help me: food shopping too much - freezable meals

LydiaSophia

£100 of food for a week! Are you mad!

I live alone and I don't think I spend that in a month.

Buy fruit and veg from a market (if you go when they're packing up they bag everything up for £1 per bag).

Everyone is right, soups and stews are great, filling easy to cook and cheap and can be frozen. Eat soup with big chunks of bread - GO TO THE sUPERMARKETS BEFORE THEY ARE ABOUT TO SHUT AND ALL THEIR BREAD IS REDUCED TO 10P. Freeze it and only take put what you need. If your bread has gone stale you can sprinkle a little water on it and stick it in the microwave for about 15 seconds and it has got some life back it in.

You shouldn't go shopping when your hungry as this makes you get stuff you don't really need just cos you are hungry.

Always make a list of items you need and stick to it!

Boiled egg and soliders is a nice meal if you can't be bothered aswell.

Good Luck!

laughing_cow

When you've just started cooking for one, it's really easy to overspend. When I first lived on my own I bought huge quantities of fruit and veg because I was used to seeing the fridge/cupboards packed with them, because that's what my mum had. Of course, that's because she was shopping for four, not just one

Be careful when you do a 'big' shop - I used to order way too much stuff and it was always gone off before I could use it. Much better to do smaller amounts of shopping more frequently. If I have lots of veg that needs using quickly, soup or stews are easily made and frozen in portions.

Re meal planners - I try to do this for about half my meals. If I try to do any more, it just falls by the wayside because I've either gone out unexpectedly, I'm tired, or just want something different. I hate feeling 'obliged' to cook something from a meal planner when all I want is a bit of toast! On the days that I haven't meal planned, I've still got plenty of standby choices; homemade frozen meals, pasta/sauce etc in the cupboard and salad stuff in the fridge. I'm inherently lazy so I always cook at least two portions so I can have leftovers the following day. But you have to find what works best for you.

I've always spent quite a lot on food but I very rarely eat any processed ready food - I just have expensive taste - eg I don't like most supermarket bread and will happily spend £2/3 on a sourdough loaf from the deli. I try and balance this out by making other stuff from scratch - eg posh bread + homemade soup.

Good luck!

laughing_cow

LydiaSophia wrote:

Boiled egg and soliders is a nice meal if you can't be bothered aswell.

Yep - I think I have this or beans on toast, or even just toast about once a week! If I've been working late, I can't be bothered to cook so it's got to be some kind of snacky dinner.

apples1

You could cook for four each time you cook but then freeze the other three portions. Its hard to buy just enough fresh food to make one meal as the ingredients come in bigger quantities. We cook in that way and after a few cook ups we have lots of home made "ready meals" in the freezer.

I never "cook" tea for my daughter but she has fresh (frozen) homecooked healthy food every eve that I just have to heat up in the microwave when its her tea time (frozen in child size portions!). If you did a couple of cook ups and froze three portions each time you could the get away with just one or two cook ups a week and the other nights just selct from your selection of homemade ready meals.

If you invite some friends over for a takeaway chinese one night you'll have lots of reusable plastic dishes to freeze your homemade portions in!

mrsmortenharket

Don't go shopping for a while

Make a meal plan with the stuff you already have.

Should you need to go shopping for basics, take a list & STICK TO IT!

Make meal plans. Make more than you need of freezable stuff like chilli/curry/bolognaise etc etc...

Don't buy ready meals.

Don't forget leftovers can be made into another meal. Left over chicken carcass is a soup, boil the whole thing up with carrot, onion, potato & any other veg lurking about. Boil for a bit. Strain, add the veggies back. Let the chicken cook & pick the meat off. You'll be amazed that even an apparently empty carcass will have meat on it. Cool & blend if you wish. Freeze in portions. Fab! I think! I'm a veggie, lol!

Good luck!

Lisa x

lynzpower

I agree 100 a week is a lot.

ONe of the things I wonder about is if you re buying soft fruits for smoothie making these too can be expensive, especially as they are not seasonal and now will probably have to be jetted from guatemala or bolivia or wherever to hity your plate ( ie NOT fresh, hardly any vitamins left) A better and chea[per bet is to buy frozen veg, particularly rasperries and summer fruits. I did see now tescos are doing frozen smoothie packs, but also farmfoods do bargain frozen rasperries etc - perfect for smoothies! ( and cheap at 3 for a pound too )

Again it really depends what sort of thing you like and what you are into, but put it this way, me & my partner spend about a 100 a MONTH on food & cleaning stuff & toiletries between us. thats including all our lunches packed and otherwise.

the sort of things we have are really varied and fall into 3 categories

"lazy tea" for when we cant be bothered
beans on toast
cheese toastie
fishfingers, oven chips, peas/ beans
linda mccartney pie, mash & peas/ carrots/ sweetcorn & gravy type affair
sausages, beans mushrooms, waffles, fried egg

Stock staples
Roast dinner
bangers & mash
chilli
bolognese ( veggie for me, mince for OH)
lasagne
stirfry v quick
fajitas / enchiladas
curry ( these are top to freeze you can do a massive batch & feeze in seperate tupperwares)
PIzza & jacket pots

New ideas
tonight im doing chicken fillets & veg in hot african BBQ sauce in tortilla (nicked from mums ) with Spicy Cuban Rice & sour cream & a bit of salady stuff.
I tend to get ideas from when we eat out, I think, I can make that at home ( usually nicer) from here, magazines, newspapers, tv wherever.
theres usually someone on here knows how to make whatever you want and the indexed recipe collection is massive and theres LOADS of stuff in there to get going on!

EagerLearner

Oooh - lynzpower - you're making my tummy rumble with the chicken and hot african BBQ sauce! Sounds yummy!

[Deleted User]

With the mince meals - don't forget Shepherds Pie! You can make a large amount of that and easily freeze it.

You could vary the mash if you feel adventurous. Replace some of the normal potato with sweet potato. Or mix some garlic or onion into the mash. Or top it with grated cheese.

I'm hungry now...

laughing_cow

lynzpower wrote:

ONe of the things I wonder about is if you re buying soft fruits for smoothie making these too can be expensive, especially as they are not seasonal and now will probably have to be jetted from guatemala or bolivia or wherever to hity your plate ( ie NOT fresh, hardly any vitamins left) A better and chea[per bet is to buy frozen veg, particularly rasperries and summer fruits. I did see now tescos are doing frozen smoothie packs, but also farmfoods do bargain frozen rasperries etc - perfect for smoothies! ( and cheap at 3 for a pound too )

That's a very good point to make. I often eat fruit for breakfast and used to spend quite a lot on supermarket berries and tropical stuff. I now just have one of these items and the other fruit is whatever's seasonal and cheaper (and probably healthier). Re the smoothies, it's worth checking shops for reduced price berries at the end of the day - it doesn't matter if they're a bit over ripe for smoothies.

lynzpower wrote:

"lazy tea" for when we cant be bothered
beans on toast
cheese toastie
fishfingers, oven chips, peas/ beans
linda mccartney pie, mash & peas/ carrots/ sweetcorn & gravy type affair
sausages, beans mushrooms, waffles, fried egg

I echo those and I've remembered another lazy tea, Bruschetta. It's something I've always got the ingredients for: Ciabatta bread in the freezer, olive oil, basil plant, garlic/red onion, tomatoes. My favourite easy tea and not too pricey.

jane_sanderson

Hi, I used to run a pub that did lots of food-all homecooked- and these are some of the best cheap catering tips i can remember:
Cook a large quantity of rice-boil in saucepan or follow microwave instructions-as soon as its cooked strain and rinse in cold water. drain- then put single portions in sheets of cling film-roll up and freeze.-Defross and reheats in minutes in the microwave and makes lots of portions in one go.
Buy tins of cheapest chopped tomatoes and add them to hot curry/chilli/bolognaise/sauce before adding meat. Takes the heat out of hot sauces too as well as making them go furthur.
Put cheese sauce on top of left over or cheap froz veg-top with sliced or mashed left over spuds and the sprinkle with grated cheese. Put in oven till bubbling- good for veggies too.janewannabeamillionaire