£100 monthly food budget?

Purple_Sparkles

You could try shopping at your local market for fruit and veg - I save quite a considerable amount compared to the supermarket.

Also pasta sauce, why not use chopped toms and add a few herbs and garlic etc... If you make a large batch and freeze some it will work out much cheaper than buying jars of sauce. We eat lots of pasta and for a month I would normally make a large sauce using 8 tins of chopped toms, 1 litre of passata, bulb of garlic, 4 onions, various mushrooms, bacon, whatever you fancy, basil, oregano, a bit of sugar, dash of olive oil - depends on my mood but that's kind of a basic sauce for us and lasts a month, I cook it for about an hour and then divide into portions.

If you leave it plain you can throw in whatever you fancy as you warm it up, bacon, mushrooms, tuna, chicken, soya chunks.

Good luck with your challenge.

teepoo

The kidney beans have just the right proportion of protein and carbohydrates for my training and they are only 14p per can!

Good point about the local market, I will look and see if one is running in my area.

I would make my own pasta sauce, but asda have a special on at the moment - 2 500g ragu jars for £2 (found by mysupermarket.com). I imagine that is close to the cost of making my own sauce.

I think I will have to cut down on the canteen lunches if I have any hope of making my target!

Cheers all,
Pete.

eand200

Hello,

I'm a student aged 21 and also do weight lifting. Personally i seam to spend a lot more on food than you as i buy a lot more meat and protein shake but do understand that eating healthy and also high protein meals is hard and expensive.

I tend to go to the reduced meat section and see whats on offer? How much the saving is then chuck it in the freezer. Also buy any fish thats on offer.

You diet and food costs seam really good and although for a normal person might seam a lot considering your trying to eat high protein healthy meals your budget is excellent.

I would suggest mixing your evening meals up as a varied diet is good for the body so perhaps look around at what else you can buy instead of your beans? Look on stuff like mens health mag online for meal ideas and see what you can fit into your budget.

I believe i spend about 150-200 a month on food which seams ridiculous compared to some people but as i said high protein diets are not cheap! I pay 25 for Sci-mentor protein shakes once every 2 months so 12.50 a month and believe it works out to be about 40p per shake but that includes BCAS and 20gs protein.

Probably not much help but my point is that your budget is good and i agree with someone else on here... i would never skimp on food costs.

All the best

Liz

Tixy

eand200 wrote: »

You diet and food costs seam really good

Possibly because food costs have risen a lot in the over 2years since the thread was started??

Malory

teepoo wrote: »

I am not really skimping, I still get all the calories/nutrients I need. I am just trying to cut out the unnecessary food or substitute in something of the same nutritional value, but that costs less.

A healthy diet needs variety.

Not including your canteen lunch - you haven't told us what is in it -you are only eating one type of fruit (bananas) and one type of green vegetable (green beans).

Rather than filling up on pasta, you would be better off eating something with more protein.

Also, it is inadvisable to eat tuna every day because of the mercury content.

I agree with the above poster who said that you should not skimp on food/your heath. Save money in other ways.

nicksthename

£100 food budget a month is one thing, and is do-able I think (lots of rice!). But a balanced meal on £100 a month is another thing entirely!

Malory

Tixy wrote: »

Possibly because food costs have risen a lot in the over 2years since the thread was started??

Advice re importance of a balanced diet is still good.

paulw98

nicksthename wrote: »

£100 food budget a month is one thing, and is do-able I think (lots of rice!). But a balanced meal on £100 a month is another thing entirely!

Indeed, i spend more than £100 a month on just booze... I would rather scrimp in other places than food or drink tbh.

Derivative

£100 per month balanced diet is simple, just not when you're spending £50pm on lunch out

coolesticeking

When money was that tight I had to live off £10 a Week for just over 4 months and that was for 3 adults and a cat.

You will be amazed how possible it really is.