Help! £40 to feed family for the month

sprogs

Well, I have been inspired!

Am currently going through divorce proceedings and had been totally ignoring my debt (direct debits for minimum payments etc. so envelopes just remained unopened) until I had to fill in all the forms last month detailing every last penny - scary stuff!

Decided to ignore it until after the holidays and then start dealing with it and trying to get it down, so am starting with my shopping - will get round to the other boards and SOAs over the next few weeks, one step at a time for now. As a single working mum I ended up shopping on a near daily basis for whatever we were going to need that day, that meant about 5 trips to tesco a week with all the impulse buys that go with it, I dread to think how much I actually spend a month shopping like that. Thanks to mbaz for opening my eyes!

Anyway - back on topic!

I have dusted off my slow cooker - which is a really big one - and it is now bubbling away with what I hope will be an extremely large bolognese mixture - complete with the addition of the grated carrots, lentils and oats to bulk it out. I have actually written down all of my ingredients and quantities and will post them if it works OK, that way I can replicate it if it is a success, if not I can work out what there was too much or too little of and adjust accordingly.

This is now going to be my Saturday morning job, a large batch of something into the slow cooker, then into portions and into the freezer - am now off to find the slow cooker recipe thread....

CoD_2

Lunar_Eclipse wrote: »

Do you mean four portions of curry, as in one meal for the family of four, or four meals which would be 16 (presumably tiny and mainly lentils) portions? It would be the former in our house. Hubbie ideally likes two chicken breasts in his curries. :rolleyes: I add potatoes to bulk out my curries, but they're not cheap thesedays!

Whenever I read about a few pieces of chicken going so far I just truly don't know how. Would I be right in thinking we are talking tiny, child-like portions? My 6ft 2" hubbie has a big appetitie (but weighs about 10 stone).

Help?! ... this is driving me mad!

if i do a curry for my husband and i we use 100g of chicken between us. it's not much :rotfl: about 1/2 a breast at most? more rice, added frozen peas, sweetcorn, then fresh mushrooms, courgette etc. he has more than me but it is more than enough. my husband is 6ft 4 and has a big appetite. also serve with some homemade naan bread or tesco sell 6 for 99p.

lilly81

Ifyou go to Printable Money off Coupons & Policies Thread, then you can print off coupons and t says aslong as tecos stocks the product you can have the money off! This will definately reduce the shopping bill.
I know its not old style but thought it might help :money:

funkyfunkymonkey

mbaz wrote: »

Hi all. Working last night so couldnt update.Still going well. Out of bread but hubbie makign a loaf today hile I'm working overtime. Still managing to survive without buying anything else but getting low on weetabix which could be a disaster!!!

If you haven't used up all of your value oats, how about making porridge? I love porridge made with either water or milk. Takes 2 minutes in the microwave and dead cheap. I use 25g oats + 150ml milk (or water), nuked for 2 minutes. Stirred and sprinkled with sugar - yum.

My OH has never noticed the lentils or oats in the bolognese, chilli or shepherd's pie - except to say that it seems to be particularly 'creamy' or a 'nice texture'.

Good luck getting to the end of the month, I'm sure you can do it, you've done so well so far.

Another good thread for cheap recipe ideas is here http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1122887

There's an index in the 2nd post.

FFM

jcr16

wow this thread is fantastic. i used to be excellent with the shopping budget. i could feed hubby , 1 and our daughter( only had i child at the time) and 3 cats on £100 a month. this would include roast beef on sunday, roast gammon another and roast chicken for a 3rd. we had proper meal's every night.

what i love about being mega strapped for money , when u think you will never be able to do it. when u get into and you can see it is working. you then don't want to spend money and enjoy very much the challenge of trying to create thing's. well i do anyway.

i've just mentioned to hubby about the oats and lentils in chili. He very much man who likes lot's of meat in a chili. but said he is willing to give it a go as he is very much up for trying to save money especially with how things are going lately.

Has anyone noticed how cheap liver is? i used to love liver and bacon or liver casserole when i was younger. and when i looked at tesco a pack of fresh liver pig i think was only about 36p.

moggylover

mbaz wrote: »

Just typed shopping list into Tesco.com and it looks good!!

Tesco Value Long Grain Rice 1kg £0.79 going to need more rice for all my bulked out sauces etc
2 x Tesco Value Spaghetti 500g £0.46ditto
Tesco Sage & Onion Stuffing Mix 170g £0.58 try the value one - great at 13p!
Tesco Value Whole Chicken 1.30kg £2.79
thought can do a sunday lunch and use leftovers in curry or with rice and if you leave a bit on the bones you can boil them up for stock and add veg for a soup. Also my butcher will give you chicken carcasses or bones free which you can also use for this: worth asking
2 x Tesco Value Chopped Tomatoes 400g £0.42
Tesco Value Toilet Tissue 4pk 800 Sheet £0.38<
Tesco Strong Brown Bread Flour 1.5kg £0.89
have got yeast and butter
2 x Tesco Whole Milk 3.408ltr/6 Pints £4.24 going to freeze one and this will hopefully last us
2 x Tesco Value Baked Beans In Tomt/Sauce 420g £0.40
Tesco Value Dark Red Kidney Beans 400g £0.14
Tesco Value Oats 1kg £0.59
2 x Onions Loose Class 2 £0.36
Miscellaneous Granulated Sugar2kg Parcels £1.61
Colmans Traditional Chicken Casserole Mix 40g £0.47
Tesco Value Pasta Sauce 440g £0.25<
Tesco Value Red Leicester Medium £2.93 for sarnies/lasagne etc
Tesco Wholefoodsred Split Lentils 1kg £1.52

Total £18.81!!!!

You are stars!!!! Any suggestions for cutbacks/replacements?

ps. not going to buy online obviously!! will go to my local store tomorrow

My suggestions in ghastly green - hope it helps!:D

mbaz

Hiya quick update.

Thanks Moggylover and all others for your support and advice. I cant believe how well this is going! and so much better than living on beans on toast for a month!

I have to say JCR I absolutely cant stand liver though! I cant understand how anyone can like it!!! Thanks for the sentiment though!


OH still none the wiser!! Had a few more swap arounds on my plan but still going well. Made some jelly and added berries I found in freezer. Will do a crumble for monday night. Doing some much needed overtime tomorrow so moved Chicken dinner to monday night.

hope everyone is well?!

Mx

1st - carbonara (just found a jar in back of cupboard)
2nd Lasagne (with added lentils )
3rd chicken and rice
4th jacket spuds with smartprice beans
5th defrost a curry
6th omlette
7th Lasagne
8th chicken dinner
9th chicken casserole
10th canelloni
11th Bolognaise
12th shepherds pie (make 2 and freeze 1)
13th veggie sausages and mash
14th Beans on toast (gotta crop up somewhere)!!
15th chicken curry with 4p sauce
16th veggie burgers
17th pasta with cheese and tomatoe sauce
18th shepherds pie from 12th
19th risotto
20th Homemade soup
21th Chilli
22th Egg and chips
23th Shezza's sauce and pasta (I'll always call it that now!)
24th - Go to take away in middle of night when OH's salary goes in!!

mother_of_the_world

just a quick tip if you live near a shop that has a bread slicer, ask them for bread crumbs to make your stuffing with.

They are free and only get thrown at the end of the day,

HTH

gairlochgal

You can dress up the beans on toast for adults. This is something I saw on telly called "dirty beans" and it's great for when you want something a bit more grown up. Heat the beans as normal and put the kids' portions out first and then add in mustard, chilli and honey to taste. Really nice and only takes another min. For me it would be about a teaspoon each of mustard and honey and 3-4 grinds of chilli flakes

brownbabygirl

oats is very filling and dirt cheap too