3293: How Basic Knife Skills Can Save You Money by Julien Saunders of Rich and Regular on How to Reduce Grocery Costs

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Optimal Finance Daily

Episode 3293: How Basic Knife Skills Can Save You Money by Julien Saunders of Rich & Regular
Host: Diania Merriam
Date: September 23, 2025

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Main Theme

This episode explores how fundamental kitchen knife skills can lead to significant savings on grocery bills, based on a post by Julien Saunders from "Rich & Regular." Host Diania Merriam reads and discusses Julien’s insights on the financial benefits of preparing your own food and minimizing convenience markups in grocery shopping, supplemented by her own personal experiences with home cooking.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Hidden Cost of Convenience

• High-tech vs. low-tech tools: While modern gadgets are popular, classic tools like knives remain indispensable, particularly for saving money in the kitchen.
• Convenience markup: Grocery stores charge a premium for pre-cut or pre-prepared products. The more convenient an item (e.g., pre-cut fruit, chopped veggies, sliced meats), the higher the cost per pound.
  • Example: Watermelon Pricing [02:35]
    • Whole watermelon: Baseline cost
    • Quartered watermelon: 79% more expensive than whole
    • Wedges: 19% pricier per pound over quartered
    • Chunks: A staggering 339% more expensive than quartered

    “The quartered watermelon is 79% more expensive because someone had to go through the hassle of cutting it and wrapping it in plastic.” – Julien Saunders [03:48]

• Broader impact: These markups apply beyond fruit to almost all pre-prepared foods (pineapple, green beans, meats, etc.).

2. Knife Skills = Real Savings

• Financial impact: With average annual food spending at $7,203 (12% of family expenses), refining knife skills can help a typical household save up to $1,000 per year.
• Initial investment: All you need are a good chef’s knife, a cutting board, and maybe a quick class for basics.

  “Assuming you’re...spending $7,203 annually...it’s possible to shave off a cool thousand dollars by investing in a good chef’s knife, a cutting board, and maybe a quick cooking class.” – Julien Saunders [05:21]

3. How to Choose and Use a Knife

• Essential tools only: Skip expensive or elaborate knife sets; a chef’s knife, a serrated bread knife, a paring knife, and a blade steel are sufficient.

  “You don’t need a full knife set... Skip the block set with the matching shears and steak knives, you’ll never use them.” – Julien Saunders [06:13]

• Cutting boards: Have one for produce and one for raw meat/fish; clean and sanitize regularly.
• Fit is crucial: Choose a knife that feels comfortable for your hand’s size, weight, and grip.
• Sharpness matters: Dull knives are more dangerous than sharp ones.

  “A sharp knife is more likely to go through the object you’re cutting instead of you.” – Julien Saunders [06:48]

4. Host Reflection: Diania Merriam’s Journey with Cooking

• Personal transformation: Diania shares that her own engagement with cooking developed as part of a larger financial journey.

  “Before I got serious about cleaning up my finances, I didn’t cook that much...But I’m telling you, changing my mindset about this has benefited me in many ways.” – Diania Merriam [09:03]

• Meal planning benefits: Reduces decision fatigue, saves money/time, and leads to healthier choices.
• Creativity and joy: Home cooking has evolved into a creative outlet and a source of joy for Diania, especially in feeding her family.

  “One of my favorite things is whipping up a great meal, even when it looks like I barely have anything in the fridge.” – Diania Merriam [09:46]

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On markups:
  “All because we want someone to cut our fruit for us, or because wedges might be messy.” – Julien Saunders [04:37]
• Advice to beginners:
  “Even if you don’t think you enjoy cooking now, I’d encourage you to start simple and ease into it. You might discover your new favorite hobby that happens to save you a ton of money.” – Diania Merriam [10:04]

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Important Timestamps

• [00:59] – Introduction by Diania Merriam; summary of Julien’s post
• [02:35] – Watermelon pricing breakdown and grocery store markups
• [05:21] – Calculating potential savings for the average family
• [06:13] – Julien’s knife buying tips and food safety advice
• [09:03] – Diania shares her journey to enjoying home cooking
• [10:04] – Final encouragement to listeners

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Tone & Takeaway

The episode maintains a warm, encouraging, and practical tone. Julien Saunders offers clear evidence and actionable steps, while Diania Merriam personalizes the advice, making it relatable and motivational. The message: mastering basic knife skills can cultivate both financial and personal enrichment—a small change with a big return.

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Transcript

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This is optimal Finance Daily How Basic Knife Skills Can Save you Money by Julian Saunders of richandregular.com Somewhere along the way we developed the remarkable ability to use our brains and thumbs to develop tools. Today, these tools have evolved and still serve the same core purpose. One in particular not only makes life easier, but but can help in saving you a lot of money. And it's called a knife. Yes, as much as we're fans of our high tech tools like our Nest thermostat, Amazon Echo, iPhones and Apple TVs, we're also fans of good old fashioned low tech like paper and knives. Given Mr. Rich and Regular's culinary background, he's a huge fan of knives since it's the must have tool for chefs in culinary school. Knife skills are one of the very first lessons taught because it's so critical to cooking. But even if you're not a chef, improving your knife skills can make cooking at home easier and save you a boatload of money. It's impossible to truly calculate the return on owning a good knife, but there are a few reasons to consider investing in a good one and learning how to use it. According to a 2016 study by the National Priorities Project, behind Housing and Transportation, food is the third highest expense the typical American family has. As a result, most people try to strike a balance between eating at home and dining out to save money in this category. However, even if you're eating in more, the cost of groceries can be very expensive. Factor in the hassle of cooking especially if you're not great at it. And it's super tempting to pick up food or order in, which can blow your budget quick. But groceries don't always have to be expensive. In general, prepared products, pre cut products, or anything that has been handled to be more convenient will be more expensive than a product in its raw or natural state. Supermarkets know this and take full advantage of your desire for convenience by charging you a premium. This is where owning a good knife and knowing how to use it can save you money, assuming you're willing to overcome your fear of cutting yourself and a learning curve. Take everybody's favorite summertime fruit, for example. A watermelon. Using some quick screenshots of our neighborhood grocery store on Instacart, which we love, we notice the price difference between the various forms of watermelon available. However, it's not always clear how much more or less expensive one form of watermelon is versus another. Consider that a quarter watermelon is just 4/4 of a whole melon. You might assume then that a quartered melon is a fourth of the cost, and you'd be dead wrong. The quartered watermelon is 79% more expensive because someone had to go through the hassle of cutting it and wrapping it in plastic. Now consider watermelon. Wedges are really just half of a quartered watermelon sliced into handheld pieces, placed on a piece of Styrofoam and wrapped in plastic. Well, those little wedges are actually 19% more expensive per pound than the quartered. But if you're really balling out of control, you can go ahead and get the large watermelon chunks, which are a ridiculous 339% more expensive than the quartered watermelon. All because we want someone to cut our fruit for us, or because wedges might be messy. The same is true for other products that grocers know most people don't want to deal with, like pineapple, cantaloupe, green beans, carrots, greens, meat, etc. The markup is for the convenience of not having to cut something, but if you knew how to use a knife, you might reconsider buying into these markups all the time and save money every time you go to the grocery store. Assuming you're one of the average American families that that spends $7,203 annually, or 12% of total spending on food, it's possible to shave off a cool thousand dollars by investing in a good chef's knife, a cutting board, and maybe a quick cooking class. So you learn how to use it without losing a finger. In our house, not a day goes by where we don't use our knife to prepare food at home. Whether we're chopping fruit for Baby Rich and Regular, smashing a clove of garlic, or slicing tomatoes from Grandma Rich in Regular's garden, a good knife is always within reach and saves us a lot of money. Eventually, as you get better, it will also save you time and you'll be able to slice through a prickly pineapple in seconds. Plus, when you know how to use a knife, you don't need all those other super fancy electric chopping tools like food processors and accessories that essentially do the same thing. Here are a few quick tips on purchasing a good knife and there's a video on basic knife skills in this post. Tips from Mr. Rich and Regular. You don't need a full knife set. In general, a chef's knife, a serrated bread knife, a paring knife and a blade steel is all you need. Skip the block set with the matching shears and steak knives, you'll never use them. Invest in a good sized wood and or plastic cutting board. You should have one for everyday products and another for raw products like meat and fish. Be sure to clean and sanitize them regularly. The key to a good knife is how comfortable it feels in your hand. If it's too big, you'll feel clumsy and likely cut yourself. Feel it out for weight, balance and grip. Believe it or not, dull knives are more dangerous than sharp knives. If you've ever tried to cut through a sweet potato and had a dull knife bounce off it headed towards your palm, then you know what I mean. A sharp knife is more likely to go through the object you're cutting instead of you. You just listened to the post titled how basic knife skills can save you money by Julian Saunders of richandregular.com.

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Enjoys cooking now, I appreciated this post. But it wasn't always this way for me. Before I got serious about cleaning up my finances, I didn't cook that much. I was single, living in New York City and strapped for time, so I didn't have much interest in cooking. But I'm telling you, changing my mindset about this has benefited me in many ways. I'm not sure that investing in a good knife and learning knife skills alone would have pushed me to get into cooking. I had to recognize the many benefits of cooking for myself and learn to enjoy it. One of the best parts about meal planning is that it removes all decision fatigue around what I'm going to eat. Investing a few hours on a Sunday to food shop and meal prep saves me a ton of time, money and energy during the week. The more I tried new recipes and experimented, the more I learned what foods really made me feel good. I know I make healthier food choices when I meal plan. I also came to see it as a creative endeavor. As I got more comfortable with cooking, I started to experiment more and develop my own recipes. One of my favorite things is whipping up a great meal, even when it looks like I barely have anything in the fridge. And now that I have a family, feeding them home cooked meals has become one of my greatest joys. Even if you don't think you enjoy cooking now, I'd encourage you to start simple and ease into it. You might discover your new favorite hobby that happens to save you a ton of money. That should do it for another edition of Optimal Finance Daily. Have a great rest of your day and I'll see you on the Wednesday show tomorrow where your optimal life awaits.