<prompt> Human: 30-day challengesWe are pleased to continue our 30-day challenge series. Past challenges can be found hereThis months 30-day challenge is to Cook more often! One of the biggest budget-killers we see in this subreddit is lots of wasted money on eating out andor spending too much on groceries. While everyones situation is different, here are some steps to help you get started be sure to read on to the end for a special challenge a mod feature this month: Planning is half the battle. It is easier to cook at home if you make a plan for the week. Just getting takeout becomes much more tempting if you have to figure everything out after a long day. Things are more efficient when done in bulk. Consider making enough to have leftovers andor cooking several meals on the same day. Make use of your freezer to ensure food doesnt go to waste. Try to shop the sales. If you watch ads, you will learn that often grocery stores have a cycle for what is on sale. It might be meat one week, cheese the next, etc. So figure out the cycle in your area and stock up! Walmart and off-brand are not curse words. This can be one way to stretch your meal planning budget and Wal-marts price matching policy can make buying all your ingredients in one place easier. If youre just getting started with cooking and tend to eat out a lot, dont feel the need to jump straight to planning an entire week of meals at once. Leave a few days unplanned. Those days can be used for leftovers, gasp eating out, or breaking something out of the freezer. rMealPrepSunday and rEatCheapAndHealthy are two great resources on Reddit to help keep you motivated and inspired. In particular, rMealPrepSunday has agreed to partner with us for this month, so feel free to drop by their sub and ask questionsjoin in the fun! Challenge success criteriaYouve successfully completed this challenge once youve done one or more of the following things: Gone out to eat 0 times in one week. Learned to cook or tried to cook at least three new recipes. Shared at least two of your favorite recipes in this thread. Bonus Feature: Challenge a ModOne of our mods, umrme487, is particularly passionate about this issue. He has agreed to offer a bonus challenge for August. Here are the details: Every week, mrs. me487 plans the meals for the week on SaturdaySunday and goes to the grocery store on SundayMonday. So, as mrs. me487 completes meal plans, shopping lists, etc. for the week, umrme487 will post them along with mrs. me487s recipes, a cost breakdown, and a view of the final product. These will be stickied at the top of the thread and updated periodically. Recipes around the me household are typically designed for a family of 4: 2 adults and 2 children a picky toddler and a 1 year old with a ravenous appetite. Typically, 3 meals get made each week. Before you ask, yes, mrs. me487 is a stay-at-home mom and this obviously impacts how much time they have to meal prep, etc. as well as why she does almost all of the cookingshopping. Because this not be your situation, feel free to give yourself handicap points for this part of the challenge. This is personal finance, so as always, personal situations differ.Can you spend less than mr. and mrs. me487? How do your dishes compare? Feel free to post your meal planscostspics as well, and good luck!  <response>: My tips after two years doing cook for yourself especially for one person:1. Buy versatile groceries if you dont know what you want to make or how much youll need. I like bell peppers and onions, because they can become fajita veggies or go in a tasty Saturday morning omelette or can go into some homemade tomato sauce or onto a salad. This really helps me curb food waste which makes my grocery bill go down and I dont throw things out and feel bad about it. 2. Not all food is good leftover and thats ok. If youre eager to try meal prepping and you make a big batch of something, only to find you absolutely cant stand it when you eat it the next day, thats ok! It takes a little time to figure out what things will be good for meal prep, and just because it didnt prep well doesnt mean youre a bad cook or meal prepping is a bad idea. Just give it another shot and youll find something that works well for you. If you want to cook something you know youll hate leftover, just make enough for that meal. 3. Find some good non perishable staples, both healthy ingredients and prepared foods. Keep enough grains, yes, but also canned diced tomatoes or olives or chickpeas or corn or black beans or whatever nutritious food in your pantry. Keep a pizza crust or some peas or some ravioli in your freezer. And it doesnt hurt to keep some Mac and cheese or pizza or other junk food in your pantry or freezer. You can fall back on these when your week gets the better of you and you dont have much in the fridge. Itll still be cheaper and not less healthy than eating out. And since you know in 20 min youll have ravioli and tomato sauce ready, its easier to resist eating out. 