Eat for £12 a week?

twink

i would agree about the years gone by too, my gran had nine of a family, no washing machine, hoovers etc often there would have been no meat although grandad caught rabbits, working men on farms anyway would have survived on brose, oatmeal and boiling water or sometime kale mixed in and did a gruelling days work ploughing with the horse, even when grandad was on the pension gran would see he got the best bit of beef while she had little of it, yet grandad was ninety six when he died and never looked like an old man and gran was eighty nine so all the hard work and scarcity of food at times did them no harm at all
to me it seems that working life consisted of exercise all and every day and any fat consumed was burned up and stress levels kept down, i am sure we could all survive on less food than we do
life is at a much faster pace nowadays but with machinery to do the hard physical work so fat isnt being used up nor stress levels kept down

newlywed

Well for all the criticism I would like to say that Black-Saturn's threads inspired me to cook lasagna for the first time, use up the wheatabix sitting in the cupboard to make fruit loaf and brownies.

Other threads here have inspired me to make toad in the hole, casseroles, and various other dishes. They have given me the confidence to try, to alter recipes and to cook. We never add salt to our meals, use a small amount of olive oil etc, we eat lots of veg, lentils (which I would never have dreamed of cooking previously). I have had a LOT less colds and coughs since doing this and have cut our shopping bill in half.

Thanks to everyone. The cheap recipes I tend to scatter through the month to reduce the bills. Just because someone gives a full week of cheaper meals doesn't mean you have to cook their exact list!

Please please don't anyone stop posting the cheap meals threads. They really do help, especially when the money runs low at the end of the month, and don't deserve the criticism some throw at them.

And I love shepherds pie, lasagna, etc and always add in peas and sweetcorn into them and grated carrots and lentils too in the one for tonight It's good food that our family grew up with.

Oh and I don't care how bad roast potatoes and yorkies are fat-wise - they taste too good and we only have them once a month!!!! (And we only drizzle oil over the potatoes, they are not swimming in it).

Gingham_Ribbon

I agree. My diet has changed so much thanks to this board and I LOVE the menu planners. We used to eat the same things over and over, waste obscene amounts of food that I expected to cook and somehow never found the time and way overspend. It's no exaggeration to say that the inspiration from this site has changed my life.

Garnet_Gem

Maybe the secret of eating for £12 a week is having a full storecupboard and freezer before you start. If you had to buy everything it would be very basic and harder to stick to.

redsquirrel80

Garnet_Gem wrote: »

Maybe the secret of eating for £12 a week is having a full storecupboard and freezer before you start. If you had to buy everything it would be very basic and harder to stick to.

I'm not sure, still think it can be done, obviously some weeks you would bulk buy something for the storecupboard/ freezer which might put you over-budget but then this would last and the cost would even out over the weeks. I'm not about to empty my cupboards and start from scratch to find out mind you

princesstippytoes

I find all these threads about weekly cost really interesting. Each to their own I suppose but I could not happily feed my children and husband on £12 and be satisfied that they were getting all the nutrition they required and not consuming a ton of additives and preservatives.
Penny Pincher, you're meals sound ok to me but you seem to stretch your meat further than I could manage but I too would like to hear Black Saturn's answers to some of the questions asked on here but perhaps she is afraid of negative comments.

Penny-Pincher!!

Stews, shepherds pies, curries, chilli etc are all padded out with pulses and extra veg inside the foods IYSWIM. If we have a roast, I buy a large chicken then I can guarantee that there will be enough left to make either a pie or a curry.

Fruit & veg are bought from the market and I can buy loads of this for about £5-£8. On average each week for the 3 of us we go through 4lbs carrots, 2 cabbages, 2 packets of french beans, large cauliflower, swede, parsnips x 2 huge ones, 2 large lettuce, cucumbers, 6 toms, 5 onions, spring onions, beetroot, about 21 apples, 25 bananas and 2 bags of oranges. We also have in the freezer peas, sweetcorn, corn on the cob and cut beans. We all have a large glass of either apple or orange juice with breakfast too.

My plates are always 1 third protein (poultry, fish or meat) then a carb (spuds, rice or pasta) then the rest is piling with veg.

HTH

PP
xx

HariboJunkie

I can be pretty thrifty with my meals plans but the amount I spend on the basics would put me over this budget in a flash.


Per week I spend.....

Coffee £2
Milk £4.80
Butter £1
Cheese £2
Bread (ingerdients)£1.50
Spuds £1
Carrots 50p
Cabbage 50p
Onions £1
Salad £2
Salad veg £2
Green beans £1
Turnip 50p
Apples £2.40
Bananas £2
Oranges £2
Pears £2
Grapes £2
Tinnned toms etc £2
Pasta 50p
Whole Chicken £3.90
Mince £2
Pork steaks £3
Fish £4
Sausages £2
Orange juice £3
Wine £10
Yoghurt (ingredients) £1
Baking Stuff £2.00 Total (approx) £53.60 (excluding wine)

I find it difficult to pad out meat as OH doesn't like pasta or rice and my kids eat 5 pieces of fruit a day. I have cut back where I can and am pretty savvy with where I buy my meat but this is as low as I can get it and it suits me fine.

lynzpower

Haribo,

have you thought about growing your own salad leaves? Spinach, lettuce, rocket endive etc are SO easy to grow.

We have a lettuce box ( one of those cheapie window boxes - pack of 3 from 99p stores) and some compost and tposoil sprinkled in the seeds and voila- there we have it!

perfectly fresh and so moneysaving- i reckon I must have saved an easy 20 quid since starting growing these since the start of the year. :money:

HariboJunkie

lynzpower wrote: »

Haribo,

have you thought about growing your own salad leaves? Spinach, lettuce, rocket endive etc are SO easy to grow.

We have a lettuce box ( one of those cheapie window boxes - pack of 3 from 99p stores) and some compost and tposoil sprinkled in the seeds and voila- there we have it!

perfectly fresh and so moneysaving- i reckon I must have saved an easy 20 quid since starting growing these since the start of the year. :money:

Thanks Lynz.

I should have mentioned that I am now growing my own............

Lettuce
Rocket
spinach
turnips
peas
sweetcorn
radish
beetroot
leeks
spring onions
spuds
3 kinds of beans
cucumber
courguette
tomatoes
Chillis
peppers.

So that should save a bit in the long run. Now all I need is to plant an orchard and I'm sorted. :rolleyes: