Flour Fajita/Taco/Gordita Tortilla Recipe: Store versus Homemade

 

Our family was feeling like some tacos and decided to take my first attempt at making these from scratch, but figured it would be a good opportunity to going a little more homemade.

The Contender – Store Bought

The competition: Mission 6 inch Flour Tortilla, $3.39 for 8 tortillas

Ingredients: Enriched Bleached Wheat Flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Water, Vegetable Shortening (Soybean Oil, Hydrogenated Soybean Oil), Contains 2% or Less of: Sugar, Salt, Leavening (Sodium Bicarbonate, Sodium Aluminum Sulfate, Corn Starch, Monocalcium Phosphate and/or Sodium Acid Pyrophosphate, Calcium Sulfate), Calcium Propionate and Sorbic Acid and/or Potassium Sorbate (Preservative), Distilled Monoglycerides, Wheat Starch, Amylase, Tricalcium Phosphate, Cellulose Gum, Dough Conditioners (Fumaric Acid, Sodium Metabisulfite and/or Mono- and Diglycerides).

The Challenger – Homemade

I had a failed attempt at making burrito sized tortilla so went with what seemed be a recipe that required much of the skills I appear to be lacking.

Soft Chewy Flour Tortilla (Fajita/Taco/Gordita) Recipe

2 cups all-purpose flour

1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons vegetable oil

3/4 cup milk

Directions: Add dry ingredients to mixer and set to low speed.  Add wet ingredients to separate bowl, whish briefly and slowly add wet ingredients to mixer.  If the dough is still sticky when you touch it add about a teaspoon of flour at a time until it no longer sticks to your fingers.

Knead the dough for about 2-3 minutes and place ball of dough on a plate and cover with mixing bowl and let it “rest” for 10 minutes.

 

After the dough “rests” cut the dough into 8 equal pieces.  I did what seemed easiest to me:

• Cut dough in half: 2 pieces
• Cut those two pieces in half: 4 pieces
• Cut those 4 pieces in half: 8 pieces.

Below you can see my 5 year old demonstrating this technique.

 

Next roll the pieces into balls and let them “rest” on that same plate for 20 more minutes.

 

Use a rolling pin (or 3/4 wooden dowel if you happen to have one) as thin as you can make them.  Don’t worry they will thicken up when you cook them

The recommended method is to use a quality dry cast iron skilled on gas heat.  Not having either of those, I went with my pancake griddle.  Which from my first try I have a recommendation set the griddle to its highest setting.  Otherwise by the time it starts to brown you will have some baked tortilla chips instead of tortilla shells.  Though my daughters loved “my mistake” with a little butter.

Once they lightly browned, flip over and cook until the second side is brown.  If you skilled is pretty warm this should take less than 30 seconds.  Overall the cooking time was about 10 minutes.

Ingredient	Amount	Cost
Flour	2 cups	$ 0.249
Baking Powder	1.5 teaspoons	$ 0.048
Milk	3/4 cup	$ 0.140
Salt	1 teaspoons	$ 0.007
Vegetable Oil	2 teaspoons	$ 0.017
Electricity	510 watts	$0.030
Total Cost		$ 0.492

The Decision…

	Store Bought	Homemade
Low Price
Great Taste
Low Prep Time

So just over $0.49 to make the same number of tortillas as the $3.39 store bought, that is over 6 times more.  To date this is definitely the best cost savings and I must say the taste between the two is not even comparable to the nice warm tortillas off the griddle.  Homemade is the hands down winner!

Basic White Bread: Store versus Homemade

In the last post, we proved that it is cheaper to make you own bread dough versus using frozen bread dough though a big question still remains, how much cost does the baking cost add to the overall cost. 

The Contender – Store Bought

The competition: Safeway Butter Top White Bread, $1.50 per loaf

Ingredients: Enriched Malted Wheat Flour (Wheat Flour, Malted Barley Flour, Niacin, Iron [Ferrous Sulfate], Thiamin Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Water, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Yeast, Canola Oil and/or Soybean Oil, Salt, Contains 2 Percent or Less of Each of the Following: Butter (Made from Milk and/or Cream, Salt and Annatto [For Color]), Calcium Sulfate (Source of Calcium), Whey (Milk), Dough Conditioners (May Contain One or More of the Following: Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate, Ethoxylated Mono- and Diglycerides, Monocalcium Phosphate, Datem, Soy Flour), Mono- and Diglycerides, Calcium Propionate (Added to Retard Spoilage), Natural and Artificial Flavor, Soy Lecithin.

The Challenger - Homemade

As we mentioned before the cost of a loaf of bread dough was $1.16 per loaf for frozen bread dough and $0.87 per loaf for homemade bread dough.

The time to preheat and bake 2 loafs of bread is 37 minutes and given the cost to operate an average electric range is $0.24 per hour, so for 37 minutes that would be a little less than $0.15 for two loafs of bread. 

Given the above it would cost $0.94 per loaf for homemade bread dough and $1.24 per loaf using frozen bread dough.

The Decision…

	Store Bought	Homemade
Price
Taste
Difficulty

Though the price difference is not real significant between the two it is hard to even compare the taste between store bought bread baked in your oven.  Though in this case I used a simple white bread recipe, baking higher end breads would definitely result in more savings as well as improved taste.

Basic White Bread Dough Recipe: Store versus Homemade

My youngest daughter (5 years old) loves to bake and one of our favorite things to bake on Sundays is fresh baked bread.  Now I doubt there are not too many people that could argue that fresh baked bread/rolls from your oven beats store bought bread, though I was curious if I am actually saving money baking it myself.  For now I am going to tackle the cost comparison of bread dough and cover the actual cost of baking in the next post.

The cost of materials completely depends on the recipe being made, so here is the one I am working with:

Simple White Bread Dough Recipe

• 4 cups warm water
• 1 1/3 cup white sugar
• 3 teaspoon salt
• 3 tablespoons of active yeast
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 12 cups of flour

Directions:

• Dissolve sugar in warm water, followed by yeast in power mixer.  Allow to proof until contents looks like some light brown cream foam. 
• Add salt and oil and 6 cups of flour one cup of a time. 
• Switch to hook attachment and add flour until dough does not stick to your finger when you touch it. 
• Cover with damp cloth and allow to rise until it doubles in size. 
• Punch down bread dough and divide into fourths and place into well oiled 9X5 inch loaf pans allowing to rise for 30 minutes (or freeze for use later)
• Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes
  
  

The Contender – Store Bought

The competition: Rhodes Frozen Bread Dough, $3.49 for 3 frozen loaves or approximately $1.16 per loaf

Ingredients: Unbleached Enriched White Flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Ferrous Sulfate or Reduced Iron, Thiamin Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Water, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Yeast, Soybean Oil and/or Canola Oil, Salt, Malt, Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate, Yeast Nutrients (Calcium Sulfate, Ammonium Chloride), Abscorbic Acid, Enzyme.

The Challenger - Homemade

To be fair I probably should have use the same ingredients as the contender buy being fresh out of Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate and Ammonium Chloride I went with the recipe above.

Here are the costs of making the bread dough yourself:

Ingredient	Amount	Cost
Water	4 cups	$ 0.001
Sugar	1 1/3 cups	$ 0.426
Yeast	3 tablespoons	$ 1.339
Salt	3 teaspoons	$ 0.020
Vegetable Oil	1/2 cup	$ 0.210
Flour	12 cups	$ 1.497

 

Now given I used an electric mixer but given it was used for maybe 10 minutes at 35 watts the cost is definitely minimal.  The total cost of the ingredients for this recipe is $3.49, given the above recipe creates 4 loaves of bread this equates to a total cost of $0.87 per loaf.  So in the end making the bread dough yourself will save you $0.23 per loaf or about $24 a year assuming you consume a couple of loafs bread per week. 

It does take about 2 hours to make the bread (though much of this is rising) on the same side frozen bread dough take a few hours to defrost and rise.  Without a motorized mixer mixing and kneading your homemade bread dough is quite a workout, this one could be a close call. 

The Decision…

	Store bought	Homemade
Price
Taste
Difficulty

This one was a close one though homemade still came out on top.  With its superior taste and you still have to defrost and let the dough rise there is a decent effort even for the frozen bread dough.  Plus my daughter likes adding the ingredients the most anyway so either way we will be making the homemade option.