January 2016 Grocery Challenge

t14cy_t

£8 left from our £200 budget, yay....so far!!

cowboymum

A couple more spends over the weekend
£2.50 at sainsburys
£59.34 tesco delivery

Making my total £544.45.
However we have had a paying guest to stay this week so I had to spend a bit more for food for them, and will take £20 out of their board and lodgings to put towards food.

Not too bad overall - I'm going to cheat a bit and start Februarys grocery challenge this weekend, as we have a family dinner on Sunday which I have to buy more food for. I do seem to have a lot of stuff left in our store cupboard (mainly nuts, dried fruit, honey etc). I am going to plan to take the money for that stuff out of total Februarys grocery budget.

Made more bread at the weekend - a success. Also tried to make yogurt - a failure! I've tried this on and off over the years and seem to have a less than 50% success rate! Back to looking at the yogurt threads.

mrs-moneypenny

Just spent £3.49 on bread sarni filler and ys eggs, salad and milk

lynnejk

Evening all


Had an NSD yesterday and another today :j


We had omelettes for tea - I had salad and DH had fried potatoes and a token salad :rotfl:


Hope you all have a wonderful Wednesday
Lx

Zed42

Oh dear, you can tell it's getting to the end of the month ... it's getting a little quiet in here!

Another NSD here from me .... that £7.81 remains intact.

I had a major wobble tonight. DH was going to cook fajitas and declared there weren't enough veggies to do it with ... I so wanted to shout "take out, take out", but he was the strong one and taught DD how to make macaroni cheese instead

We're running rapidly out of milk however, so I will have to venture to a shop tomorrow.

Tomorrow, I'm out working, so energy for cooking will be at an all time low, but chicken tikka masala (20p whoopsied last Friday) is on the menu for tomorrow, apparently DH is going to add things to bulk it out

I have, however, (almost) decided to do a shop on Friday night which will be counted into February's budget, as I do need to get food to last the weekend (tea bags, olive oil, milk, weetabix to name some staples!)

mrs-moneypenny

Morning all

Today should be an nsd
Having veggie lasagne tonight using the YS spinach and mushroom we have in

We will make it through to the month end under budget and still have enough in to get at least a couple of weeks into Feb before I have to do a big farmfood shop using the voucher I got.

FurryBeastOz

Budget blown after Mr T delivery, but I'm not too stressed, as I had guessed an amount, and last time we had no dog and I wasn't on a high protein diet.

I have been breaking it down into 'type', so drinks (Pepsi and beer) £61 , basic food - £234.94 , dog - £56.09, toiletries and household - £14.97 , 'special food' - £63.40 , and indulgence :eek: £47.90 . The actual basic food isn't too bad. The indulgence has to go!

Going to continue to Sunday - as Mr W has the last of its 25% off fish Fridays this week. Then re-set for next month.

I'm thinking of separating out us and dog as there is little 'discretionary budget' in dog food. Although a lot of yesterday was dog food so would mean less spending in February.

I can't believe I'm trying to work out a way to fiddle the budget so I can declare under on here:rotfl: OK. Bite the bullet. £275 for February to include everything food related (but now excluding household and the dog as they are not areas I splurge and can sensibly rein in.)

Main focus is to eliminate the 'indulgence' (all me, on magazines, cake/chocolate, treat coffee. So all a matter of will power not need)

Hope everyone else is doing OK. I get the feeling everyone is doing better than me:T

mrs-moneypenny

FBO it's really not about anyone doing better than you. It's about you getting the best value you can from your money and living to within the budget you set for yourself. As you correctly stated your lifEstyle has changed you are now on high protein and have an extra doggy mouth to feed.
It takes a while to sort things out when changes happen.

My lightbulb moment was over Christmas when the cupboards were rammed but we were still shopping and buying the same things or stuff we had loads of because it was on offer. I'm coming in under budget this month because there is so much food in the house and I've been using the recipie index at the front of the thread to meal plan and cook what we have rather than just grabbing something that is to hand.

DanielleNic87

£25.10 spent on more fruit, milk and sausages as they were on offer. Me and the LO seemed to be going through the fruit far too quickly

Out of interest where do you buy your fruit? I'm currently shopping at Mr M's as the quality of fruit is good. But seem to be spending a fortune.

mrs-moneypenny

Danielle, we are lucky that we have a local guy who stands a fruit and veg stall nearby a few days a week, so I mostly get my stuff from him. He's not £1 a bowl but good quality stuff that lasts so I'm happy to pay a little exa for that. I supplement it with rtc stuff I pick up in the coop as there's is really good quality that last even if you buy it reduced on its best before date.
Hth