Student Budget - Food

MissAT

I always gave my son £30 a week, he didn't have a big shared freezer and the fridge was quite small so this puts costs up. I think £30 for one person is a reasonable amount to spend per week.

Sainsburys have a great scheme where you top up some money on one card and the other card has the money for the cardholder to spend with.

weemissnaughty

hiya,
i'm a (slightly mature- 26 yr old) student, i currently spend £80 a month for me, my bf and my kitties... I buy some luxuries in with that - the odd bar of chocolate but its basic food and if I fancy something a bit posher we spend it out our weekly budget (spent far too many months scrimping the week before bursery!) farmfoods does 3 bags of meat for £10er (chicken/pork/gammon steaks) that are alright... they also do two big 9 packs of loo roll for £4 and its pretty good quality (not thin and nasty!) if theres going to be a few sharing! atm theyre doing 3 bags of frozen veg for £2 so i usually spend about £40 in there (9 bags of meat for £30, 2 packs of loo roll and the rest in veg) and then spend another £30 in asda on toiletries, bread, cleaning supplies, (£10 of that is purely on the kitties though!) so if theres a big freezer i think £15 a week would be plenty - especially if theres a few of them chipping in on bulk food - and in my asda shop i have the odd bottle of wine (manged 2 last month in my £30 budget! ) and other non food nessesities and juice! xx

Penny-Pincher!!

Where DD will be living there is a Sainsbury's about 3 minute walk away, so she'll be shopping mainly there. Apparently, they do a student meal card where you as a parent or guardian gets one to top up and the other for the student. Will need to look more into it.

She will have 2-3 kitchen cupboards, 1 shelf in fridge and quite a lot of space in the freezer.

PP
xx

Derivative

flea72 wrote: »

But supermarkets tend to reduce items at set times of day, so the 'trick' is to go at that time.

No, the trick is to go at that time (if you're actually available), live in an area where other people don't have the same idea (my local supermarket is right next to accommodation for 5000+ students, good luck), have a supermarket where the reductions are actually reasonable (I see meat for £5 go to £4.49 sometimes), have a freezer or some other means of eating large amounts of reduced food, etcetera.

Same deal with growing. I can't grow in my accommodation. Reasonably, most students couldn't. I have a windowsill that barely fits a pot plant. To be frank, vegetables don't make up a significant amount of my food budget anyway, meat does.

By contrast, it's much easier to just buy economy brand food and make your own meals.

I'm really not meaning to be obtuse here. Growing your own is certainly a way to reduce your food budget. Just as using less minutes is a way to reduce your mobile phone costs. If you can.

emmac92

I am a third year student (avoiding revision by writing this... my first post!) in Plymouth. Like others have said, fridge/freezer space is important, I have 2 fridge shelves and 1 freezer drawer, which I would say is about average (maybe expect 1 fridge shelf). Then one and a half cupboards for dried food/crockery. I also have a large drawer under my bed which is very useful!
I like to think that I eat healthiely and shop well so hope this is helpful...

My nearest supermarket is a sainsburys, and also an iceland. I aim to shop about once a week. I find Iceland (or equivalent places like farmfoods) great if you shop carefully! There frozen fish is really good! 5 tuna steaks for £4 or 2 microwaveable salmon fillets (perfect for when I had long evening rehearsals and needed to eat quickly) for just £2.50. I also buy frozen southern fried chicken strips there which I keep as back up to use as fillings for wraps.
I am relatively unfussy so generally buy chicken on the bone or thigh fillets, but I know some people prefer breast meat. If this is the case, I'd suggest turkey breast as it is generally healthier and cheaper! I also buy a pack of pork loin steaks to freeze individually which are great for stir frys and sweet and sour. I find cooking bacon great value and can generally adapt whatever shape/cut I get to different meals, its great to have in the fridge as well as with a tin of tomatoes it becomes a very quick pasta sauce (as does a chorizo). I willl also buy a joint of cooking bacon/gammon which does sandwhiches for a week as well as an evening meal for the same price as a few slices of nice ham!
I stock up on things like tins of tomatoes and jars of curry sauce when my parents visit and keep them under the bed (more for the weight of carrying them than cost). This also works for things like sharwoods noodles and sauces which are often on 3 for £3 offers and have a long expiry date on!

'Luxury things' such as cheese or orange juice (I'm a tropicanna snob thanks to my mum!) I will buy when they are on offer, often if there is nothing on a great offer I will go without/ration what I have left.

Finally my top tip is using websites! I have a tesco express in the centre of town, although smaller than sainsburys, it has a pretty good stock! I will generally compare tesco and sainsburys websites for things like orange juice, cheese, multipacks of crips, ben & jerrys (for a extra treat!) and if Tescos has things on offer will go there instead/as well. I also check the flyers my housemates would throw away for places like co-op.

I have a budget of £50 a week for everything, I like to get out around £30 in cash at the start of the week and not use my card so I can easily see how much I've spent/have left if I'm going out at the weekend. My 'big' weekly food shop comes in at around £20, however some weeks will be more, some weeks less (depending if I buy things like a pack of tuna or pork steaks). I then generally end up spending between £5 and £10 a week more on the things I forget or that need replacing more often...bananas, milk etc.

Sorry this has become such a long message, I hope its somewhat helpful