February 2011 Grocery Challenge

rachelww1

Just on to update sig (again ). I forgot it was half term and the gannets would be home all day. Spent another £31.58 in T$scos tonight. Only got 3 things that weren't on my list inc 24 pouches of cat food reduced to £3.82 because the box was broken! And a smoked gammon joint on offer at £3.99 per kg - that's about to go in the slow cooker overnight in a bit of apple juice and will be used for sarnies and as many meals as I can stretch it to. Oh and I got 4 mugs that were 10p each.

Pretty sure that's me done for feb, but I'll declare on thurs when my month finishes. MIL has DS6 on weds, so going to do an inventory, then I'll decide what to budget for March. I have his party to cater for so will have to factor that in, though I'm not going overboard as I have done in previous years. At least I'm doing better than the £100+ a week that I was spending before I joined here.

seductivesmile

martafdz wrote: »

Has anyone got a good recipe (so easy and cheap, lol) for either Cottage Pie or Sheppherd's Pie? I have some mince meat that I wanted to use that way. I haven't found a recipe for this in the index and before making any random online recipe I thought I could ask and see if you had any advice/ideas.

Hi Martafdz,
My method/ recipes for shepherds pie,
~ 200g Mince Meat
~100g Rehydrated soya mince (in boiling water with an beef oxo)
1 carrot grated
1 diced onion
Tin Baked Beans
Tin / Handful of peas / green beans
Dash Worc Sauce
Tomato Puree
seasoning
Beef stock cube

I make up the stock with the stock cube and pop the soya mince, worcester sauce, tomato puree in together and leave the mince to rehydrate,
Brown of the mince and diced onion, add the rehydrated soya mince, stir in the carrot, and tin of baked beans and peas/ green beans. add boiling water if too thick, season to taste, stir for about 5 mins, top with mash potato and then if u want sliced tomato or cheese and pop in the oven, gas 5, 190C for about half an hour
HTH, soya mince bulks it out so i tend to get 5 portions from this.

I nipped into Mr T on my way home from work, needed some bread & eggs for lunch tomorrow, and wasn't going to get home til 10 after helping dad, picked up pitta bread, reduced salad, and lots of reduced sliced Mr T finest Deli Meats, from about £3 odd to between 20-50p each, so for a total of £2.54 i got 24 sandwich fillers of premium tasty meat! :j, also in the reduced section i got 2 blocks of 300g of cheese, so 600g for 91p. going to grate it into portions and freeze! woo! so 24 portions of cheese! thats 48 sandwich fillers for £3.45!
so much for not going to the shop. haha - oh well, guess its a spend to save!
Anyhow - was a spend of £7.08, used £6 of vouchers, so only really £1.08. happy happy!

Have a good tomorrow all!

SS x

sorting_myself_out

Well today i had a day off and i made my first batch of twinks hobnobs and they are soooo nice!!! :j Thanks for the recipe!! Had a trip to Mr m's 1st and have done my last shop of the month, just a top up came in at £24.32...so i think i will be coming in under budget, my month runs to wed 2nd....meal planned up til then, only will need milk i hope!:T Having the challenge has kept me on track and having stocked up slightly this month, next should hopefully be alittle easier!! Will update signature!

meanmarie

Spent €62.14 this week, bringing my running total to €142.97, still some meat left in freezer so hopefully will make it this month, had a terrible month in Jan, so due to keep myself in line!

Marie

rosieben

seductivesmile - I've added your shepherd's pie recipe to the index :beer:

Candy_Belle

Morning:D

A few spends to report from yesterday

A**a - £2.07 Dusters, Jay Cloths and Dettol Wipes
W****s - £4.68 12xFelix Pouches

Total Spend £6.75

Would like to thank everyone on this thread for the support and advise that you all share x

Winged_one

I spent €49 over the weekend. Went to Farmer's market and spent €10 on 3 packs of spices for curry (great mixes though), €9 on 3 bottles of apple juice (the man was off the ciggies so grumpy and let me have an extra euro off), and €13 on cheese (a slab of blue and a slab of local cheddar) and olives. Then €18 in SV last night - €9 on chicken breasts, and then bread, milk and flu remedy.

We made a curry last night when we got in (just a jar), and I got a spag bol from the freezer for tonight. I have pumpkin soup for lunch. Then I will have pasta vongole (clams) on Thursday, perhaps a nasi goreng tomorrow with frozen rice or else chicken and a jar of different sauce, and a beef stew on Friday.

DD wants to get a pack of pizza dough at the farmer's market next Sat, so that will be Sat dinner for all.

funnyflipp

After comming on here regularly and setting myself a totally unrealistic Feb buget I will try again
Aimed for 350 in Feb HOWEVER forgot that I had a house guest for most of the month (Adult and male!)
Also think it might be better to try and reign things in a little more slowly
SO I did come in at £35 less than last month so I'll settle for that, I have enough to last until Friday but then still have a full freezer
My month runs from 25th-25th so as of Friday I will be aiming for £450.00 in March, I know most of you guys would think that's huge but I think cutting back bit by bit is going
to be better in the long run

xx

goodgirl80

Went to Laldi and Addl last night, spent £6.89
£87.44/ £100.00


:T

I'm a bit cross though because last time I bought two large milks and got one out of the freezer the other day and it's already gone off :mad:
Going to try buying less milk this week, Although we're both off work next week so will be using more. I think I'll get 2x 4 pinters instead of the 3 litre ones.

Remaining to buy: Milk, Cat treats, Quorn pieces, foil, quorn sandwich chicken slices, spread(margarine).

goodgirl80 wrote: »

10.00 spent on a cat toilet and crickets £80.55/ £100.00





OK - I don't think I've spent any more of my groceries budget, but my bank account I use for bills isn't tallying with my spreadsheet... I think I'll leave it a couple of days because sometimes transactions take a while to appear. Hope everyone is getting on ok.

My spreadsheet is showing about +18p overall. Don't know why

quintwins

£3.20 on a cooked chicken yesterday, today will be a nsd