What's your average daily spend on weekday lunch?

Inquiring minds want to know.

I’m currently at ~$15.

I usually make my own lunch. So probably <$3, or even less.

1 Like

A lot of times it’s leftovers that would be thrown out otherwise so probably <$1.

1 Like

Why do you ask?

1 Like

i usually spend under $15 for lunch, but if I bring lunch or leftovers during the week . i’ll treat myself to a $30-40 lunch on a Fri-Yay…

1 Like

Cath? Is that you?

3 Likes

I need to feel less guilty.

1 Like

Depends on the day and workload. Most days it’s a salad from the Trader Joe’s across the street $4-5. Other days, I try to stay sub-$10, so my weekend eating can splurge.

LOL. When we lived and worked in SF (as long ago as the 80s), we likely spent entirely too much money at lunch. But we cooked dinner most nights so hopefully that offset it Also, back in the day, SF was a hard drinking ‘town’ so lunch often included “adult beverages.”

Try to stay under $10 per day. But sometimes I’ll splurge and do a $25-$30 lunch if I bring lunch a few times that week.

1 Like

I bring leftovers almost every day because there aren’t too many food options near my work. For the days when I don’t bring food, I’ll grab a sub sandwich from a little place nearby, which runs me about $9, or a lunch special from a nearby thai place which runs $8-10 depending on what I order.

I work in downtown LA, actually almost across the street from Grand Central, and there are very few sub-$15 lunches available around here. So, I’d say ~$15 is a decent budget for a regular lunch, like a sandwich and chips or ricebowl of some sort.

On the very cheap end, there are $4 “tacos” at Grand Central which contain the equivalent meat of a mini burrito and are more than enough to satisfy. I also like the $5 beans and rice from Y&O Deli.

On the high end, the sky’s the limit, including a $200+ lunch I once had at Zo Sushi, but upper range tends to be about $25-$30. I’m currently tempted by the $50 bento at Hayato. Soon…

2 Likes

My lunch cost per day is zero. I factor in to my weekly groceries what I want for lunch in that week and prepare whatever that is on a Sunday afternoon My work is such that getting away for an hour or so is near to impossible (and if I do, I will be tracked down) so I bring my lunches and snacks everyday.

1 Like

Yay for what you do and Boo for that you have to do it. One of our daughters is pretty much “tracked down” unless she leaves the country.

I’m just a lowly government employee, but it has gotten to a point where others have tracked me down in 'loo looking for me. That’s bad enough.

//edit

n/m, this reply got far too technical.

Now you’ve piqued my/our curiosity :slight_smile:

in summary:

if it costs $100 and 5 hours to make 5 lunches and 5 dinners, it would not be correct to say you’ve spent $0 on lunch, even if lunch is just your leftovers.

Yeah, I had that thought also but you said it quite well. But I do consider meals from leftovers as “free” meals.

I consider leftovers free only when they’d end up in the compost otherwise.