September 2008 Grocery Challenge. Please read first two posts.

lainz

Can I declare at £111.12 for September. Not too worried as I've stockpiled cat food that was on offer (although Mr M has it on offer now - so maybe I'll get some more :cool: )

Can you put me down for £88.88 for October and see how it goes!

Julimk

Have just updated my siggy following a MrT shop today.

I have the best part of 2KG of mince in the freezer, so I think mince dishes are going to feature heavily in October! Today’s shop included 1KG of red lentils (£1.52 – this is cheaper than even the local asian grocer) and 375g soya mince (99p) to pad out the meat mince without noticing too much & for very little cost.

As an exercise, to see how I was doing compared to previous months, I fished out as many receipts as I could for the last couple of months (I tend to keep them anyway). In August (just based on the receipts I have) I spent £315.21 on groceries :eek: . May have been slightly skewed due to school hols, but July was still £228.40! So with just a few days of September to go, I am feeling quite pleased with myself .

Over the weekend (DD will be with her Dad) I will work out October’s meal plan & start batch cooking some mince dishes.

Usually the most convenient time to shop is shortly after 9am when have dropped DD at school (on the days I am working at home) but there aren’t a lot of whoopsies at that time of day! One more shop for this month, on Saturday. As DD will be with her Dad & enough money still in the budget, I will go after 5pm & see what bargains I can get!

Juli

Winky,_The_House_Elf

Blew the budget last night! bought lots of reduced to clear stuff (Matured steak reduced 75% to £3 Free range eggs 41p etc) and stocked up on lots of store cupboard things like tins of toms, bread flour, oats etc so I don't feel too bad, especially as its my first month and a guess.

I need to fish out my recipe but the damage was about £60ish, so I will be over by about £45 so far...


Will be back and update my siggy tomorrow.

c-m

You have £25 only for food each week. You exercise more than the average UK person so need around 3500kcal per day. The only real accessible place is a large supermarket (not aldi/lidl)

What would your shopping list look like?

Uncle_Ben

Top of the list, rice.

anguk

Pasta, beans/pulses (instead of meat), porridge oats & peanut butter. All the big supermarkets do value versions that are just as good but alot cheaper than the branded stuff.

angelatgraceland

gemma1984 wrote: »

I wanted to ask what you all thought of this budget, as we are finding it very difficult to live by but have no other means of stretching it any.

The £100 is to cover all food bills. We usually do a monthly shop for meat and cupboard items and then just use the left over money for interim stuff like bread, milk, sandwich filler etc etc. But we're finding that we are always ending up digging in to our savings or elsewhere to afford the interim stuff, and this is without the baby even being here yet!!!!!:eek:

Do you think maybe that in today's climate £100 for two adults and a fully formula fed baby is not really very realistic or do you think we are doing it all wrong?

We always buy own brand when we can, always take adantage of BOGOF's etc....

My own experience of monthly shops rather than weekly or almost daily is that they tend to be more expensive because you cant buy whoopsied meat, take advantage of the ever changing offers from store to store etc. I get nearly all meat reduced and basically unless it has a sticker on it I dont buy it. This is impossible on a monthly shop. Same with offers on milk-I trek store to store as necessary according to what is on offer(within reason)so I make great savings. I dont know your situation and if you cannot get out and about to do this for whatever reason it is making life more expensive for you.
It also made me have a tendancy to buy things I didnt really need in anticipation of weeks ahead whereas shopping often I dont have to plan more than a couple of days ahead. I have NSDs and often only take out the amount of money I am prepared to spend. As far as your budget goes I can only answer the part regarding you two-and not the formula feed. formula is something you cant economise on except if the health centre sell it at a special price? I know they did at one time rather a long time ago.
I spend £75pw on food only for 5 people so £15 pp per week. That involves trekking around. So in theory on those figures you would spend more than you do now. Personally I could cut back more but choose not to as I dont need to. Mealplanning definitely makes the biggest difference and when I planned I didnt spend so much. Some of the "interim things" are the ones which break the budget I found in the past. you say sandwich filler? Umm whats that? Its a little plastic tub costing about £1 I think and for that I can make about 3 or 4 times what it contains. Its little changes which make big impact. When I worked in Iceland I tried a couple of these fillers. Enough to do a couple of sarnies. I now boil 3 or 4 eggs and add some mayo and salt and pepper and make a big dish of egg mayo or tuna mayo(very cheap)pasta with mayo and tuna(very cheap) sausages sliced in sarnies, homegrown salads in summer,there are ways but again-its the meal planning which saves the money as "anything in a hurry costs more money."
I dont know if any of this is possible for you but if it is it will help. Your budget is tight though and you can only stretch it so far so it sounds like you are doing quite well to me. Well done!

Nigella_2

Value Tuna, Sardines, Pears, Apples, Oranges, Peppers, Courgettes, Onions, Carrots, Skimmed Milk. Cereal Offers/Value Oats. Bake own bread. Garlic from market etc.
I had budget of £21 pw and managed to do fairly well. Now on £35 pw so live like a KING!! (now add Mackerel/Salad/Mushrooms/chopped toms etc.)

pretz_2

ok im a dancer so pretty up on diets.

the things i generally live on are
porridge
bannanas
eggs
chicken
fish - preferably oily
sweet pots - low gi so good for sustaining energy
beans/ pulses
pasta - try to keep to wholemeal
rice- try to keep to brown
stir frys - i use the 1cal spray to minimise on fats
skimmed milk
brown bread
tofu - doesnt taste great but a good source of protein
avocados - good source of fats
nuts - good source for fats
jelly - great if you have a sweet tooth

also plenty of veg, water and sometimes if i really fancy it dark chocolate but only a few squares, dark is best to go for as it has the least amount of sugars and milk solids added.

try to avoid red meat although this is a good source of protein it also contains large amounts of fats, avoid full fat milk it can aid in dehydration as the fats are harder to digest.

Sorry if im teaching granma to suck eggs but nutrionist is important to me as i am and never will be a diet coke and marlbrough lights girl lol

angelatgraceland

SJC31 wrote: »

This will be my first grocery challenge. As I've never done it before, can anyone suggest a budget for me. I've just got myself to look after. I'm fairly good at cooking from scratch too, so I'm off to look at the recipes.


Suggestions please......

Well I dont know what you normally spend so judging by my own I can suggest £15 per week. If that sounds awful start with £20 and bring it down a fiver per month until you feel it is right.
Meal planning and keeping a diary is the most effective way to make savings.
You can probably bring it down to about £12 per week if you try hard(some manage even less). Just make sure you buy the oats and lentils and you should save a fortune. Check how many weeks you are counting for October for the challenge so you can declare a suitable amount. Allow a bit more rather than less-don't try too much too quick.

bertiebots wrote: »

I just thaught I would pop on and say my unofficial gc came to £205 this month so not too bad. Still not convinced about doing a store cupboard monthly shop though as this hasnt actually saved me anything so I may just go back to weekly! For the first week of my next challange I have only spent £20 yayeeeeeeeee!

Well done bertiebots. Yes the monthly shop doesnt work for everyone-we all have different ways-whatever works for you is the answer! Keep up the good work.

I made spag bol tonight with 250g lean mince. I added about a cup of uncooked lentils to this and a jar of sauce and a tin of toms. It was enough for 6 people but some of us had seconds!!! It was rather nice.
Managed to get reduced milk again today. 4 pints for 80p so I bought 2 of them.Still have lots of bread from my store of it in the freezer. Did online Asda shop tonight-took ages-my keyboard stopped working! All fixed now though! Asda came to about £60 and Ive booked it for Sunday but as normal-I may postpone it a day or two. OH asked what time I was going shopping tomorrow-errr-Im not! Except for D.I.Y. stuff. Wants me to pick up some lager for him with my shopping. Yeah right-I only have to go to the boot of my car for that-rations well hidden! No work for nearly a week so hopefully will try some mealplanning and cooking.

Ah Nikki-thanks-now done the multi-quote! Take care of yourself and best wishes in everything you do.