How much do you spend on food?

Dora_the_Explorer_5

I nuke mine for 2 mins on 800 and add sugar cos I have a sweet tooth. Porrage is a good way to start the day as it sits in your tum like a haystack and wards off hunger pangs until lunchtime - moneysaving! It's also good for keeping your innards in good working order and keeping your cholesterol level down and best of all.........it's cheaper than chips.

purplepixi

I've never really thought about how much I spend per week per person, as I do the shopping monthly.

But just working it out. I spend £60-70 per month on shopping for 2 adults and 1 child (and 2 gerbils). So in a 4 week month that would be £5.83 per week per person.

Which I think is pretty good. My daughter asked if she could have school lunches instead of a luch box. The school charges £1.70 for a school lunch. And I worked out that on average her lunch box only costs me 0.44p to make, that includes, yoghert, apple, chrisps, biscuit and sandwiches (I only buy value tesco's food).

Although I say its £5.83 per week per person, it would probably not work out like that, as my husband eats no breafast, has a home made sandwhich for lunch and a proper dinner - so he would probably be less than my daughter who has breakfast, full lunch box and a proper dinner. So it depends on the person really.

houndour

I spent £70 to £80 every 2 weeks, plus probably about another £10 topping up on bread and veg....so £45 a week per person (that includes veg for bunnies). Thats for 2 of us. I used to spend just £20 a week when I was at uni.

Makes me think that I could really cut down on our shopping. The increase is mainly down to my bf. He eats a lot of fruit and drinks a lot of coke. Although I now limit him to 24 can pack to last 4 weeks. The only other thing he'll drink is Ribena and at nearly £5 for a bottle it's not cheap.

The other problem I find is time and my fussiness. I don't like ready meals or processed food, so we tend to buy 'real' meat like lamb chops and Whole chickens. For us a small chicken at £3 only lasts 1 meal and sandwiches the next day.

My cheapest meal has to be a tomatoe sauce: 4 tins of 'basic' plum tomatoes, garlic, basil, oregano, olive oil (expensive but lasts a long time), 1 jar of puree...all mashed up. Add some meat of choice - beef is best for flavour - I add a piece of steak at about £4. simmer for ages, like 3 or 4 hours, stirring occassionally. Serve with pasta. For us (as I don't eat much of the sauce) this meal can be frozen for really quick future dinners. And I get 5 meals for 2 people out of it

sans_2

houndour wrote:

The increase is mainly down to my bf. He eats a lot of fruit and drinks a lot of coke. Although I now limit him to 24 can pack to last 4 weeks. The only other thing he'll drink is Ribena and at nearly £5 for a bottle it's not cheap.

Tesco did have Ribena on BOGOF last week although I struggled to get more than a couple of bottles as it was all sold out.

Beccal_3

I spend £8 a week for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and eat really really well. Tis money pays for toiletries and dog food too!

I found i used to spend about 20 per week when i brought ready made things and processed crap. now i have gone back to basics, fish, meat and veg, all fresh, it so much cheaper to live!

rchddap1

Something that has worked for us is that my OH comes with me shopping. He walks down the isles with me and sees the packets and prices on the shelf. We both work out where it is best to spend the budget and the money that we have. Once we have gone through the tills I check the receipt....comment on how much money we've saved...and if I'm happy that we're under or over budget.

Its something that we both do together.

That way we both know exactly where we are in terms of our grocery budget. Quite often he'll spot something on the shelf (non-branded) that is cheaper than the stuff he would normall have (Sugar puffs are a good example) and will say that he's happy to try them to see what they're like.

hlessinvest

I have found this thread interesting but having just done some back of the envelope calculations I spend approx £120 per week feeding just two people the things they like, then when I add things like tea, sugar flour,butter, milk,eggs etc but not cleaning supplies into the equation it comes to around £150 a week.

Also most of my stuff comes from the supermarket as that is open when I leave work or before I go to work. Also lunchtimes when I could go to things like grocers and such I would rather spend walking the dog.

I think also where my diet seems to be different from everyone elses seems to be we do not have pasta, rice or any sauce based recipes apart from soup as we do not like tomatoes. Also although I homemake all of our meals and desserts I still do not think its is cheaper to make somethings, for instance we have home made trifle once a week, 1/2 bottle sherry + pint cream + homemade custard + fresh strawberries + leftove sponge cake my calc makes that approx cost of £7 to buy a really nice one would not cost more than £ 3.50.

Looking at my quick sums as well I can see that I also have enough spare capacity in the food I do buy to have some for visitors.

Eg Sunday roast half Leg of pork or home made steak pie with around 1 1/2 kg of steak or beef joint topside around 2 kg. + assorted veg + trifle + fruit cake+ sponge pudding . Normally Sunday lunch caters for 4 but usually it normally seems to be about eight people there.

During the week we also have relatives in for most of the day so that adds 2 extra people for morning tea + dinner + sometimes tea in the evening.

Usually during the week we have main dinners like homemade fish/chips, boiled gammon with salad, mid week roast pork chops or steak. Plus they all have dessert.

Although I am at work my house is never empty when I get in and when I leave there are always people about wanting food, so although there are only 2 people living there there are normally around four people in and out everyday.

Also there is the dog his food is approx £45 per month.

vintagegirl

Beccal wrote: »

I spend £8 a week for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and eat really really well. Tis money pays for toiletries and dog food too!

I found i used to spend about 20 per week when i brought ready made things and processed crap. now i have gone back to basics, fish, meat and veg, all fresh, it so much cheaper to live!

id be interested to know what your menu is like to help me bring down my food budget can you give me an idea of what you eat

natlie

Hi

Im managing £67 a week for 3 adults and 2 children at the moment - my eldest is off to uni soon

that around £13 per person we eat mostly vegan, my husband and daughter eat fish, my other children still eat dairy

a typical day:

breakfast toast/porridge or cereal
lunch sandwich/soup or beans on toast
dinner dhal, homemade naan bread, homemade onion bhajis and rice

the kids snack a lot: apples, homemade cereal bars, crisps (value brand), cereal, veg sticks and hummus, bananas, tinned fruit, yogurt etc

SuperMoose

vintagegirl wrote: »

id be interested to know what your menu is like to help me bring down my food budget can you give me an idea of what you eat

The post from Beccal is from 2005 so may not be relevant now