5 Southeast Asian Pantry Staples That Make Home Cooking Cheaper Than Delivery
· 5 min read
DoorDash raised its service fees again last year. The average delivery order in the US now costs around $5–8 in fees and tips before you even factor in the meal price. A pad thai that costs $14 at the restaurant becomes a $24 transaction by the time it arrives at your door.
We talk to a lot of home cooks at MAMAM, and the most common reason people give for ordering delivery instead of cooking is not laziness — it is uncertainty. “I don’t know what to make with what I have.” That uncertainty almost always traces back to an under-stocked pantry.
Here is the fix: five pantry staples that unlock dozens of Southeast Asian dishes. Buy them once. Use them for months.
1. Fish Sauce
Cost: Around $4–6 for a bottle that lasts 3–6 months.
Fish sauce is the backbone of Thai, Vietnamese, and Filipino cooking. It is salty, deeply savory, and adds a kind of flavor complexity that is almost impossible to fake. A tablespoon of fish sauce in a stir-fry or noodle broth does more work than any other single ingredient.
What you can make with it:
- Pad thai
- Vietnamese dipping sauce (nước chấm)
- Thai basil stir-fry (pad krapow)
- Fried rice with a savory punch
Cost per use: Under 10 cents.
2. Soy Sauce
Cost: Around $3–5 for a bottle that lasts months.
If fish sauce is the Thai/Vietnamese pantry anchor, soy sauce is the pan-Asian workhorse. Light soy sauce for seasoning, dark soy sauce for color and body — pick up both if you can, but light soy sauce alone will cover 90% of what you need.
What you can make with it:
- Chinese-style stir-fries
- Japanese teriyaki glaze
- Korean bibimbap seasoning
- Malay-style fried noodles (mee goreng)
Cost per use: Around 5–15 cents.
3. Sesame Oil
Cost: Around $5–8 for a bottle that goes a long way (you use it in teaspoons, not tablespoons).
Sesame oil is a finishing oil, not a cooking oil. A teaspoon drizzled over fried rice, noodles, or a cucumber salad right before serving transforms a good dish into a great one. It has a high smoke point when toasted, but the flavor is delicate — add it at the end.
What you can make with it:
- Chinese cucumber salad (smashed cucumbers)
- Korean sesame noodles
- Fried rice finish
- Dumpling dipping sauce
Cost per use: Around 5 cents.
4. Coconut Milk
Cost: Around $1.50–2.50 per can. Stock 4–6 cans at a time.
Coconut milk is the base for virtually every Southeast Asian curry and many desserts. Full-fat canned coconut milk (not the refrigerated carton variety) is what you want — the fat content is what makes curries silky and rich.
What you can make with it:
- Thai green and red curry
- Malaysian rendang
- Pandan coconut rice
- Vietnamese chè (sweet soup)
| Meal | Home cost | Delivery equivalent |
|---|---|---|
| Thai green curry (2 servings) | $6–8 | $26–32 |
| Malaysian rendang (2 servings) | $8–10 | $28–34 |
| Coconut rice | $1.50 | $4–6 (as a side) |
Cost per use: $1.50–2.50 per can, split across 2–4 servings.
5. Sambal
Cost: Around $4–6 for a jar that lasts months in the fridge.
Sambal is a chili paste used across Malaysian, Indonesian, and Singaporean cooking. It is spicy, slightly sweet, and layered in a way that fresh chili alone cannot replicate. A spoonful of sambal oelek (the plain version) or sambal tumis (the cooked version) adds instant depth to anything.
What you can make with it:
- Nasi lemak (coconut rice with sambal)
- Sambal stir-fried long beans
- Sambal eggs
- Mixed into fried rice for a Singaporean-style char
Cost per use: Around 10–20 cents.
The Math
These five items cost roughly $18–25 to stock up on. That is about the same as one DoorDash order — except these ingredients cover 30–50 home-cooked meals across weeks or months.
Here is what a typical week looks like when your pantry is stocked:
- Monday: Thai basil chicken over rice — $4 total, 20 minutes
- Tuesday: Sambal fried rice with egg — $3 total, 15 minutes
- Wednesday: Coconut milk curry with whatever vegetables are in the fridge — $6 total, 30 minutes
- Thursday: Sesame noodles with cucumber — $3 total, 10 minutes
- Friday: Pad thai — $5 total, 25 minutes
Total for the week: $21 in groceries. Equivalent delivery spend: $110–130 with fees, tips, and markups.
The pantry approach changes the question from “what should I order?” to “what do I feel like cooking?” Once you have these five ingredients, you have an answer for almost any night of the week.
Where to Buy
Skip the “international foods” aisle at major supermarkets — the markup is real. Asian grocery stores (99 Ranch, H Mart, or any local equivalent) stock all five of these at a fraction of the price. If you are ordering online, look for Red Boat fish sauce, Kikkoman or Pearl River Bridge soy sauce, Kadoya sesame oil, Aroy-D or Chaokoh coconut milk, and Huy Fong sambal oelek.
Your pantry is an investment. Stock it once, cook from it for months. And every time you cook instead of ordering, that investment pays you back.