I'm eating out of the freezer and cupboards challenge

Lynsey

recovering_spendaholic wrote: »

Lynsey - I don't buy meat or chicken from Farmfoods but find their frozen veg very good. I buy the sliced mushrooms (currently BOGOF at £1), sliced bramley apples, leeks, stir fry mix and sometimes I get the bread. I never spend enough to get the £2.50 off £20 though.

Jane, why not make up the difference with Nicky toilet rolls up to the £20?? Just a thought.

I noticed the mushrooms and may buy for spag bol. Agree about the meat though, I think all frozen meat looks strange compared to fresh - I prefer to buy fresh, then freeze.

Lynsey

ammonite

Hi all, can I join you?
I sorted my freezer out last week and woah! I have got a whole farmyard of animal going on in there. Had no idea I had so much meat. I am rubbish at sticking to a budget for food, I always, always go way over what I intend to spend in a month. Costco is my friend and my faux - I'm a big stockpiler which always bankrupts me!

Typically we need bread, milk, fruit, cheese etc. in the week - my freezer is full and my cupboards aren't much better. I've budgeted £50 this month for food for two of us. I am going to stick to it this month and eat what is in the freezer/cupboards. I might surprise myself!

Lip_Stick

Morning all.

Sounds like everyone is doing well with this challenge. Last night I had breaded pork steaks with fries and a side salad. Ds enjoyed the chinese style chips. Think I'm going to do pasta for tonight. Not sure whether to make it with tuna or chorizo, will probably use both lol.

Nipped into Asda this morning for ironing water and ended up buying a pack of 3 JW tuna for £2.50. Don't have many soups in now so the cupboard is looking bare, but they didn't have any offers on. Noticed Princes corned beef was £2.50! :eek: They have some frozen whole salmon that have the head and guts removed for £3. They're not very big, 850g, what do people think of the price? Worth it? I don't really buy frozen salmon so no idea.

Washing to do today as well as clean the lounge. Hopefully will be able to start on some ironing too.

Lynsey - You should look at how much you've saved, rather than how long you have to go. You're doing really well.

RS - I've been tempted to order some salt marsh lamb, would love to try it.

cheerfulness4

I buy the FF BOGOF mushrooms, too. And the leeks.

Just had a shoulders and head in the freezer moment to reach the bottom and realised that I have much more in there than I realised. What a relief!
Its so crammed into the corners at the bottom that I found:

2x minced beef
2x 4pk angus beef burgers
2x braising beef
1x frying steak
1x pork joint
2x beef joint (how did I lose those!)
2x blocks cheese
1x tub clover
1x lrg tub cooking marg
4x pks tortilla breads
2x naan breads
6pk small seedy rolls

:eek::eek: All hidden away.

I've other things that I did know about but these are the little treasures that were hiding in bags right down the bottom.
Oh and my two bags of mushrooms mentioned above and a pk of Spring Rolls that apparently my mum gave hubby one evening.

Combined with the rest of the stuff in the freezer and cupboards I really should be able to manage well on very little.
And the freezer was looking quite 'empty' by my standards, too. Didn't need the soap powder to hold down the lid or anything.

Florencee- I could just eat your quiche now. Yum!

Lynsey

ammonite - welcome to the thread and good luck. I would like to bulk buy, buy 6 months stock at a time and do to a degree, but limited this year. Have got a very large stash of washing/cleaning/toiletries etc., though.
I wish Asda/Tesco would sell tinned stuff in bulk at wholesale'ish prices (packs of 24 etc.).
Good luck.

Lip_Stick - thanks for the support, just having a "down week", I think the coffee bulk buy and spending £46+ in a single week knocked me off my stride for a while, even though I know it was an investment as no coffee needed for a while!!
Once I get over being frugal this week, I'll be back on track and only 3 weeks today until holiday - that week of no spending will help my budget for the quarter!!

Lynsey

ammonite

Thanks Lynsey - I try to bulk buy when possible but just don't have the space to store it always. We are overrun with loo roll and kitchen roll at the moment I have a huge collection of toiletries too - always buy things on offer as I can't bear to pay full price for things!

Off to dig out some Salmon for dinner tonight. Pasta shells plus salmon plus tomatoes plus mange toute and I'll have to devise some sort of sauce out of the cupboard

abitofhelp

well i have taken soup out of the freezer. that will do a couple of lunches. chicken strips(out of the freezer) have been marinaded and will also do for lunches. stash of deli meat is going down from the freezer. i will have to pop to asda on my way home this evening to see if they have any ys. also having gammon steaks this evening. so there is a bit of space in there.

recovering_spendaholic

Can't stop eating the bagels I made!

Lynsey Kids will only use Andrex:mad:

Ammonite Welcome to the thread!

I was round at a friend's yesterday who has recently become unemployed at the same time as her OH. They previously had a good standard of living and are now reduced to JSA (£105 a week for them as a couple) and nothing else. I went through to help her sort out her freezer and cupboards and she had soooooooo much stuff. She said that she needed the 15+ tins of corned beef as she uses 3:eek: tins for every time she makes corned beef hash (there's only 3 of them !!!!!!) and when she makes tuna pasta she uses 5 tins of tuna!! I shudder to think of the waste. There was also about 20 bags of bread flour, sugar, ordinary flour etc. She also bought 24 packs of Lidl bacon this weekend and wonders why she hasn't got any money!! I know that bulk buying for economy is a good idea, but I only do it when I'm flush. We sorted out the cupboards and she is now doing the cupboards and freezer challenge, but not on here cos she doesn't use the internet. I reckon if she could sort out her portion sizes she could live for several months on what she has in!

Am just waiting for my pasta and sauce to cook - didn't fancy soup! just popped back to say that the pasta and sauce was horrible! I usually use the Aldi one but this was a Batchelors one from Homey B - I found it to have a really chemically taste, but I really like the Aldi one.

Edwardia

Lynsey and anyone else who wants want,have a hug xxx

recovering_spendaholic I'ved done online shops for groceries eg last week did Spices of India but not butchers yet. I've bookmarked a few and need to go through the meat etc with OH, reviews, delivery charges and so forth.

ammonite and newbies hi there !

ammonite

wow recovering_spendaholic - I feel mega guilty if I put 2 tins of tuna in a tuna/pasta salad/bake and I only do that to compensate for the fact that DH does not class fish as "real meat" so if he sees a lot of it, it keeps him quieter.

Thinking I could potentially get to Christmas without doing any sort of big shops! Just shows how much we have.

EDIT: oops just spotted an offer for Milk and More on the discount board. £5 off a £10 spend. Had to be done - in fairness it is perishables, juice, bread etc. so all of the things I'd have had to buy at the shops anyway. £44.11 left this month