Just buy it at Trader Joe's, if you can. Shockingly cheap and really delicious, particularly the B grade. It'll take the cost of the granola way down.

On a another note, not counting time makes this an exercise in futility when calculating cost comparison in any sort of convincing way. I love making bagels, but tend to do it when I'm snowed in, since it can be pretty time consuming, with the mulitple rise times, shaping, boiling and baking (at least for my fave recipe). When deciding whether to make or buy bagels, one has to weigh the value of one's time, the pleasure gained from baking, the ease of purchase, etc.

The price of one's time is such a widely variable thing that I don't think you could reasonably put it in an article like this. You know best the value placed on it, so just add it to what she's compiled and decide from there. If you're working 60 hours a week, have two kids, and an hour commute, that puts an awfully high price on time. If you're out of work, the theraputic value of cooking might actually be a benefit instead of a cost. It beats watching out the window waiting for the mail to come.

I enjoyed this article, particularly that she chose some stuff like yogurt that I really wouldn't have thought to make on my own. I'll have to try the bagels. I made pretzls a while back (similar process) that were fantastic.

"When deciding whether to make or buy bagels, one has to weigh the value of one's time" - Absolutely, especially if you are doing it with any regularity. I eat a bagel for breakfast almost every day and pay about 60 each for bagels. There is no way I am going to make a batch of bagels every other week in order to save 35 cents a day. If it takes 3 hours to make a batch, I'm getting "paid" $1.50 an hour. My free time is worth more than that.

Good point on the time issue (the "opportunity cost," so to speak). That's why I'm now such a big fan of home-made yogurt. It takes maybe five minutes of actual effort.

1) Pour a bunch of milk in a pot. (10 seconds)
2) Place the pot in a bigger pot of water to form a double-boiler and turn to high (20 seconds)
3) Check back every five minutes to see if the temp is up (doesn't really take any time if you're working on something else anyway).
4) When it's up, dump the hot water and fill with cold water, and wait till the temp has fallen enough (2 minutes)
5) Stir in the starter (10 seconds)
6) Bundle up the pot, set it in a sunny window, or do whatever else you do to keep the temp up. (30 seconds)
7) Come back in 4 to 10 hours and you've got yogurt.

I'm not much of a cook, but I highly recommend making your own yogurt. It blew my mind how easy it was, and it tastes so much better.

The time cost of any cooking is important -- and so is the pleasure payment! Baking Bread is one classic. A long commitment, but very little actually engaged with the dough. It's mostly knead and rise.....allows other chores or social time to be combined, or making that yogurt or whatever. Then the taste payoff and the grateful friends, the warm house on a chilly day.

Soup has all those elements to me as well. The many steps with plenty of time in between, the sense of abundance and excellence. The pride in the accomplishment and the pure pleasure of enjoying the food alone or with others. I made this? Wow!

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I wrap up the yogurt-to-be in a blanket and leave it overnight - in the morning I stick it in the fridge and it is delish.

Even my 7 year old likes it, especially with fruit.