I moved to the country three years ago and I have been growing my own vegetables and herbs each year. It is so satisfying and you don’t need to live in the country, have a big garden or even have a garden at all. When we lived in Dublin we had cabbage, mint and broccoli [...]

In today’s pricewatch, Conor Pope tackles the glamorous subject of coupon collecting and finds out the best way to use a loyalty card. Popular in the US and UK, it would appear that Irish consumers are also getting into coupon clipping with 30 per cent more people using coupons than in 2008. The Irish Independent [...]

For years, I’ve heard people banging on about the merits of loose-leaf tea versus tea bags and I thought to myself – surely there’s better things to talk about. It turns out there isn’t! Loose tea is so much better than bagged and I want to tell the world – I can’t believe it’s taken [...]

I’ve heard all the reasons for customers to dislike supermarket’s buy one, get one free offers. They can make us buy things we don’t really want or need. They can encourage us to overspend on products we’ll never get to eat. They’re often on perishable goods, and a lot of the food ends up in [...]

This has nothing to do with food, but given that CheapEats often features household offers (washing powder, toilet rolls, dishwasher tablets etc.) I think I can get away with this post. It’s a simple handy hint and it will save you a fortune on heating. My rented house is pretty low on insulation, so we’ve [...]

Mince pies and pudding are the quintessential Christmas treat. Both share many of the same ingredients so making your own will save you money. Last year I made mince pies the easy way. I bought a jar of mince meat and filled some ready-made vole-au-vent cases and bunged them in the oven. They were tasty, [...]

Like great prizes? In association with the Irish Independent’s LoveFood magazine, we’ve an amazing competition coming up on CheapEats tomorrow. Here’s a sneaky preview article by LoveFood deputy editor and CheapEats contributor Jacqueline Strawbridge.

By Catriona McGrath I just never know what to do.  How much do you tip a waiter?  Should you tip the poor man who has driven in the pouring rain to deliver your dinner?   Do you tip if you’re just getting a tea or coffee in the coffee shop?  I mean, they have those tip [...]

I’m not dreaming of a white Christmas; I want mine to be a ginger one. I’m kind of bored with the Christmas decorations I’ve had for eons so instead of going out and buying new ones, I’ve decided to make them. Gingerbread Christmas ornaments are a cinch to produce and they look great on the [...]

A couple of years ago, I received a jar of jam for Christmas. This may seem like a stingy present but it was actually one of the nicest presents I got that year. It wasn’t any ordinary shop-bought jam but homemade, wrapped specifically with me in mind and had my name printed on the jar. [...]