September 2008 Grocery Challenge. Please read first two posts.

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FairyElephant wrote: »

Just popping in with an update on how I'm doing so far.......

EEEK! - it's only 9th Sept and I've spent over half my budget - £75.88 to be precise, leaving me only £54.12 to go.......

Actually - it's not as bad as it seems:

I've stocked up on rice & pasta (in the expectation that prices are gonna rise due to the bad harvests, so bulk-bought when on offer) - probably got enough to last 3 months at the moment! If things get tight later in the month I'll adjust the budget and take out 2/3 of the cost of this, but if I can manage not to I guess I'll be doing really really well this month!

We're away on hols from 20th to 27th, so this month is a week less than normal (taken into account in my challenge total of £130).

Managed to keep religiously to my meal-plan so far this month - apart from SK's eating all the roast meat & potatoes on Sunday that I had planned as cold meat and bubble&squeak for yesterday! Resorted to my 'emergency' supplies shelf and used tin of stewed steak & packet of instant mash with the leftover veg

On the downside, we've got several of people coming tomorrow nite to watch the footie, and I've got to feed them! (not that I am not pleased to have them - you know what I mean! and it is our 'turn'). Will pick up some of Mr A's £1.00 frozen pizzas on the way home I hope - if they have any left - got a £2 voucher card from them last week as I had been overcharged on something the week before, so that'll help towards.

Hope everyone doing OK.

FE

Hi FairyElephant,

I think you may have meant to post this on the Grocery Challenge thread so I'll move it over there for you.

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MRSMCAWBER

Afternoon all

Quick update-

1. 2 huge caulis @ 69c / 55p
2. huge broccoli - 99c / 80p
3. big bag fresh nobby greens (brussels) 99c / 80p
4. 2 fresh chickens @ €2.69 / £2.12
5. 24 x 1.5litre fizzy water €4.56 /£3.50
6. 5 blocks yeast @ 9c / 7p

So I have spent €13.75 taking me to a total of €20.54 and im half way through my month :T and I really can't think of anything else i will need before next month :j

Im planning a huge broccoli/cauli cheese -and will freeze some up for having with jacket potatoes later on,
Im also going to give the recipe I have found for cauli cheese lasagne a go
Tomorrow I will roast 1 chicken (the other is wedged in the freezer) then i will do a roast dinner on Thursday and strip the rest off and s-t-r-e-t-c-h it into allsorts of other meals;)
Have a loaf of bread proving in tis tin, and have roasted off yet more tomatoes :T -just about to bag them up and freeze with the others

I have mown the lawn and cleared out the tubs with finished crops... so now im planning what and where im growing next season :j ...so now im off to knit/x stitch woohhooo .. have a lovely afternoon all

Money_saving_Diva_2

Did well yesterday and made the sausage and bean and tinned tomato casseroley thing and a huge apple crumble with plenty left of both for tonight. We ran out of bread though so went to Sainsburys and they had three packs of their granary and crusty bread rolls for £1 so froze 8 of them and had two for lunch with home grown tomatoes and cheese. The other two we will have with dinner.

To all you people resisting temptation - You make me feel even more embarrassed about our sunday night slip into Dominoes land!! :rotfl:

Greent - love the idea of the quesedillas, thank you, we shall definately try that this week - I had put 'mince meal' on the menu for Thurs without deciding what to do, but now I have!!

hugs to everyone

Diva.x

SmlSave

this being my first grocery challagne i think you would all be proud!

I've spent £60 of the budget and hopefully - fingers crossed - this should last us two weeks.

I did some bulk cooking this weekend and made lasgne, meat stew and pasta sauces. Ta Da!

Also found some lentils in the cupboard and a can of hotdogs so its lentil and sausage soup tonight.

4Moneysaver

Hi all, just swung by to update my sig. I'm off from work at the mo with a chest infection and bored stoopid but yesterday I made bread (by hand) which has converted me to baking rather than buying as it's not just cheaper but really satisfying too. I also found a huge 5 litre container of white vinegar in my local Asian supermarket for £2.80 so I snapped it up and it'll last me forever.

Chell

Hovis bread mix - it is back to full price in Asda which I think is 77p. There is a SEL for the wholemeal saying 2 for £1 but it isn't against the white and granary.

The bread mix offer got me into the habit if making bread so now I've bought the ingrediants to make it from scratch. I've been mixing it in the breadmaker then baking it in the oven for a better shaped loaf. It isn't money saving as we are using more!

I'm doing really well with the challenge, we aren't spending a fortune on food but we are eating very well. I've been making sure there is always homemade cake or biscuits instead of buying treats. It isn't only cheaper but it is nice to know exactly what is in the food. DS no longer has Tropicanna Go bottles with his packed lunch but a nice thermos bottle with an ice section and filled with squash. That is saving a £1 or 2 a week and also reducing waste.

I need a recipe for a loaf type cake to make later. I've eggs to use up but no weetabix or yoghurt so can't do those types of loaves. Any ideas?

jackie_w

Hi,

Just to let you know if you have a Farmfoods near you to check it out, my local Farmfoods are selling 24 bottles of Fruit Shoots (orange & blackcurrent flavours) for £3.89.


Jackie

ravylesley

Another NSD for me but its been a productive days as I've been cooking all the blackberries,apples and crab apples that we've picked over the last few weeks.I've got 4 big tubs of Blackberry and Apple pie filling for either pies,crumbles or sponges and 2 jars of blackberry jelly,6 jars of blackberry and crab apple jam and I reckon about 2-3 jars of crab apple jelly to make tomorrow cant be certain how much crab apple jelly cos its still dripping Got 1/2 a pig and 1/2 a lamb coming tomorrow so that will eat into my monthly allowance but cant be helped we need the meat and its cheaper to buy in bulk

Lesleyxx

Purple_Sparkles

I've had a great few NSD's - went camping at the weekend and took lots of my own food & drink so didn't need to spend there. I've spent 2.95 in the last two days, spuds & essential (to my son) ice-cream!

Still I'm still feeling very positive about keeping within budget this month.

Rowan9

I've had a few NSDs so am pleased with the way it's going after a blip of worrying that it was going too early. Anyone else think money seems to be going more quickly this month?
We had a chicken on Sunday - £8 from our butcher. We've had 3 'roast' dinners from it along with sandwiches for 2 people for 2 days. There is still enough to do 'something' with and I'm going to stir up the chicken, some cooked veg, mashed potatoes and mix it all with a tin of Scotch broth (last bit not very OS but I have no soup on the go at the moment). Then you just put it into a dish and bake in oven. It's delicious and eeks out that last bit of chicken that would be small on 2 plates. Buying the bigger chicken saves a lot on sandwich meat for our packed lunches, I think.
w