The "Saving Money on Food Shopping" Challenge

saterkey

ive started doing a few things when going shopping


ie go to the reduced aisles first and try to base the meals around what meat I can find, ie just had a beef joint dinner for 4 with a joint reduced to £6 from £11, no way would I have paid eleven pounds for it. chicken tends to go further than the beef though.


cheese never pay more than £3.00 for a block, if cathedral cheese our favourite is not on offer normally is, go for tescos own which is 2.50 for bigger block.


use Tesco and nectar points to stock up your store cupboard.


watch adpoints and do surveys to collect nectar points and do valued opinions to get sainsb vouchers to stock up your cupboards. in the last 6 months or so I have got about 250ukp worth of free food from vouchers, points, bogoffs and offers, this doesn't include my normal shop offers just the free stuff. takes a while, but its a hobby to see how much I can make £5 worth of free food stretch, how much I can get in my trolley for it etc you would be surprised, when you go for sains basic tins etc


I get a packet of 18 small choccy bars for just over a pound for lunchboxes but Tesco also do packets of their own version of mars bars, caramel bars, wafers all very cheap, get a couple of packs to last the week, crisps I get whatever on offer about a pound for 6 bags once they are gone they are gone. Also can cook a very quick cake that goes nice with custard.

dreamsaver

Hi, I'm in too.
I need to cut my food bill badly. There are two of us and we spend around £400 per month... On food! No takeaways or eating out... Planning meals should be a great way to cut on food.

CattOfTheGarage

When we did the CAP money course (basically a budgeting course run out of a local church - very good) we started withdrawing a set amount of cash per week for groceries. It started out at £82.50, and we have pulled it down gradually. Now we are on £50 per week. We are two adults and a five year old.

We do not meal plan just because I like to freestyle. I work from home which gives me a lot of flexibility. These are my top strategies:

- Instead of having a standard shopping list, I have a Cupboard Basics list which lists all the things there need to be in the house. If these things are stocked, I know I can feed us well for a week even if we have no extra money. There is no meat on this list, but there is fruit and veg and dried pulses. You can do without meat but you can't healthily do without fruit and veg. Before shopping I go round the kitchen and write down only those things on the cupboard list which are too low to last us a week. It includes cleaning stuff, binbags, bogrolls etc.

- We now shop in Lidl, and what a difference it makes. We used to use the Co-Op. I love the Co-Op, but it is expensive. We were often pushing right up against the £50 and so eating very little meat. Now we often come in at £30-£40, meaning I can go to the butcher! Happy happy week.

- If I have money left over after the cupboard shop, I take it to the butcher. I tell him how much money I have and ask him what I can get - if I do this he often throws in some things free or cheap cos he knows he's getting a decent sale overall. I have a slow cooker, so I look for things like lamb shanks, beef hough (shin), boiling beef and mince. Also sausages.

- If I get up early enough on Saturday I go to our local food co-op (not to be confused with the Co-Op supermarket, which is also a co-op, but I digress) - this is run by volunteers and sells really nice knobbly fruit and veg for very cheap. Otherwise I get the fruit and veg from Lidl - it really is their biggest strength, good stuff, fresh, really cheap.

- I make most of our own bread. If you work from home this is not difficult to do, a batch involves three 20min bursts of activity separated by 60-90 minutes. Good for screen breaks and really does save money. 1.5kg white plain flour (which makes fine bread, don't believe the chefs) costs 45p at Lidl; 10kg wholemeal chapati flour (great for breadmaking) costs £5.50 at our big Tesco; so that's 15p a loaf for white and 28p a loaf for brown, plus yeast at 28p for 2 sachets in Lidl - one sachet does 2 loaves. Takes practice but worth a try, if you like it it can be very therapeutic to make. I half the loaves once they're cool and freeze them - we can eat half a loaf without it going stale, a whole one often gets hard before it's finished. Make cakes for your sweet treats, cheap to make and much better than store bought. Kids love to help.

- I use the freezer heavily, lots of bulk cooking, often in the slow cooker.

Hope some of these tips help!

AnnieO1234

Seriously consider the recipe book by a girl called jack blogger, jack Monroe. I have it and love it! Don't get me wrong there are certain cuts I won't make that she had to do from necessity, but her understanding of flavours and ability to make up simple, delicious recipes is fantastic. Her blog alone will take you through exactly how to bring flavour into the blandest of dishes.

Aside from that, look for your local market. As an example just this last week I visited on Monday to do a huge shop (4 hessian shoppers full) of fruit and veg. It came to less than £20 and included pounds of carrots, pea pods, broad beans, lemons, mushrooms, apples, pears, potatoes, sweet potatoes, peppers, cabbage, broccoli, strawberries, garlic, red onions and other stuff I can't even remember right now! My point is that things like Aldis super six are great but not as cheap or varied as going to your local/nearest good market.

I shop with a meat van that I was really circumspect about at first but genuinely love the butcher there. Look for something similar or meat packs at your local butcher. As an example, yes I could get two chicken breasts in the 3 for £10 meat offers the supermarkets do. I'd need to use three for meat and veg, or two for stir fries etc. But the butchers chicken breasts are large enough to use one for stir fries and two for meat and veg between the three of us.

Cook your own from scratch as much as possible. Yes compared to value lines some things might be more expensive. For example this morning I've made a batch of fish pies for the freezer. Compared to say youngs fish pie, no they aren't 99p, but I know precisely what's in them and they're much cheaper than getting the equivalent quality from say the Tesco Finest range. Oh and they've got more fish in them too.

You don't have to cut out all junk food as such, you can bake, make desserts etc quite easily so you will still get your fix! Home made pizza with luxury toppings will always knock spots off of any pizza in a store and always be cheaper!

Learn about preserving foods (garlic in white wine vinegar for example). You can get cheap Kilner style jars in ikea, or use old jam jars for it. Then buy in bulk, makro often has 20 bulbs on for a couple of pounds. Kinda sucks paying nearly a pound a bulb in supermarkets for same thing!

Another trick, buy fresh herbs that are potted and living salad leaves, take them out of their pots and separate the "plant" you will find it's many different plants all together. Pot on to something bigger and you will have herbs and leaves that last a very long time (until you kill them! )

Take a look on google about things like sprouting an onion or garlic and then using the greens from that. Put sprouting potatoes in the ground for a homegrown crop.

It all sounds so nitpicking at first, but I promise you will save money, eat healthier and just feel better about your food. Xxx

Frugalsod

CattOfTheGarage wrote: »

Hope some of these tips help!

Yes I might try the plain flour bread and chapati flour options for bread. I also do mine online so can compare prices without moving from the desk. So this weekend will be getting things from A£di and then save what I can for a really big online order.

raphanius

what i have found when cutting the shopping bill is there is no room for brand loyalty or favourite foods/meals. flexibility is they key. the supermarkets reduce items to lure you into buying them, then just as you get the taste for that item the price goes up. also watch out for false prices, items are often artificially high before a big price drop. I never pay full price for coffee, cheese, margerine, crisps or chocolate as these items are all on offer at one supermarket or another at different times. it pays to shop around, I am lucky with all the big supermarkets within walking distance. if this is not the case for you use mysupermarket to compare prices and look for the cheapest shop and have an internet delivery.

CattOfTheGarage - how do you use chappati flour in breadmaking? i have always stuck to bread flour when using my breadmaker but have a massive bag of chappati flour to use up.

[Deleted User]

My big tips is to cook double or more when cooking rice, pasta, potatoes. The rest can be boxed up and fridged or frozen for other meals, or to make rice/pasta/potato salads (they are good for packed lunches and quick meals on a busy day)

[Deleted User]

raphanius wrote: »

how do you use chappati flour in breadmaking? i have always stuck to bread flour when using my breadmaker but have a massive bag of chappati flour to use up.

Chappati flour makes good pizza base when used with yeast - or naan/similar flat breads.

Frugalsod

I found that the simple mantra "Can I make it? then don't buy it!" works wonders for me. So no more things can be made from scratch, and it means I can get by with ingredients which are a lot cheaper than even value ready meals.

When it comes to everything else I experiment with value brands of the item. Most of the time I find that it is just as good and I cannot tell the difference. I am no brand snob and very few brands are worth paying extra for anyway with value and own brands so good.

pinkpansies

Thanks for all your help and tips, it is really appreciated.

I have been thinking for a while now about making my own bread. We love the smell of freshly baked bread. But we don't have and can't afford at present, a bread maker. But it is something we plan to buy in future.

I am with those nectaradpoints as someone above mentioned but I usually forget to watch them and miss out on the points. I am also with maximiles which every now and again when I get enough points, I like to save up for either a supermarket or another retailer's gift voucher.

I think our main problems that lets us down with shopping is our sweet tooth. So I think if I can bake all the sweet treats we would both need instead of all that junk from the supermarkets, my sweet tooth might not be as powerful lol.

When I started my thread last night, I noticed there was another long standing challenge which is the same as the one I wrote about. I am going to join in on there and hope everyone from this thread follows me over there too . I think we will all be able to cut down on our food shopping and keep it reduced if we all stick together and all help each other out.

See you on the other thread