February 2014 Grocery Challenge

Pixie_Fairydust

BlueCow1975 wrote: »

Just done my meal plans for the next 2 weeks.

Do you just plan your main meals or all your meals? (b'fast/lunch/dinner/snacks/drinks). I just get so bogged down trying to plan everything, I think that's why I give up. Any help would be appreciated. :T

marris wrote: »

also won £20 for breakfast at Frankie & Benny's. So will have a wee treat sometime.

Congratulations, enjoy

kayester wrote: »

not happy at all. asda delivery came and after sending back an item or 2 and ringing up to complain it is 105.31 (with a free SMALL joint) i ordered 2kg and they delivered me 0.6 kg!! so i have to go to the butchers, they also gave me £10 voucher i will knock that off next food shop.

i guess i will cook this other joint tomorrow for a stew or pies or something

I find the convenience of online grocery shopping brilliant, it saves me so much time!

I find A$da really reasonable but the home shopping is not as good as other s/markets, I've had lots of damaged food, leaky lids etc and they have substituted non available items with really bizarre replacements................washing up bowl requested, not available so i received a soup bowl :rotfl:

My fav is $ainsbobs, but a bit more expensive.

Have a great Sunday, lovely here very sunny. Ok just off for a brew :coffee:

Pix
xx

Soworried

A large spend for me today of £23.59, this did include 24 rolls of toilet roll and 4 of the pork loin joints that are on the lid l weekend offer. The only thing I need that I didn't get was cheese, we only have about 100g left after baking a quiche, some individual quiches and some chilli and cheese biscuits this morning.
I just couldn't find any decent cheese at under £6 a kilo, I'll have to check mysupermarket and get some in the next few days when I will need milk and fruit anyway.
I will update my signature.

EDIT- I just updated and I am almost half way through my budget yet only a quarter of the way through my month

This mornings baking.

redbooties

I've done my meal plan for February, I think my original budget of £600 is too high. In January I spent £700 on food, toiletries and pet food. I've found cheaper pet food that my animals are ok with eating and also I'm going to cut back on the non-essentials like the bottled water we've all been drinking when I have a brita jug and loads of filters sitting in the cupboard.So I would like to change my budget to £500.

spendinglikemad

Shopping for the week done, W@itrose first picked up a bargain 1Kg piece of beef to pot roast (yum I love their meat it always good) and some hot chocolate and Ribena for DD, we didn't buy anything else but got our free Sunday newspaper and free Mocha which DD drank going round Ald! which luckily is over the road!
Ald! managed to get everything on my list for the week and I had already planned meals and even a couple of beers for DH. Made my first bread for a long time in bread maker.

Relaxing watching sleepless in seattle now and need to get up and make:
Pasta
Split pea and ham soup
Put Beef in to slow cook

Meal plan for the week:
Beef pot roast today - make later in slow cooker
Chicken tikka masala
Turkey lasagna (own HM pasta)
Creamy tuna pasta & Garlic bread
HM Quiche and pot wedges & beans
Creamy chicken in mushroom/mustard sauce/veg & rice

Need to give myself a kick up the derrier to get cooking!

SLM

Ches

kayester wrote: »

wanting my asda delivery to hurry, (between 8 and 10 my slot) but im guessing it will come later rather than earlier. my cupboards/fridge is bare. if my freezer wasnt linked i would have turned my fridge off haha.
wanting to slow cook (in oven) beef brisket, before 1. at a kids party from 1-4 so wanted to let it rest before then, if not ile have to have it cooking while im out and not baste it =/ how do you guys usually do beef.
ive ordered 4.4lbs worth

I use roasting bags.

Ches

NSD days yesterday and today. Weeks menu was/is yesterday we had HM quiche, oven chips and salad. Today its Taco's with salad and I have HM fruit pie and custard for pudding. (mixed continents)
Mon. Liver and Bacon, potatoes, carrots, onions, green veg.
Tues. Take away fish and chips as I am working a long day.
Weds. Braised steak, potatoes, carrots,onions,green veg.
Thurs. We eat lunch out and OH pays.
Fri. Sausage roll, chips, salad.

I always have eggs and bacon in for OH as he insists on cooked breakfasts and cooks his own. He will also have beans on toast from the storecupboard or leftover fried potatoes/mushrooms/tomatoes. I don't eat breakfast.

Lunches for me are usually crispbreads with cheese/pickle/marmite or soup (sometimes HM) and fruit.

BlueCow1975

Pixie_Fairydust wrote: »

Do you just plan your main meals or all your meals? (b'fast/lunch/dinner/snacks/drinks). I just get so bogged down trying to plan everything, I think that's why I give up. Any help would be appreciated. :T
Pix
xx

I very much still have my L plates on as only started this challenge last month. I only properly plan for main meals. I have found it has helped massively (esp as DH works shifts so I know if I'm feeding the whole family or just me and the kids). When making a plan I look at what we have in already and make as many meals around that as possible. Then I think what we would like to eat and do a shopping list accordingly. It has also helped as I plan "quick" meals on busy nights (like when the kids are in cubs etc), slow cook meals if I know I can get them on in an am if we are out for the day at the weekend etc.

It can be a bit of a "groan moment" doing the plan but the fact that it is planned out it saves me time having to think about it on a daily basis! Also saves me randomly going into shops for one or 2 items and ending up spending a fortune. Its also helped me try and vary the family diet a bit more and try out new things. We have also saved on takeways at the weekends when we may have been out for the day and we used to randomly order them as we were too tired / ill prepared to cook properly when we got home.

I don't plan breakfasts and lunches, but instead keep my eye on cereal, bread, cooked meat and salad levels. I try and forward plan roughly for the week in my head and might batch cook soup etc if I get the opportunity.

I feel so much more organised and think that once I have got a few months meal planning behind me it will get easier as I can "repeat" previous weeks.

Anyway, am rambling on now (sorry!). Just reporting a spend of £41.41 today in Alderoonie. Topped up on month supply of toilet roll, kitchen roll, laundry stuff, tinned stuff and weeks supply of fresh fruit / veg etc. Quite scared looking at my total spend this early in the month, but I am optimisitc will comfortably stay in budget as should only need some fresh top ups until well past 20th Feb so future spends ought to be under the £10 mark until then (well that's the plan anyway!!).

Tiffany_Aching

Pixie_Fairydust wrote: »

Wow that's an impressive budget :T You must share your budgeting skills (please:))


xx

Nothing exciting or magical, I'm afraid!:o Its a bit dull, but I'll give you an idea of what we eat...

Out of the seven of us, I'm the only meat eater in the house, the others are all veggie so that makes things much cheaper. I will pick up some meat when it is yellow stickered down to a silly amount and then freeze it in single portions for if I ever fancy some but TBH I only eat it once a week, if that. We don't eat 'fake' meat stuff - Quorn type things - most meals are based round pulses, but I will once in a while use TVP.

We rarely drink wine etc. - DH makes some wine and beer every now and then and we will drink this if we fancy alcohol. We go through a loaf of bread a day but the bread maker makes this as it is cheaper than bought (and I slice it with an electric knife so it goes further!;)) When I can get some yellow stickered mozzarella it goes into the freezer for when we fancy pizza - the bread maker makes the base and the sauce is just half a tube of tomato puree, a good blob of tomato ketchup, garlic granules, basil and oregano. I'll cut some potatoes into wedges and stick them in the oven to go with the pizza.

We get through a sack of potatoes every four weeks and I get these for £6 from the farm shop, a large bag of carrots was £4 last week and that will last a month. Most fruit is bought from the market at the end of the day - they do a bowl full for £1 so I can usually get about a carrier bag of bananas and half a carrier of apples for £4. The bananas have nothing wrong with them - they are just singles that have lost their bunches! All other fruit and veg is bought from either the weeks Aldi Super Six offers or from the farm shops. Being in the middle of the fens there are a lot of farm shops nearby and you can pick up some sacks of veg for a good price.

Very, very rarely buy crisps, chocolate or fizzy drinks / squash. If the kids want them then they can buy them out of their pocket money! They rarely do! I buy popping corn and make up a huge batch and keep it in an air tight container - the kids snack on this they usually eat it plain or (if I'm feeling nice!) I'll occassionly pour a bit of melted butter and sugar over.

Cleaning and toiletries type stuff is the cheapest available, usually from either Home Bargains or Boyes, or from the supermarkets 'basic' range.

I often cook pulse based meals in the slow cooker as we have a huge one and I can make two meals at once, freezing the spare for another day.

We have a pretty plain diet, I guess, but we are happy with it

Sorry for the long post

ikesmummy

Typing quickly whilst my bread maker is whirring away and my Roast beef dinner is cooking away. Think part of the reason I struggle with the food budget is I just love food so much .

Have already realised that I should have brought sugar when I went food shopping, hubby is making do with jam sugar in his tea (have loads of sugar of various descriptions, just not the granulated he'd normally have in his tea) but not thought of much else we need in the next few days which is good. Do wonder though if him using the jam sugar isn't actually the most economic thing but if I allow him out to buy some he is bound to come back with other bits as well nd I am too hungry (waiting for my roast) to consider going into a supermarket).

We had the scrummiest home made pizza's last night and made enough for them for tea on Monady as well. I opted for smoked salmon (trimmings) and cherry tomatoes on top of mine :drool:

Hope you are all going well

meg72

Had an enjoyable morning batch cooking, roasted the reduced chicken I bought £2, and made

Roast chicken dinner x2
Chicken curry x 2
Sweet and sour chicken x 2
Chicken and veg casserole x 2.
Pot of chicken and veg soup.

Dinner and lunch sorted for next 4 days and 4 days meals in freezer for net week.