August 2013 Grocery Challenge

MissOrganised1972

meg72 wrote: »

Yesterdays dinner

How did you crispy up the potatoes like that?

Dizzymcfarlane wrote: »

How does everyone store theirs. I have bit of papers, magazines etc. keep finding lovely recipes but need some suggestions. Has anyone found anything on App Store that users can add their own ones to ?

I have a lever arch file that I keep in the cupboard under the sink. It is full of plastic wallets, full of recipes. I just pull out the relevant plastic wallet! It also makes the recipes wipe clean!

mumoftwo wrote: »

Morning. Just spent £7.04 in our new HomeBargains. We needed razors, foil and juice/snacks for road trip tonight. I could have easily spent lots more, that shop is so nice, and lots of good prices but resisted.

What do you all include in your budget? Toiletries, cleaning stuff etc?

You can include what you like but my budget includes all grocery food, alcohol, toiletries & cleaning products! We have separate budgets for dining out etc.

barneydee_2

Small shop yesturday £ 7.38 in asda's pizza reduced,toilet rolls,cauliflower,broccoli,Greek yogurt and white baguette.All I will have to get today will be milk at the corner shop
Dee x

XSpender

We are supposed to be going for a walk and a picnic today but DH is still asleep/hungover after a work party and it is rainng:o. Because of the picnic plans we went to mr t yesterday because DH wanted ham baguettes to take us back to our holiday:). I also bought some chorizo as this is the only thing I need for next weeks meal plan and I thought it would stop me going to mr t at all next week and I could just go to a local green grocers for fruit, eggs and the onions I will need. I have lots of milk and bread in the freezer.

I had set a budget for this month of £140 as I was planning to use up what we had in the freezer and cupboards but I did not have as much usable meat as I thought I had and this week have bought sausages, pork chops and beef burgers.

I have now spent £144.46 so am over budget. I will need about £20 for next week as we eat so much fruit although I will supplement it with some tins of fruit I have in the cupboard. This should mean I only have to do one more shop around the 17th before pay day. I underestimated how low our budget could go as I forgot it was a five week month. If i can come in around £200 I will be really pleased. My usual monthly spend has been between £500 and £600 this year so far:eek:

I made some banana muffins from 2 very past it bananas last night and some raspberry muffins with some frozen raspberries I had defrosted earlier in the week and not used. They have been frozen to use for lunches through the next 2 weeks. I need to make some mini quiches this morning for the picnic/work lunches.

I had bought some cooking bacon last week and have used it n omelettes and quiches and I am really pleased with it. At 81p it is good value.

mumoftwo

scotdebs wrote: »

Help help help....... I am a grocery shopping addict :eek:

So this was going to be the month I get on top of the grocery spending........ £400 was the budget

My "month" started last Friday on payday 1st shop was in a@da £129
Mid week visit to m@s £16 and just done an online shop at sbugs for £102 oh and stopped in at coop on way home tonight £18 !!!!!!!! So just out of the first week of the month and I'm over £260 :eek::eek::eek:

Hells bells we are a house of 2 adults and 2 children under the age of 8
So to stay in budget I have £140 to last to end of month - I know lots of good folks on these boards can work miracles with that amount of cash but I am taking baby step at the mo ( previous monthly spends have been over £600)- downloaded a great free app where you "stocktake" cupboards and freezers etc and it suggests meal for you. .........just need to do the stocktake:cool:

I'm with you! My husband calls me a supermarket tart cause I go to them all, Sainsb, Morrisons, Tesco, Asda, Lidl, Aldi. and can spend lots on so called bargains.

I've started this week with a meal plan and made a shopping list and just went to Asda. I should really go on mysupermarket and compare prices but at this moment I am taking baby steps too and can't be doing with taking hours of planning etc.

Good luck, you can do it.

suzybloo

Hi folks, can I join again, pretty please. Things are tougher than they have been in our household for many years. Shopping is something I try to save on but there is more I could look at. I will give myself a budget of £350 [COLOR=for the month of August. I have spent so far Tesco £23, chicken direct from factory £13 and £19 for lunch out. I will need £15 for the 10lb of rasps that are being delivered for my jam making, but other than that shouldn't need much this week.

I will include in my £350 the milk delivery, which I get which includes eggs, I will also include my lunches if I go out, and all cleaning products. We are living out of the freezers at the moment as I would like them cleaned out and restocked for winter, so I will put £50 out of my £350 into my freezer fund!

I will update my signature when I remember how to! Will have a wee quite hour reading back for inspiration too :-)

CountingPennies

Sorry for late start. A mix of life and internet problems. Only going to reduce by £20 (slow and steady), so £480 for the month whilst its still summer holidays. This however is also to include food I will be buying to take on holiday next week. I have very little in my cupboards/fridge/freezer, but I seriously have VERY LITTLE spending money for my holidays so i'm really gonna need to try not to go to the shops much this week, and do not plan on doing a "big shop" till I come home from holiday (apart from the holiday shop i plan on doing).

Anyway, i'm rambling as usual. So far this month I have spent: *digs receipts i don't want to admit to out of purse*

CO-OP: £14.80 on chocolate, milk, margarine, crisps, water, bread and crisps. Mainly all for a huge picnic I made but it was a cheap full day out with the kids.

ICE CREAM VAN: No receipt but we did a huge walk with the kids and they didn't moan. They were so well behaved and it was scorching and miles from anywhere so treated us all to ice creams. But bit into my purse to the tune of £7 (they know how to charge in the middle of nowhere lol.

TESCO: Embarrassed to say this but £17.69p made up of £9 pic n mix sweets, alcohol and dog food.

ICELAND: Only picked up a bottle of Pepsi, milk, ice pops, toilet rolls, choc ices and spent £6

So a total of £45.49 ..... Wow thats so much more than I thought. It just goes to show for easily i can waste money.

NSD planned for today. Have enough milk. Will take bread of out freezer. Took chicken fillets out of freezer yesterday and have everything else in I need to make dinner. Tea will just be sandwiches, the same as every sunday after a big lunch.

Have a nice day everyone

CP xx

she_who_can_not_cook

scotdebs wrote: »

The app is called hate waste love food

I do like that site but i did not know about the app thank you

Billie-jo

scotdebs wrote: »

Help help help....... I am a grocery shopping addict :eek:
downloaded a great free app where you "stocktake" cupboards and freezers etc and it suggests meal for you. .........just need to do the stocktake:cool:

why don't you do your stock take then pop over and also join the I'm eating out of the freezer and cupboard thread -

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3307650
I have recently joined this and did a stock take :eek::eek::eek: Oh my goodness once its listed I realise just how much food we do have in (plus food upstairs in wardrobe etc has not been listed) and realistically there is no need for me to go shopping for anything other than fresh stuff and milk until at least 2014. However I know this will never happened as even now DH says 'there's no food in this house' :rotfl:
Good luck anyway.

she_who_can_not_cook

XSpender wrote: »

We are supposed to be going for a walk and a picnic today but DH is still asleep/hungover after a work party and it is rainng:o.

I have now spent £144.46 so am over budget. I will need about £20 for next week as we eat so much fruit although I will supplement it with some tins of fruit I have in the cupboard. This should mean I only have to do one more shop around the 17th before pay day. I underestimated how low our budget could go as I forgot it was a five week month. If i can come in around £200 I will be really pleased. My usual monthly spend has been between £500 and £600 this year so

I had bought some cooking bacon last week and have used it n omelettes and quiches and I am really pleased with it. At 81p it is good value.

I amso envious my local asda and tesco does not have the 81p bacon in i have been looking for for about a month six weeks now

meg72

MissOrganised1972 wrote: »

How did you crispy up the potatoes like that?


I have a lever arch file that I keep in the cupboard under the sink. It is full of plastic wallets, full of recipes. I just pull out the relevant plastic wallet! It also makes the recipes wipe clean!


You can include what you like but my budget includes all grocery food, alcohol, toiletries & cleaning products! We have separate budgets for dining out etc.

I dried the potatoes and put them in a polythene bag with some
So Crispy lemon and herb chicken mix, shook them up and sprayed with fry light. Then I cooked them with the gammon in the Halogen over for 20 mins. Was really pleased how they turned out.