March Grocery Challenge Please Help!!!

Hi Sarah,

Please have a good read through the February grocery challenge thread and the cheap meals thread, you will find loads of useful info there.

My partner and I spend about £25 a week on food, and it helps to look through your cupboards before you go shopping, and think of meals you can make from which you already have 1 or 2 of the ingredients. It is crucial to make a list of exactly what you need to buy rather being tempted by just whatever takes your fancy when you get to the shop!

I really helps to base your meals around basic staples (rice, pasta, potatoes, noodles etc) as these are very cheap, filling and healthy. Make yourself a list of how many meals you can make with these as the main ingredient- for example pasta with home made sauce (made from tinned tomatoes or passata with say tinned sweetcorn and tuna), cheese potato pie, rice with vegetables, jacket potatoes, macaroni cheese..... the list goes on!

If your family doesn't mind buying value or economy ranges then this can save you big time. The most expensive brands are usually put eye-level on shelves- look lower down and try the bargain brands- I usually find they taste the same anyway!

For fruit and veg, beware of bigger value packs if you won't use it all, better to work out how much you will need and buy them loosely in a bag.

All the processsed foods in the freezers eg chicken burgers/ nuggets etc generally works out much more expensive than if you try to cook from scratch, and it's far less healthy. You can make your own pizza from scratch that is just as yummy.

I am on a diet at the moment so the meals that I will list that we have on a regular basis might not be what you would like all the time, but hopefully it will give you an idea how it can be done cheaply:

-pasta (tesco value about 20p) with home made sauce of passata (about 40p a carton in Tescos, this is smoother than tinned tomatoes), tuna (Tesco value about 35p) and sweetcorn (you guessed it tesco value about 40p).

-omelettes allowing 3 eggs each (about 90p a box of medium eggs, the value eggs are one thing I won't buy due to the cruel conditions but that's a personal choice only), with sliced mushrooms and a modest amount of grated cheese in, served with salad.

-Cheese potato pie, made with a few potatoes from a bag of Tesco white potatoes just under 90p a big bag. Boil and mash the spuds with a little milk and butter, put in an ovenproof dish with grated cheese on and grill till cheese melts. Serve with tinned spaghetti (about 10p a tin if Tesco value).

-Sausage casserole, use a Colemans sauce mix for this, it is yummy don't know the cost guess about 60p. Tesco do thin sausages in value range, might actually be called chipolatas but buy a bit more expensive range if you prefer, serve this with mash and veg (could be a cheap bag of frozen veg).

-Home made pizza- when at school we made this and it had a simple scone base so came out as a deep pan style, bung on some tomato puree and your fave toppings and bake. You instead could buy value pitta breads and use these as bases instead.

- Stir fry- buy some egg noodles about 70p a pack, boil them up, meanwhile fry up some chicken or other meat, you don't need a lot as can bulk it out with veg. Add lots of beansprouts (40p ish a bag from the veg chiller) and veg, just experiment-mushrooms, broccoli, carrot, peppers, onion, even sprouts(!), courgette bought as loose ingredients all cook well. When cooked mix with the boiled noodles and serve up.

For cleaning stuff I wouldn't bother buying branded products, at least in Tesco most of their own cleaning products state 'clean as well as the leading brand' so they must have been properly tested. For stuff like washing powder it is worth buying big packs when on offer as you will always need it, same with toilet rolls. In our under stair cupboard I have about 10 boxes of washing powder I stocked up on when BOGOF, same with toilet roll and toothpaste.

Hope this helps, just shout if you have any other queries. Do give the challenge a go, work out how much you could save and think what else you could do with that money eg holidays, that's how I look at it!

Good luck, Sarah.

I can only repeat the above excellent advice! Morrisons usually do bogof on sausages or cheapy sossy's. So you could have toad in the hole one night with veggies and sausage and chips another or sausage casserole. So thats two nights (unless you don't like them). Mince is great, spag bol or lasagne lovely with salad (or chips!!).
Paprika chicken is great just rice and chicken all cooked together in one pot - I use chicken legs you can get the recipe from bbc food website I think it was origianlly on money spinners!
Tuna pasta bake or similar cheap as chips on the side of campbells condensed soup that are on offer in some supermarket or go on their website.
Liver - liver with orange is great - I don;t put the orange in though, its delish even if you don't like liver, magical with mashed potato - I will post the recipe if you can't find it.
Ther are tinned pies (fray bentos or similar)at morrsions at the moment , 2 for £1.50 not bad even if you eat tehm both in one go.
So sausages around £1.20
Mince £1.00
Chicken legs £1.99
Tuna pasta guesstimate £1.00
Liver £1.00
Pies £1.50
Brings it to 7.69 for a weeks maincourses, allow a fiver for desserts if you like although jellies and blancmanges are cheap, £5 for cleaning stuff and loo rolls
and £5 for fruit and veg brings it all to £22.69 you can allow more or less as you want!

I threw out my receipts from the fruit and veg shop yesterday, but last week I spent £8 something in the fruit and veg shop. For that I had a very large bowl of fruit and veg, bananas, apples and pears. I also had tomatoes, carrots, peppers, broccoli, courgettes, swede. I buy a sack of potatoes so always have those in. I also buy frozen peas and sweetcorn in the supermarket. My children take 2 pieces of fruit to school in their lunch boxes and school gives them one piece each for their morning break. I always give them veg with their evening meal and pudding during the week is either yoghurt, or banana and custard or baked apple and custard. Tonight it was a banana and walnut loaf that I made this afternoon.

In addition to fruit and veg I used tinned kidney beans, cannelini beans, chick peas, lentils, baked beans.

£5 is a small amount for a family but for not too much more you can eat healthily.

Mushers wrote:

£5 for fruit and veg for a whole week is a really small amount.

Are there any markets near you?

Last week I bought:
5lb new potatoes, 2lb carrots, a large cabbage, some broccoli, 10 red apples, 10 satsumas and 2lb grapes for £4.70.

It was gorgeous, the house smelled of barbeque pork in the slow cooker and banana and walnut bread in the oven. My husband was in shock, I spent 2 hours in the gym today too lol This is the recipe as taken from the www.foodnetwork.com website. I used less sugar than the recipe and you wouldnt notice.

1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon fine salt
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus more for preparing the pan
1 cup sugar
3 very ripe bananas, peeled, and mashed with a fork (about 1 cup)
1/2 cup toasted walnut pieces


Sift the flour, baking soda, and salt into a medium bowl, set aside. Whisk the eggs and vanilla together in a liquid measuring cup with a spout, set aside. Lightly brush a 9 by 5 by 3-inch loaf pan with butter. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.



In a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment or with an electric hand-held mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Gradually pour the egg mixture into the butter while mixing until incorporated. Add the bananas (the mixture will appear to be curdled, so don't worry), and remove the bowl from the mixer. With a rubber spatula, mix in the flour mixture until just incorporated. Fold in the nuts and transfer the batter to the prepared pan. Bake for 55 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the bread comes out clean. Cool the bread in the pan on a wire rack for 5 minutes. Turn the bread out of the pan and let cool completely on the rack. Wrap in plastic wrap. The banana bread is best if served the next day.