How do you manage to spend so little?!

valk_scot

Just as an example of what proteins my kids are eating yoday (12 &7, both very tall for ages and both currently going through growth spurts, also both have sports activities today.)

Breakfast: Muesli and milk, milk or orage juice, banana. (Protein in the milk plus the nut/oats combo.)

Lunch. Beans on toast with either a rasher of bacon or an egg on top, yoghurt, fruit. (Protein in the egg or bacon, plus the beans on toast, plus the yoghurt.)

Dinner. Pork chop (one medium) marinaded in chilli-garlic marinade, corn on cob, boiled new potatoes, cauiliflower cheese. Fresh fruit pavlova. (protein in the chop, cheese and milk.)

Their actual meat consumption is that one pork chop plus the single rasher of bacon. But they're getting a lot more protein in that from milk, yoghurts, egg, cheese, beans and nuts, probably (undoubtably!) well above the daily minimum. I could take the meat elements out totally, replace the chop with a couple of vegetarian sausages and they'd still be getting far more than they need. And that's not including their snacks...they drink a lot of milk and eat things like peanut butter on wholemeal bread as snacks, which are both high in protein.

eselt

We're eating less meat now because supermarket meat seems to be such poor quality, and we are buying it from our local butchers which is much nicer but a lot more expensive so we have to eat less. At the moment we are not eating meat at breakfast or lunch (unless we have left overs from night before) and not every night for our evening meal.

Roughly, our evening meals are:
1 night red meat
2 nights chicken
2 nights fish
2 nights egg/cheese based

So I think you can get plenty of protein without eating meat at every meal, and to tell you the truth we all feel better for cutting down on the meat, far less sluggish and more energetic.

clairelg88

I have done a little better with the weekly shop this week, i spent just over £30 and took a list with me, so bought nothing that wasn't on the list!

I've planned all meals this week, we have 2/3 planned with meat...so i think we'll get on fine

We've been keeping up with making cakes as snacks rather than buying cakes...they seem to last much longer and my daughter enjoys making them too.

thanks for all your replies

missychrissy

I can't get my head around meal planning for a week/2 week as advocated by so many people. It would leave me no space within which to take advantage of special offers and no flexibility in what I was eating on a particular day. I understand the concept of meal planning but it doesn't work for me. I can honestly say that I have not thrown any food away for over 4 months now. I think the last thing was half a cucumber. As a result I came to the conclusion that I really am not that keen on cucumber and actually prefer courgettes instead and they last longer.

xxvickixx

Just to add my bit, Chicken thighs are so much cheaper than breast, I like them better as they are more tender and really good in stews, curries and casseroles, plus they have a lot more iron in them which is great if you have a young child.

I buy plain yoghurt for my son and add fruit etc to it, my reason is that he doesn't have sugary food and a lot of the yoghurts have added sugar or worse sweeteners. My issue is that Smartprice etc only do a very low fat version of plain yougurt and a big tub of full fat is about £1. Very annoying but is much better for my son as he is under 2.

I have worked out the best times to go to Asda for yellow stickers and I see what's there and plan my meals around the bargains I get. I make good use of my freezer as the best bargains need using or freezing that day. I do the same with fresh veg and freeze it or cook it straight away. For our family of 2 adults + 1 child our grocery bill is around £25 each week.

To maximise the yellow stickers I incorporate a walk to the local co-op (also very good for yellow stickers) into our day as often as possible and if I am passing I pop in to see what's cheap. I always check the reduced counters for meat, veg and bakery if I need to pop in to the supermarket for a top up shop and have trained DH to do the same.

We eat really well and do have quite a few luxury items too, due to about 60% of items coming from the yellow sticker counters. Almost everything we eat is cooked from scratch and is not processed so I do need to be quite creative with my shopping as I can't meal plan the way I shop as you never know what you will get!

I think once you find a system that works well for you it becomes habit and very easy.

Before I became a SAHM we were spending some months £400 per month on groceries and I have always cooked from scratch so it really does make a huge difference.

Fire_Fox

IlonaRN wrote: »

I think I've heard that the body can only process about 30g of protein at any one time, so anything over that is "wasted". Would mean it's better to eat smaller amounts, but more often. Think this was info the bf found when researching which protein supplement to take (so I've no idea how true it is).

I am a fitness instructor and this is absolutely correct. The body can't store 'spare' protein so if it needs to do running repairs it needs the fuel in the form of food. Otherwise it will steal protein from your muscles, or fail to compete the repair. Hence anorexics may damage their heart (muscle=protein) and have poor immune systems (cells need protein to build).

Any excess protein eaten is converted to carbohydrates for fuel - not only is this a very expensive way of getting the same nutrient as from a potato, but again any excess is converted to fat. I have to work very hard convincing my lady dieters than they need protein at every meal to maintain muscle and hence their metabolism, and male bodybuilders that ten eggs and a steak will make them fat not muscular. :rotfl:

missychrissy

Hi xxvickixx

What is the best time to go to Asda for the bargains? I pass a Coop occasionally but have never found any bargains in there. Tesco I have found is good for bargains from about 4pm onwards.

misscousinitt

I can't get my head around meal planning for a week/2 week as advocated by so many people. It would leave me no space within which to take advantage of special offers and no flexibility in what I was eating on a particular day.

I meal plan for 2-3 weeks at a time, but I tend to swap things round and adapt as per situations that come up. I may not feel like cooking, or something happens that means I don't get home till late, I might fancy something different or we might get invited to a friends house for dinner!!! - this doesn't stop me from meal planning, I just jiggle things around a bit to compensate.

However, if you are not throwing any food away, you are doing well - its finding the right balance for you - not following hard and fast rules. ;-)

debtmuncher

misscousinitt wrote: »

I can't get my head around meal planning for a week/2 week as advocated by so many people. It would leave me no space within which to take advantage of special offers and no flexibility in what I was eating on a particular day.

I meal plan for 2-3 weeks at a time, but I tend to swap things round and adapt as per situations that come up. I may not feel like cooking, or something happens that means I don't get home till late, I might fancy something different or we might get invited to a friends house for dinner!!! - this doesn't stop me from meal planning, I just jiggle things around a bit to compensate.

However, if you are not throwing any food away, you are doing well - its finding the right balance for you - not following hard and fast rules. ;-)

totally agree....as long as you have the main component plus a good stock cupboard then you will be fine. just because everyone else does it doesnt mean to say you have to do it and it would work perfectly well for you. i meal plan but i dont do special offers , i do change my meals from the origninal quite a few times. nothing is set in stone and being flexible means you are more likely to enjoy cooking than to think "god its sphag bolognese again, yuck"!!!. sometimes thats been on the menu and i change it to a cowboy pie version by using the mince for hte base, topping with cold cooked slices of potato, brushing with oil or butter and into the oven where the potato will then go crispy. love the potato but being a veggie i wouldnt touch the mince lol

skiTTish

I found that the best thing is to not keep going to the shops ...sounds simple !
I found that if we ran out of something ,we went to the shop and bought that + 10 other things
So now ,if we run out of something ( other than milk ) we just have something else ,and we dont starve