Going shopping this weekend - need to be a bit more OS

thecornflake

I've got the monthly shop to do this weekend and although we do cook a lot of food from scratch I could do with a few ideas to improve on this.

Generally we have things like casseroles, spag bol etc but I could do with replacing some of the convenience food we eat to save money (and eat healthier of course).

The main issue is my wife feeding my daughter at lunch times - she generally just has sandwiches or occassionaly sausages and chips done in the deep fryer. She has trouble cooking for anythign over about 10 minutes as she's recovering from a broken ankle at the moment.

I'm a bit more adventurous with my cooking - I have been playing around with bread making and did home made pizzas the other day - so I'm happy to try cooking pretty much anything from scratch for the evening meals.

My main problem is not being able to store fruit and veg for the whole month, I know there's some threads on this in the indexed thread so I'll check these out but I do need to buy everything at the beginning of the month as at the moment by the end of week 1 all the money's gone on other bills.

So mainly I need some ideas for versatile ingredients I can buy this weekend that will help us have more home-cooked meals and maybe provide some fairly quick healthy meals for a 3-year-old during the day (she doesn't mind veg too much by the way which is great).

I'd like to grow some of my own food but at the moment I'm guessing it's the wrong time of year to plant anything.

squeaky

There's nothing wrong with some frozen veg. Peas are frozen within a very short time of picking, for example, so are actually "fresher" than ones bought in the pod. I stick to sweetcorn and peas mostly, and cauli is not bad though I steer well clear of broccoli and carrots.

You could also blanch and freeze surplus veg as soon as you buy it so that you've got a stock of reasonably fresh stuff to see you through the month. Then there's soups, stews and casseroles you can load with veg and freeze, and quiches freeze well too.

As for fruit - well, you could make and freeze such things as pies and crumbles and even fruit fools, and there are quite a few tea loaves and cakes that take a fair amount of fruit. Not totally fresh, I know, but at least they've got fruit in them somewhere.

This pretty much how I deal with my veg box deliveries, and deliberately save currently in season veg for use later in the year.

HTH

lynzpower

cornflake

Can you knock up a quick weekly menu plan inc lunches , snacks drinks

ie spag bol monday
bangers & mash tuesdays
then we can see where you can buy cheaper, or more economical versions to make at home

the other things to bear in mind when keeping costs down is
would shopping weekly be easier ( it definately is for us, much less waste)
how much/ what usually goes in the bin wasted?
what have you got in the cupbaords/ freezer already etc

using up is the best moneysaving of all!

thecornflake

Ok, lots of info and questions coming up -

I'm stuck to monthly shopping at the moment due to having to use the money before all the bills eat it up!

A typical week's evening meals will be -

Mon - Spag Bol
Tue - Casserole (done in slow cooker, with frozen bag of casserole mix from Iceland and frozen diced meat also from Iceland)
Wed - Chicken breasteaks (from frozen) with chips
Thur - Jacket potatoes and salad
Fri - Frozen pizza and garlic bread
Sat - Frozen chicken kievs etc with chips/veg (steamed from frozen)
Sun - Roast if possible with veg, roast potatoes (froz) yorkshires (froz)

Breakfast - only my daughter eats this, usually own-brand cereal or toast.

Lunches - As I said mainly ham sandwiches for wife and daughter and at the weekends I have soup from cans or rice and something (bored of sandwiches after eating them all week at work).

Where I've put Chicken kievs or breasteaks that's basically whatever similar thing was on offer at Iceland when we did the monthly shop. We have two freezers which helps take advantage of bogof offers.

I tried homemade pizzas the other night and did ok, although the first one was too think and the base was undercooked in the middle and the second I rolled thinner but then couldn't get it onto the pizza cooking tray we use. Next time I'll put the topping on once it's on the tray!

I plan to do these again this month. I used mozarella for the cheese, does grated cheddar work as well?

All our veg is frozen Iceland own brand. We had a leaflet through the other day from Abel & Cole (http://www.abel-cole.co.uk) who do organice boxes but I think they will work out more expensive?

Squeaky why do you say steer clear of brocolli and carrots? Do you mean freezing them from fresh?

In the cupboards I have all the basics - bicarb, yeast, flour (bread, plain and sr), dried herbs (plus basil and parsley plants although the Parsley is looking quite unhealthy!), pasta, some rice. Quite a lot of cans - chopped tomatoes for the spag bol, soup, hot dogs.

jcr16

just a thought , would it help if you mande a bigger evening meal and then that could be re-heated for your wife and daugthers lunch next day ?

i often have re-heated left overs for lunch and it makes a real change and also so easy.

squeaky

thecornflake wrote:

Squeaky why do you say steer clear of brocolli and carrots? Do you mean freezing them from fresh?

I mean buying frozen. Carrots come out all chewy and broccoli is just a disaster.

Not that home freezing of them is much better. I need to work on my technique I reckon

EagerLearner

I tried Abel & Cole this summer and to be honest didn't think much of their £10 small box - maybe the other boxes are better - but still, we ended up canceling it and I now get some bits from the market each saturday. I spend around £3 each Saturday on veg - can you put by say £20 when you get paid and do the same? Of course it depends if you have time and/or a market near you...

thecornflake

Yes, we could cook bigger evening meals and re-use the next day. When we do spag bol etc we normally do too much anyway!

I could do with any hints for things to stock up on that will help with some of the recipes on here once I get round to reading them all? - any commonly used items here that might not be obvious to 'normal' shoppers (although wife doesn't like lentils so they're out). I've got flour, tins of tomatoes etc but anything else that comes in handy?

EagerLearner

Tins of sweetcorn, tins of baked beans, own brand juices, spices from Turkish or Indian shops, stock cubes, cous cous (I love the flavoured ones from Sainsburys - 1 sachet around 45p and does for a meal for two when you can't be bothered cooking for ages), long life milk (for those days when you'just need a pint of milk' and it would have cost you £12 if you'd gone to the shop and bought stuff you didn't need!), sliced meat for sandwiches (you can freeze in freezer bags for following weeks), cheese to grate and freeze, tins of cheap rice pudding, tins of chick peas, red beans and butter beans... Plus my recent favourite: Cooking 4 jacket potatoes on Sunday and freezing them for weekday lunches or lazy dinners!

Hope this helps!