Many books and articles about saving money will tell you simply to not do it. After all, when you eat out in Lakeland restaurants, you’re not only paying for the food, you’re also paying for the service and the preparation.

To make a profit, restaurants need to charge four times the amount of the ingredients. So, even if you cannot purchase the ingredients as cheaply as restaurants do (because they buy them in bulk), you are still paying for more than when you can prepare food at home.

Be your own server

Fine dine-in restaurants charge more because of the service they provide by bringing the menu to your tables and serving the food and the bill. That will easily add $20 to $50 to the total bill. You can choose a self-service restaurant instead such as a buffet, fast casual, and quick serve.

Get your food to go

Takeout food is cheaper than food served in a restaurant. Dining in a fine dine-in restaurant will get you to pay for a service charge and taxes, of course. You will also need to order appetizers and drinks.

But if you can just have your food to go, you can simply order the entrée and then mix a salad at home and pair the dish with a bottle of wine you already have in your pantry or fridge.

Dine during lunchtime

Restaurants charge less for their lunchtime meals than their dinner offerings. Applebees’ dinner entrees range from $8 to $18 while their lunch combos are priced between $7 and $8.

Cheesecake Factory’s dinner entrees cost $11 to $30 while their lunch options cost between $9 and $14. The same goes for other popular chains of restaurants such as Olive Garden and Red Lobster. You can also have your dinner a little early since these restaurants extend their lunch hours until the late afternoon.

Dine during your birthday

Many restaurants offer coupons for birthday celebrants. You can get a free dessert or a discount deducted from your total bill during your birthday. Some restaurants also offer this promotion for your whole birthday month so you can take advantage of dining with different sets of friends in that month.

Split a meal

Most restaurants have big servings and the dishes are certainly more than you can finish. Split a meal with a friend or your partner. That way, you can try out twice as many dishes and save money as well. Instead of ordering separate salads, you can split one and the same goes for the entrée and the desserts.