Written at the kitchen table The Tried It Manual · First Edition
The Tried It Manual Get the Manual · $39
Clara Whitfield · First Edition
From Clara Tried It and Better Ask Clara

The most expensive thing in your house is everything you were told you have to buy.

I am Clara Whitfield. I keep a running list of what actually saves money in an ordinary American house, and what only pretends to. This is the whole list written down: ninety-nine chapters on cleaning, pests, food, the garden, the pantry, the freezer, the small repairs, the bills and the weekly shop. Every one of them has a section on what I got wrong, because those turned out to be worth more than the tricks.

Get the Manual See what’s inside
“I tell you when it does not work. That is most of what this book is for.”

No brand pays me to name a product. This is just the list.

$39 · PDF and EPUB · read on any device · 7-day refund

The Tried It Manual
— Ninety-Nine Things I Actually Tried in My Own House, Including the Ones That Did Not Work
Clara Whitfield
Clara Whitfield
PDF + EPUB Any device · print at home
655 pages · 99 chapters · 15 parts
01 · The math

Your house runs on numbers nobody ever checks.

These are them. Not my numbers, the government’s: what an ordinary American household actually spends in a year, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Energy Information Administration.

The green ink in the margin is which parts of the book go after that line. I am not going to print a figure for what you will save, because I do not know your house or your prices, and a book that promises you a number has told you something it cannot know. I will tell you where the money goes.

$39. Once. The bills come back every year.

Get the Manual

$39 once · emailed instantly · PDF + EPUB

The chapters
that go after it ↓
An ordinary house
— what one year actually costs —
Food eaten at homeBLS, Consumer Expenditure Survey$5,700–$6,300Stretching what you already bought, the pantry, the freezer and the weekly shopParts 3, 5, 6 & 12 · 28 chapters
Food thrown away uneatenUSDA / EPA household waste estimates$1,300–$1,600Knowing what is thirsty and what is finishedChapters 22, 23 & Part 6
Housekeeping suppliesBLS, housekeeping supplies$800–$950Eight things from ordinary shops, and the four they replacePart 1 · 8 chapters
Electricity and gasEIA, Residential Energy Consumption Survey$1,900–$2,400The dial nobody touches, and holding heat at the glassParts 10 & 11 · 12 chapters
Clothing, and replacing itBLS, apparel and services$1,700–$2,000The stains people give up on, and five-minute mendingPart 14 · 5 chapters
Pest control and small repairsBLS, household maintenance$400–$700Nine pests, and the three faults worth fixingParts 2 & 9 · 15 chapters

Fifteen parts, aimed at every line on that page.

Sources: US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Consumer Expenditure Survey · US Energy Information Administration, Residential Energy Consumption Survey · USDA and EPA household food waste estimates.
What you keep depends on your house, your prices and how much of it you actually do. This book prints no savings figure of its own, and it says why.

02 · What’s inside

15 parts, 99 chapters, 655 pages.

Every chapter is built the same way. What the problem actually is. What almost everybody does instead, and why it does not work. What I do, and what it cost, with real prices. Where the safety line is. What I got wrong. And what the method will not fix, said plainly, because a book that only ever says “this works” is not one you trust the second time.

01

Cleaning the House Without the Store

8 chapters
  1. The Gallon of White Vinegar That Replaces Half the Cleaning Aisle
  2. Baking Soda: Fifteen Jobs for Under a Dollar
  3. The Degreaser You Already Paid For, Sitting by the Sink
  4. What Hydrogen Peroxide Cleans Better Than the Spray You Are Buying
  5. One Box of Borax, and the Jobs It Actually Does
  6. Rubbing Alcohol, Glass, and the Streak Nobody Can Get Rid Of
  7. The Laundry Detergent I Stopped Buying, and What Replaced It
  8. Lemons, and the One Cleaner in This Book I Will Not Oversell
02

Driving the Pests Out for Pennies

9 chapters
  1. Mosquitoes: Kill Them in the Water Before They Ever Fly
  2. Ants: Never Kill the Ones You Can See
  3. Roaches, and Why the Fog Bomb Wastes Your Money
  4. Mice: Trap Them Out, Then Seal the Holes
  5. Fruit Flies Are Not Living Where You Think They Are
  6. Ticks: Win in the Yard First, and Pull Them Out Right
  7. Wasps, Dish Soap, and the One Nest I Leave Alone
  8. Diatomaceous Earth: The Powder That Kills Almost Anything That Crawls
  9. Moths in the Wool and the Flour, and Why the Mothballs Go in the Bin
03

Stretching the Food You Already Bought

7 chapters
  1. The Stock Pot I Fill Out of the Trash
  2. One Whole Chicken, Four Dinners, and a Pot of Soup
  3. Bread for About a Dollar a Loaf, and No Machine
  4. The Buttermilk, Yogurt and Sour Cream I Never Buy Anymore
  5. Bringing Limp Produce Back, and Knowing When It Is Really Gone
  6. The Use-It-Up Meals That Empty the Fridge Before Trash Day
  7. The Spice Blends I Mix in My Own Jars
04

The Kitchen Garden

6 chapters
  1. The Windowsill Herbs That Pay for Themselves in a Month
  2. A Hundred Dollars of Tomatoes From a Three Dollar Packet
  3. Salad Greens That Grow Back Every Time You Cut Them
  4. Potatoes in a Bucket, and the Truth About the Tower
  5. Regrowing Groceries From Scraps: What Works and What Does Not
  6. Free Soil Out of What You Are Already Throwing Away
05

The Pantry That Outlasts the Power

7 chapters
  1. Canning, Without Poisoning Anybody
  2. Sauerkraut: A One Dollar Cabbage That Preserves Itself
  3. Drying Food: A Whole Glut Shrunk Down to One Jar
  4. Eleven Foods That Never Spoil, and the Fine Print Nobody Mentions
  5. The Root Cellar You Can Fake in a Closet
  6. Salting and Curing Meat: What Is Safe, and What Will Hurt You
  7. The Twenty Groceries That Carry a Pantry
06

The Freezer, Run Properly

8 chapters
  1. The Freezer Is a Bank, Not a Cupboard
  2. Fifteen Freezer Habits That Stop Food Going in the Trash
  3. Five Foods That Freeze Badly, and Why the Water Does It
  4. Freezer Burn: What It Actually Is, and How I Stop It
  5. Blanching: The Ten Minutes That Buys You a Year
  6. Batch Cooking Into the Freezer Without a Second Fridge
  7. The Second Hand Chest Freezer, and What It Really Costs to Run
  8. When the Power Goes Out: What Keeps, and What Has to Go
07

The Kitchen Medicine Cabinet

8 chapters
  1. The Sore Throat: What the Kitchen Soothes, and What It Cannot Touch
  2. The Cough: A Spoon of Honey Against the Ten Dollar Syrup
  3. The Upset Stomach: Ginger, Mint, and the One Thing That Actually Matters
  4. Small Burns and Scrapes: The Right Way, and the Folk Cures That Do Harm
  5. The Onion and Honey Syrup: What Is Proven, and What Is Only Tradition
  6. The Headache: A Glass of Water First, and the Signs That Mean Stop
  7. The First Tickle of a Cold: What Helps, and What Is Folklore
  8. Cracked Hands: Why the Three Dollar Fix Beats the Fifteen Dollar One
08

Looking After Yourself for Pennies

6 chapters
  1. Face Cream: The Hundred Dollar Jar and the Three Dollar Tube
  2. Shampoo: Washing Less, Spending Less, and Where Baking Soda Belongs
  3. Whiter Teeth: What Is Safe, What Is Cheap, and What Ruins Enamel for Good
  4. Lip Balm and Body Butter: Where Homemade Finally Wins
  5. Deodorant: The Aluminium Myth, the Baking Soda Rash, and the Two Dollar Answer
  6. Kitchen Hair Masks: The One That Works, and the Ones That Waste Good Eggs
09

Fixing It Instead of Replacing It

6 chapters
  1. The Screw That Will Not Hold, and the Two Minute Fix
  2. Bringing Back a Cutting Board, a Pan and a Wooden Spoon
  3. The Drain I Unclog Without a Bottle of Anything
  4. Rust: Taking It Off, and Keeping It Off
  5. The Squeak, the Stick, and the Drawer That Fights You
  6. Small Appliances: The Three Faults Worth Fixing, and the Ones That Are Not
10

Keeping Cool, Keeping Warm

6 chapters
  1. Beating the Heat Without the Air Conditioning Bill
  2. The Four Dollar Damp Puller That Keeps a Closet Dry
  3. Window Film and Window Quilts: Holding the Heat at the Glass
  4. Sealing the Drafts: Plugging What Is Bleeding Your Heat
  5. Heat the Bed, Not the House
  6. Summer Curtains That Stop Three Quarters of the Heat
11

The Secret Switches

6 chapters
  1. The Water Heater Dial Nobody Ever Touches
  2. The Thermostat Setback, and the Menu the Installer Uses
  3. The Fridge: The Lying Dial, and the Coils Nobody Cleans
  4. The Dryer: The Sensor Setting, and the Vent That Starts Fires
  5. Phantom Plugs: What Draws Power With Nothing Switched On
  6. The Washer: Why Almost All of Laundry’s Cost Is Hot Water
12

The Grocery Run

6 chapters
  1. The Same Store Every Week, and Why That Beats Driving Around
  2. Unit Price: The Small Number That Settles Every Argument
  3. The Store Brands I Buy, and the Four I Never Will
  4. Buying in Bulk: Twenty Things I Do, and Five I Stopped
  5. Coupons, Apps and Loyalty Cards: What Is Worth the Bother
  6. The List That Survives the Middle Aisles
13

The Old Money Habits

6 chapters
  1. The Five Questions I Ask Before I Spend a Dollar
  2. Writing Down Every Dollar for a Month, and What It Shows You
  3. Cash in Envelopes: Why Spending Real Money Hurts
  4. The Pantry First Week: Eating the Money You Already Spent
  5. Barter: Trading What You Have for What You Need
  6. The No Spend Month: The Reset That Shows Where the Money Went
14

Making Clothes and Linens Last

5 chapters
  1. The Stains People Give Up On
  2. Five Minute Mending That Saves a Whole Closet
  3. Bringing Grey Whites Back, Without the Bleach That Greyed Them
  4. The Thrift Rack: Buying Quality for Pennies
  5. Sweaters, Socks, and the Rebuying I Stopped
15

A Frugal Christmas

5 chapters
  1. The Gifts People Actually Keep
  2. Feeding a Crowd for About a Dollar a Head
  3. Decorating Out of the Yard
  4. The Pantry Gift Everyone Actually Wants
  5. Wrapping and Cards: The Most Thrown Away Money of the Year
03 · The honest part

The deal this book makes with you.

✕The famous trick everybody repeatsWhere it does not work, I say so. Including the beloved ones, and including the ones I used for years.
✕The cheap way that is actually worseSometimes the honest answer is to just buy the thing. There are several chapters that end that way.
✕The number inflated to sell you somethingThere are about a dozen places I refuse to print a figure. I say so at the point, and name a tested source instead.
✕The job that is not worth the riskWall nests, low-acid canning, anything on a ladder. The book tells you to stop, and who to ring.
Clara Whitfield — Clara
Clara Whitfield
Clara Whitfield
04 · Who is telling you this
“I tried it. That is the whole of my authority, and it is enough.”

I am not a chef, a nutritionist or a financial adviser, and this book does not pretend otherwise. I keep a house, I do the shopping, and I have spent years quietly working out which of the things everybody repeats are true.

A lot of them are not. I made my own laundry powder for a year and greyed every white I owned. I built a potato tower and got four pounds. I grew carrot tops in a saucer for four months waiting for a carrot that was never coming. All three are in here, with the reason.

The people I wrote this for are not beginners either. You already run a household on less than people think it takes. This is the book I wish somebody had handed me twenty years ago, so I could have skipped the expensive half of the learning.

Read it once through. Then start with whichever room annoys you most.

05 · Order the manual

Read it for a week. If it does not pay for itself, I do not want your money.

Read it for seven days. If it has not saved you more than it cost, or it simply is not for you, write to me and I will refund every cent, no questions and no hard feelings. Pay once and it is yours to keep, on your phone, your tablet, or printed at the kitchen table. No subscription. Nothing else to buy.

It is a working manual, not a doorstop. 99 short chapters, each one a thing you can start on this week.

$59$39
99Chapters
655Pages
7Day refund
Get the Manual · $39

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06 · Questions

Questions people ask

Is this book for me?

If you run a household and the weekly shop has been getting worse, yes. It assumes no skills and no equipment beyond what is already in an ordinary kitchen. Where something genuinely needs a tool, the chapter says what it costs, and it is usually under twenty dollars.

Do I need a garden?

No. Six of the ninety-nine chapters are about growing things, and every one of them works in pots on a windowsill, a step or a balcony. The other ninety-three are indoors.

Does any of this need me to be handy?

Very little. The repair part is six chapters of small, reversible jobs. Anything electrical, anything at height, and anything involving gas gets handed to a professional, and the chapter says which trade to ring.

Home canning and preserving. Is that safe to follow?

That is the strictest part of the book, and it is strict in an unusual way: it prints no canning recipe of its own. It explains why acidity decides the method, why low-acid food needs a pressure canner and why boiling water cannot substitute, and then it routes every actual process to a currently tested source such as the USDA guide or the National Center for Home Food Preservation. It also says plainly that I am not a food scientist.

Is there medical or financial advice in it?

None, deliberately. Where a subject touches either, the book stops and points at a doctor or at published guidance. There is nothing about investing, debt, benefits or income anywhere in it.

What do I get, and is it a subscription?

One book, as a 655-page PDF and an EPUB, both emailed the moment you buy. It reads on a phone, a tablet, a computer or a Kindle, and it is laid out to print at home. You pay once. Nothing renews.

Can I get it on paper?

Not as a printed book, no. It is a digital book you can print yourself, which is what keeps it at $39 instead of what a 655-page hardback would cost.

Most of it was free. Somebody just had to tell you which part.

Ninety-nine chapters on the cleaning, the pests, the food, the garden, the pantry, the freezer, the repairs, the bills and the weekly shop. 655 pages. One honest book. $39, once.

Get the Manual · $39

7-day refund · emailed instantly · PDF + EPUB