I swear my food budget can be lower!

abby1234519

Well, even though this budget won't start for a couple of months, I'm planning ahead as I won't have time to plan once this baby arrives.
I thought £130 a month to feed myself was fair enough...but I still think I can spend less than this. So I've spent the last couple of days going through mum's Rose Elliot's and Crank's books as to be honest, I don't mind vegetarian food.I based it on a 30 day month (I know there aren't always 30 days but its likely I will have a takeaway with the OH once a week when he is over to stay).

Basically there are some ingredients which are expensive as I've seen as I've broken costs down, 1 organic egg is about 30 pence from Tesco. I put the shopping list on Tesco and it came to about £130. If something doesn't have a price its because its in my storecupboard, or freezer, eg peas and cheese and herbs(I always have some cheese)

Breakfasts £32.50

2 scrambled eggs 60 pence
2 slices of seeded bread 15 pence
250 ml smoothe 71 pence = £1.46 (8 of these meals is £11.68)

Tesco organic porridge oats 50g + water 10 pence
Glass of smoothie 71 pence
Banana 14 pence = 95 pence (20 of these meals is £19)

then I would have enough left over for 2 or 3 omlettes a month (using stuff I have to be used up including eggs at £1.80)

Lunches £30.66

Makes 4 portions = £3.96 for 4
2 tins Tuna £1.75
1 tin cannellini bins 59 pence
10 cherry tomatoes 50 pence
4 spring onions 40 pence
Olive Oil
Salt+pepper
8 pitta bread 72 pence

10 portions = £7.40 for 10
5 cans tomato soup @ 82 pence
+ 2 bread rolls @ 33 pence

mediterranean wrap = £4.70 for 4
1/2 cup water
1/3 cup cous cous
1 cup parsley
cherry tomatoes 50 pence
cucumber 20 pence
chicken breast £4

12 x subrolls 35 pence each = £14.60 for 12 rolls
plus fillings
ham £1
lettuce £2.61
Cucumber £1.20
Salami 99 pence
beef slices £2
red onion £1
Green peppers £1.60

Dinners £20.26

Lentil lasagne = £3.54 (makes 6 portions)
175g lasgne 23p
1 onion 18p
125g mushrooms £1.2
400g tomatoes 33p
125g red lentils 22p
150 ml stock
olive oil
3 garlic cloves
herbs
salt and pepper
225 cottage cheese 56p
125 cheese 82p

Pepper and tomato stew = £3.99
300g peppers £3.30
2 onions 36 pence
2 tbsp olive oil
2garlic cloves
2 tbsp paprika
400g tomatoes 33 pence

stuffed aubergine £1.37 (1 serving)
aubergine 80 pence
onion 18 pence
50g cheese (didn't work it out)
1 egg 30 pence
pasta 9 pence

vegetarian cottage pie £2.14 for 4
1 leek 67p
2 carrots 14p
125g red lentils 22 pence
1 can organic baked beans 50 pence
1 can tomatoes 33 pence
500g potatoes 28 pence

bacon and pasta bake 4 portions £2.53
frozen peas
fusilli 200g 22p
120g bacon £1
400g tomatoes 33 pence
onion 18 pence
red pepper 80 pence
grated cheese

lentil soup £1.33 for 3
125g lentils 22p
2 tbsp oil
2 onions 36p
celery 30p
400gplum tomatoes 45
850ml water

onion and potato soup £1.26
800g onions 68p
400g potatoes 22p
stock cube
garlic salt and pepper
60g bacon 36 pence

5 cans of tomato soup to fill the other days in £4.10

Comes to £83.40 but I also need to buy things like a massive bag of pasta, snacks and fruit and frozen veg. I'm going to breastfeeding so the other £40 per month needs to go on things like this to keep me going whilst at university. I love flapjack, but will make it rather than buy it but I hate water so need to buy squash. I can't really budget on a plan for these, just not spend more than a certain amount per month! If I am suddenly ravenous then I'd probably have a snack of some cous cous and frozen vegetables. If I am not hungry well I won't have it.
I'm trying to have this as cheaply yet as healthy as possible due to the fact that I will be breastfeeding. My idea with the dinners is to cook 4 portions at once and eat those over the next few days. I don't have any problem eating the same food for 4 days at all. And the reason I've chosen subrolls is I need something substantial at university, I can eat half a subroll in the morning and half in the afternoon if I have to. No point taking pasta when its messy.

Does anyone have any suggestions or does this look ok for a single mother? Thats purely my food budget I have a seperate stock cupboard kitty and also a monthly boyfriend kitty which he contributes to anyway as he eats twice as much as a normal person and thats twice a week.

life_in_termoil

Take a look HERE for some cheap and tasty ideas. Its weezls site and she can feed a family of 4 for £100 a month.

Mrs_Veg_Plot

I have made a few of the dishes on this site of wezels and they are really tasty

[Deleted User]

Have PM'd you with a suggestion if it helps

xrjtg

A few random comments.

abby1234519 wrote: »

I don't mind vegetarian food.

Good start!

abby1234519 wrote: »

1 organic egg is about 30 pence from Tesco

Supermarkets tend not to be the cheapest places to buy eggs; I get 6 free range for £1 from the market. You might have trouble finding them organic though.

It's probably worth investigating any markets/greengrocers nearby to see if they can undercut the supermarket on the things that they sell.

abby1234519 wrote: »

250 ml smoothe 71 pence

This is about four times the cost of orange juice.

abby1234519 wrote: »

]5 cans tomato soup @ 82 pence

You could try making your own soup. You've got a lot of room for manoeuvre between the cost of a tin of tomatoes and the cost of the soup.

abby1234519 wrote: »

Green peppers £1.60

If you're motivated by price then it's the expensive individual items like these that kill you. If you like green peppers anyway then you'd probably get on quite well with the value mixed bags (Sainsbury's and Asda do these, but I don't think Tesco does).

abby1234519 wrote: »

Lentil lasagne = £3.54 (makes 6 portions)
175g lasgne 23p
1 onion 18p
125g mushrooms £1.2
400g tomatoes 33p
125g red lentils 22p
150 ml stock
olive oil
3 garlic cloves
herbs
salt and pepper
225 cottage cheese 56p
125 cheese 82p

Just eyeballing this, it doesn't look like it would stretch to a main meal over 6 days. I also notice:

abby1234519 wrote: »

125g mushrooms £1.2

£9.60 a kilo? The standard white mushrooms are something less than £3.

abby1234519 wrote: »

300g peppers £3.30

Make sure you think they're pulling their weight, as they're almost the entire cost of your meal. Similarly:

abby1234519 wrote: »

1 leek 67p

Onions are cheaper and can often achieve a similar result.

abby1234519 wrote: »

If I am suddenly ravenous then I'd probably have a snack of some cous cous and frozen vegetables.

Sensible and cheap! But as I mentioned above, don't plan to be hungry; be realistic about how far you expect your cooking to go.

Aarons_mummy

Sounds good to me, I have my LO (2 and a half) and me and I spend maybe £80-£100 per month. That includes loads of fresh fruit and veg, snacks etc.

If you can buy reduced things these can make a meal very cheap but it does depend on what you buy and if you have the money to buy it.

Check out cheaper shops such as Iceland, Farmfoods, markets etc for things that you would be buying but so much cheaper. Also see if a butchers would be cheaper for meat.

For a cheap healthy meal I boil some pasta, add homemade cheese sauce and a handful of frozen veg. Costs 20/30p for a meal, yummy and nutritous I can make 2 adult portions for that.

abby1234519

xrjtg wrote: »

A few random comments.

I'm not toooo fussed about eggs being organic, rather that I hate battery hens! I will have a greengrocers near my new house, it has got a wide array of fruit and veg outside and definitely some odd things. The only thing that worried me was that its next to the halal butchers and I wondered if they were linked (I'm funny about halal meat not sure why)

As for the smoothie well it was just a simple way of getting half my daily allowance in one quick drink in the morning.

I am making soup for other days, but I just know I will have some days I can't be bothered so was going to have some cans of soup in my cupboard. Just for those days. At the same time I love the lentil soup recipe I've written down, I've only done it for 4 portions but its pretty easy to double it!

As for the peppers, well it was a pepper and tomato stew. I could scrap that I guess! Maybe just have one pepper a week ^^
I mean I adore soup I just thought maybe I shouldn't have too much? I read somewhere that someone died from eating too much soup!
As for the mushrooms, I've gone back onto tesco and I mean

12.5 pence were the mushrooms!! I've written £1.20 in my book no idea why. well....that brings the total of each portion of lasagne if I made it into 4 not 6 portions to 62 pence each

I'll cut out the spring onions then! I had some for salad but I can use red onions.

Barneysmom

Swap one or two of your scrambled egg breakfasts for beans or tinned toms?


12 x subrolls 35 pence each = £14.60 for 12 rolls
Does that include filling, it looks outrageously expensive?

I just got 6 free range from Morrison's for £1 (got 4 boxes). Tesco seems to be the most expensive for fr eggs.

Waxy_Bean

That wouldn't have sustained me while I was breastfeeding for the first few months - I was constantly ravenous, and ate all manner of stodge (biscuits, toast etc) at all hours of the day (and night) and still lost weight.

Also be aware that some newborns are sensitive to what it is in your diet - my little boy used to get awful stomach cramps if I'd eaten lentils, lots of green vegetables, spicy food or garlic. He later turned out to be allergic to milk, eggs and nuts so they had to be cut from my diet while I breastfed him too, though I appreciate that this is unusual.

If I were you, I'd budget for puddings at least once a day (sponge and custard, ice cream etc. normally aren't too expensive), and probably two snacks a day (hot cross buns, cereal bars, breadsticks and hm hummus) at least for the first few months.

I know you're on a budget, but you'll also need to bring your iron levels back up to a reasonable level after pregnancy and labour - red meat and liver is the best (most easily absorbed) source of this, though green leafy veg and beans are also reasonable sources. You will also need to make sure you take in plenty of calcium if you're breastfeeding, your plan doesn't seem to include much of this. A couple of meals of jacket potatoes, beans and cheese would go some way to helping with this, as would hot chocolate made with milk, cereal/porridge with milk, yogurts for dessert etc.

almondsalty

Hi. Your first mistake is shopping at Tescos. They put all their prices up when they done that double point for christmas thing. Clubcard points are a joke. You spend more, then they send you less than the amount they ripped you off by a while later. I've noticed that Waitrose is actually the same price or cheaper on tons of items. Its better quality too. Also, i hate the way they try and force you to bulk buy specific items, like theyre buy 3 x '4 pints' of milk for 3 pound offer. Asda has 3 x '4 pints' for 2 pound and waitrose had 4 pints of milk for 1.25.

Also if you have space in your back garden, get some chickens and you can have your very own organic eggs, that arent weeks old.

LittleBrownFrog

Definitely agree with upping your stodge levels. Do not underestimate the importance of cake when breastfeeding.
Not sure whether this is on Weezl's site, but her 'spiced lentils and sundried tomatoes' recipe is fab, makes a huge amount, freezes beautifully & is very iron-rich.
I'd be wanting to see more leafy greens I think - spinach, kale, things like that - very good for calcium and iron, and nice and quick to cook.
Since you're planning ahead, why not see how many frozen meals you can put by between now & your EDD - you'll be very grateful for them in those early days when you feel like a zonked-out-milk-machine.
Good luck when your little one arrives :j