October 2013 Grocery Challenge

Verityemilia

Good week last week :j

£53 / £60

List ready and off to Mr M tonight

craigywv

nsd today made stew in sc prob have nsd tomorrow too as not going too far. good luck all

XSpender

Budget has been blown. I did quite well on a small shop in Mr S on Friday but then went to Morries twice at the weekend:eek: I used to shop there quite a bit but we felt it went down hill but were pleasantly suprised when we went back this weekend. Got some really good offers on coffee, cheese and showergel.

My total now stands at £420.65 well over my target of £375. I am aiming to get my spends down to between £70 and £75 week for everything. I managed £72 in August but that was a use it up month when I had loads in, £83 in September and am currently at £106 for October:eek: It doesn't help that I have included stuff this month like snacks and drinks outisde the home and a small amount of booze that I didnt include the last 2 months. It would still be over £95/week excluding this so waaayyy over where I want it to be.

I don't know if my £70-75/week budget is realisitc really but it is what I would like to spend. I may raise it to £80/week for the rest of the year and if I can manage that try and bring it down a bit each month.

I don't think I will do a big stock up shop the first week of next month as I find I am spending too much of my budget in the first week and running out of money the following weeks even though my spends are not massive for the normal weekly shop as I just buy what I need. I could get away with one or 2 stock up items on offer on top of this to build up my store cupboard, especially with the weather that is forecast.

Chicken and chorizo risotto for tea followed by berry slump with custard/icecream. I am also going to attempt to make H Biker sausage and bean casserole in the slow cooker for tomorrow's tea.

joedenise

A top up shop of £20.49 today so have now spent £262.80 of my £350 budget. Hopefully I'll make it.

Denise

sachatith

Well done K9 (sorry bit late!) and good luck for tomorrow!

Made the pizzas on Saturday night and the dough was the nicest I have made - and the only time I haven't followed a recipe! Typical was also experimental night for me as still trying to figure out what it is that makes me ill - 95% certain it is dairy now as the cheese (and I didn't have as much as normal) made my tummy gurgly within fifteen minutes, and the rest of the night was in incredible pain. Pizza was worth it though ;p

Got the other half of the pork out of the freezer from the other week so had roast pork on Sunday (which the OH said was the nicest roast I'd ever done - either I had an awesome weekend cooking or he's up to something lol) with HM apple crumble after. I also tried the apple crumble as my dad is dairy intolerant but can eat it cooked in - I can't it seems still, next week I am going to buy some goat and sheeps cheese to see if I can eat that.

Also found a couple of squished chocolate bars in the back of the cupboard (in date but goodness knows how long they had been there! Just Mr T's own brand Mars Bar and Milky Way) so I experimented and made fairy cakes, put a small square of each bar on top with a bit more mixture and then cooked - the ones that had the caramel in them spurted a little like lava from a volcano and left a gorgeous solidish caramelised topping and they were a winner with the OH! Will make them again me thinks...

Nelly11

Another no spend day for me, infact I made 45p, had a friend over for lunch, beans on toast, finally managed to use the last of the Gluten free bread out of the freezer, then knocked up an Apple Crumble with apples my neighbour dropped , Ebay sale and postage was less than I thought and I found 25p road kill in the washing machine. Off to pick over the left over chicken from last night, might make a pasta bake with it and a tin of mushroom with a hint of garlic soup. I'm getting so creative! Want all my cupboards and freezers empty for Christmas. Have a great but rainy evening everyone:j:j

Sequeena

£18.64 spent in lidls on dog food, salad, fruit, popcorn, yoghurts and some other bits. Brings my total up to £29/£60 with 3 days to go. I'm doing really well this week and tomorrow there's a 15% off day in morrisons I also noticed lidls have 500g beef mince reduced to £1 on this weeks half price deals so I'll be getting about 6 packs on Saturday.

laura_hoggle

Was only meant to buy milk today, but went into the local T Express, and they had some YS goodies, and couldn't resist!

£4.19 to add to the total, but did get milk, 2 blocks of gorgonzola cheese (10p each - both have a month left on the use by! Need to find a recipe for it now so I don't just eat it in block form!), 2 packets of frankfurters which have 2 months left on the date, 2 pork chops, and a packet of puff pastry - quite pleased with all this for that small amount, that I don't mind having bumped up the spends a bit!

2childmum

Spent £73.59 today in Mr T - more than I wanted really as it wasn't a whole week's shop as I'm going to Mr M on Thursday and need to spend £40 to get my Christmas voucher. Bought fruit and veg, milk, cheese and some cupboard bits, including baking stuff. Also bought gerbil bedding, and some frozen fish - no frozen smoked haddock so bought plain fish and will make 2 fish pies instead of smoked fish crumble. Also bought a value frozen half leg of lamb - not sure what it will be like, and some lamb mince - both for the freezer at a later date, and icecream and sorbet to fill the gap in the bottom of the freezer - so some stuff not needed this week that I can use next week. I can't believe how expensive potatoes seem to have got!

Was pleased to discover that Mr T will give my 15 year old a flu jab - Mr S refused. So I will book that in for next week as the is away at half term.

Also had to buy a new phone - our old one cuts people off mid conversation, but that came out of a different budget.

Cauli and broccoli cheese a success tonight Please at using up left overs.

Off to update sig

minicooper272

Currently have £30 of my £80 budget left this month. I think I've gone wrong somewhere, I borrowed a few pounds here and there from my food money purse, but somehow seem to have more left than I feel I should.

Only spent £12 over the weekend on bread and lunch bits. I will need to pick up another loaf of bread this week, but now I need to think about running the cupboards down before I go away in a couple of weeks (long weekend). Hopefully I'll finish the month with about £10-15