Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
12
Tips for Saving Money on Food and Beverages
After accommodations, food is going to be your next largest expense. After all, people need to eat. You
can eat cheap canned beans throughout the world if you really want, but if you're looking to actually en-
joy the local cuisine, try these methods instead:
Cook Your Meals
A week's worth of groceries is cheaper than a week's worth of restaurants. I generally find that when travel-
ing, I spend about $50-60 USD per week on groceries, as opposed to $20-plus per day at restaurants. That's
a reduction of 70 percent in food expenses. Even if you are simply going away for a two-week vacation,
consider cooking some of your meals. Food costs add up quick—a snack here and a dinner there and you'll
be wasting a lot of money on food. The majority of hostels, guesthouses, and shared apartments have full
kitchens where you can cook your meals. (They provide the pots, pans, and utensils too!) Even if you are
staying at a hotel without a kitchen, you can still prepare your own food by making sandwiches. However, I
recommend trying to stay in a place with kitchen facilities so you can cook some of your meals and reduce
your expenses still further.
While we all love to travel to try new food, you don't always need to do so by eating at a restaurant. Su-
permarkets are a good place to learn about the food of a culture. How people eat, what they eat, and what
they don't eat tells much about how they view food, life, and health. In America, our emphasis on big, quick,
and easy shows that we aren't foodies as a culture. Food isn't as important as speed. We eat a lot of fast food,
prepared meals, and on-the-go food.
Going to the supermarket tells us a lot about the place we visit. What kind of food do people like? What
are the local delicacies? You see a lot of fish in Scandinavia, lots of different meats in Austria, packed shelves
of wine in France, and a wide vegetable and cured meat section in Italy. In Bangkok, you see a lot of prepared
meals with rice. In Australia, it's skewers ready to be thrown on the BBQ. All around the world, the emphasis
on food is different.
Lunch Specials
In many parts of the world, especially in Europe, you can dine on dinner menus at lunch-special prices. The
“plate of the day” is the best bargain in the world. For example, while I was in Barcelona, I went to eat at the
seafood restaurants near the beach. However, dinner was around $50 USD. Yet coming back the next day for
the lunch special allowed me to get the same meal for only $20 USD. Another destination that is great for
this is Singapore. Singapore is a very expensive place by Asian standards—food here can cost as much as it
