I think it's a matter of finding the things you enjoy making from scratch and sticking to those. For me, if it feels like a chore to make I'm just not going to do it. I love being in the kitchen and I want to keep it that way.

I don't have a large arsenal of homemade goods but I do love making my own pie crusts, cookie doughs, cakes and ice cream.

I bake all of our own bread for the simple reason that I really, really enjoy doing it. Crackers--meh--I gave up on them because I found it tedious to cut them out one by one. I would rather buy a box from Trader Joe's. My husband makes cheese and ice cream--delicious of course, but not what I like to spend my time doing. You are right; it has to come down to what we like to do (as well as what we have time to do).

I couldn't agree more with @dani edmonson.

When it feels like a chore, I don't want to do it anymore. I make bread when I want a good loaf, I always make baked goods from scratch. My husband brews his own beer.

Most homemade things for us though are special treats when we have time. When we have a free evening, a big bowl of homemade pasta in homemade sauce is wonderful. If the mood strikes, homemade ice cream is a nice treat.

Most of it is a time/cost issue. Yes that loaf of crusty bread sounds wonderful but its 9pm on a monday and a cheap grocery store loaf plus time in the oven ain't that bad. Stuff like that.

Beans take no effort, especially with a pressure cooker, and are radically cheaper dried than canned, so I always do those from scratch. I bake pita bread and make chicken stock from scratch. I don't bother with crackers or yogurt, although some day I may take a crack that those. I've been known to make my own tofu, although that's not that much cheaper than buying it, so I don't always bother doing it from beans. It's a lot of work and I only do it when I feel like being a mad scientist.

In times long past, a household included hired help. Now, it is not possible to make all your own food from scratch, do all the cleaning, raise all the children, and go to work 40 hours a week. If your hobby is cheesemaking, then that is something you should enjoy doing as an enriching leisure activity. If you want to make oyster crackers with your daughter of an afternoon, then that is one of the pleasures of the modern world.

It should also be said that many of the things that are longstanding buy options; as in things that are mostly bought for hundreds of years (crackers being one) are that way for a reason. Many of the things that have also been featured aren't something people make all the time because it is a pain, but may be eaten with alot greater frequency when they are readily available and cheap when bought (crackers fits here also). I make almost everything if I can because it usually tastes better and is healthier. But it doesn't seem tedious to me because I find cooking enjoyable because I succeed in the kitchen. People who have alot of trouble in the kitchen (my wife) tend to find cooking to be hard/tedious.

For me it's a week to week decision, based on how much time I have, and how organized I am. If I (or a family member) is craving something, I'll make time for it, sure. But sometimes something as simple as cooking dry beans in the Crockpot doesn't happen because I have too much going on and just don't get around to it. That's why there are always a few cans in the pantry.

It's seasonal, too. A wintry day is lovely for baking bread. July? Not as much.

I love going the homemade route but things like pasta and bread would need to be made constantly in our home. I do however make my own ice cream, butter, cakes (box mixes are banned from my home) and sauces (condensed soup is banned from my house as well as jarred tomato sauce). Hopefully one day I will have a bigger kitchen to store appliances for pasta and bread and be able to make those as well but for now I am happy with keeping as much preservatives out of my cupboards as possible. Also, as a note, its great that there are people out there who do want to make homemade rather than relying on supermarket staples.

Beans and tomato sauce and salsas

I tend to make bread and beans as needed; bread is weekly, beans in big batches that are frozen so I have several types on hand at all times. I also make pasta sauce regularly--much better than store bought. Beyond that, it depends. I think fresh pasta and dried pasta are really two different things; we make fresh when in the mood or the dish calls for it; otherwise we use good quality dried. I live in Wisconsin so the cheeses are incredible--we buy those. I tend to bake when we want something sweet, since I have much more control over ingredients. We don't use mixes for much of anything and our freezer is full of home prepared ingredients, again for the control issue.

I think the freezer is a huge help here--we do big batches of, say, stock, or fruit sauces, or pasta sauces and freeze in small amounts, so most everything we use is home-made, but we don't spend all day every day cooking.

It's more a question of mood and timing for me. One week I'll make my own pie crust, another I might just buy the pie.

As much as possible, I like to know what I'm eating. So for me, it's a matter of how many "extras" tend to come in the store-bought versions.

I find that sandwich breads, baked treats and ice cream tend to be filled with lots of preservatives and ingredients I don't recognize, so I like to make those at home if I have time. However, in the case of canned beans, whole grain crackers, and yogurt, it's usually pretty easy for me to identify reasonably priced options at the store that are straight forward with very few "extras", so I go ahead and buy those. Does anyone else break it down this way?

I live in SF and while I can pretty much get anything easily, I tend to try all the locally crafted foods looking more for new ideas to make my basics at home more interesting (buying constantly was so expen$ive), but even though I cook extensively I still keep about a 70/30 mix of homemade/purchased in my home. When I make a pie, I make enough crust to stock the freezer for at least another 4 pies; when I make cookies, I make enough dough to put several logs of dough in the freezer to slice/bake whenever I want fresh cookies (most doughs keep for 3 months in the freezer); the same with crackers (dough freezes for 3 months or more), sauces, condiments, candies, pasta (eat fresh today/tomorrow; dry the rest; I'm using expensive flour so it makes the most sense for me), vegan marshmallows, jams, curds, etc. I might flavor each batch a little differently but, at the end of the day, when I add it up I'm usually saving considerably by making it at home (compared to the locally handcrafted). And, because I'm making cookies just a few times a year and freezing logs of dough, it's a pull on my time 4x a year rather than weekly or monthly. So if make it in bulk, in an amount that you can share or just as much as will hold for its keeping duration, and I think it's worthwhile to make at home... it certainly comes with a sense of accomplishment and that alone is pretty delicious.

I agree that what you make from scratch should be what you ENJOY making from scratch.

There's no doubt that some of the things I make for my family would be store-bought if there were healthful alternatives available in my area. But living in the country, with a half-hour drive to encounter even the most mediocre grocery store (Super Walmart) and no chance of finding something like Whole Foods or Trader Joes within 150 miles, if we want good, healthy foods made with whole ingredients, our only choice is to make what we can ourselves.

Make or buy depends on SO many different factors: time, mood, resources-to name just a few. I do the best I can on any given day and sometimes that means homemade and sometimes not.

I would like to add a comment to some of the "times past" comments that have been made here thus far. If I remember correctly, in times past many families did not make everything at all. There would be a few families that specialized in certain things (bread, cheese, butchering meat, ect) and the families would then buy eachothers' products at a market. Unfortunately we don't really have that choice anymore (besides our farmers markets) so I suppose I would have to agree with the option of making what you enjoy and buying what you find tedious.

Maybe one option would be partnering up with families in your community to have each family make a certain product from scratch and then trade them?

I cook almost all from scratch. For me, it has just as much to do with nutrition as anything else. My homemade caesar dressing sure tastes better, but I make it myself because I don't want a glug of hydrogenated soybean oil on my salad. I don't have a lot of spare time, but it comes down to what is healthiest for us, and it's unfortunate that our busy schedules sometimes take precedence over our food. Yogurt is simple to make, but store-bought yogurt is plenty healthy (as long as I can find the full-fat stuff with no junk ingredients). So usually I buy my yogurt. Canned beans, though cheap and easy, generally come in cans that are full of hormone disruptors (BPA) so for me, that is not an option. So homemade beans it is! There are a lot of things to weigh, and I usually weight health over practicality, although those lines become blurry after a while!

I tend to eat beans most weekdays, so I make a big pot on whatever day I'm also doing laundry (both tasks are pretty hands-off, except for an occasional check-in to see if they're done; makes me feel extra productive). I also tend to make all sauces, dips, salsas, etc. from scratch because they taste better, are relatively quick and/or easy to do, and the ones in the store contain way too many of those indecipherable "extra" ingredients. I don't eat bread often, and although I enjoy baking the occasional loaf during winter, I typically buy bread from a local artisan (we have a ton of those in SF - very fortunate). However, any time I bake some sort of dessert, I make it from scratch, largely because I enjoy doing so but also because many store-bought versions (even in local bakeries) are far too sweet for me.

I lived in Brazil for most of last year and when I wanted to make a simple cheesecake, I couldn't find graham crackers anywhere. That's about the time I discovered this site and others and made my own. From that point on I was hooked, love homemade grahams! Now when I return later this year, I am armed with a bunch of recipes for making my own "US" comfort food.

I make most sauces (tomato, BBQ, peanut), most baked goods (I'm gluten-free; sometimes I'll purchase from a local bakery), salad dressings, pie fillings, icing, granola, and beans from scratch. I've never purchased prepared polenta because it's easy to make. I want to try making yogurt this year. I suppose I make and/or enjoy making most things from scratch, but no, it isn't for everyone, and yes, it is very time consuming. It's easier for me as a single person to prepare my own foods from scratch...though at the same time you can just double batch it (like granola). I find a lot of home cooking is more about planning and time than energy or resources, about making the hours count. If you start getting too busy (I work a full-time job, a part-time job, and volunteer), planning becomes a lot harder to do.

If I can buy a good quality product, without additivies and junk, I will. But they have to be at least equal in quality to what I can make.

I live in an area where it is easy to buy top notch bread so I rarely bake it. I can buy good pastry but it is expensive, and I love to bake, so I rarely do. We don't enough yogurt to justify making it. But most canned good have high levels of BPA so I've learned to cook most of our beans. We use a few condiments and purchase them. But I always makes vinaigrette or mayonaise if it is important to the dish.

I used to make my own yogurt which was delicious, but I discovered that Stoneyfield yogurt was just as good, and with a coupon, not too terribly expensive, so I gave up on making my own. Making my own ice cream- now that is totally worth it to me. So many flavor combinations!

I have certain foods that I pretty much always make, (bread, crackers, ice cream, pastry dough, sauces, pasta, etc.). I've actually found that it helps me stay on track with a healthy diet, (for me). If I have to make something myself, like crackers, I tend to have it around less often and eat it more carefully when I do have it. If I have to make my own pasta, I'm less likely to have it night after night as a thoughtless, easy meal. This helps me stay focused on whole, unprocessed foods like fruit, vegetables, beans, whole grains, etc. When I let myself buy prepared foods, they wind up in my shopping cart way more often than they should and tend to disappear from the cupboard more quickly.

i can never find the time to do much from scratch in terms of panty staples. i just try to buy quality and minimally processed when I can.

Since I dont have time to make crackers and pasta I usually just focus my meals and snacks around simple to cook grains, fresh produce, and good cuts of meat.

one thing I do make myself is trail mix stuff snacks, its shockingly cheaper to mix up a bag of your own than buy some premixed thing. Only takes 2 seconds to make tho!

i make almost everything at home, but i do think it has a ton to do with planning and familiarity with the processes that leads to being able to do things quickly so you dont feel as if all you do in your spare time is cook (though i along with most everyone here obviously do like to cook). the "active" time on most of the things talked about here is mostly quite brief- bread and yogurt only take 10 minutes, the rest is just waiting (and by waiting i mean working, leaving the house, sleeping, or whatever else you do with your life). dried beans take 30 seconds of active time, and less effort than making a pot of rice. there are obviously more "project"-y type things that take longer-- making your own kimchi or whatever-- but those aren't weekly things because you make a large quantity to have around for awhile. and i tend to agree with foodefafa, and with something mark bittman wrote about, too, which is that "junk" food should be homemade, as to moderate its intake and at the same time control its quality. the fact that its easier to buy then to make in that case doesn't make me think i should buy it, you know? more like, only eat it when im willing to put in the effort to make it (although most ice creams and cookies arent really particularly time-consuming either).

If an item doesn't keep very well (if at all) then I won't make it unless it's very quick or easy. If I need to make it every other day, it's so not feasible.
Along with that, however, if it is something I enjoy doing, I'll make it every chance I have. (Bread. I love making bread.)

I'm relatively new to the "make it instead" club, but I like it already. :D

Several things influence my choice to make or buy

1) Having a wheat allergy, I oftentimes either have to make it myself, or be highway robbed when I go buy a gluten-free alternative (that usually doesn't taste as good). I also don't bake in the summer heat, so that adds into my decision making.
2) Cost, time, and effort play a role, as well as mess, storage space, and equipment.
3) Sometimes I can't buy things that I want. Like brown rice flour waffles. Or good Korean food in my part of town (just the way I like it). The foodie perfectionist in me forces me to make it myself.

I make things I can't find easily, are too expensive to buy often or I simply enjoy making.

That means I grow my own sprouts, make sauces, spice mixes and salad dressings from scratch, bake desserts and bread when it's not too hot outside.

I don't make yogurt because I eat too much of it and would constantly be running out. But I strain plain yogurt rather than paying premium for the Greek stuff. I make popsicles but not ice cream because I don't want to buy an ice cream maker. And I rarely turn on the oven in the summer because my apartment doesn't have air conditioning.

Like others here, I make the things I really enjoy making and that I think are significantly better homemade. For me, that includes sauces, baked desserts, and sometimes bread. I only make pasta from scratch on special occasions. It has never even occurred to me to make condiments like ketchup, but I might have to try that!

I can't even remember the last time I bought cookies, and that is partly for my health. I like the requirement for some effort there. If I want a cookie, I have to bake some cookies, not just walk over to the pantry. Probably saves me from a fair amount of mindless cookie-eating.

Ok. Am I the only one here? After having kids our decision comes down to - are we making or buying DINNER!!

Anyway, at least we're being as healthy as possible with that - organic, whole grain, local from the csa and farmers market and all that, but life's too short to be making the staples we consume so much of! I used to make yogurt and granola, but after calculating the cost and getting frustrated at the difference inconsistency we just went to buying quarts of plain and calling it a day.

Its all worth it to have one (or several) less thing to worry about each day.

Since six months I'm living in UK and when I go to supermarket and see all this people looking to ready food boxes and saying "what should I cook for dinner", I can not belive. This is not cooking. Maaaake it!

This one is easy. I just can't make everything from scratch. Two teenagers, full time job, 100 year old house. It's just not gonna happen. So I focus on buying and cooking earth-friendly and healthy food (and seriously, are granola bars and crackers 'must haves?' I never eat either) but splurge on time and sometimes calories/health for things like homemade ice cream, waffles on Sunday, and pizza every Friday. I do make dinner at home every night, but it's often store bought pasta, not homemade, or canned beans rather than soaked/cooked. And I'm not slaughtering my own cow...

I think that the difficulty with these debates is that we often devalue our own time and underestimate how much time it really takes to do something. Baking bread, for instance. Yes, it is extremely delicious and likely better than what most of us buy. But that "down time" that everyone talks about? The resting and kneading? That interrupts your concentration on other tasks. You constantly worry about the bread-- when is it done? Do I need to do X? Can I run out to the drugstore? It ends up that you spend the better part of the day dealing with bread and little else.

There are certain foods that are rather low maintenance, like freezing individual portions of beans, but on the whole I find that the people who routinely claim it is easy and fast to make everything are the ones who claim they can clean their apartments top to bottom in under an hour. I love homemade food and often find it to be far superior to store-bought, but unfortunately we downplay the investment of time and concentration that they require.

I have tried to make nearly everything once. And when I think back to some of the things I made from scratch in my 20's, I can't believe I ever had that much free time. But I've learned a lot along the way, so I feel pretty accomplished and capable and have no qualms about buying ready-made. I go for homemade now usually based on quality of ingredients, price differential and time. Oh yes, and what others have said about having to work for the junk food.
How about this follow up question: When out to dinner I order primarily on the basis of what I couldn't/wouldn't make myself. Does anyone else use this rule?

I think you should make what you like to make or what is the most economical in time an money to make. For me, I like to make things like soups, mac & cheese, and beans. However while homemade crackers, yogurt, pasta or bread does taste better they are too time consuming to make from scratch all the time. Instead I only bake bread or make pasta occasionally but the majority of the time I'd rather buy it an spend my time on other things.

Someone posted above that in olden days people ha household help to make food. Well that was true for the upper classes but the vast majority of women the only help they had was their children an another adult female family members. Back then some staples were still purchased ready made for those living in towns, bread from the baker, beer from the brewer, sausages from the butcher, etc.

These people ate very simple foods and generally only one large meal a day with any others being small and often leftovers or other simple to prepare foods. The variety we have come to know in our choices for food just didn't exist. You ate what was in season and mostly what was grown locally (with a few exceptions like molasses, salt, etc. that were important trade goods)

I make a lot from scratch. some things are worth it, some aren't.
Plum jam? oh yes. (brings me right back to breakfast in Paris.)
Dijon mustard? not so much. (flavor is better, but sieving out the husks is hard work!)
small batch fermented cuces? so worth it! (no one in NYC makes a truly sour pickle.)

I think you just pick and choose based on what's most important to you and which cooking projects you enjoy. It's also important to remember that it needn't be all or nothing. I regularly cook beans, but I also use canned sometimes. I've sworn off yeast breads, but I regularly make cornbread, scones and biscuits. I eat a ton of yogurt, but I'd never make it. And in total contradiction to my statement about yeast breads, I'll only make pizza with my homemade dough. It is better than any store or restaurant.

I think it depends on the situation and the time allotted, as a general rule when I'm doing a really nice dinner for someone I tend to prefer to go with scratch made, having said that though I always do a test run with anything new I want to try to compare it with the store-bought variety. What I'm looking for is to see if there is a big enough "taste" difference (and when I say taste difference I mean, appearance, aroma, flavor and texture) to justify the extra time needed.

i actually love to make bread. i found a bread recipe on the internet that i use all the time to make fruit breads which my family loves but i also found a bread recipe that i have been using to make rolls etc to go with dinner but im thinking im going to get up early in the morning before it gets too hot and make up the roll recipe that i have and try to make loaves of bread with it and see how it turns out i just make the breads then freeze them in either foil or ziplocs