I enjoy trying out new recipes, but I have to be careful. I have some picky eaters around here. So, what I try to do is cut the recipe down to make just enough of whatever it is for each person to try. I save money by buying less to begin with, but I also don't end up having to waste a lot of food that will get thrown away if they don't like it. Say a recipe calls for four pork chops or chicken breasts. Sometimes, I'll just make two. I'll divide it up and add "safe" side dishes that I know everyone will eat. If they do like then next time I'll make the full recipe. I hate wasting food.
Trying new recipes is a great way to keep the menu at home exciting so that you are not as tempted to go and dine at restaurants. Even when you have to buy expensive ingredients, it still normally works out cheaper than the bill at the restaurant. We just ate a brand new pepper and beef over rice recipe last night and it was delicious.
I try new recipes also, and I can get very creative when it comes to whipping up a meal, as I am not much of an established cooker and don't really have any habits formed yet. I find that whether you are making new recipes or not though, the cooking in bulk and freezing it until you want to eat it method, is great for saving money.
I love trying new recipes too. I can spend much of my free time searching cooking websites and reading through recipes. I have a good idea of what my kids like so I look for recipes with flavours they like. I would say 95% of the time when I'm trying out a new recipes I've got a good one that everyone likes, and the other 5% of the time it's one I won't try again. I don't print out recipes, I just keep my ipad in the kitchen. Then if it's a keeper recipes I'll print it out and put it in my recipe box.
If it is anything substantial that is a new recipe, like you said I will just make a lot and hope for the best so that I can at least save a little money in the process. I do not tend to stray from the usual though when it comes to making new foods, for that very reason, but when it comes to going out I love to try the things that I would never make, but I do not go out that often so it is more of a rarity for me.
It sounds like you have it down to a science Zyni. I hate wasting food myself, but ocassionally it can't be helped, so I only make things that I know are going to be eaten. I have some pasta already made that I think I am going to have to throw away because I am dieting now, but since it is just a small amount it isn't worth freezing for later.
That's understandable. I'm not eating pasta right now either. I also find that it doesn't reheat very well, as far as saving it for another meal (other than soup). I've got it down to where I don't make way too much any more, but that's always been a challenge for me. I always make too much, because I don't want to make too little. Sometimes, I'll whip up a new soup recipe to use the leftover pasta. Even spaghetti noodles can be cut up into tiny pieces and added to soups. That's one area where I try a lot of new recipes - soups. You can get inspiration and then doctor it up to what you know your family will like.
I think it's great to try making some new meals from time to time because otherwise you can get a bit bored of what you're eating and if you're bored of it you won't enjoy it so much, so it will start to feel like a waste of money. I like to make new sauce recipes in particular as I find they can really jazz up a meal and change it from something boring to something that can be a lot more enjoyable. I typically freeze any excess I make so it doesn't get wasted, but like @Zyni said, I'll only dish up enough to see if everyone likes it the first time around. Most times, everyone does enjoy it with something. On the odd occasion I've gone a bit overboard with the chili though I use it to add in smaller portions to other sauces to add spice to those. I find it's a good way to use up a sauce that wasn't liked!
My mother and I love trying out new recipes. Thankfully, we haven't made anything that my son and my sister didn't like, lol. We're the cooks though so we're bound to like whatever we make so I counted us out. Haha! Like you though, we tend to not make so much of a new meal we're trying out. We don't really make another dish but if we have a leftover of the day before meal, we heat that up just so if someone doesn't like the food, they can eat that. Like I've said, whatever recipe we did or made up, our family members don't have any complains about it. It helps as well that we know the preferences of our family members. Like my son doesn't like peas or bitter melon so we tend to avoid recipes with those ingredients. And my sister eats any kind of vegetables except bitter melon as well.
If I can afford it then I also like to try to cook different kinds of meals that we have not had yet. Especially those from foreign countries.... That way the picky eaters in my family get challenged. It makes sharing meals more fun.
The best way to save on wasting food is to plan as much of the meals ahead as possible so you get to figure out what you can do with leftovers. Often times here we usually start with fried meat and whatever is left we turn into stews for the next few days and those tend to last for very long so even if we eat it through the course of a couple of days it's not so bad. If we start out with stews then sometimes we'll use those to just make sandwiches and snacks eventually or sometimes we'll turn it into fried rice.
