Restaurants are on a tighter budget than almost any household. If cooks don’t precisely control food costs, they’ll be left without a penny of profit at the end of the day. At restaurants where ingredients are expensive, making the bottom line work is even more difficult but also even more important. Whether they learn it in culinary school or on the job, restaurant cooks have many tricks that can help you save money without sacrificing quality.

Americans have become used to eating the more tender and more expensive cuts of meat. Eating the “whole animal” may seem like a trend, but it’s actually the oldest and most cost-effective way to eat.

To save money, buy cheaper cuts of meat, rather than lower-quality meat. Make soups, stews and pasta sauces, because they stretch meat out to more portions.

Start with chicken. Cooks tend to prefer dark meat over white meat because it’s far more flavorful. Don’t take off the skin (or if you do, don’t tell me). The added fat and flavor from the skin make the meat more flavorful. Cut empty calories from your diet rather than fat from natural sources. Legs and thighs can be roasted or braised, and they’re much less expensive than chicken breasts.

Cheaper cuts of beef, lamb and pork are usually the tougher cuts. These types of meat are superior in flavor to more tender cuts – they just take a little more work and a lot more patience.

Treat meat like a flavoring ingredient rather than the focus of the plate. Use smoked or cured meats like bacon, ham hock or guanciale (cured, unsmoked pig jowl or cheek) in soups or as the base of otherwise vegetarian dishes. Think of it as “vegetarian plus.”

Offal, which used to be part of every cook’s repertoire, has been making a comeback in restaurants, but not as much in home kitchens. Chicken and calves’ livers are good places to start.

Even seafood has cheaper options. Octopus (if you can find it) and squid are a bit challenging to cook, but when prepared correctly they are delicious. Cleaning mussels is an onerous task (that’s why restaurants may seem to charge a lot for them), but they’re relatively inexpensive and very easy to prepare once they’re clean. Read the rest of the tips

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