A lot of people get takeout food thinking it's going to save them a whole lot of time. The reality is that the time saved is almost nothing (if it exists at all),
Well, once you factor in the travel, it's true. Of course for home cooking you have to go shopping and clean up afterwards, so that time counts against home cooking, too. But they call it "convenience", which is a word meaning, "I'm lazy."
Now, if you factor in the work you have to do to pay for that food... it takes longer to prepare takeout than home-cooked, for most people on an hourly wage, anyway. For example, if you earn $20 an hour, then that $20 meal actually cost you 30 minutes, on top of however long it took to go there and get it. Which is a normal hot meal preparation time. Of course, some people would prefer working 30 minutes at their paid job than working 30 minutes in their kitchen.
I don't think it's wrong to do any of these things. Everyone chooses, will I spend money or time? Will I spend time on X or time on Y? I just say: be aware of the choices, be aware of the costs. The choices we make thoughtlessly tend to be worse for us than the choices we make thoughtfully.
Edited to add:
For example, once a week I go out and play a game with friends. I eat out, Schnitz or some place like that. It's $15-$20. I buy some junky snacks, $5-$10. I'm also taking the train there, that's $5 on average depending exactly when I head out. In all, the evening costs me $25-$35. I do it about 40 times a year, so that's $1,200 or so.
Most days I'm up at 0645. It's kids and housework until 1600 when people come to my garage to train. At 1800 my wife will have heated the meal I made earlier in the day and we sit down to dinner. We put the kids to bed. At 1900 it's back in the garage until - it's supposed to be 2100, but often they're not all gone until 2145. Clean up a bit, read a book, lights out 2230.
My life is barbells and babies. I love them both, but not enough to have nothing else in my life. So far in writing this edit I've had to stop 11 times, 3 to respond to the 6yo boy and 8 to respond to the 20 month girl, and 7 of those times I had to get up - she was tearing into the pantry or something. It's nice to go out once a week for a few hours and someone else cooks the meal and does the dishes for me, and then I go and sit down with adults and talk about something other than barbells and babies. I'll pay $1,200 a year for that. It's cheaper than alcoholism or psychotherapy.
But this is a considered choice. If I just did what I felt like without thinking about it I'd sleep in till 10, have no breakfast, and eat takeout lunch and dinner every day.
We should try not to be frugal, but to have considered frugality. It's not that we don't spend, it's that we consider each spend to decide whether it's worth it. When things are looked at in their turn to decide if they're worth it, this always leads to less spending.