March 2015 Grocery Challenge

XSpender

Billie-jo wrote: »

I have been told by doctors that I must eat more protein but also need to watch my cholesterol so will have to see if this normal budget is going to support this or if I will have to increase it. Any meal ideas xspender would be very welcome however I can not eat any type of pulses as they make me ill. Need to read a few things about what to eat as at moment can only think of meat, cheese, fish, nuts, grains and eggs and yet there must be more out there plus I don't want to increase my weight if at all possible. (Don't want much do I) :rotfl:

Hi Billie-jo


Here are some of the meals we have had:


Turkey bacon and scrambled eggs (1 egg, 2 egg whites) or made into a BLT
Omlettes (1 egg, 4 egg whites)
Chicken with salad/vegtables (fave salad is chicken, spinach, cucumber etc pecans and diced apple)
Steak, broccoli and a small portion of carbs
Beef or turkey with salad (sometimes in a sandwich)
Peanut butter on toast or spread on apple slices
Plain fat free yogurt with fruit


We also have diet whey protein powder made into a smoothie with milk, banana and berries or mixed into porridge with berries and walnuts. The powder is expensive to buy but lasts a long time.

medsdemon

Hi. Can I join in this month please as we are trying to save for our "big" holiday in June and want to keep control of food spends.

I am making our budget £300 starting on 27th Feb as it's my payday and our cupboards are a little bare. This will include all our food, toiletries, cleaning and expensive cat food. I think I may struggle as OH has a week at home off work next week so will be tempted to spend and I think DD will be home from Uni for some of the month too and it's always hard to budget when she's home!!

nevertheless we will give it a go and I am planning a shop at Asda or Aldi on friday evening after work so we have food in for the weekend. I also made OH put in his prescription order for his GF foods which he doesn't normally do.

I will make a big portion of spicy lentil soup in the slow cooker for lunches and also choose another soup too so we have a choice.
We are eating more veggie days atm and trying to eat fish more and to generally eat more healthily. I have chickpeas so am planning a chickpea and spinach curry with rice, I have a veeta risotto kit bought at weekend for a bargain 29p and will make that up to stuff peppers I have in the fridge for another night. Also will make a portion of salmon fishcakes to pop in freezer for next week as have a can of salmon to use up. I might even make a portion of GF gnocchi so pop in freezer as I love them but too much hassle after work to make from scratch and have a nice pesto to toss them in in cupboard so that would be another cheap meal. may have a busy saterday morning batch cooking !!

okay enough waffling, will update with first spend on friday:)

Anzac_Biscuit

Hi everyone! I'll be sticking with the Feb challenge until the end of the month but could you please put me down for AU$450 for March? I think I was a bit too hard on myself in Feb and tried to cut down too much too quickly.

See you in a few days' time!

Kim317

Hi, please can I join and I will stick with my £200budget. I am really pleased that I have managed to come in under budget this month and my freezers etc are pretty well stocked so £200 should be doable.

WantToBeSE

joedenise wrote: »

I would suggest you have a look at Jack Monroe's website (https://www.agirlcalledjack.com) or perhaps try to borrow one of her books from the library.

Loads of cheap veggie meals in there, mainly using beans.

I used to do a kind of spag bol years ago where I just finely chopped (or grated) up loads of veg, onion, carrot, mushroom, courgette, aubergine or whatever was in the fridge and fry it all together until soft and then add a tin of chopped tomatoes. Even my kids liked it (probably because the veg was so finely chopped you couldn't see what anything was, LOL!).

Denise

Thanks joedenise. I already have the jack monroe books, and have made a lot of things from them.
I feel like a lot of veggie meals are either tomato based or quite processed. I dont want meat replacement products, but am sick of making things with a tomato base.

happydays_70

The £5 voucher off £40 shop is in Mirr8r today.

mulchingoverwinter

Well thats the first spending of this month, took £10 out so that I could buy some bread, lovely lovely handmade stuff which was going cheap in the local "big" shop. Eating one loaf for breakfast and the other is in the freezer for next week, nomnom.

Spent - £4.50/£225

summerlady_2

Could I please come out of lurkdom and join in with a target of £150 for March?


I have lots of food in the freezer so I hope to use it all up by the end of March. Then I will start again.


I have already cleared all the ancient items from my cupboards. (I tend to buy things to try and then don't like them or use them once). The £150 will give me a bit of leeway to restock on store cupboard necessities, but not enough to be a spendthrift.


At least I can see what I have in my cupboards which will help me with meal planning.

DebtFree2012

Hi All

In short I have a very strict budget and paying debt off. I want to feed my family well and stick to the (tight) budget I've set myself. I've been trying to get to this for the last few months and this month is the test.

My new month starts today but I won't be grocery shopping until the weekend. We'd ran out of bread so I put the BM on last night and made breakfast and lunches from that. Tea tonight, tomorrow and Saturday is sorted and I plan to wait until Sunday to shop.

We have breakfasts of porridge/toast/waffles/cereal/teacakes and the like. Lunch is 1 packed lunch for DD (DS on free school meals that were introduced this school year for his age group), I take something and DH likes to have a couple a week though I must say I've been neglecting him lately and he's taken care of himself! Tea is home cooked meal 5 out of 7 nights with Wednesday's being pizza and fish fingers night for the kids and soup or omlette night for us.

We aren't fussy eaters though I try to cook lower fat for the most part (natural, not shop bought low fat).

Whilst I am paying the debt off, the budget will remain the same so it's going to be an every day keeping check thing for me.

Next week's main meals are below. The mince base will be made up on Wednesday and kept as required. I'll use mash from freezer (LO sunday lunch) for the shep pie topping as the kids don't like the mince and rice due to texture (despite me saying we're not fussy :rotfl:)

So please can I be added to the challenge with a budget of £150 for March. My dates are 25th Feb to 24th March which is 4 shops for me (Sunday's). Thank you

Chicken and Pasta/Rice
Chicken one pot (slow cooker)
Fish Fingers/Pizza/Jacket Pot/Omlette etc
Mince and Rice/Shep pie for kids
Steak for us/Soup with bread and pudding for kids
Lasagne
Sunday lunch

Solstice_3

Quick update and I will go back and read more after when I get 5 minutes.

22/02 NSD (2)
23/02 £12.61
24/02 £18.07
25/02 NSD (3)
26/02 NSD (4) But I really want chocolate

I received a money off and free stuff voucher from A&C through the post as I haven't ordered from there in a while - yay for that I was going to go back any way as they are cheaper than the other company I tried and I prefer some of their meat - sausages and chicken.