January 2010 Grocery Challenge

angelatgraceland

slscarborough wrote: »

Having spend nearly £75 on my weekly online shop that I know will not last the week I am after some advice. Surely £300 a month for a family of five is achieveable. I know it is possible if we eat rubbish but I want to feed my family healthy meals. I also know if I went to the store I could grab the reduced items but as I dont drive at present this is near on impossible with 2 little ones. (hopefully will change as have my drivign test next week!!)

I dont want to appear to be making excuses but I am already struggling.

Well I think its achievable even though it will mean good planning-especially as you don't drive.Now you seem to think that eating rubbish is a cheaper alternative??? Im not being critical but I think a lot of people will agree with me that eating healthily and eating good food can actually be a lot cheaper. However-I don't know what you are buying or determining to be rubbish. To my mind it is snack foods, crisps,shopbought cakes, cheapest brand bread(unless really nexessary)pasties,pies,cheap sausages, burgers-things like that.
Healthy cheaper alternatives can be made at home if you are willing to make some changes. Things like spaghetti bolognese for instance-rather than using "cheap mince"(not economical at all when you drain off the fat), use half dried soya or quorn and half good quality mince, along with some lentils and a handful of oats. That will be cheaper and healthier. That is just an example and as far as cost goes Ive done veggy meals-spagghetis and curries,chillies etc for approx 45p per portion for an adult-one which was very cheap was a veggy surry using chickpeas and potatoes and rice,plus homemade naan bread. Now-the junkfood version costs twice that! Buy some dried chickpeas, lentils and soya, and some porrige oats along with some stock cubes for starters-these will stretch out your good quality meat. Personally if I can't buy decent mince I cook a veggy version-I don't like cheap nasty ingredients. Neither do I like soya on its own-hence I cook 50/50. Its a very personal taste but theres a start-hope it helps!

puss14

Hi, Im all revved up and would like to be put down for $240. I haven't had much past success with these challenges but am feeling quietly confident this time. I don't have much in the freezer but have an ok pantry and I do have some things in the garden to harvest cherry tomato/ beans/ rocket/chilli/silverbeet and a multitude of herbs. Also by next month I should have some other stuff coming through. I just realise I have to do this as i am sick of feeling so anxious about money. It has to stop.

Casperthefriendlyghost

Hi, I spent £8.39 yesterday on half a shoulder of lamb and a pork belly and also a rather large bag of crisps "which just fell into my trolley".

Was thinking that 10 days ago I used to spend £6 a day on cigarettes and thought I couldn't afford £3 on a joint of meat?? but now I've happily spent it and loved eating the pork belly today. Have updated my signature too.

G'night everyone, finally off to bed now! and thanx to everyone, am enjoying doing the grocery challenge ;o)

Cheers
Casper
x x

remmie

Said my challenge starts Jan 8th, but bought some whoopied steak, bacon and spuds for £6.99 so will amend my siggy as I`ve plenty in the freezer, just couldnt resist them!!

Sunnyday

Morning everyone :wave:

Helen could you please put me down for £120 for January - thankyou!

well after last months reciept fiasco (when Morrisons kept them) i still don`t reckon i was far from my target so i shall have a guess for my annual total and then set off to beat it this year.

We still have lots left from the last couple of weeks so will be using that up from the freezer and my spends are still for everything - dog food, cat food, our food and toiletries etc, once i`ve made a hole in the stocks that we have in i shall be dieting for a couple of months again so i`m looking forward to that. Things have been a bit awkward in that we still don`t have a fully functioning kitchen and we won`t for quite a while to come but by doing everything the way that we have we have saved so much money that its hard to believe it spurs me on knowing this, i reckon that by the end of March we should be up and running again if we don`t hit any more snags

Right i`m off to walk the doggies and i shall pop back later to start reading the thread, hopefully by later today i shall have made some inroads into the 14 pages :eek:

Have a good day peeps

SD

elf06

Freezer
2 packets of uncooked diced turkey curry which can be frozen for 'fast' food once you back on schedule
1 packet pork mince frikaddellar which can also be frozen for convenience
Loads of bread / crumpets / pancakes etc. snacks. lunch boxes, bread pud??
12 burgers as burgers or broken up over pasta or make into meatballs etc
1/2 pkt frozen chips
1/2 pkt frozen beans
1/2 pkt frozen onions
Loads of ice-lollies!
4 Birds Eye Chicken Steaks
Full pkt veggie mince lasagna/chilli/shepherds pie?
Full pkt veggie bacon bits in pasta with white sauce or in omlette
1/2 pkt mince pie / cake pastry
4 pkts fish pie sauce fish pie with salmon below
1/2 pkt smoked salmon
4 microwave meals (3 suitable for veggy, 1 meat)
1 pkt smoky bacon
1 black pudding with pots in a black pud hash?
pkt potato scones

Fridge
Processed Cheese (2 pkts)
2 packets value ham use in pasta with a sauce or in omlette
1/2 carton orange juice
tonic water
Enough milk to sink a battle ship (was whoopsies!)
2 pkts of salad
Lots of butter / marg / trex - enough to last month
1 pkt cheddar slices
1/2 pkt duck pate
1 pkt cheese spread
6 eggs with use by date of 29th December.

Cupboards
Lots of pasta
Jar of curry sauce
6 tins soup
4 tins beans
1 tin meatballs
1 tin tomatos
4 tins rice pudding
4 tins sliced peaches
Loads of cereal (incl. porridge, weetabix, rice crispies etc.)
Tea / Coffee / Hot Chocolate
All sorts of home baking stuff (except sugar) incl. 2 jars mincemeat
Herbs /spices / gravy / stock cubes / Ketchups (every flavour) (lots)
Lemon chicken sauce
bolognaise sauce
chilli sauce
2 pkts stuffing
value pkt noodles (kids love this)
4 pkts instant custard
Biscuits / chocolate / Xmas Pud / Mince Pies / Sweets galore
1 pkt fajita wraps use with curry or to make thin pizza
2 pkts chicken soup
2 pkts instant cheese sauce
50 pkts crisps!
2 apples, a melon and some rather brown bananas banana loaf for snacks/lunchboxes

Should only need a few extras to do the bits i have suggested. As i think someone before will prob have said bulk meals out with grated veg, porridge oats and lentils. I used 250g of mince last night, one carrot, one courgette, chopped onion, 3 mushrooms, one carton pasatta and some mixed herbs and i think i have enough meals (by meals i mean one for me and one for my DS who is 3) for about 4 or 5 nights. Will know for sure once i have portioned it up

Good luck x

elf06

Happily can report that i have spent anything yest or so far today :rolleyes: but my list of things that are running out (deoderant, loo roll etc) is growing and my budget of £40 until 25th is looking hugely unlikey :mad: I have however done a huge pot of mince concoction so should be able to freeze and survive off that for a while. Going to sort out my sig just now so i am more likely to keep on top of it

SunnyGirl

signs_of_recovery wrote: »

Signs of Recovery £200 this month for 4 adults, 2 children and a labrador whose main hobby is food.

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: I have a Labrador whose main hobby is food & a Beagle too!! They would both eat until they were sick if we let them and the Beagle is on a permament diet as he puts weight on really quickly - my little pork chop

knithryn

If you have an Aldi near you, buy a couple of their foil trays of cat food and see if your cat will eat them. I think they are 25p each, and our fussy cats love the salmon pate one. At least by buying them individually you don't have to buy a whole box full and then waste it...
Aldi loo roll is also very good value. In fact all Aldi cleaning stuff is great.
You can use the float test for the eggs if you are in doubt. If they sink you can use them. The more they float, the less viable they are. If they float completely then don't eat them.

Thinking about when you DO go shopping...
Look out for Tesco/Morrisons cheap curry sauce at about 6p a jar. You could also get their cheap noodles (about 6p a packet again) and add a few frozen veg, bit of ham etc.
And use the Aldi Super Six veg to get the cheapest veg and fruit...

With some sugar you could make flapjacks which are good and filling for packed lunches.

I'd ration the crisps (perhaps hide some for a couple of weeks) to eeek them out a bit longer through the month.

Kitchenbunny

Good morning, everyone! Looks like it is going to be a cold, but clear day today. If we do venture out, it will be to a friend's house so it looks like today will be a NSD. First of many this month, I hope. The fridge and freezers are well-stocked now and I shouldn't need anything beyond the odd bit of veg or some fruit here and there for a week or two.

Tea tonight is a chilli con carne made using a packet mix I found at the back of the cupboard. I'm going to make some potato wedges to have with it and there is lots of ice-cream in the freezer for pud leftover from Christmas. We did get in a couple of tubs of the Carte D'or Ice-Cream (coffee and cinnamon caramel flavours respectively) because, well, sometimes you just have to. And they were on half price...

...so I can reuse the tubs for pasta, rice or other storage

Lunches are going to be some toasted bagels that were on offer yesterday and bought with the vouchers. Have a good day everyone!

Kitchenbunny xx