January 2006 Grocery Challenge

Gambit

Well after reading all the posts here I am def up for joining this grocery challenge! I have to say its been great reading all these posts and the suggestions that people have about how to save money on simple things like food. I have been using this site for over a few years now but only ever really looked at Martins articles and didnt really go into the forums but thats changed over the last few days and I'm glad it has. I'm amazed at all the tips that are given and how supportive everyone is!:j

Ok, as for my situation. I am a young money saver in my early 20's but am the type of person that keeps an eye on my finances. My food budget has tried to be around £40 a week adding up to a massive £160 a month and I'm a single bloke! :eek: But having only left home under a year ago I think the reason for this high spend is my lack in cooking skills. Dont get me wrong, I can cook but cheat a lot using packets of sauces and such which I think costs more then it should. I am fully prepared to cook but the problem comes when I get home from work at around 6/6:30 not in the mood to cook so I just cook some pasta or something and add in some sauce....:rolleyes:

But having read all the views on this site I will be trying to do the following:

Plan my meals in advance
• Cook more then one or 2 portions and freeze the leftovers
• Buy more frozen foods (although the problem with this and the first suggestion is that I dont have a lot of freezer space
• Buy a steam cooker and try out some new receipes that way
• Try to cook more from scratch

I will be starting on the 1st Feb and my target for the month will be £100. My debts are my priority this year so I hope to be able to reduce this further over the next few months, hopefully to around £60 a month if I'm lucky...

I would be grateful to any other suggestions that people have that may help.

[size=+1]Good luck to all![/size]

kiwichick

Mrsbojangles wrote:

BTW congratulations on your weight loss, how have you done it? I need to lose quite a bit of weight too xx

Hiya,

Why not join us over on [post=1365520]THIS[/post] thread in the Arms. Its a bunch of us encouraging each other to eat healthily, cheaply and excercise more. We find it easier if there are a bunch of us to jolly things along. Everyone is more than welcome to join in.

HTH,
Al.

Interest-Ed

I've just read this thread and very inspirational it is too.

Co-incidentally I'd just listed all last year's spend on a spreadsheet and the amount on food for 4 of us was quite an eye-opener!!! :eek:

We have been renovating the house though and for some time were living with a very basic kitchen which could only be described as indoor camping! and being up to the elbows in d-i-y had seen us, as dust settled, ordering a take-away chinese or slipping down the pub for a quick bite.

So this year - with nearly a brand-new kitchen completed! I'm going to start reading some of the money-saving ideas then set myself the challenge - 1st March will be the start date.

The one good thing is that as I put things away in my "new" cupboards I'll know exactly what I've got. (no-more furry jars lurking at the back ...) :rotfl:

swizzlebabe

I`ve done it! I`ve come in under budget. Although we did have quite abit of stuff still in. But then again we still have!

Going to bring the budget down to £175 this month- feb starts today for me as OH got paid yesterday.

Going to go to Lidls and the local farm shop today, then shop online for the other stuff.

Been menu planning by what we already had in, and put a list on fridge at beginning of the week of what we were having for tea each night. Even trying to get the whole family to eat the same, although that did mean the children had garlic bread and brocoli for tea the other night- they did not like pasta in sauce- although the little one did eat pasta on it`s own. They had fruit for pudding so sure they will not come to too much harm!

Mrsbojangles_2

Well done Swizzlebabe! Keep up the good work x

skystar

My month finished on the 19th of January and from a £260 combined budget for both food and diesel I came in at £196.25 (split £93.50 for food and £102.75 for diesel). This is for 2 adults and a nine year old and includes packed lunches for school and work.

Don't know if I should be worried that I spend more on diesel for the car than on food ?!?!? I do have about 45 mile round trip to work each day though.

:j

kiwichick

My month finishes on the 24th and we ought to come in bang on budget this month once I've got the last milk run done. Thing is though its still too damn high so I REALLY need to work at my feb challenge. Normally I budget £75pw for 2 adults and 3 kids (2 in nappies full time), no pets. This works out at £10.71 per day. I think to begin with I'll try for £10 per day and do more of my own cooking. Bought an apple crumble from iceland yesterday which used to be my fave but it was rank _pale_ am used to HM now:D

Essex-girl_2

Really pleased as came in under budget but it was a strange month - had loads leftover from Xmas but also bought a large chest freezer and filled it up.

Not going to do it for Feb as going on hol for 2 weeks but will def be starting again 1st March!

Janeryan

So far I have spent £322.74 but that was from the 16 December as we got paid early for Christmas so thats 5 weeks worth(and still have until the 28th when we get paid to go) so that works out to just under £65.00 per week.Over budget which is normally £50.00 a week but does include all my Christmas food and drink and hopefully will not need anything else till after Friday so all in all not too bad.

Need to menu plan and cut down next month though as now owe ourselves for new car and double glazing so need to start paying ourselves back.Still it's a nice short month coming up!

dooj

Im pretty OS now since signing up on this site but what is confusing me is how the grocery challenge works? I usually spend about £25.00-£30.00 on shopping a week (sometimes a bit less) i do all my meal planning etc but still dont feel like i am saving. So what i want to ask is what is the best way to actually notice the saving. Me and my OH have alternative shopping weeks when we pay for the shopping, what im thinking is that we should have a cash budget that we both contribute to (im thinking 120.00 for feb) then anything we have left over at the end of the month becomes savings for nice stuff (not sure what yet but want a weeked in dublin sometime this year) but im worried that this wont be enough and then we wont have any savings. But if we put more into grocery money then we are not really saving as we may aswell put an amount of money in a pot at the end of the week?
Can any one advise me as to what is the best way to actually see the savings we are making.