Food prices too high to stomach? Home-cooked meals are having a moment

Dining in tonight? You're not alone. Home cooking is getting more popular as food prices and pinched budgets force Americans to cinch their belts.

As the busy single mom of an 11-year-old daughter, Ellen Hornberger loved the convenience of having a restaurant meal deposited on her doorstep until she realized just how much that home delivery was costing her. 

After downloading a money management app last year, Hornberger took a hard look at her household finances and discovered she was spending about three-quarters of her food budget – $942 a month – on takeout. 

“I used to just do what’s easy even if it was a little more expensive,” Hornberger said. 

No more. She canceled Doordash and started whipping up dinner at home, saving hundreds of dollars each month. Not only is she cooking more, she said, her daughter is, too.

“I hated cooking. Now I am wearing an apron. Who am I?” the 33-year-old sales program manager from New Jersey said. “But if I’m changing my habits, you know the economy is changing.”