Confused about low weekly shop

SammyD_2

When I was on maternity leave last year I worked pretty hard to try to get our food budget down ... I found that £40-50 was the best I could do for food and grocery items (excluding nappies) without compromising quality.

While I bought the odd value item (like tomatoes and kidney beans) which I do anyway, I was not prepared to compromise on some things. I found the key for me to cut back was menu planning (breakfast, lunch and dinner) and cutting out the extras which invariably were bad for us anyway (coke was always big in our house...).

We always eat at least 5 servings of fruit or vegetables, but with vegetables I would rather serve frozen beans than something close to its use by date and grown several thousand miles away, so that saved some money too.

Also, we are vegetarian which no doubt helps as tins of pulses are very cheap, and even cheaper if you can cook them yourself. I don't because I just don't have time.

MegS

I think most of you must live up north, I live in Portsmouth and having been in most of the supermarkets down here at various times of the day and night I have never seen anything reduced by much more than £2, so none of those bargains here. We have a market but the fruit and veg aren't much cheaper than the supermarkets and not that great quality, I only know of one possibly two greengrocers in the whole of this town (something I find very bizarre coming from up north where there were two or three on every shopping street), there are three butchers, one of which is extremely expensive and can only be used on special occasions, I do shop in the one of the other two and it is cheaper than the supermarket but not organic/free range unfortunately. There are no fishmongers but there is a fish market on the quay I'm told but that is a pain to get to with no car, I overspend at Waitrose for the simple reason its the only place I've bought a fillet and never found a bone, if I find a bone I won't eat it. Sans there is no way that would cost so little in Tesco down here. I am fighting really hard to keep my grocery bill down, I'm getting an organic veg box this week as it seems the cheapest way of doing things.

Luna69

freda wrote:

I'm by no means an expert, but heres what I do:

Tomatoes - either buy little plants in spring from market stalls (c.20p per plant), or this year I just planted some seeds from a tomato into a pot with compost in it, with great success.

Chilli plants/sweet peppers - first experiement this year, planted from seed in small pots on the windowsill in the warmest room of the house, in small pots of compost.

POtatoes - buy seed potatoes from the garden centre in early spring. Leave in a tray in a dry room for a couple of weeks to let them sprout. Then put about 3 or 4 in a tub (mine are only about 2foot square) with a few inches of compost above and below them. As the green grows up, add more compost so it is encouraged to root more tubers as you pile up the compost.

Runner beans - easiest of the lot, just stick the beans in the ground at the foot of a bamboo wigwam.

Cucumber - buy a small plant from the market stall. This works best in a grow bag and needs something to climb up.

Courgette - buy small plant from market stall. Put in other half of the grow bag to the cucumber. Will gorw and grow and grow and grow.... (Doesn't need to climb but grows forwards)

Rhubarb - find a neighbour/friend with a plant and get a root from them. Don't pick it too much in the first year, the second year pick as much as you want!

Spring onions - chuck the seeds in the ground and thin out when they look like blades of grass.

Herbs that are indestructible: mint, thyme, parsley, rosemary, sage, chives.

Re the sun, I'm not sure - things like tomatoes need sun to ripen them, but my patch of garden isn't the sunniest in the world and they are fine.

I don't read any magazines, but get a gardening book out of the library in early spring, have a good read.

Thank you, I will keep all this info for when I get started. Are there things that we can start now? I really have no idea about this.

Yvonne

Luna69

We average out between £50-£60 a week for 2 adults and 2 children ( I have 3, but one is only coming up to weaning, so doesn't quite count yet as breast milk is free! :rotfl: )...I don't get much chance at all at the moment to go out and about hunting down food bargains i various supermarkets/shops. I don't drive otherwise I may have a little more chance of it.
I tend to shop at Asda as a general rule, online. I stick to mostly the same basic things each week and try to menu plan as much as I can and then buy accordingly as cheaply as possible but trying also to buy the healthiest options and where I can organic or free range.
I have cut out more snack items like crisps and biscuits, but I do still get the 3 for £1 chocolate biscuits of their own make.. caramel wafers..yum.
I stopped buying fizzy pop ages ago, I don't drink it anyway and the kids are happy with water, milk, squash or fresh fruit juice. We found we were buying it for the family who came over once a week, so stopped and they had to bring their own if they wanted it! :rotfl:

I do get a lot of frozen vegetables.. peas, sweetcorn, broccoli etc. But potatoes and carrots I get fresh, don't like frozen carrots, they always taste odd.
I have tinned veg in for emergencies, tinned beans, tomatoes, soups for slow cooker, tuna, sardines and mackerel.. use that in a nice pasta recipe with macaroni, kids love it, yet DS doesn't like fish!

Anyway for me each week is different, depending on offers at the time online and what we actually need that week, I include all household stuff in with or shopping too, not just food, this week it was kitchen rolls.
Luckily we can't buy clothing from Asda online otherwise it would be a bit more! :rotfl:

I must try going to our makro for some stuff, seeing as it is just at the back of our house.. never think about it even though we do have a card...hmm.

Yvonne

CFC

For me OS shopping is about the following:

Planning - using a menu so you buy what's reasonably priced and cook around that
Impulse - be prepared to ditch the plan if you see a bargain, and instantly replan the menu
Maths - work out or compare all the prices per 100g or equivalent, to make sure you are always getting the best deal
Meat light - meat is expensive. Meals tend to be a small amount of meat, plus lots of veggies. They could also be vegetarian, using pulses, or use pulses mixed with meat to make the meat go further. Ah, I wonder who amongst us holds the world record for stretching mince LOL!
Fancy free You won't be buying much ham, or stuff like that. It's out of your budget. You'll be purchasing Salami for sarnies...etc...you also might not be buying that many winter grapes, there will still be fruit in your budget, but it won't be expensive like blueberries......

To be truthful, whatever people say, you're not going to be eating top quality organic produce unless you're paying top dollar. I agree with Caterina - work out what is important to YOU.

Sarahsaver

MegS fish do have bones! If you get them whole its cheaper!
We get 2 whole salmon from the market for £10.