Restaurant Hacks: Your Money Saving Guide to Discount Dining

Posted on | July 21, 2010 | 3 Comments

Eating restaurant quality food may not seem to fit in with your frugal life or budget, but I am here to tell you that you can have your cake and eat it, too. How many times a month do you eat out? How many times a month do you wish you could eat out? Perhaps you are eating out as many times as you would like, and though your stomach and taste buds are simply dazzled by the experience, you sure wish your habit would cost less.

                Today I would like to talk about how to satisfy your taste buds and your wallet at the same time—a little frugal decadence if you will. We’ll start with the low-hanging fruit and go from there.

Restaurant Directory: Kids Eat Free Restaurants

If you have children, then your bill at a restaurant goes up dramatically versus if it was just you and someone else. And if you were to leave the kids at home, you’d have to pay for a babysitter anyway. Below is a taste of some of the restaurants where kids eat free in Houston and around the U.S. (Check out this link at Family Fun Houston for a great complete listing and further details on days of week, age, etc.). For other zipcodes, check out Kids Eat 4 Free to search by location.

              Houston Dining: Kids Eat Free

  • Gabby’s, County Line, and Dickey’s Barbecue Pit
  • Goose’s Acre Bistro and Pub
  • Sam’s Boat
  • Ninfa’s Mexican Restaurant
  • Boudreaux’s Cajun Kitchen

             National Restaurants Where Kids Eat Free

  • Moe’s Southwest Grill
  • Bennigan’s
  • Coco’s Restaurant
  • Ponderosa Steak House
  • Perkins

Discount for Restaurants: Gift Certificates

                A great way to eat out at the places you love is to purchase gift certificates to that location at a discount. Restaurants.com offers $25 gift certificates for $10 and $50 gift certificates for $20…normally. To get them even further discounted, wait until they go on sale for 60-80% off! I only purchase $25 gift certificates from this website if they cost $2 or $4. You can do a quick google search for online codes for restaurant.com, and new codes are available just about every month. You can spontaneously decide to go out to dinner and print out a discount gift certificate moments later. This is also a great option for when you have guests coming in from out of town, and you want to treat them to great dining—you can easily save $50 or more by using this service. Places that Paul and I recently saved 50% at are Banzai Sushi downtown and The Fish restaurant and sushi bar in Houston Midtown.

                Another great service to earn you free gift certificates towards restaurants is Opentable.com. With over 13,000 restaurants worldwide signed on, all you need to do is make a reservation through this website and you will earn points each time you dine out. You receive approximately 100 points per restaurant that you dine at, and when you have 2,000 points, you are eligible to begin receiving OpenTable Dining Cheques that can be used at any of the 13,000 participating restaurants.

Alternatives to Eating Out

Two weeks ago Paul and I had a pecan, feta, spinach salad with vinaigrette, parmesan-encrusted tilapia, roasted red peppers and red onions in balsamic vinegar, and tiramisu for dessert. The meal was absolutely delicious, and cost us less than $20. This is because instead of going out to eat, we picked it up from the Prepared Foods section at Whole Foods! The food is fresh, delicious, and without preservatives and other non-essentials your body can do without. Plus, if we had the same meal at a restaurant instead of picking it up ourselves, the price would have been double. What a treat! My other favorites from there are grilled veggies, sushi, and their crab bisque soup (yum!). If you don’t have a Whole Foods that is nearby, check out your local grocery store and see what they have to offer in their own Prepared Foods section; you might be surprised.

While we have all heard of the money saving tip of cooking food at home in order to save on your food bill, very little personal finance bloggers are discussing cooking restaurant food at home in order to save on your food bill. Todd Wilbur has a series of books called “Top Secret Restaurant Recipes” where you can find your favorite restaurant recipes that have been tested and approved as actual versions of the real thing! Some of my favorites include:  Lone Star Steakhouse’s Sweet Bourbon Salmon, The Cheesecake Factory’s Pumpkin Cheesecake, and Outback Steakhouse’s Coconut Shrimp. The book even details how to assemble your dish so that it looks just like the one you would order in a restaurant, at about half the price. Check out his website for weekly free recipes.  

Please Note: No matter what sort of discount you receive on your food, you should always tip the waiter/waitress based on the original cost of the food, and the quality of their service.

I’d love to hear your own tips on saving money by eating restaurant quality food.

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Comments

3 Responses to “Restaurant Hacks: Your Money Saving Guide to Discount Dining”

  1. Budgeting in the Fun Stuff
    July 21st, 2010 @ 4:01 pm

    We love our Entertainment Book. Tons of BOGO Free offers and it entices us to try new places.

    Oh, and we’re also fans of Restaurant.com. :-)

    [Reply]

  2. Yakezie Alexa Challenge Roundup
    July 25th, 2010 @ 2:36 pm

    [...] Frugal Confessions shares Restaurant Hacks: Your Money Saving Guide to Discount Dining. [...]

  3. restaurant specials
    October 4th, 2011 @ 8:07 am

    Hi! for me my family chooses where to dine, restaurant that offers restaurant gift certificates, not only we enjoy dining but we also help for charity.

    [Reply]

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