Help - Weekly Food Bill cost

tigger200272

[SIZE=6]Hi
I am trying to reduce my debts. With the help of this site and CAB I am doing okay. However,I think I need to reduce my average weekly food bill. I can't seem to do this and wondered what the average food bill is a week for 2 adults, a 3 year old, a 5 year old and a 10 year old (who comes every other weekend and half of school holidays).

Oh I also get cat (4 cats) and gerbil (2 gerbils) food and stuff as well as a pack of nappies every two-three weeks for the 3 year old.

I am going to potty train her soon so then I wont have to pay for nappies.

NB. I shop at local tesco (about 9 miles away) as our local shops are too expensive. [/SIZE]

Magentasue

I have four children (11-20) so there's six of us. I can't get our shopping bill (includes one dog and two cats) below £75 a week. That's everything (cleaning stuff, shampoo etc) and I would recommend Aldi/Lidl and market stalls.

Jet

Have a look at the old style board - they've got lots of ideas on how to cut weekly shopping bills.

exessexmum

Hi
I have 4 children, from 6 months to 6 years and our shopping bill is £60 a week, online from tesco including the delivery charge, and all of the kids are in night time nappies and the baby is in daytime nappies. We also have 3 chickens, 3 gerbils and 4 guinea pigs.
Firstly make sure you get hold of the Tesco codes as that covers your delivery charge at least.
Tesco own brand nappies are fab, don't pay the premium for Pampers.
Do your menu plan for the week, only buy the ingredients you need and by shopping online you dont get tempted to buy extras.
Own brand cereal is the same as Kellogs. Trust me, I have the Kellogs boxes, buy the own brand stuff and siphon it into the Kellogs box. Have been doing it for months and my DH who will only eat Kellogs has no idea LOL!
Meals like toad in the hole, spag bol and shepherds pie are cheap and filling. My kids would eat this sort of thing all the time. Jacket spuds are another cheap meal, we have all of these once a week.
Buy fresh meat and then freeze it. If you buy ready frozen you pay for the water. And it mushes down when you cook it and makes less.
Tesco own brand washing powder is excellent. I use half the quantity they say on the box and my clothes are still spotless.
I dont buy fresh veg. It goes off too quickly and we dont use enough. I buy frozen, its got all the vitamins still but you can use what you need. Market veg is a waste of money as its more often than not the class 2-3 stuff and goes off really quickly. Only buy it if you can cook it that day.
Tracey

Magentasue

Agree with most of what essexmum says but ... Market veg is brilliant! Depends on the market, I suppose. The fruit and veg at ours is excellent and very cheap half an hour before they pack up but it's a few miles away from me so I don't bother unless I'm going that way. I only use frozen peas and sweetcorn as standbys, have to have fresh veg most days. To me frozen and tinned veg are tasteless in comparison but that's just my opinion. I shop every five days and buy enough veg for the week and keep most in the fridge. Anything like broccoli that doesn't store well gets used first, carrots and things like savoy cabbage keep a few days easily. I grow veg in the summer and only buy things like runner beans in season and like essexmum have chickens for eggs.

Meal planning and cooking from scratch (and in bulk if you can) is the key. It doesn't take much longer to make two pies than one and you can freeze one for later. Plan around what you already have and make a list for what you need.

I use Aldi and Lidl a lot now, I used to think they didn't have what I wanted but I've got used to them now. There are a couple of things I buy branded but generally use Tesco/Asda's own.

Sweet_Pea_2

Hi,
I used to spend £75 - £80 per week for 2 adults and 2 kids, (7 and 10) at Sainsburys.
I always felt this was too high, so when I was off work over the summer holidays and had more time I tried the grocery challenge on the Old Style board. I decided to shop around at different supermarkets but there are not many by me to try. The first place I tried was Aldi and I have been shopping there ever since. I buy as much as I can from Aldi, there is still some branded stuff we get at Sainsburys every week, but we are now eating much much better than before and my average food bill is £58 per week. I love Aldi stuff it is great!

The only other thing I have done to reduce bills is to stop buying ready meals and make my own. I have a big cook in every few weeks and make loads of stuff from the freezer - fish pie, shepherds pie etc and freeze for days when I have limited time.

My next challenge Im going to try after Christmas is meal planning to see if that reduces the bill further because people on the Old Style board reckon this is a major contributing factor to reducing food bills.
Good luck!

Magentasue

I do meal planning but not rigidly. I have a list of seven meals, put the missing ingredients on my shopping list. That way I know I have what I meed for dinner every day but I do the meals according to how I feel and often do something different!

Another thing I do is double up - so if I make tomato sauce for 'stew' (ratatouille type), I make double and either freeze half the stew or use half for lasagne. Leftovers are liquidised for pizza topping. Same if I make cauliflower cheese, extra cheese sauce and defrosted stew from the freezer or fridge makes a lasagne for tomorrow. If we have mash, I make double and make cheese whirls (recipe on Old Style).

stellagypsy

Hi there

To reduce your shopping bill, do your main shop at ALDI - if you have a freezer, you can also include Farmfoods and / or iceland.

For us - family of 4 adults (inc 2 19 year old gluttons) - cost at Sainsbiurys / Tescos mostly buying "value" products = £75.00

Same stuff at ALDI etc - £51.00. It ws nicer and I think I actually got more for my money than I normally do at Tesco et al.

I also think Morrisons are good value, if you have one near you - lots of good BOGOF bargains - if I shop there I stil spend about £75 but if I buy what is on offer I have enough main ingredients from the BOGOFs to cover the best part of 2 weeks.

I don't like market fruit and veg either, but where I live we have a fabulous meat market which is good quality and cheap so I often buy there.

Make as much of your own stuff as you can - it's winter and home made soups go down a treat with kids, especially with a chunk of home made bread (dead easy to make) - my lot used to love it. Be creative - the current favourite in our hose is carrot and lentil - a cheap tin of carrots, tin of toms, veg stock and lentils plus seasoning to taste, cooked up for about half hour, whizzed in the blender - lovely!!

Use your slow cooker for cheaper cuts of meat / make bulk quantities and freeze it for "free" meals later in the month

Be creative - go on to the Old Style board, if they can't eke out your housekeeping,no one can!

Just keep trying - you'll get there!

HTH. Stella xx

Funky01

Hi,

In know this is a stupid question, but can smeone tell me the following:

If I make more than I need and freeze the extra, do I then need to defrost before cooking, or can it go straight in the oven? This is the only thing that stops me from doing this believe it or not! I'm a pretty good cook I think, but simple things like this confuse me!

Thanks!

Rebob

Lots of things can be reheated from frozen. Just make sure that it is heated all the way through.

purplepixi

My shopping bill is normally £60 - £70 per month.

There's 3 of us, 2 adults and one very hungery little girl.

I only shop online (I get trolley rage :mad: ), I use tescos, I only buy value food where it's available, and normal own brand when not (for those that are fussy, keep some old packaging and just put the new contents in, we do that with coffee and tea, no one can tell the difference).

Then each month, I use the favourites section and buy the same stuff I brought the month before - that way I'm not tempted because something is buy one get one free - when I wouldn't have normally brought it.

I make sure my Clubcard it set up for evouchers, so I get them for my points.

I then use https://www.tescovouchercodes.blogspot.com and use a code to get money off my shopping - I always try to get the £10 off £75 codes.

I brought my bill down from £160 to £60 per month doing this.

I also buy long life value milk - 10 litres for £3.50 - lasts nearly all month, and tastes just the same.

I always buy value bread - but when I've run out and don't want to go all the way to tescos, I still only buy the Spar own brand (although tescos is 25p and spars is 83p)

Anyway I hope thats helpful