September 2007 Grocery Challenge

teedy23

firstly thanks to all who helped with soup and colcannon recipes, Marie nobody ever makes stuff as good as your mammy, sometimes just because it,s your mammy thats making it. Hollysan, thanks for soup help. Yes it can be hard to stick to weekly budget, when your running out of basics, even monthly gets out of control sometimes. You just have to look at the bigger picture in these cases, if your still cutting down waste and not buying just so much rubbish then your still on the right road. Good luck
just having a rather late, second breakfast from the 10p batch loaf and 20p finest game pate from Tesco,s, best 30p I,ve spent in a while, but may have to change my name to rotunda if this keeps up

mikeD

Went into town this morning ON THE BUS!! Car out of action at the moment. Called in at Mr. T's for W/E veggies. There was a French Market in town today so took the opportunity to buy two types of Brie. I love it......yummy . Spent about £6.

willow_girl

Managed to come in under budget again this week (even though it was only just!). Stocked up last week on alot of offer stuff from Mr T's., so the cupboard is looking quite good. Got to use up the jam I bought ages ago. Will probably make a Victoria sponge.

Here's to this week :rolleyes:

meanmarie

Spent another €7 on piece of ham yesterday, it was delicious with cabbage from the garden...even better there is enough left to have for dinner to-day. Lovely day here but a little colder so think that I will make a vat of soup to see us out of food this evening and to-morrow...so a no spend day to-day and probably to-morrow if I am not too lazy to make some flat bread...have lots of flour etc.

Bobbykins

Went to Tesco last night, late, in the hope of picking up some reduced stuff but somebody beat me to it....there was hardly anything there! I guess there must be a few OSers around here!

Anyway, spent £15.54 and "should" be OK for the rest of the week. DH did end up going away after all, so it's just me, although I still have to create some meals for my DD's freezer for her, for when the baby arrives!

It's a good job they are vegetarian! I think I'm going to make her a couple of veggie hotpots this afternoon, whilst I'm making a corned beef hash for myself - might as well use up the space in the oven.

I've just worked out that I have about £18.00 to last me to the end of the month - that's 2 weeks away :eek: :eek: . I feel a bit of belt tightening coming on!

meanmarie - how do you make your flatbread? I don't have a breadmaker, just occasionally make my own bread because I enjoy it, but have never tried making flatbread - is there anything special/tricky about it? Would appreciate any tips. I think I might have a go this afternoon.

Cheers everyone - keep up the good work!

shell2001

Quick update from me. Did big Mr T shop at the start of the month £123, but got 1000 point code to work plus saved another £15 in BOGOFs etc:D . So now with 2 weeks to go I have £100 (plus a few £1 coins in my purse) to last till end of month.

I have done my mealplans till end of month so should just need fruit & veg and maybe top up of milk (still got couple of 4 pinters in freezer, plus 5 cartons of soya milk for girls).

I am not counting my chickens here as I tend to make that mistake every month but am hopeful. So keeping everything crossed (wont be able to get money out of my purse that way:D )

spiritwish

I find it hard to keep food bills down cos I have 8 kids but there are always ways to cut back. I asked the asda staff for times when food is reduced drastiacally - I save a fortune this way. Also I always save left over food eg shepherds pie, curry, spag bol etc and microwave it at work to save buying dinners.

miss_empty_piggy

Hi All
Haven't been on for a while and have been reading everyone's posts. I find it really inspiring as I know you lot are out there trying as hard as me to money save. :beer:

Doing OK I think. Have spent a total of £119.46 so far and have £90.54 left to spend for the rest of the month. Feeling quite good about this but know that I could still manage to fluff it up before the month ends. Am going shopping this afternoon armed with £17.00 only to get stuff in for the week.

I have decided to live off cabbage soup for the week as control-freak partner has told me to loose weight and I want to hack him off by proving that I can do it (but not for him!!) Aaarghhh!!! :mad: He drives me potty! Otherwise have to go and get food for my little piggies to eat. :A

Hope you all have a good week!!!

Miss Empty Piggy

lil_me

spiritwish we do have some other big families on here, pigpen also has 8, maybe would be worth you sharing ideas.

miss empty piggy please be careful with the dieting, some can make you ill and with little piggies to look after you need your energy. Don't let yourself be bullied into dieting.

Well I went shopping this morning and spent the grand total of £4.65 inc what I need for the meal plan and lunches, even got some bacon to top the BBQ chicken with. All I should need now is fruit, hopefully. If I can spend under £15 this week I will be very happy. More money for the moving pot! In fact I'm just thrilled that I have 2 weeks left and over £200 left Saying that just shows how bad the overstocking is as the £87.03 spent includes last months £15.67 overspend!

redsquirrel80

I've not posted for a while but have been keeping track on my signature. More or less done all my grocery shopping for the month as I'm away on holiday this week (then get paid on Friday). Have only spent just under £40, which looks 'good' but in reality I've been a bit lazy with making lunches etc. As I take the price of bought lunches at work out of my weekly budget, I've overspent on those budgets instead! I'll also admit I haven't always eaten very well this month, due to being very busy/ stressed at times.

Oh well, onwards and upwards! Good things have been that I decided to include toiletries etc within the grocery budget and thus discovered Tesco's own brand shampoo and conditioner which really suit my hair. Have been using the shampoo as shower gel as well after I ran out of 'proper stuff' and it's made my skin really nice! Will have a think about budget for next month, I know I need a few bits of cleaning stuff and I know I need to eat a bit better!

Hope you're all doing well!