2014 Frugal Living Challenge

kb_soma

Evening all, a not so spend free couple of days here, went to aldi on the way home yesterday and spent £17 on the week's groceries. Very impressed with their 35p tinned toms. Made bolognese last night with mince from the freezer bulked up with 6 tablespoons of oats, I didnt even notice they were there. OH doesnt even know they were in there! Had bolognese again for tea today and froze 2 leftover boxes of it. Shall be making stew - hopefully another month's supply tomorrow from 2 chicken legs and a stew pack and leftover potatoes (cost around £3 in total).

Went out with mum today and she bought me lunch, I bought cat food for the month, cost £10. Picked up a bargain bag of onions with around 15 large onions for £1.

And... knitters, aldi have baby 4 ply wool, 200g for 3.99 and alot of their christmas scarf stuff on sale.

kb_soma

BMG wrote: »

I haven't got a choice but to have the low budgets. I just hate staying at home and go out for a change of scenery

Do you have any free museums near you.? I leave my wallet at home taking only a few pounds with me, that way I cant spend. I second the my waitrose card, free coffee if you have a local waitrose.

BMG

kb_soma wrote: »

Do you have any free museums near you.? I leave my wallet at home taking only a few pounds with me, that way I cant spend. I second the my waitrose card, free coffee if you have a local waitrose.

20 mile round trip to nearest museum. We don't have a waitrose in the area

kb_soma

BMG wrote: »

20 mile round trip to nearest museum. We don't have a waitrose in the area

Thats a fair way away. At least with the days getting lighter the weather should hopefully be getting warmer soon! Saying that, even in winter I'll make coffee in travel mug and go sit in the park (wrap up warm!) To get out for an hour. A change of scenery can save our sanity!

Living_proof

I'm continuing to plod on, trying hard not to shop. I couldn't resist a charity shop on my travels today and ended up buying a new dressing gown, craft book and another item which I will put on ebay I think. On a good note I have started to cut quantities a little when cooking so over time that should save quite a lot.

I am making plans for later in the year when I will start using my dehydrator and drying a lot of fruits and vegetables rather than freezing them. I'm quite concerned with the amount of added sugar in everything these days so over the next few months I want to condition myself to making as much as possible from scratch from natural ingredients.

My regular hair appointment today was at a special price - about £15 saved there, unknowingly. The salon also has 20% off the next appointment which is a nice start to the new year. I am saving all change under 50p in a big kilner jar so that should mount up by the end of the year.

I have pretty much examined all my spending and I think that I've now cut back as much as I am prepared to do. For instance, I will always have my 'roots' coloured every six weeks and I am not prepared to be cold. Everything else is a candidate for additional frugality combined with a healthier lifestyle.

Wishing you all continued success!

Nicki_Sue

I did get some coffee to review today ( a work thing) but a big enough package to knock coffee off my shopping list and an owed £5 love2shop voucher from Park which I'll use in Boots to get essentials.

Cantfindafreeuserid

Can anyone point me in the direction of a cheap and easy madras recipe please? My son and I love curry so I want to learn how to do madras from scratch (and by memory eventually) thanks in advance.

I am trying so hard not to go to tesco but we need pasta (I buy the value one) and my son needs milk. I really need to go through the freezer and cupboard and list everything as I know I have food to do half a meal so I need to get the other half but before that I want to know I have exhausted every option in the freezer! I know I can make home made fish cakes as I have 1 egg, a tub of breadcrumbs and 2 types of fish in the freezer as well as some sweetcorn so I might try that next week :-)

kb_soma

Cantfindafreeuserid wrote: »

Can anyone point me in the direction of a cheap and easy madras recipe please? My son and I love curry so I want to learn how to do madras from scratch (and by memory eventually) thanks in advance.

I am trying so hard not to go to tesco but we need pasta (I buy the value one) and my son needs milk. I really need to go through the freezer and cupboard and list everything as I know I have food to do half a meal so I need to get the other half but before that I want to know I have exhausted every option in the freezer! I know I can make home made fish cakes as I have 1 egg, a tub of breadcrumbs and 2 types of fish in the freezer as well as some sweetcorn so I might try that next week :-)

This one looks good, not too many ingredients either: http://titlisbusykitchen.com/recipe/chicken-madras or one which uses paste: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/quickchickenmadras_67786 I may try it myself too

I usually make a homestyle curry from the curry lovers cookbook by roopa gulati http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1993658/homestyle-chicken-curry this is lovely, I'd recommend this.

DawnW

A spend day today as I went to the hairdresser this morning and OH went to the supermarket while I was there. We spent the afternoon walking DD's baby and two dogs, plus our dog,to give DD a break. We were originally going to babysit while they went out tonight, but a night with little sleep put paid to that for them I am afraid

Still, we looked after the little one all afternoon instead, so poor mum could have a couple of hours sleep. Baby enjoyed our walk, and only dozed off for about 20 minutes. She was happy just to lie in her pram and look around for nearly two hours while we walked, which is quite impressive for a 7 week old

More spends on the way home as we stopped off and picked up fish and chips for a treat Still, we shared a portion of chips (they are huge - how can one person eat all that :eek:) so it only came to £8.40 and the fish tasted lovely and fresh.

I am still logging spends obsessively!

Cantfindafreeuserid

kb_soma wrote: »

This one looks good, not too many ingredients either: http://titlisbusykitchen.com/recipe/chicken-madras or one which uses paste: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/quickchickenmadras_67786 I may try it myself too

Thank you so much I think I will try the first one as I only like coconut straight from the shell :-)

Thankfully I have some of those ingredients already hopefully it won't cost loads to get the rest or failing that I will do it week by week :-)