September 2014 Grocery Challenge

p-pincher

2 days left for this month and I'm running at £251.00/£250. Got a 1 pound overspend. I've only got 1 more spend planned for some show gel as we're completely put so hoping to be no more that £3.00 over.

Even though Im very slightly over I'm really pleased with myself as I'd spent about 2 thirds of the budget in the first couple of days. Meals are all planned til the weekend and hopefully we won't need anything else. Good luck everyone x

rosieben

anna-marie, I've added your Chickpea and Vegetble Stew with Couscous to the front page index on the October thread

bmma

Spends to date £31.64/£50.00p x

Billie-jo

meanmarie - sorry to hear about your loss.
Small spends of £3.53 today - bread, tomatoes & bananas.

Use up some leeks out of the freezer today in a leek & potato soup which we have had for tea. Also taken out some chicken wings for tomorrow.

GettingOrganised

Only a couple of pounds left of my budget and a full week left of the month. Not much chance of staying within the budget, so I suppose it's just damage limitation now! I really need to sort myself out, the amount I'm allowing is more than enough, but I've slipped back into old ways. Grrr!!!

HelenRachel

So it's been a bit of a wake up call for us food wise this month! I've got to the last week and I had a budget of £50 per week and we did it for the last three weeks in September. Just on food we have spent £225.11 I've got to pick up some stewing steak so will take top he total up to about £230. In addition to that we've spent £25.20 on toiletries and £56.75 on the little man. So I've decided for the time being to just work on the food part of the budget and go from there. The food part of the budget also includes two quite expensive take always and I've been buying in bulk to try and get better prices for things and make the most of our new freezer (we've just moved house and had a tiny freezer so we're kinda starting from scratch). So the food budget was an average of £77 per week.

So as per the recommendation of the op I'm going to reduce the total amount we spend gradually per week to make it a bit more do-able! So October is a five week month for us making the budget if we go from this month to be £385. I'm going to reduce the weekly budget by £7 to make an even £70 a week giving me a budget of £350 for next months food!

MrsSave

Meanmarie - I'm sorry to hear about your loss x

I've had my final home delivery of the month today. I've decided to try fortnightly home delivery, and just topping up on fruit and milk in between. So far, in September, we've spent £147.39, which leaves £12.61 for apples/bananas and milk next week. I'm pleased with that, as it was a 5 week shopping month here.

I have worked out as well, exactly where that £147.39 has gone. £119.47 was on our home deliveries, £7.49 on nappies and £20.43 on extras (doughnuts being one little treat!). I aim to get the extras down next month a little.

K9sandFelines

Just a pound spent yesterday on YS lemons and spring onions. Need to get organised tomorrow with a meal plan.

Solstice_3

Sorry about your loss meanmarie (hugs).

I have 1 week and 2 days left of this month's challenge and £76 roughly left, except I don't really. Play school fees have eaten into my grocery budget so I am going to have to dip into the other account again. I suppose if I had taken Play school fees out of the other account my grocery budget would have been fine.

Wanted an NSD today but I think I need an onion and carrot for my soup (tonight's dinner).

physicsgirl

Hope you're ok meanmarie

Mad a curry last night and wanted to make naan bread to go with it, so had a look through the recipes on here but couldn't find any without yeast (didn't have any) or eggs (makes it too expensive).

I ended up just making them like this:

100g SR flour (3p)
75g yoghurt (7p)
Plus a pinch of garlic granules and dried coriander leaf because I had them in the cupboard but I'm sure they'd be nice without these too

Mix everything together, knead a bit, then set aside while you make the curry (not sure if this was actually needed as they didn't seem to rise?). Split into 2 and roll out to about £1 coin thickness. Pop in the oven for a couple of minutes, then under the grill to brown.

I used Ald!s cheapest yoghurt (low fat). They didn't look much when I rolled them out (more like pizza base than bread) but they puffed up nicely in the oven and had a good texture.

OH said they were tasty, and they were certainly cheap and easy enough, so will be doing them like this again.