Grocery Shopping budget thread

falady

hi there,

Our household is similar to yours - 2 people (me and OH), one large dog (greyhound) and 3 cats!

We give Meg, our dog, dried Burgess complete food, which we buy from Jolleys pet food superstore. She has the 'Greyhound and Lurcher' one at £15.99 for 12.5 kg, but I know a friend who gives her greyhound and GSD the Burgess 'Sensitive' food (£24.99 for 12.5 kg) and finds it suits them very well. You could give it a try, but make sure you introduce the new food gradually and only buy a small bag to try it. Its a lot cheaper than burns :-)

In terms of food budgetting for me and OH, I have set myself the challenge of no more than £230 this month, inc dog and cat food and cleaning stuff, but i'm not sure i'm going to meet it, cos of christmas. I really need to start spending less though, becuase my contract at work finishes at the end of january.

We have very well stocked cupboards, and i'm slowly beginning to 'shop from the store cupboard' so i spend less at the supermarket / on takeaways etc.

Another suggestion is to go to a wholeslaer if you can. Do you know anyone with a card for costco or makro? I'm a member of costco and we go there for some meat, cat food (eg 4 kg of dry whiska complete is approx £6), drinks, household stuff (eg 100 v good quality black bin bags for approx £5) etc. Obviously, they sell things in bulk, but if you've got the storage space and the cash available, it's great.

Hope that helps,

Ali x

k2tog

You could use the daughter-free time to practice with the slowcooker and get some food stockpiled in the freezer from the practice sessions as it may take a little getting used to. Have a look on the in my slowcooker today thread for inspiration. Maybe start with bunging a chicken in there before work with a small amount of stock or water and some garlic or onion around it. It will smell fab when you walk in from work and IMO is a failsafe first slowcooker practice.
Good luck :beer:

gettingready

Thanks for replying to my post.

I think the issue with my "overspending" is not how much we buy but what we buy - organic, free range etc

I have to be honest, when I look at cheaper meat for example, I simply do not think I could eat it - some does not taste like it should.

It is not just a case of filling up with any food is it?

We also buy branded yogurts etc - not much of them but they are expensive.

My last Asda order was almost £100 per month and there was no dog/cat food (order those separately) - just our food/toiletries/cleaning things.

I think I need to rething the whole lifestyle if you like - I can buy cheap washing up liquid for example or bleech but can not compromise on by Bold Gel and Lenor Red conditioner as I like the smell of those too much.

Am I no hope whatsoever?



Just reserved a slow cooker though - will try things out when my daughter is away...

http://www.argos.co.uk/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=10001&catalogId=1500001801&langId=-1&productId=1500508127

Now going to look at the thread with those slow cooker receipes....

Can someone please point me in the direction of Bread Maker and Steamer threads - if those exist on boards here?

Thanks a lot

remmie

Hi, getting ready. We have 2 gsd`s and have recently changed them over to CSJ dried food. This is very economical and 1 of our dogs has put on 4kg (very fussy eater)!
They have a website and you can email them and they will advise you which food will be suitable for your dog. HTH

mummysaver

gettingready wrote: »

Thanks girls - I am trying to work out some weekly "menu" for the 4 of us now, to get ready for january

Even got myself a diary (do not worry, got it is a pound shop LOL) with day to a page and will write everything down in there.

Just wonder now - I normally get my shopping online (Asda) to avoid any temptations and stick to my list and of course to save the time (do nto have too much of that).

Got a bread maker recently, love it to bits but hey - my daughter does not like "that" bread.

Got a steamer, love steamed food but guess what? Daughter does not like it.

I absolutely hate having to cook for 2 or end up eating what I do not like only because I cooked it for my daughter.....

Yes, I know, at 19 she should be cooking for herself but.. ermmmm she is a baby......



How do you ladies shop? Where? What do you eat? LOL

Thanks

Hi there! I'm sure you'll find loads of help and inspiration here, everyone is full of great ideas, you just pick out the ones that work for you!

First thing, before buying a freezer have a look on freecycle, you may well find one there at no cost!

My advice would be to make a list of foods that you know your dd does like, and then compile a list of your favourites and see if any of them meet or can be slightly adapted. In my house the children all now take turns making the meal plans, a great way to learn that sometimes you can't have what you want, but must compromise! Also when they make the meal plan they have to take into account leftovers and what is in the cupboards and freezers - for example, if we have roast chicken then on another night there will appear a chicken curry, or chicken pie or stir fry. Anything that needs using up must be incorporated into the plan, and then there is always mince in the freezer (generally bought on offer or reduced) so one meal usually features that (bolognese, meatballs, burgers, chilli, lasagne etc - leftovers going into wraps generally for a quick mexican meal!)

So once you have your likes and what you can compromise on, then make a list of possible meals, from this draw up a meal plan and from that a shopping list - this may need amending or adapting to use up stuff you already have.

Bread maker bread can taste different or at least be lest crusty if baked in the oven and covered with a teatowel when you remove it, my dd3 much prefers a softer loaf. Rolls are always popular as well, perhaps your dd would eat these, just make the dough in the bm, take out and form into rolls, leave to rise for an hour and then bake, and cover with a teatowel if you want them to be soft. If she still won't eat bm bread, then I suggest that she takes responsibility for buying her own, and hunting down the reduced stuff possibly!

Steamed veg is good for her, if she doesn't like it, then she can take turns at cooking - can be amazing what people are prepared to eat if they don't fancy cooking themselves!

And at 19 she isn't a baby! It will be doing her a favour if she learns how to cook and realises that there is a budget!

I explain to my children that we have a budget, we have a meal plan, and if they don't like it then we simply don't have the money to go and buy other stuff, and if they eat what is in the cupboards or freezer, and it was bought to use in another meal, then they better be prepared to go hungry another day! Saying that I am not a complete dragon :rolleyes: I always have soup available (hm is easy, cheap, filling and freezes well), and they can always have fruit and bread.

I have no pet food tips, other than hunting around for bargains on the stuff yours will eat, thankfully my animals will all eat anything almost (except for the famous pasta incident, I don't know what happened to the sauce, but even the dog wouldn't touch it!)

Good luck and have a look on the grocery challenge thread (at the top of the os board list of threads), it's full of tips and people cheering you on, and there are also loads of recipes there

Edit:

forgot to say that I shop everywhere! Do a run into Lidl and Aldi for their cheap fruit and veg offers, then pop into other supermarkets as passing for their bargains and a rummage for their reduced stuff! Asda are probably the best value all round though for the stuff we eat. I work nights so have the days free to pootle round, usually I spend a morning doing a proper shop, with forays into Lidl and Aldi, and perhaps a detour via other supermarkets if they have any bargains that I know we use a lot (Morrisons currently have lots of offers so will be popping in there later, they also have the best ethnic section locally). I don't do a big shop once a week, I tend to do a huge shop every few weeks, and then just pick up the bits to fill in meal plan gaps once a week.

And the sort of things we eat might be:

Sun: roast chicken
Mon: spag bolognese
Tues: sausage based meal (casserole/toad in the hole/with mash and gravy)
Wed: baked potatoes and soup
Thurs: chicken pie/curry/stir fry
Fri: leftover bolognese made into lasagne?or turned into chilli/or in wraps
Sat: veg stew (to use up extra veg left in fridge) with couscous

Rebekah24

Shoot for £30 a month for me

Household stuff usually get once a month all Value/basics/budget line

12 Toilet roll £1.30
Facial tissues x 2 48p
Toilet cleaner 28p
Spray cleaner £1
Razors 70p

Then offers for : Showergel/bubblebath

Usually buy Cuppasoup on offer for work, 42p - usually go through 1 box a week
Apart from that usually get

Squash
SF Red bull (generic brand) 4 for £1
Eggs
Juice if its on offer

then the odd bits for oh(Iceland vegetarian meals/cheese/eggs) for when he is over, try and keep food spending to a minimum since its just me!

gettingready

You are all truly amazing ladies....got a lot to learn at my grand age of 40

I live in London but "in the middle of nowhere" and working full time have not got the time to run around various supermarkets etc to check offers - I generalkly order home delivery from Asda to save time to be honest.

can not fiddle much with dog food as she has quite sensitive stomach and a 35 kg of long haired german Shepherd with upset tummy is not much fun.. yukkkk

Taking the tips for the human food though, thanks a lot.

Picking up my slow cooker tomnorrow too

Souk08

I aim for £70 a month for me on my own. This includes all food but not booze (which I could do with cutting down on!) or toiletries/cleaning stuff as I only buy this when it's on offer and stock up.
I do most of my shopping online from Asda and use my Slow Cooker a lot. I top this up with fruit and veg shops from Aldi. It's a revolution!

milliemonster

Right, now normally we are sticking to a budget of £40-60 a week for food while we pay our debts off, this is for a family of 4, 2 adults and a 10 yr old that eats more than me and a 6 year old.

I have allocated £180 this month for 'xmas week', this is to include everything we need for xmas dinner (we tend to go to town in our family, have turkey, beef and pork and gammon!!! its a bit of a tradition lol!!) and really for the rest of the month, drink etc.. as I don't particularly want to shop again until Jan.

I have 6 people coming for xmas day, all adults so that makes 10 of us. I would like to cut this budget down a bit if poss, but last year the meat alone cost almost £200:eek: (we bought from a local farm who do fabulous meat but it costs, plus oh got the sizes wrong so we ended up having to cut it up although it did create a few extra joints for Jan!!), My sister who is coming for xmas dinner has asked if I want her to get anything to bring so may be able to cut cost a little there.

So I'm not being so extravagant this year, meat will be from the supermarket.

I guess what I really want to know is what kinds of things should I be buying so that we can have a great xmas, reduce the budget a bit and have enough for the rest of the month?

Luckily, we do have well stocked cupboards and freezer!!!, but no party food or anything.

What budgets does everyone else have for xmas?

Almo

Hi Milliemonster,

There's just me, OH and the cat for Christmas this year and we live in Australia so our budget won't be comparable to yours. We're having a whole fillet of beef on the barbie (mmmmmmmmmm) plus veggies etc. In the evening we'll have a 'picky' dinner - cold meat, veg, bread etc. I'll probably bake something for breakfast and OH will also have Alpen (imported from the UK and horrendously overpriced here, but he loves it).

Just wanted to say to ask you: do you need party food? If I was going to someone's house I would rather have a good hearty main meal, than loads of extras throughout the day.

I would expect every adult coming to bring a bottle, so that should pretty much be booze covered - you don't need to have a load of random spirits, people rarely drink them anyway. I guess if you wanted to you could get a couple of bottles of cava and have them with orange juice for pre-meal drinks? That shouldn't eat into the budget much though. Perhaps you could have one hot meat, and a ham? That should be enough. Add veg, potatoes (maybe two types of potatoes? cheap and filling!) etc and that's your main meal done. Ask sister to bring a dessert and do soup for starter - if you present it nicely (swirl of cream etc) everyone will be more than happy with that.

If you want to have chocs etc with coffee, go to the pound store or equivalent, get their own version of after eight mints, remove them from the wrapping and serve on a small plate. If you want to do nibbles, don't buy them, make your own - cheese straws, mini filo parcels, crudites and dip - all of those look impressive but would be cheap to make.

I know you have kids and that Xmas is probably manic enough as it is, but I would spend time and effort on making things yourself, and presenting them beautifully, rather than money on things that people probably won't remember eating.