July 2017 Grocery Challenge

Florence_J · 2 July 2017 at 12:25AM

A few items bought today - orange juice, cucumber, mozzarella, spent £1.76, have £116.60 left of the budget.

t14cy_t · 2 July 2017 at 6:20AM

£6 ys spends yesterday. setting budget at £90 this month. x

olgemama · 2 July 2017 at 9:15AM

Thanks for everyone's kind replys. Feeling positive about saving some money.

Someone suggested splitting the budget down to food/entertaining/cleaning/toiletries - and that's a really good idea. So I'm going to keep an eye on that this month.

We probably can cut the amount of entertaining down, and I know I definitely can cut back what I serve, I love to cook and offer people good food.

We are entertaining later today, but I made time to go to a cheaper shop yesterday rather than rely on a delivery - I get free Ocado deliverys so I always used to think that was being sensible by not paying delivery! I live in a village and the 2 cheap supermarkets are a half hour drive away- they're not on my way home from work either - so it always seems such an effort to go + the added petrol.

I can cut back on our meals too, I never do something like jacket potato and beans for dinner, it's always cooked from scratch recipes, as I said I love cooking, but I know I can make some easy cut backs here.

First shop of the month done, it's not a full week, I'll need a top up of fresh fruit and salad stuff mid-week. £58.86

£58.86 / £600

DaniS · 2 July 2017 at 9:47AM

Hello Everyone!
I would love to join in the challenge.
I've been a long, long time lurker and a few life changing events have prompted me to really get a grip and save for our own home. I'm tired of renting.

In our household, there is myself, partner and our 14 month old son. I am currently pregnant and due in August with our second little boy.

I love cooking and cook most meals from scratch. I can take or leave meat, whereas my partner has to have meat with everything. He also loves things like curly fries, mint choc chip cones (one for pud everyday) and sweet popcorn. He's also a brand fiend so he does take some reigning in! He does also a couple of cold beers a couple of times a week. We rarely go out though.

I would like to put in for a budget of £300 as I don't really have any idea what we spend so I think that seems like a good place to start to see how we get on.

I'm looking forward to being more active in these forums now

£0/300

elsiepac · 2 July 2017 at 11:16AM

Save_Dosh wrote: »

I'm going to try to concentrate on stores - I have a ton of white & brown rice, but got a bit put off with the arsenic claims, so not sure I can bring myself to use it, do others worry about stuff like this, probably not huh - we shall see

With dry goods I'm not bothered tbh - I guess in my head it's dry so can't be bad, and of course it'll get boiled for ages anyway! I can't imagine there's any logic to that,
of course, but there you go!

My thing I get funny about (I mean, really, really squeamish about) is flour. I go through phases of buying flour then throwing away the bags because I'm worried they will have those little bugs in. I used to keep all different flours, and I kept them in big kilner style jars (Rocco they are called).
One day I thought I saw something moving and lo and behold, in a jar of organice natural wholewheat flour, there were little beetle things EVERYWHERE.

UGH

Now I have to keep it in the freezer and even then I'm funny about it!

Florence_J · 2 July 2017 at 11:24AM

Elsiepac, I thought you might be the best person to ask as I seem to remember you mentioning it before, I have a tub of Nutritional Yeast (nooch?) in my cupboard that has been untouched since I bought it, what can I do with it to use it up?

elsiepac · 2 July 2017 at 12:12PM

Florence_J wrote: »

Elsiepac, I thought you might be the best person to ask as I seem to remember you mentioning it before, I have a tub of Nutritional Yeast (nooch?) in my cupboard that has been untouched since I bought it, what can I do with it to use it up?

Oooooh yummy, yummy, yummy... lucky you! I just luuuuuuurve Nooch!
Here aresome uses for you:

1. In sauce for cooked grains and veg,like this recipe from Oh She Glows. The sauce is sooo good and all you do is chuck everything in a blender then stir it through. You could stir through roast vegetables, use as a really thick and delicious salad dressing, or top a baked potato perhaps! Here's just sauce recipe from OSG (if you don't always have tahini in the cupboard like I do, then a nut butter would be a very good sub. If you get chance, do try with tahini though, as it's REALLY yummy!)
Lemon-Tahini sauce:
1 large garlic clove.
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice.
1/4 cup tahini.
3 to 4 tablespoons nutritional yeast, to taste.
3 to 4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, to taste.
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt.

2. Sprinkled on EVERYTHING - it's particularly nice on baked beans, or on avocado on toast.

3. Make some parmesan subtitutes!
If you have hemp seeds, try mixing about 6 tbsps each of nooch and hemp seeds, add 1/2 - 1 tsp good salt, and pound in a peslte and mortar - this is a raw substitute and is good on pasta or salad etc.
Or you can do a toasted nut version, which is also delicious...
Try toasting sesame seeds and almonds, then adding nooch and some salt and whizzing together.
Or use pecans!

4. Mix it into soups...yum!

Errr run out of steam now, but hope that helps!Report back!
!

[Deleted User] · 2 July 2017 at 6:39PM

Hallo!
I'd like to do this challenge..not been around for ages but definitely wanting to get back into my money saving ways! Would like to do £120 (for 2 of us) till the 2nd august :j

Suzywoozy8 · 2 July 2017 at 6:58PM

So, first week down and some quite big spends, but have bout all the nappies, formula and meat we should need for the month, I'm also quite please with how little we have gone to Tesco Express, which used to be almost daily as it is opposite our house! But with the rate I've spent this week I am starting to see why we spend so much. We haven't done any entertaining yet this month either. That comes out of the same budget. I did use what we already had in the cupboards to take snacks to a quiz night though, which was unusually resourceful for me as I would usually go and spend a few quid on snacks before going.

So, anyway, this weeks spends: £193.49/£400.

Thanks for all the inspiration. You are all helping me think about what I spend before doing so. Here's to a cheaper week!!

PennyGrabber · 2 July 2017 at 7:02PM

Hi everyone.

I was really cross yesterday. It'd already been a pretty rubbish day, lots of little annoyances, but then I was cooking dinner - late- and the chicken smelt funny... So two chicken breasts, a pepper, five mushrooms and two onions chucked away. As it was already really late, I just drive round the corner to the chippy. Fuming!!!

Today has been much better. Just had a lovely dinner, no chicken in sight, and about to have strawberries from the pick your own for pudding.

'Weekly' shop yesterday came to £2.83. Just got bread, bananas and something else, as I knew I'd have no time to shop today. I'll probably need to get some stuff during the week.

PG x

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July 2017 Grocery Challenge

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