I keep trying but....

elantan

it does all add up, and then i read stuff that says i should be eating organic and free range eggs and i'm like ... eh i'm struggling just now how on earth can i afford that

Ches

I think you are doing well to keep your budget at £250. I think you should stop beating yourself up as if you want to continue eating as you do apart from buying on special offer etc it all looks good to me.

elantan

i'm thinking maybe you are right Ches as i know i have tried to get my food for less but just cant seem to, i just know when i speak to others and they inform me that they spend much less i am sitting scratching my head and wondering where i am going wrong, i have a friend that tells me she spends less than £50 a month, i cant understand how she manages, and have asked her, but either she isn't telling me something or i am missing something .hmmm

when i have looked at what others spend and what a typical meal is there is a difference, thats not to say that we eat better or they eat better, its just to say we eat differently,

maybe i need to understand that we do well for the money we have and yes we could spend less but in order to do so we would have to change our eating style

i was just wondering if i was missing anything, or if i was doing something wrong

FairyPrincessk

Elantan,

If you have the money to eat this way, then I wouldn't fret too much about it. We aren't low carb, but I do work carefully to keep our diet healthy and to avoid bulking out with excess carbs. If I'm going to bulk out meat, I either do it with veg or lentils, this adds some carbs, obviously.

Just a couple of thoughts--I love avocados, but they're very expensive. Could you switch it up and use nuts or pulses some days? For your OH's chicken tikka, could you batch cook this and freeze rather than buying premade? Finally, for the chicken breasts--have you considered thighs and legs? They can be a bit more work, but might save you money. Finally, a slightly radical solution...what about something like Dahl for your breakfast? Alternatively, greek yoghurt? Just some more ideas.

Overall, it sounds like you're doing a pretty good job. Sure, if in dire straights, you could cut back, but not unless you're either prepared to change what you eat, grow more of your own, or downgrade--and if it isn't a real economy for you to buy cheaper rocket or travel to a cheaper supermarket, then it sounds like you're working well within your circumstances.

What is that saying "if it ain't broke?";)

elantan

Hi fairy ,

thanks for the input, we buy the chicken tikka from the asian supermarket and cook a batch of it one lot for indian meal ( we have one a week... usually butter chicken ... home made .. yum) and for mr el's salad

we can afford to eat at our current budget but life would be better if we could shave a wee bit off of it if that makes sense? this week i am cutting my avacado's down to 3 ... will try 2 next week then 1 and see how we go from there i think as they are £1 each and that does make a dent in the food budget

hubby prefers legs and thighs, i have tried to eat them several times as they are much cheaper but i just can't i land up leaving more meat by the side of the plate than anything else .. making it a waste

as we get the meat from the asian supermarket £6 a kilo we are trying to get it as cheap as we can (chicken tikka £7 a kg roughly)

zzzLazyDaisy

OP I have chrohn's disease and diabetes, and have to eat low carb and gluten free, otherwise I am ill.

What that means is that you don't have access to the cheaper foods traditionally used to fill you up (yorkshire puddings, bread, pasta, porridge, etc etc). That inevitably means that you are going to have a higher grocery bill (well that's my experience anyway). And that's before you start thinking about organic, free range etc. So don't beat yourself up!

There are a couple of things I do to keep the cost down.

1 - I usually have a bowl of hm soup, or a nice shredded salad to start the meal.

HM soup can be really cheap and filling if you can use the special offers or veggies that they are selling off. Use the bones from chicken to make the stock more tasty. Make a big pan and freeze what you don't eat into smaller portions.

A spiraliser, while an initial expense, is great for making courgette 'pasta', and also for making layered salads.

2 Green lentil casserole is very cheap and filling and yummy (google yesil mercimek for the basic recipe, and then adapt with tinned tomatoes, stock cubes, etc to taste).

3 you can bulk out mince with grated carrots instead of oats. They cook down so you don't really notice them.

You can make a nice substitute drop scone for savoury or sweet things from ground nuts (get a little coffee grinder if you don't have one, and grind your own in a flash) whip with an egg and drop into a heated frying pan.

I also have a high protein 'bread' recipe which makes it easier to make sandwiches when you need to have a snack. I'll find it and post it.

Hope this helps

Dx

zzzLazyDaisy

Here it is - no carb 'bread'

Will you have a hard time living without bread? Ooopsies are a good option. It’s a “bread” without carbs and can be eaten in a variety of ways.

Oopsies
6–8 depending on size.

3 eggs
100 grams (3.5 ounces) of cream cheese
a pinch of salt
½ teaspoon baking powder (can be excluded)

Separate the eggs, with the egg whites in one bowl and the egg yolks in another.
Whip the egg whites together with the salt until very stiff. You should be able to turn the bowl over without the egg whites moving.

Mix the egg yolks and the cream cheese well. If you choose, add the psyllium seed husk and baking powder (this makes the Oopsie more bread-like).

Gently fold the egg whites into the egg yolk mix – try to keep the air in the egg whites.

Put 6 large or 8 smaller oopsies on a baking tray.
Bake in the middle of the oven at 150° C (300° F) for about 25 minutes – until they turn golden.

You can eat Oopsies as bread or use them as a bun for a hotdog or hamburger. You can also put different kinds of seeds on them before baking them, for instance poppy, sesame or sunflower seeds.

elantan

thanks daisy that would be a great help, a spiraliser? never heard of one of them before will look into buying one

i do add onion and carrot to my mince ... i find it makes it that wee bit more yummy

i like onions we go through between 1 and 2 a day for two adults, we also go through quite a lot of garlic ( yum )

you are right it is hard enough going without adding the organic or free range into the bill, i dont think i could afford that, although yes i would like to be organic and free range, but when you use over 20 eggs in a week you tend to have to go for the 10p eggs compared to the 25p eggs

edited to add: saw you bread recipe thanks,

tbh we dont eat bread at all , although that isnt technically true as we do eat bread just maybe once every other month when we have a junk food day, i have a bread maker that cost me over £100 and it sits languishing in the loft as when we decided to go low carb the first thing to go was the bread, then the pasta, we have approx 20kg of white rice to go through though and at a rate of once indian per week it is going to take us a while lol

sonastin

I think the reality is you can eat cheaply or you can eat according to principles (low carb, free range, organic, etc). You have to set your priorities according to what matters most to you. My personal view is if you can't afford it, you should drop the principles - I see no reason to get into debt just to go organic but that is simply a reflection of my priorities.

I aim for £200/month for 2 of us (no pets) but it is a struggle and I'm averaging closer to £220 most months. I can see some easy savings in our diet... OH has a sweet tooth so lots of biscuits and baking ingredients, he prefers Coke Zero to alcohol so although I rarely buy my wine (prizes from sporting stuff) I don't begrudge his "vice", we both prefer heinz ketchup and colemans mustard to non-branded versions, etc ...but while we can afford the extra £20 it doesn't seem worth giving up the things we enjoy to make the compromise. I could do with an extra £20 to do other things but not at the expense of having OH spoil it moaning about not having treats or coke!

If you really really needed to save on the groceries, I'd say you should start filling yourselves up with cheap carbs. As you say you can afford it, there's scope in the rest of the advice to shave a bit off with cheaper veg & protein combinations but perhaps you should simply be satisfied that £250/month is the price of a low carb lifestyle? (sounds pretty good to me given we have plenty of cheap carbs in our diet!)

elantan

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Commercial-Spiralizer-Japanese-Vegetable-Turning-Slicer-potato-spaghetti-maker-/170907259338?pt=UK_Kitchen_Accessories&hash=item27caddd1ca


is this the spiraliser you mean? well something like this .. not exactly this one

Thanks Sonastin,

i think you are right, just now we are not desperate to cut our bill i would just like to, i think if we had to cut our bill more carbs would need to come in and more protein out

we have a shop in our local town that sell big bags of biscuits ( broken ones and non broken ones) for £1 it's like a factory shop, they get a whole load of things in from the factories and sell them onto the public sometimes its 3 for a £1 .. mr el likes to visit there once a month as he has a sweet tooth ( i am addicted to sugar so try to stay away ) he got 4 packets of jaffa cakes for £1 the other day ... not sure if you have one of these shops near you but if you do they may be worth visiting ? sometimes they have 4 bottls ( 500ml) of coke for £1 etc as well ... kinda depends on what they have in