March 2011 Grocery Challenge

cat_smith

Mothership thanks for the recipes for the DR delivery. I was wondering what to do with some of the bits. DH back late tonight but will be doing some more of the steak for a treat tomorrow. I've also got tonnes of sausages to experiment with. Hope DD is ok.

bexs.ua

Just updating, spent £26.60 in te$co online used £18.50 of vouchers to minimise spend and also splashed out £15.75 on an organic veggie box for the first time EVER!! As OH is vegetarian and both me and DS eat most types of vegetables I figured it might work out better (and more interesting :rotfl: ) than getting from SM......

Total spend so far this month : £42.35 which isn't bad as the usual shop would be over £100 :eek:

Oops forgot the £58.96 spent on dog food :eek: but I did get cashback on this and a £5 discount that has not yet been taken off......

better update signature!

SpendlessKaren

I am so desperate to stop wasting money on grocery shopping that I am going to read this whole thread and hopefully save some money. There is only myself and 2 other adults in my house (my kids aged 23 and 24) plus 1 dog. I must spend at least £200+ a week on food - most of which gets thrown away the next week to be replaced I also work in a supermarket so buy more food there .... I sooo need Help and am getting soo frustrated at the money we waste

helen_jelly

cutiepieabf wrote: »

i tried.....................

Oh no - I'm sorry

Yours was fab too :T

I didn't mean to upset or offend

I look at so much on here that I forget to mention everyone - sorry

Helenx

CherryPie

SpendlessKaren wrote: »

I am so desperate to stop wasting money on grocery shopping that I am going to read this whole thread and hopefully save some money. There is only myself and 2 other adults in my house (my kids aged 23 and 24) plus 1 dog. I must spend at least £200+ a week on food - most of which gets thrown away the next week to be replaced I also work in a supermarket so buy more food there .... I sooo need Help and am getting soo frustrated at the money we waste

Then you're in the right place!

Best thing I found was to read the first few pages with the recipes etc. And everyone will chip in with some advice for you. I've been on here over a year, and have only just got into the meal planning.

Good Luck, and feel free to ask as many questions as you want!

:beer:

Having an NSD today (hopefully) Sausage casserole in the SC to be portioned up and frozen for my own ready meals. I like cooking from fresh, but can't be bothered by the time I get in from work.

Might go freezer shopping later and see what else is lurking in there waiting to be turned into something wonderful :rotfl:

prophecy_grrl

I have just added up my grocery shopping bills for this week. Total spends so far = £48.29. This is a whopping £1.71 under budget :rotfl:

I will be going shopping again on Monday and am hoping to spend about £40. I'm aiming for £50 p/w and this is a 5 week month so £250 for March. Am meal planning my little socks off as we speak!

martafdz

OMG! It has to be difficult when you work in a sm, since you keep looking at "offers" and you might just buy there for easyness. I do think that £200+ a week is too much specially when you are throwing away stuff. Most of things I buy go directly in the freezer, everything that can be frozen pretty much. I defrost in the morning for the evening, that helps me to avoid throwing meat.

I am doing now the same with bread, I put 5 slices in a small sandwich bag and goes in there. I take one of this when I need it. Sometimes we have toasts and sandwiches but some times we don't eat bread and when we arrive to the ood there is mould in the last few slices. So freezing is also helping me to avoid that. I re-use the same bags for freezing it.

Do a week plan and see how much you would need to buy for real. Give yourself a maximum "treat budget" on top of that, I find that helped me when I started as I was used to get too many speciality food, treats and chocolates. Sticking to an amount a week helped me to be more careful with those too. I started with £5 for sm treats and I also started making my own cakes, which I must say have saved me a fortune. A cake lasts in my house 2 or 3 days so with a couple of cakes a week I am served. I buy the cheapest eggs from sm to do them, last time I bought 18 for £1.80 at MrS and MrM. I might use 3 for cake, so about 30p in eggs, 1/3 of flour is about 30p too, butter I bought on offer at 62p for 500g, so I might spent 30p on there; sugar another 30p and any flavour/filling for 50p-£1 each cake. That makes a yummy cake for £1.70-£2.2 ish. The kind of cakes you could buy in sm for that price are tasteless, artificial, full of weird stuff and small. I used to buy loads of chocolate bars for DH, he goes through one every couple of days given the chance, plus biscuits. I was spending over £20 a week just in sweets, biscuits and chocolates before.

Keep all your receipts, staple them to some diary or notepad. Highlight the basic household items in one colour, the fresh items in other colour and what you can understand like treats, sweets and not really needed stuff in another. Look at the household items first, you do not need to buy those for the day most of the times, these are usually bought in advance, never in a rush of "omg, I run out of...". Could you buy them in £land or H0meB4rg4ins? Could you hold to buy any until you see an amazing price to stock up on that? Check MySupermarket.com to see where that item is cheaper within a their 4 sm. Then look at the treats, see how much you really spend a week on those. Think how many of those items you could have reduced, how many you could have ignored and how many you could actually have tried to do yourself or find a cheaper alternative. Then check the fresh food, see what is that you have thrown away and the reason: is it because you had too much? Is it because you did not eat any? Is it because it had a short expiry date? I used to buy loads of meals and think "I will eat this, I will eat that"... the problem was that I bought many and suddenly I had 3 or 4 things going out of date in the next couple of days and no way I could eat them all. Sometimes I could freeze, sometimes I could not. I have understand that I do not need that much food at home. I am buying now for a week maximum, instead for 2-3 weeks. I don't have a chest freezer (yet) so buying over that means having loads of food in the fridge and a chance of expiring without me realizing. I am still trying to be good at meal planning, I am slowly getting there but still a good way to go.

I am thinking of doing an excel file where I put all my basics like dishwasher, coffe, tea, etc; things I can stock up. I want to put when I bought it last, how much it was and the cheapest price I have found. That way if I see a "good offer" on any sm I could see if it really is a good offer. A couple of weeks ago I went to MrS and saw Robinsons 2 x £1.60 or £1 each; so I bought loads and stocked up thinking that 80p per bottle was a good price. Then I went to MrM this week and saw the same bottles at 50p each!!! Grrrr.... lol So now if I run out of Robinsons I might buy one or two bottles until I find them again at a similar price to stock up. Has anyone got anything similar?

Winged_one

Well, I spent €42 in M&S yesterday, but only €19 of that counts in the GC. (I also got lunch for work and a plant for my desk and choccie things for the girls in the office, all from my "weekly pocket money" alllowance for coffees, papers, general spends).

I got 3 quiche and put 2 in freezer, the 3rd is for lunch tomorrow. I got 2 lots of puppodums (I sometimes make fresh but often too mcuh hassle to get out deep fat fryer) and a pack of naan breads for indian meals midweek. Bearnaise sauce for a steak and chips dinner tomorrow for DH and I (the spuds in the sack I got last week are HUGE and perfect for HM chips!). And a pack of indian starters for tonight (having these, and puppodums, means I will MAKE our Indian feast rather than going to takeaway - so I don't feel as bad about it and I also keep takeaway budget intact for another week).

I am not giong to the supermarket this weekend. I need steak, maybe another night's meat, some meat or fish for Sunday, lots of fruit and veg, milk, and possibly bread (although I may make some instead). I have put a few things on the list to get next week - but seperate.

Meal plan for the coming week is:
Fri: Indian feast with Chicken curry as main
Sat: Steak and chips with mushrooms, and bearnaise sauce
Sun: Something from butcher or fishmonger
Mon: Shepherd's pie
Tues: Chicken goujons and waffles for DD, rasher sambo for me
Wed: Pasta and tomato sauce with prawns and veg
Thurs: Beef bourgignone
Fri: Travelling so probably a picnic for the car - perhaps even a quiche sliced in advance and some salads!

fedupandskint

just thinking what I can meal plan for the weekend and next week

Tonight - rainbow trout, veg and potatoes
Sat - beef brisket casserole, mash and cabbage
Sun - casserole leftovers as I frantically finish off my assignment due in the next day (eek!)
mon - HM pizza with what ever is in the fridge!
Tues - pancakes - cheese and bacon
Wed - scampi and HM potato wedges with peas
Thurs - pasta with butternut squash and blue cheese
Fri - pork chop, veg and mash

Shouldn't need to buy anything until next Friday at the earliest - please let me keep out of the shops and rack up some NSDs this week!

tessie_bear

hi...went to asdaa today and came out with what i went in for...makes a change...i thought prices were getting ridiculous...i wanted some salad but at 99p for 6 small not ripe tomatoes i decided not to bother ....i wanted some chicken joints...the breast with the wing on but for the same price i could get a whole chicken and cut it up myself...i get the legs free and can use carcass for stock

there is a head line on the mail today ( not a paper id buy but saw it in the libary) saying how much prices are going to go up...it mentioned bread breakfast cereal and a few others i think meat...im not sure what the answer is fir families..u can only cut back so far ...um food for thought

tata tessa