December 2009 Grocery Challenge

winterfrost

More than half the budget gone already... but will be a virtual no-spend day tomorrow as I have enough food and have used up my weekly general budget (which the food budget is part of) and don't give myself the next week's amount til Friday! Will not really be a NSD though, as I have to get the perishable things for early Christmas lunch on Saturday... but that does come out of a separate budget.

franby64

Mr T delivery arrived last night - only £65.06 after I used the coupons they sent out recently. And another £4.47 today - still managed to find things to buy even after delivery!

pammyj74

spent another £1.31 in whoopsies today, should have been £5.39 :T
im addicted to getting whoopsies now and i think the shop staff see me hovering now lol
dont think my nsd total is looking very good though

Kitchenbunny

Waaah, busy few days! I've spent another £49.00 in Tescadiddles last night, so that's another whacking great chunk of my budget gone. I think I might have to revise my budget Ah, well I shall update my sig and do my best to not spend any more this month!

In other news, I've made a couple of really nice meals this week. One was my pasta bake using leftover sausages and bacon with a tomato sauce, and the other was a new way with fajitas. I made a spicy chicken and tomato Mexican style filling and made tortilla parcels. Then I sprinkled on some grated cheese and grilled it for a while to melt the cheese - mmm.

Kitchenbunny

cw18

pammyj74 wrote: »

im addicted to getting whoopsies now and i think the shop staff see me hovering now lol

Most of the staff at work are getting used to me too - and the last couple of weeks seems to have had the same chap doing reductions in the chilled section just after I knock off. He now asks me how my day was while I start lining up the bits I'm interested in, and he gets those reduced for me so I can get home :rolleyes2


Another good haul for me tonight..... spend of £1.70 (including 17p staff discount that goes into a savings jar for Christmas 2010) on goods with ticket prices of £7.46

2 more rolls of sausage meat (25p each instead of £1.59)
twin pack of garlic baguettes (25p instead of £1.09)
tub of sunbush tomato & sweet chilli pepper houmous (25p instead of £1)
pack of 3 strawberry trifles (35p instead of £1.79)
pack of 2 chicken kievs (35p instead of £1.99)

JayJay14

Hi all :wave:

Just here to update sig, and declare another NSD total now stands at 11 out of 19 days so I'm really pleased so far.

Only a couple of trips to the shops before the big day so it looks like I might be OK for this months challenge. Will be trying to be uber frugal in te New Year as we are back in the land of uncertainty cos OH's current contract will end at the end of Jan. The agencies will be working hard to find him another job (after all he makes them money too) but until then we have to plan for unemployment. It will soon be three years since his redundancy so we're getting by better than many.

Will be hitting Asda tomorrow so my total will go up a bit.

poppy-glos

the spends are creeping up, when i don't have my eye enough on the target!

nsd yesterday, today £11 in lidl (went in to buy thier lookalike diet coke and some flour and ended up!!!??)
out to supper tonight so that put the budget up, treated my friend as we were celebrating fantastic news!

just under £35 virtual pounds to see us to the end of the month on GC, will have to try harder in january....... Got some hostessing to do this weekend and still need to buy bits for that so think i'll be going over (just a little).

Flat_Eric

HELP !!

I found a nice recipe for falafel but I fear that I have missed a vital step and thus need to bin the mixture.

The recipe just said to boil the dried chickpeas for 45 mins. Now this I did. I cooked them for longer than the 45 mins although I did have to turn down the hob in the end to avoid my kitchen becoming the next best thing to a steam room.

I drained the chick peas (can't remember if rinsed?) and left overnight sat on the kitchen side.

This morning I added the spices, eggs etc and blended and have stuck in the fridge. BUT having spoken to a work colleague this morning, I understand, I should have soaked the chick peas overnight before the boiling for 45 mins step to to get rid of the nasty toxins ??? Now I don't know what to do. Should I just bin the mixture or will it be ok to make my little falfel cakes/cook/eat.

Incidentally, If I wanted to make this recipe again, could I use tinned chick peas ? presumably I wouldn't have to boil these ???

In money news, its gone a bit pear shaped. I haven't been very well so have not been keeping proper track of my spends and nothing everything down as I have been doing.

SunnyGirl

Flat Eric I use tinned chickpeas and this recipe. It's brilliant and very quick to make with a food processor. I'm unsure about the chickpeas you have cooked as I only use tinned but I remember something about having to soak them overnight. Hopefully someone with a lot more knowledge than me will come along soon

jade86123

well I am well and truely lost this month! I started out with good intentions, kept all my reciepts and logged all my shopping and now its gone off on a bit of a tangent!
from what I can gather I have gone slightly over budget this month, but the good thing is no food has gone to waste in our house! we have just about finished off every last thing in the freezer! there is enough in there for tonights dinner (casserole for OH and curry for me) and then frozen pots of nosh for the little'un...

We get paid tomorrow so our food month starts earlier than everyone elses, but I have bought nothing for Christmas yet so got MrA tomorrow, then Costcococo on Sun and Mr S on Mon and that should do it (I hope!) Dont intead on shopping again then until after Xmas, apart from bread & milk top-ups... hhhmmm we will see eh?