October 2008 Grocery Challenge. Please read first two posts.

tango

Bitsy_Beans wrote: »

I spend roughly around £35 a week on two adults and one toddler. I also have a baby but get her milk on prescription (thank goodness as it's blinkin' expensive!). No pets or anything like that.
My H normally takes a packed lunch but I am on maternity leave at the moment so am at home. We eat plenty of chicken and turkey, sausages, bacon etc. I buy a lot of my meat from costco which is an expensive outlay initially but works out OK as it's good quality meat. Use a meal planner that works on a 6 week rotation so plenty of variety.

How does the meal planner work ? There are two adults,four children in my house ..and they all eat adult sizes..and cost a fortune,am trying to be more organized,and reduce costs:rolleyes:

rach

We spend about £200 monthly for 2 adults, though I think there's scope to get it down to about £150.

Think there are older threads on this, worth doing a search, and also worth looking at the Grocery Challenge thread at the top of old style

Bitsy_Beans

tango wrote: »

How does the meal planner work ? There are two adults,four children in my house ..and they all eat adult sizes..and cost a fortune,am trying to be more organized,and reduce costs:rolleyes:

I decided in advance what we are going to eat each night of the week (don't do this for lunches or breakfast). Then I check my stocks before going shopping and only buy what I need rather than filling the trolley with random stuff I may or may not use that week. I do cook most from scratch and buy a lot of Sainsbury's basics items (which I prefer to Tesco's). I am trying to get us used to eating a little less meat per portion than we were before. I have also tried using lentils (never really ventured down the pulse avenue before) as they are cheap and help stretch the food further. I have also started using dried soya mince to add to my minced beef steak to stretch that further too. Before I'd use 400g of mince between myself and H on spag bol. Now I add dried soya to it and can make more meals out of the stuff that I can freeze. We don't scrimp on portions but have more in the way of veg, pasta, rice and spuds and a little less meat.
have also started cooking whole chicken and picking the carcass to pieces and using the meat for various meals rather than just a roast on a sunday. Now use chicken legs and thighs for some receipes too which is something I never used to do.
It's a learning curve and my H isn't always keen on some experiments (he's not keen on chicken legs he's a breast man at heart :rotfl: ).
HTH

toffee65

I'm having go at reducing my (roughly) 600.00 a month shopping bill down to 200.00 (saving for a new kitchen) starting this Saturday.

It can be done...I can cook

Purple_Sparkles

I spend £25 - £30 per week for myself and my son who's 10. That includes ingredients for cleaning/toiletry products.

*Paris*

I usually spend between £100 - £150 per month, £150 is the absolute maximum though! This is for 2 adults and includes breakfast, lunch, dinner, cleaning products & toiletries.

inamess200

I currently spend around £450 per month on everything ( toiletries, cleaning and food) for 2 adults and 3 children - this has come down by about £200 a month and I am working on getting it lower.

I invested in a slow cooker from ebay (£4.21 - 6.5 litre swan) which means i can now make a cheap chicken last 2 meals and 400g mince with lentils last 2 meals which is unheard of. Today i have invested in a bread maker as I am sick of the plastic value stuff we eat alot so now I am going to bake my own.

I reckon if I was really organised ( i work fulltime and never seem to have enough hours in a day ) i could get it down by another £100

Flylady_Flower

Hi all,

Not been on here for a while, so hope everyone is well and keeping up with their budgets... especially important at the moment eh!


Mrs M - Just need to let you know a change of name so you can update the sheet (was denisefowler) - wanted to be a bit more inconspicuous :cool: - you never know who's looking :rotfl:

The budget is still on target if my 'in my head' figures are correct, but I still have to total the whole lot up - I think I have spent about £50 under at the moment and only have to get through till Friday (where has this month gone???) I will update final figures then... Take care guy's...

sistercas

about £80 a week for 2 adults and 2 teens and a cat cut down from £120 a week trying to reduce further by cooking from scratch freezing leftovers

Liz3yy

We spend between £35-40 per week usually on groceries for two adults, we've recently got into hunting down reduced items in Tesco and managed £28 last week and still have some of it left in the freezer