How To Save Money On Food

MrsPitcher2b

I know this sint strictly debt free, but it is as it will help me get there quicker!!

I noticed in a few threads some people stated they spend £50 a week on food for their family, someone even mentioned £50 for nearly two weeks.

I just wondered what meals i can do/what i can buy which will save us some money - its only me and OH, no pets etc - but we always seem to spend about £80-£100 a week - mostly on drinsk (non alcoholic) but it does seem a lot.

What meals can i cook which will help keep the budget down?

binty

Have a trawl through the old style board, those people are amazing!

whatatwit

MrsPitcher, have a look on the Old Style board.

There are quite a few threads and a lot of them have recipe ideas and ways of bulking out the more expensive items

There is a monthly grocery challenge also.

Miss_Piggy_2

Why not have a look at the Moneysaving Oldstyle forum, loads of ideas on there for cheaper meals.

I tend to spend about £30 a week on me, hubby and toddler so £80-£100 seems a huge amount to me!

What drinks do you buy that bumps this up?? My OH used to live on pepsi but I've managed to get him to cut back and drink supermarket own brand instead.

Miss P
xx

MrsPitcher2b

Its cos we drink fresh juice - health concious daddy and i am not too keen on fizzy. We do get fizzy if its on special - but yeh i do prefer supermarket own brands for fizzy.

I dont liek from concentrate so its a biugger there as they are the cheapest - perhsaps i should make a sacrifice for a while!!

Used to buy water - then decided i am not paying for something i can get from a tap!! (Plus work provide water so i fill up here lol)

Ok thanks everyone will have a look on the Oldstyle thread - didnt realise there was one!!

Naomim

I found this on the old style forum. It's bl**dy amazing! :j

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=750489

HTH

Naomi x

Idiophreak

MrsPitcher2b wrote: »

but we always seem to spend about £80-£100 a week - mostly on drinsk (non alcoholic) but it does seem a lot.

Yeah, that does sound a lot! As others have said, pop over to the OS board and have a read.

In the meantime, think of the holiday you and OH could have if you saved, say £50/week on your shopping - over 2.5k per year...

Personally, I think a good way of doing it is to mix "real cheap" meals with "better" ones...so get some cheap fish and chips from iceland or whatever - have those with a tin of beans one night - probably under £1 each. Next night, maybe spag bol - £2 a head. Then pasta bake - £1 each, then turkey stir fry - £2 each...The OS board will have a *stack* of recipes for <£2 each...If you get your average down to, say, £1.50 each per meal, that's £21/week + brekki, lunch and drinks. That should be quite easy to achieve and should certainly halve the amount you're spending. When you start getting a bit more "hardcore" about it, you can drive the prices down even further.

General DFW advice also applies - keep a spending diary for a couple of weeks, see where your money's going - it'll be worth "analysing" your big shop receipts, split the stuff into categories (dinners, lunches, brekkie, cleaning, drinks etc) and see what categories most of your spend goes on. Seeing it in black and white can actually be quite enlightening.