Do you spend £10.00 per month on food you don't eat

Living_proof

When I first read the thread topic, I thought "not me" but having read the posts I can identify with the blown brocolli, sprouting onions, floppy carrots and dessicated lemons. Having to buy in quantity for a good price is pretty much the problem, but sometimes life just doesn't fit into last Thursday's splendid plan. I strive to waste nothing but sometimes miss the golden hour to process the breadcrumbs, make soup of the brocolli, remember to juice the old, hard oranges, etc. We are not perfect but can only strive to do our best. We recently had a UFO soup and it was all the leftovers before we went on holiday in July. It missed a bit on the presentation skills but tasted great and was a warming welcome lunch on a wintry day. I never feel as guilty with fruit and veg. casualties as at least they nourish my compost heap!

[Deleted User]

I'm ashamed to say I probably did as my shopping bill used to come to over £100 per week and there is no way that a household of 2 adults and 2 children would eat that much. Since watching our pennies and setting a monthly budget of £160 we have spend a grand total of £24 this week and used all the veg we probably would have thrown away once upon a time - so nothing thrown away this week.

seasalt_2

I don't throw out very much at all from the fridge/cupboards etc. I find the trick is to check the fridge every day or at least before you go shopping. I am quite good at being creative with leftovers and using up things - it's good food left on plates that annoys me. I was brought up to clean my plate - which is why I'm fat and they're not - I have just about managed to stop myself cleaning their plates too and I don't want them to eat more than they've room for, but the waste still bothers me, even though it all goes into the dog or onto the compost heap or into the green cone (like a compost bin but you can put cooked food and meat into it). I try not to oversize portions or to dish up food I know they don't like but someone nearly always leaves a little bit of something.

Jackie, sardines (the ones in tomato sauce) make quite nice fish cakes mixed with mashed potato. I add a tiny bit of chilli, harissa or tabasco and sometimes finely chopped spring onions too.

Petlamb

morganlefay wrote: »

yes but....I've got 2 jars of curry sauce in my cupboard which I bought because they were 4p each. We don't eat much curry and I distrust it because it was SO cheap, but I did feel very thrifty when I bought them. I shall now go and throw out the contents and use the jars for jam !

Actually, if it's anything like Asda's cheapy curry, check the ingredient list - less additives and rubbish than most 'big brands' for much much more £££! We like it

[Deleted User]

adelight sardine curry ????
seasalt thank for the ideas for using up the sardines
lostinrates your recipe sound rather nice, I am determined to get through the sardine mountain I have, only another 9 tins to go :) I have been reading though and it seems we are all thinking twice at the moment about buying more food than we actually need.I noticed even the Co-op is running an ad campaign on t.v. for using stuff up before getting more which sounds like an odd sort of ad for a shop, but I think they realise that folk are going to watch their money more closely this year.Less waste means less in landfill sites. To me wasted food is an obscenity with half the world starving .
I too have cut right back on wasting stuff and as I live alone I can eat what I fancy and any odd concoction will only have me eating it anyway.Tonight I enjoyed my ham salad and used up the small cherry toms that were starting to go a wee bit soft but chopped up and mixed into my salad they were fine.I have some cold cooked charlotte potato in the fridge and some mushrooms that need using up tomorrow so it may be a type of onion,sliced potato and mushroom ommelette for lunch. Then I will try lostinrates sardine recipes for dinner tomorrow night.I have some grated red leicester cheese to use up in the fridge.
Re the left over oranges I sometimes make an orange drizzle cake instead of a lemon one for a change if I have a couple that are getting past their best.
Thinking about this I have three bananas in the conservatory to use up which I will make a banana custard with tomorrow that will do at least two days pudding

mrs-stressed

Kirri wrote: »

I've seen a wormery or two on Freecycle though they were snapped up quick!

We used to put pearl barley in home made dog food - it's also good to boil up, drain the liquid off and cool

I shall do some research on wormeries - a friend got one for xmas and I was sooo jealous!!!!!! Thank you for that tip though. As for the pearl barley - another one on my list now - as sometimes I do run out of the tinned stuff and give my dog bread, eggs and some warm water all mushed up. She eats and there is no 'follow-through' after!!!!

bramble1

We mostly waste dairy products and fresh veg and fruit, we either don't use all the cream etc (can we freeze this) or the fresh food goes rank before i use it up.

Going to make more of an effort to add it to my cooking in future!

mrs-stressed

JackieO wrote: »

Thinking about this I have three bananas in the conservatory to use up which I will make a banana custard with tomorrow that will do at least two days pudding

Your roses will love the skins in the spring and summer as the potassium is something that benefits them greatly. Just chucked at the base is all you need to do - they will turn black and then compost as natural stuff does. Result - lovely roses and a feel-good-factor not having just chucked them away.....!

Kirri

mrs-stressed wrote: »

I shall do some research on wormeries - a friend got one for xmas and I was sooo jealous!!!!!! Thank you for that tip though. As for the pearl barley - another one on my list now - as sometimes I do run out of the tinned stuff and give my dog bread, eggs and some warm water all mushed up. She eats and there is no 'follow-through' after!!!!

Our dog would throw up nearly every commercial dog food going, we never found out why, god knows what goes in it to affect some dogs!

So after a trial, he went onto home made, mix of shop mince and various store cupboard things or a bit of veg.


Back to waste and I have half a carton of soya milk that needs to be used today or it will need to go down the sink :eek: was opened to make yorkshire pudding, so I really should have made it again - though I was going to do soda bread (with yoghurt) and squash soup today. Soya milk doesn't freeze well either so no idea what to use it in.. or I could do scones I suppose, think they have milk in? Though I was going to have artichokes tonight - I have too much food even though I have very little in the fridge!

purpleivy

adelight wrote: »

Pfft the most I waste is the last slither of nutella i can't get out of the jar or the very end of an onion that gets lost in the veg box!
I just cannot afford to, what I buy, I eat and this definitely shows in some of the odd concoctions I eat :eek: Meals like sardine curry and peas & egg have become a delicassy :rotfl:

You need a couple of those long handled plastic scrapers that you get at Lakeland. Not a SCRAP gets wasted! They seem to be able to get every last bit of mayo/marmalade/nutella/cakemix ( I never said that last bit! :eek:) and the kids get fed up that they put a jar down, saying it's empty and then I get the scraper out.