Fruit and Veg Spend

gayle1

do u know that if ure kids are under 5 u could be entitled to a healthystart voucher i think if u get certain benefits covers a fiver

arbrighton

I spent £16 in the greengrocer yesterday for the two of us. Fortunately the budget isn't hugely tight but I got rhubarb, grapes, cherries, tangerines, cherry toms, half a pineapple and half a melon.
We easily get through a pack of grapes each week and OH is a man of habit so has a tangerine and cherry toms each day.

I buy the value/ basics onions, peppers and carrots at supermarket usually and whatever leeks are cheapest per kg (sometimes that's the trimmed ones). Usually once a fortnight.

Then other things depending on what looks good or that we want to eat such as broccoli, lettuce, spring onions (lots of dishes, but have got some seeds for the garden for those)

We pick blackberries in summer and apples/ pears from our trees although some of those don't keep very well.

LoveTheCoast

A few cost reducing savings I've made recently for fruit and veg are:

Buying frozen mango chunks - kids said they liked them though daughter now less sure but means no wastage, convenient and cheaper than the equivalent weight of whole mangoes from the supermarket.

Buying more cucumber than tomatoes, we have them nearly everyday and I realised the cherry toms we like are x3 the price of an equivalent portion of cucumber.

Buying iceberg lettuce more often than salad leaves. One lettuce ~50p does 2 meals for the 4 of us. We each have a wedge, American style, and drizzle with dressing.

Today I've also planted some cut and come again salad leaves which saves so much and gives variety.

Fruball

pollyanna24 wrote: »

I've overspent this month and was just looking back over my spreadsheets to see where I can cut down. The first thing I noticed is that I spent £46.74 this month on fruit and veg!

How much do other people spend? There is me and my two little girls.

That is a little over 50p per day for each of you. Doesn't seem high to me

Killerseven

gayleygoo wrote: »

I might try adding up my fruit and veg spends this month, out of interest! Though ultimately if your family eats all of that food then the cost is possibly justifiable by the health benefits.

If I went to the market each week (though I rarely remember as it's only on two mornings a week), I'd probably spend around a tenner a time, and that would include potatoes and loads of onions. Grapes seem to be quite a chunk of your spend, but we'd easily eat a package of grapes a week too. I nearly always buy the cheapest tomatoes rather than cherry ones, although my DD is happy to eat whole cherry tomatoes so it's usually worth the extra expense when I do get them. The bulk of our fruit is cheaper ones like bananas, local apples, big oranges etc. Berries, mangoes, pineapples and other exotics are more of a treat or bought when on offer/reduced.

Frozen peppers, sweetcorn and other stir-fry veg might be cheaper than buying them fresh. You could look into sprouting your own beansprouts etc, as it's inexpensive. Needs a little forward planning and daily attention, but I do it occasionally as I don't want to pay for a bag of beansprouts that I'll only use half of before they go slimy

If you can shop in the evenings you might find some things are much cheaper, reduced. I have sometimes got big bags of greens for 10p, berries for 40p, and peaches/plums (still nowhere near ripe) for a fraction of their original price. I also buy a lot of stuff from Lidl, particularly they stuff they'll have on offer for 39p or whatever each week.

The growing season has started too, and lettuce is much cheaper to grow than buy. Some sort of cut-and-come again lettuce will do well. Pea shoots are delicious too!

I have a sprouter, But where is the best place to get them? Im asking in all the supermarkets non of the staff have any idea what Im talking about. The best I found was mung beans in Asda.

I want to find some cheap alfalfa seeds.

Any suggestions please?

pollyanna24

WantToBeSE wrote: »

LOL, i think i was getting confused, i actually thought that you were the OP :rotfl:

Damn similar names eh? Haha.

I do use everything up, just eating more fruit and veg than we used to I guess.

The olives are the pitted olives in jars, it's a recent thing of mine and I love them!

This is what I am up to so far this month, don't seem to be on as much of a health kick and my girls will only eat strawberries, peppers, cucumber and the odd banana.

Pitted Olives 3.60
Grapes 2.00
Bananas 1.52
Peppers 1.50
Chopped Tomatoes 1.36
Lettuce 1.30
Mushrooms 1.00
Cucumber 0.98
Carrots 0.75
Beansprouts 0.60
Plum Tomatoes 0.34
Onions 0.33
Garlic 0.30
15.58

pollyanna24

Fruball wrote: »

That is a little over 50p per day for each of you. Doesn't seem high to me

I don't begrudge spending the money on healthy stuff. Just when people say they can feed an army on £10 a week, I just wonder how they do it!

I mean, my "Sweet Stuff" column is almost as much as f&v

Chocolate Pancakes 3.00
18 x Mini Smarties 2.79
WW Chocolate Mousse 1.25
Chocolate Milk 1.00
12 x Haribos 1.00
Chocolate Mousses 1.00
Chocolate Chip Cookies 0.69
WW Mini Chocolate Rolls 0.65
11.38

chelseablue

Just out of interest do you type out every item you buy in a food shop onto a spreadsheet?

mashedavocado

I've been meaning to look at our shopping bills in more detail for ages. My partner thinks I'm bonkers but I'm going onto maternity leave this week so I'll have a few days to scan over things We hardly ever go over budget on groceries, but I'd like to see where we can make cutbacks.

I honestly don't know how much we spend on fruit & veg at the moment. What I do know is that when we make the effort to go to our local greengrocers (rather than the supermarket) we save loads. I know it's not always an option to spread your shopping out between different shops (depending on transport etc) but we get two big carrier bags full of fruit and veg for about a tenner from the grocers. We seem to eat a lot more healthily when we do it that way too.

Recently I've thought more about growing some veg... we've planted some basil, rocket, spinach and radishes to start us off, and we're sprouting some alfalfa. It's stuff that we might not eat all that often anyway, but certainly for things like spinach it should save us quite a bit (especially as we won't be throwing any of it away).

maman

mashedavocado wrote: »

I've been meaning to look at our shopping bills in more detail for ages. My partner thinks I'm bonkers but I'm going onto maternity leave this week so I'll have a few days to scan over things We hardly ever go over budget on groceries, but I'd like to see where we can make cutbacks.

I honestly don't know how much we spend on fruit & veg at the moment. What I do know is that when we make the effort to go to our local greengrocers (rather than the supermarket) we save loads. I know it's not always an option to spread your shopping out between different shops (depending on transport etc) but we get two big carrier bags full of fruit and veg for about a tenner from the grocers. We seem to eat a lot more healthily when we do it that way too.

Recently I've thought more about growing some veg... we've planted some basil, rocket, spinach and radishes to start us off, and we're sprouting some alfalfa. It's stuff that we might not eat all that often anyway, but certainly for things like spinach it should save us quite a bit (especially as we won't be throwing any of it away).

Courgettes grow well in pots if you like those and chillies look pretty even if you can't get to eat them all.


Hope all goes well with baby and when you're walking baby you'll have time to shop around and put all your shopping in the pram. I miss that.;)