£100 for 5 weeks food - family of 4

Seraph123

I'm inspired by what you are doing.:A Where do you do your shop?

DebtFree2012

This weekend’s spends for the coming week:

I got a lift to Lidl and Aldi so no fuel charges incurred for me

I spent £15.64 however am missing a few things as they didn’t have them so Mum’s kindly going to pick them up this week when she goes and I will pay her.

FR chicken whole £5.59
carrots £0.69
prawn crackers £0 Given free from Mum who “bought too many”
veg stir fry frozen To buy – expect £1.09
waffles To buy – expect £1
gravy granules £0 Given free from Mum who “bought too many”
mozzarella * 2 £0.94
cherry toms £1.00 (these are cheaper – I know for next time now)
fromage frais 12 £0.89
bananas £1.12
yogs 8 To buy – expect 58p
lasagne sheets £0.92 (I read the wrong price tag as the one I saw said 47p!!! Annoyed)
garlic clove 3 £0.49
baguettes 2 £0.39
bread * 2 £0.94
porridge oats £0 Given free from Mum who “bought too many”
milk £3.00 for 3, 4 pint cartons
breakfast juice £0.69

These will last the week minimum and some longer, like the waffles and frozen veg. I decided to get 2 mozzarellas so we can have more pizza rather than have to ration it. Also the tomatoes were expensive based on comments here.

To be fair, I didn’t find Aldi and Lidl cheaper than my value items at Tesco overall. Yes some things were and others weren’t but I find there is a balance to be had and the amount is the same coming out of my purse in the end. Having said that – I now know what I can get cheaper in Aldi (closer than Lidl) and should I be passing I will get those items however I won’t make a journey specifically for those items as it’ll generally mean more fuel to get there as walking back isn’t always an option if it’s heavy items like milk/apple juice and so on.

I also had a meat order delivered which included

14 sausages
Joint ham
5lb bag of mince (given to me free as frozen as a whole bag and they were too impatient to let it defrost and batch cook!!!!)
3 pork chops
4 chicken breasts
Apx 30 good slices of back bacon

The total of this came to £14 which is excellent. :T

So now I need to reassess the menu plan to incorporate these. It has taken me past what I wanted to spend this week but it was too good to turn down, do you agree?

Therefore I am left with £20.36 for the rest of the month, **beep**. :eek:

The chicken I bought from Lidl I have jointed and now and 2 huge breasts (I wish:rotfl:) , 2 thighs, 2 drumsticks and 2 wings. I boiled up the remains with carrots, onion, S&P and a few bay leaves all of which I had in and the bay trees are in my garden J I have the stock in the fridge and will look at that tonight and hope for inspiration!

The chicken from the “meat order” I took the inner fillets off and bagged them up separately as that is another meat meal. I also took the scrags off the bacon and have about 3 slices so I plan to use the inner fillets and the bacon and do something with them for tea tonight. I have loads of pasta so may make a sauce. Will google ideas. That frees up the stir fry meal I had planned for tonight to another night.

The chicken I have jointed I am going to roast everything except the breasts and use them towards a one pot meal and maybe in DH lunch box.

Off to catch up on the posts (:AThank you all in advance:A) and also to hide my grocery money that I have left. No more spends until Sunday. Shock to the system this new way of working but it is rewarding and thoroughly enjoyable in a weird way!!!

Sorry for the ramble and also the text formatting - I have to copy and paste it across from my word document to have minimal time on the internet

DebtFree2012

nataz wrote: »

Sounds like an interesting thread. We're having the same prob, family of four, two adults and two little-uns aged 4 and 2 (one still in nappies)

I've pretty slashed the budget over the past year by shopping in Aldi and Mr Ts, grabbing offers and reduced items when I can - but Im a useless cook, I'd probably be ok if I actually liked cooking or food that much in general, but of course, my family loves it! So we tend to have a lot of frozen easy to cook meals (not ready meals though) and very few from scratch meals.

I bought a SC but havent used it, Im generally not good with meat, not sure what to look for or how to cook it, except chicken and some fish.

How can I encourage myself and my kids to cook more and still keep costs really low, and without buying lots of ingredients that sit in the cupboard gathering dust

Any tips greatly received and can't wait to hear more debtfree2012

Hiya there

I am lucky this month in that LO has enough nappies to see him through unil pay day. Next month will be even tighter as same budget but to include nappies too. I hope to learn alot this month - about myself, my habits and mu tolerance levels - all of which I would like to address and follow the frugal path to becoming truly OS. Yes I know I am a long way off but one event at a time - I was going to write one day at a time, but that isn't true as there are multiple things in the day that I can address to help me on my way.

I'm also trying to reduce my gas and electric and general household outgoings. We are doing fairly well on this but for now I am concentrating on Grocery only to write about.

Do you buy joints of meat for sarnies? I enjoy spending time in the kitchen and seeing the results, we made Jam tarts yesterday - myself and DD. Obviously not a meal but something we enjoyed doing together with ingredients we had in and now they are in packed lunches awaiting eating

Have you checked out the slow cooker thread - it is wonderful. SC's are very easy to use and apparently use V little energy so bonus.

I have stopped feeling the need to always have a full cupboard of spices etc and now stock only what I use regularly. Have a look on bbcgoodfood website at the budget meals section which I have found uselful since starting this - i find planning is the key. If you plan it in, and have the time to do it, you may find you start to enjoy it
HTH xx

DebtFree2012

ceridwen wrote: »

Well - actually one tip that never seems to come up - but I use it myself is trying to eat at least a little bit mindfully. That is - once I have had a noticeable amount of whatever I have on my plate is to try and stop before sticking another forkful of the food in my mouth to ask myself "Am I actually hungry for this - or am I about to stick it in my mouth just because its there?"

To me - quite often - I will reach a point where I think "Nope - I dont think I do feel hungry any more - so I will leave the rest of the food I have made up for this meal and have it some other time".

Its not a perfect system - as, having a full-time job, I do multi-task often and eat some meals whilst surfing the Web (my note for future reference is "when I have more time - when eating just eat" and then I will be able to focus better on whether I actually feel hungry for another mouthful or two of food or no). However - even at a "read computer - whilst eating" level it does curb my intake to some extent and helps my figure (which is my own personal main concern) and my finances.

This is SO true. I have noticed it myself. If there's been a limited amount of food to serve for tea I always do the kids and DH first and I have the amount that is left (talking small amount here) and DH will ask if I want some of his (I would never say yes, he has a physical job and needs his food) but I have found that what I have on my plate actually fills me even though I didn't expect it to.

Also since I have menu planned and made myself have breakfasts I have found it helps lose weight and that I get hungry midmorning (presumably breakkie is starting my metabolism?) whereas not eating breakfast I don't get hungry sometimes until lunch!

Thank you for this, totally agree.

DebtFree2012

Seraph123 wrote: »

Good luck with your challenge DF2012. If you could feed your family on good wishes, encouragement and fantastic advice then there'd be enough of it on here to last you for years.:)

I'm new to all this so please can somneone explain to me the sealed pot thing? Sorry if this isn't the right place to ask

Hi and thank you.

I am not sure about the sealed pot - It sounds like one for the debt free wannabe boards

HTH

xx

DebtFree2012

mophead wrote: »

Home Made Spicy Lentil and Spinach Soup.

1 x Large Onion
1 tsp x Curry Powder or a bit more depending on how spicy you like it
250g Red Lentils
2 or 3 lumps of frozen spinach
1 pint Chicken Stock

I don't really measure my ingredients but if you have too many lentils just add some more liquid or visa versa.

Fry the diced onion for a few minutes in oil then add the curry powder fry for a few minute more.
Add the Lentils and stir into the onion mixture so they are nicely coated.
Next add the Chicken Stock and bring to boil, simmer until lentils are softened/Cooked
Then add the Spinach and simmer until cooked and warmed through doesn't take to long.
Then blitz with the hand blender should turn a nice green colour akin to pea soup.

I love this soup and it's really filling my husband loves this and used to be a strictly meat and 2 veg kind of guy he's a big bloke but a bowl of this with a crusty roll fills him up!

We eat soup quite a lot for a cheap meal will post some more recipes when I get a moment

Goo Luck with the Budget by the way.x.

Writing this down now - will be using it with my HM chicken stock from last night

Do you know how long red lentils last in a sealed jar? I threw the packet away AGES ago lol (they are still getting used regardless, just need to know if they will be dangerous please anyone?).

quintwins

lentils keep forever well more or less unless they get damp and i would ignore any date on them aswell

katkins78

I think I read somewhere that the older lentil/split peas etc are stored the longer they take to cook and soften. I can't really see that being much of a problem for red lentils as they are so small but I can say from experience that ages old split peas take forever to soften enough to be pleasant to eat......but apart from that perfectly safe!

Missus_Aka

It is really interesting to read what you are buying and making im doing something similar on the food shopping and groceries board the thread is called Shopping, Whoopsied & Meal Planning For £100 Per Month For 3 + Visitors? but as per the thread title mine is for 3 people (me, oh & ds) plus my little sister 9 days a month, sister 22 4 days this month and my niece for 4 days and runs from 29th july - 31st august, im trying to see if £100 can be sustainable long term so i can put more to the side for the big move next year.

You must have a really great supportive family i can only dream of dinner at my mums for us, but she is quite busy with other things....not able to get any bit from family so i tend to go on the prowl for whoopsied items for our fresh fruit otherwise i wouldnt be able to afford it.

I will bookmark your thread for any ideas that might help me my current total is £40.61 so far, if you have an asd* near you their whoopsied items are great at about 8, down to 10-20% of their original price

Good luck and i will watch with interest.xxxxxx

satchmo1

Hi Debtfree2012

How are you getting on, have you managed to feed everyone on the money available?

I used the tip about buying a gammon joint last weekend, which we had for dinner on Sunday night, I made masses of soup from it and I've had it in wraps four days this week. We also had it with fried eggs for dinner last night. It was a bit saltier than I'd like even though I threw the first boiling water away, but it was such a success that I'd do it again.

Hugs
Satchmo x