Is it Cheaper to Make or Buy Garlic Bread?

Garlic bread is one of my favorite side dishes. It makes sopping up gravy or tomato sauce so satisfying at the end of a meal. Unfortunately, unless garlic bread is on a super sale, I tend to skip buying it lately.

This made we wonder if making garlic bread at home is actually cheaper than buying it fresh from the bakery or even the frozen kind. Let’s breakdown the costs, and see which option comes out cheapest!

How much does homemade garlic bread cost?

For the cost breakdown of homemade garlic bread, we are going to use a basic recipe from Delish. For the full recipe, click here.

Keep in mind, that you can make garlic bread a zillion different ways and you can just use what you have on hand. It doesn’t matter if you use shredded cheddar cheese or parmesan cheese.

Homemade Garlic Bread Ingredients	Cost
1 loaf of bread (Italian or French is fine)	$1.47
4 cloves of garlic	$0.24
1/2 cup of butter	$0.56
1/2 tsp salt	$0.01
2 tbsp chopped parsley	$0.09
1/4 cup of grated parmesan cheese	$0.37
Total Cost of Homemade Garlic Bread: $2.74 (6 servings total)	Cost per Serving: $0.45

This total cost to make this recipe for homemade garlic bread came out to $2.74. The recipe says it makes 6 servings, so each serving is approximately $0.45 each.

Now personally, the serving size is going to depend a lot on the size of the loaf of bread that you get. So, this is really just a good starting point, and can differ a lot.

The biggest expense for homemade garlic bread is definitely the bread itself. So, depending on how cheap you can get the bread, this will greatly lower the cost!

I priced all the ingredients out at my local Walmart because that is the cheapest store in my area. Your prices may vary slightly.

We can actually get the cost of this homemade garlic bread down, by using pre-minced garlic instead of fresh garlic cloves and by substituting dry parsley flakes instead of buying fresh parsley by the bunch.

You can also skip the parmesan cheese or substitute any leftover shredded cheese that you already have at home.

How much is garlic bread at the grocery store?

Now let’s head over to a couple grocery stores to get an idea of how much pre-made and frozen garlic bread costs.

Pre-Made Garlic Bread & Number of Servings	Store & Price	Cost per Serving
Freshness Guaranteed Garlic Bread, 8 servings	Walmart, $2.48	$0.31
Publix Texas Toast Garlic Bread, 8 servings	Publix, $3.17	$0.39
Mama Cozzi’s Texas Toast Garlic Bread, 8 servings	Aldi, $1.89	$0.23
SE Grocers Fresh Garlic Parmesan Bread, 8 servings	Winn-Dixie, $3.49	$0.43
Market Pantry Garlic Bread, 5 servings	Target, $2.79	$0.55
Food Club Garlic Bread, 8 servings	Food Giant, $2.79	$0.34
Furlani Texas Toast Garlic Bread, 6 servings	Family Dollar, $2.89	$0.48
New York Bakery Texas Toast Garlic Bread, 8 servings	Foodland, $3.79	$0.47
	Average Cost per Serving of Premade Garlic Bread:	$0.40

The cost per serving of premade garlic bread at the grocery store ranged from $0.23 each (Aldi) to $0.55 each (Target). That made the average cost per serving about $0.40.

So, depending on the price of the premade garlic bread, it is very possible that it is cheaper to buy garlic bread than to make it! (If you can get the cost per serving to be less than $0.40 each.)

Is homemade garlic bread worth it?

I am a huge fan of garlic bread, and I happen to love the homemade version, the fresh version, and the frozen version. I just really love garlic bread!

One of the ways, that we keep the cost of garlic bread down to practically nothing, is that we utilize our leftover bread. Instead of throwing out unused hamburger buns, hotdog buns, or hoagies, we freeze them.

Then on spaghetti night, we pull out a few frozen pieces of bread and make our own garlic bread. We usually throw some leftover shredded cheese on top, but we like it just plain with butter and garlic too.

We have also used leftover plain bagels, dinner rolls, and pretzel buns. Occasionally we find a great deal on a manager’s special for a loaf of bread for like $0.25 each.

The major cost of garlic bread is the bread, so if you can get that cost down, you can definitely make it cheaper than you can buy it!

For most cost breakdowns of making versus buying, check out “Is it Cheaper to make or buy Coleslaw Dressing?” and “Is it Cheaper to make or buy Tartar Sauce?“