for expensive store-bought, even just a few times a year.
The ingredients to make a few pies at home — dough, red sauce and cheese — cost about $8. Compare that to the average cost of $17 for a unmarried pizza in the US, and the savings opportunities are clear. Since most households need two pizzas per order, you could save about $30 each time the craving hits.
Best of all, pizza ovens are easy to operate, with many gas or wood-burning models, and can produce restaurant-quality pies in less than 3 minutes. Some of the our favorite models It only costs a few hundred bucks, so your pizza oven won’t take long to pay for itself.
- Upfront costs: $300 to $500
- How much can you save?: $500+ per year (based on one pizza per week)
2. SodaStream water purifier
Making fun with SodaStream will cost you less than buying cans of seltzer.
I drink a lot of seltzer, so this analysis hits close to home. I thought it was almost impossible to give up cans of LaCroix and Polar, but the decision was made easier when I counted the savings of using SodaStream instead of buying 12 packs every time.
I did the math, and those who drink two cans of seltzer a day will save more than $300 a year if they start a $70 SodaStream, which makes things at home. After the first year, you can deduct the cost of the device and save even more. In fact, you’ll need about two CO2 cartridges — $15 each if you use the exchange program — to last a year drinking one 12-ounce bottle of sparkling water each day. If you’re a two-can (24-ounce) drinker, you’ll spend about $60 a year on the four cans of CO2 needed to produce that amount.
I drop as much as three or four cans a day, so the annual savings clock in at more like $600. All of this proved reason enough for me to kick the can.
- Upfront costs: $70
- How much you can save: Up to $600 per year
3. Coffee maker
Coffee is a big expense for many. Do it at home and save hundreds, even thousands a year.
If you buy coffee at Starbucks or another coffee shop even once a day, the spending over a year is astronomical. Fortunately, coffee can be made at home for a fraction of what the chains charge and all you need is a good coffee maker constant availability of beans to make it happen.
We crunched the numbers to see how much making coffee at home will save you a year. Even someone who drinks one cup a day will save up to $700 a year, depending on the order. Those who drink two or more cups a day are likely to save about $1,000.
- Upfront costs: $30 to $150
- How much can you save?: Up to $1,000 (based on consumption of two cups per day)
4. The fridge
An air fryer uses less than half the energy of a large oven.
I mean normal air fryer users know that these trendy chefs save time and hassle, and anything that encourages us to cook more and order less will save big money in the long run. But you may not have considered what these countertop convection ovens can do as well save money on your energy bill.
A conventional air fryer uses much less energy than a large oven to operate, takes less time to preheat and cooks food faster. By my calculations using New York electricity rates (2023), a standard four-quart stove costs 25 cents an hour to operate. That’s 50% more energy efficient than a full-size electric oven and about 35% more efficient than a gas oven.
- Upfront costs: $50 to $100
- How much can you save?: Up to $114 (based on 300 hours of cooking)
5. A rice cooker
A rice cooker is essential for anyone who regularly eats these meals on a budget.
Rice is probably the most versatile ingredient possible. Top a bowl of basmati or brown rice with vegetables and meat or a fried egg with chili oil and you’ve got yourself a budget-friendly meal.
Former CNET editor David Priest caught the rice cooker bug while in solitary confinement and did a breakdown of how much it costs to make rice at home. On average, it’s about $1 for four servings of homemade rice, or 25 cents per serving, while buying a portion of cooked rice for four will cost about $3 or $4. That means you can feed a family or group cheaply if you start with rice and don’t go too crazy with all the other ingredients.
Best of all, a decent rice cooker won’t cost more than $25. And, once you have it Instant Potit probably has the function of a rice cooker.
- Upfront costs: $25
- How much can you save?: Up to $547.50 (based on two servings of rice per day)
6. Instant Pot or slow cooker
Using a slow cooker is easy and turns cheap cuts of meat into tasty dishes.
These hybrid pressure cookers have been around for years now and for good reason. Multicookers are easy to use and will turn tough, cheap cuts of meat into food you can cut with a butter knife.
Beyond the Instant Pot’s power to turn budget ingredients into toothsome meals, these lil’ cookers also use less energy than a wall oven. We’ve done the math to see how much you can save using an Instant Pot in a large oven. While a large conventional oven costs more than $0.50 an hour to run, a slow cooker costs just $0.05. Using the pressure cooking mode costs less at $0.17 but is still about a third of the cost of running your main oven.
- Upfront costs$40 (slow cooker) or $90 (Instant Pot)
- How much can you save?: Up to $135 for power only (based on 300 hours of cooking)
7. Water filter jar
If you’re still drinking bottled water, a filter jar and reusable water bottle will put money in your pocket.
If you’re still drinking single-use bottled water at home, or outdoors, it’s time to kick that bad habit. bind yourself with reusable water bottle and a water filter jar and will eliminate the vast amount of plastic that enters landfills and clogs recycling systems. You’ll also save yourself some serious dough and have some tasty water, to boot.
We did the math, and those who drink three bottles of water a day could save more than $800 a year by switching to a home filter. While the Brita is one of the cheapest models, even the best-performing pitcher in our more than 10 tests, the Zero Water Filter, still costs less than $30.
- Upfront costs: $20
- How much can you save?: Up to $830 (based on consumption of 12 ounce bottles per day)
