6000 meals under 50p in 2010; feeding your family on a low budget

mark55man

OK so having gone through my budgets for the month - here is a guesstimate of all my spends. Not done very precisely - but against a total spend of £497 (GC rules, OK)

* 490 meals 50p or under £220 - covers all cereal, main meals, vegetables
* 50 meals overbudget £45
* wastage £20 - not great but seemed to have more 1/2 packs around that went off especially lettuce, but also some blunders with mince _pale_ - will try harder
* fruit £40 - 30 bags of apples/oranges/bananas/pears - over an above that for lunch boxes
* store cupboard/freezer balance (ie incoming vs used)- £25 Was trying to run down storecupboard, but did keep it stocked up during the snows
* Alcohol £5 - bottle beer on saturday
* oj, aj & coke £30 - for the rest of the times 20litres OJ, 10 litres AJ, 40litres freeway cola
* non food £15 - washing, dishwasher, dishcloths ...
* crisps & biscuits & chocolate - £30
* baking £30 - OH did a lot of cake making with the kids in the big freeze- and went a bit OTT on chocolate and sprinkles

Unaccounted for £35 - so this is the snacking
... Thinks back
... veggie quorn got used up quickly £5 (points figure at DD1 and DS1)
- the smoked mackeral as well £2 (points finger at self)
- sliced ham goes but not too quickly but we do have a lot so £3
- tomatoes & cucumber go very quickly as well - £10 5 packs & 5 cucumbers snacked in a month (they love those Lidl Cherry tomatoes - points figure at DD1 and DS1)
- looking back through my posts as well some extra portions saved (and fridged not frozen) have gone awol - especially the veggie chilli - points figure at DS1 mainly) -

I think I can live with the above apart from the wastage, and maybe try and cut down on the chocolate - OH likes Giant Buttons - yummy but not cheapest way of doing it)

But if you check my GC challenge I previously had problems getting under £600, so to be under £500 is a result - a year of that would be great

aplaceinthesun

Sorry I dont post much Mark but I do come and read daily , well nearly every day!

I wanted to congratulate you on such a great start to the year , :T well done on coming in under the £500 mark for this month :T . Good luck for February.

Heres hoping PBS doesnt come along and make too many comments about what youve spent your money on .... !

mark55man

good news on the snacking front - I forgot about the cat food - (not for snacking) but that's another £20 that didn't go to waste or drive-by snackings - as I certainly didn't count it in any of the other categories.

not a bad month in all - lets see how February goes

domesticgoddess789

Hi Mark,

Just wanted to say that altho I don't comment, I have been reading your thread everyday with interest and think you are doing great!

You're an inspiration!

Hayley

mark55man

Thanks for your kind words - I think we're in a good place on this thread at the moment. Got some recipes to get through and some links to read through, and will try and do that steady-eddie style

All the "heated debates" have been had and "lessons have been learned", and now we're just getting on with it, and isn't that the secret to MSE - we're in for the long haul and don't spoil it all in a mad moment

weezl74

mark88man wrote: »

I think I can live with the above apart from the wastage, and maybe try and cut down on the chocolate - OH likes Giant Buttons - yummy but not cheapest way of doing it)

hiya Mark, a possible idea for you... if your DDs like this sort of thing, then making the buttons by dipping a spoon in melted cadbury's choc and then drawing a little circle onto greaseproof with the back of the spoon leaves a nice button shape. Big block cadbury's is 58p per 100 g and giant buttons are normally 96p per 100g. This would save you £35 in a year if yourhousehold ate 1 bag of giant buttons a week.

(if you then experimented with half cadbury's and half cheaper brand you could save even more-but women can be very particular about their chocolate. Wouldn't want to see you have to start a thread called 'cooking for one' :rotfl:)

HTH!

xxx

mark55man

:rotfl: :rotfl:

LizzieB

Hi Mark,
I've been lurking for a while here and I think you are doing a great job. Don't feel bad about any over budget (and we're talking pennies here!) - you have obviously made so many positive changes which you believe are for the benefit of your family (and that's the most important part - it's YOUR family) that it is your right to feel good about what you are doing. So what if using up something you brought pre-challenge takes you 'slightly over budget' - better to use it up than waste it! Good for you!

mark55man

news flash - just trying piadine from earlier in the thread - everyone is looking forward to it - link is at:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=319790&highlight=piadines

doing it with quorn chicken pieces £1 a bag and one of the Lidl pork fillets so should be good. will serve with chopped tomato sauce and sweetcorn on the cob (69p for 4 woopsied from Mr S)

Fire_Fox

Just popped by to soak up some inspiration (newly unemployed ) and to tell you that Asda has reduced Taj frozen crushed garlic to just 50p! For that you get 400g or 22 little blocks which are at least two cloves per block.