January 2017 Grocery Challenge. NEW BEGINNINGS!

Lordhightiggythe3rd

£55 pound spend yesterday for the fortnightly shop no spend now till Thursday I hope when I'll hit the market for some nice fruit and maybe nosy in the butchers:) also managing to save money which is very new to me hoping to start small and save £50 this month.
:j

caronc

Top up shop of £17 completed so far £71/£175 so not too bad

[Deleted User]

Wow, how fast is this thread moving. Had a few spends, £1 & £2.98, plus another mini spend my daughter did, not sure how much, so will add later. I am so determined to go through stores WITH A FINE TOOTH COMB. I have tagliatelle & vegan cream needs using up, will come up with something, maybe with Quorn and mustard. Hoping not to shop until Saturday Elsipac - this is the Linda Mc Vegan range - want to try them chorizo sausages, but not been able to find yet http://www.lindamccartneyfoods.co.uk/our-food/vegan-range/.

t14cy_t wrote: »

oh my, did a huge ys shop in morrisons yesterday, bought everything from saddle of lamb, to cooked meats! worked it out when i got home i had £178 worth of goods and paid £13.80!!!!! i did have coupons of £6.20 though. freezer now very full!! very chuffed with that haveny had such a huge haul for ages!! xx

Wow, that is so impressive.

zafiro1984 wrote: »

Meg72:- Your posting could have been written by me, I am/was exactly the same. I particularly like your comment. Even stranger is the buzz I am getting from not going, am finding it rather exciting to see how long I can really last without going to shops.

Me three, I get a buzz out of seeing how long I can last, though always seem to have full cupboards.

wishus

Whoops - On £64.13 with an extra £2 in the tuck shop, and will need to buy cat food later...

But let me tell you about my Love Food Hate Waste triumph of yesterday...


We bought some sweet clementines for Christmas, but there were a few left and one had gone green and the others were beginning to look a little past their best.

To use up a bit of citrus goodness, I squished juice and some flesh into oats, mixed with a little yoghurt, and hey presto overnight oats for brekkie this morning.

Also, a citrus twist was required for a variation on Hyderabad Rice - no idea if authentic, but my recipe book had this and I swapped okra for mushrooms, cayenne for a mix of paprika and chilli, orange zest and lemon juice for clementine juice and skipped shallots. It also needed saffron, and I had some v. old YS still in the cupboard.

So what I did: fried an onion in stages in sunflower oil until crispy, removed from wok and set aside. Added chilli, paprika, chopped ginger and garlic to the wok, then some basmati rice, then added chicken stock from a cube and the saffron.Covered, and after ten minutes, I added mushrooms, cooked down a bit, then added sultanas, and separately toasted some flaked almonds (another Christmas leftover). Squeezed in the juice to finish. When the rice was ready it was served topped with the onions and almonds. Yummy!

This went with sag aloo (spinach was 59p in Aldi last shop - I love spinach!) and cucumber raita - all homemade. One of the best curry nights I've done in ages - and no meat!

Islandmaid

Another NSD here

Meg - I know how you feel, my parents cupboards always had barely anything in them, money and food were very scarce, so when I left home a good stock of food was like a comfort blanket x I now try to treat my stocks like a commercial kitchen i.e. Good stock rotation and one to use, one spare etc

Tonight's meal is fish pie made with frozen fish portions and the tail end of my spud stock - cheese sauce - yummy

elsiepac

Save_Dosh wrote: »

I have tagliatelle & vegan cream needs using up, will come up with something, maybe with Quorn and mustard. Hoping not to shop until Saturday Elsipac - this is the Linda Mc Vegan range - want to try them chorizo sausages, but not been able to find yet http://www.lindamccartneyfoods.co.uk/our-food/vegan-range/

Save Dosh What about mushroom stroganoff with tagliatelle? If you need to use your Quorn you could do mushroom and Quorn lol

This is a recipe I found saved on my computer - I know I made it a few times years ago before becoming vegan:
VRC Chickpea Stroganoff

Ingredients

2 medium onions
500g mushrooms (2 punnets - suggest one is chestnut)
1.5 tbsp oil
4 tbsp water
1 veggie Oxo cube
1/4 tsp fresh ground nutmeg
1 good tbsp soya sauce
1/4-1/2 tsp mustard powder
2 tins of chickpeas
2 tsp cider or wine vinegar
200ml natural yoghurt (or vegan plain yoghurt if vegan)

Noodles/spaghetti/rice to serve

Method

1. Saute the sliced onion and mushrooms
2. Add the water, the stock cube, the nutmeg, soya sauce, mustard powder and vinegar
3. Stir in the drained chickpeas
4. Simmer for about 10 mins (I keep stirring as the water is only in the bottom of the pan - don't be tempted to add more!
5. Cook your accompaniments
6. Turn the heat right down and add the yoghurt to the chickpea mixture
7. Heat through, stir constantly but DO NOT boil!!!
8. Serve with your chosen accompaniment!


Not gonna lie - I did NOT like the chorizo sausages... funny flavour and texture - not for me! But then I don't think I had ever eaten chorizo before I went veggie then vegan so it may be that they are spot on and I just don't like the flavour!

Just realised today is the 10th and so marks the end of my 3rd week of this month's five, so am splitting my remaining £10.60 I haven't spent this week (HOW? lol) between weeks 4 and 5...
Revised Plan accounting for first 2 weeks over budget!
21-27 Dec: £40.22
28-3 Jan: £35.62
4-10 Jan: £9.40
11-17 Jan: £24
18-25 Jan: £30.76 (keeping this one big so I have spare for my birthday weekend with friends over)

I don't want to jinx it but... maybe this will be my first month on budget?! :eek:

catznine

Week two and another £19.57 added to the bill so only £35.77 taken from the £120 budget this month leaving £84.23 until the end of the month and plenty in the freezer and larder 👍 I've menu planned and that helped enormously when writing a short shopping list. Also going to Aldi first to get as much of it there if cheaper and most of it was (saved 30p on milk alone) then on to Sainsbys for the more unusual ingredients (Szechuan peppercorns this time for a sw meal) and the bargain priced light baby bels at £1 for 6:j also trying the js fat free Greek yogurt as only £1 compared to our usual total 0% Greek yogurt at £2.50 when it's in and it wasn't today. Fingers crossed😀

sitesafe

Oh dear - I'm not doing as well as I thought. I think the not having a freezer/only a small fridge isn't helping.

I thought I'd done okay the other day and had loosely menu planned. Went to buy milk and bread locally yesterday but whilst there bought chocolate and wine as well so overspent. I think I was rewarding myself for how I felt I was managing the budget only I was later punished for giving into temptation:

In the evening I went to use the fresh fish I'd bought a few days' earlier before it went by it's use by date. Opened the pack and I wasn't sure if it smelt 'right' - always hard with fish as it doesn't smell 'nice' at the best of times and so I decided against cooking it as the smell was a bit strong and I didn't want to risk making myself ill. Very disappointed as £3 down the drain. What's even more annoying is when I held the open packet up to smell it, fish juice dripped down inside my jumper - yuk! It stunk so I had to go and get changed. I was not a happy bunny.

This morning I noticed my dog licking the floor at the bottom of the fridge door - I shooed him away and when I opened the door noticed milk on the bottom of the fridge base (which I had used to store veg and eggs on) and on the bottom of the shelf. The unopened 2 litre of milk I had bought yesterday had about a pint missing from it so it was obviously leaking from that. Whilst I was cleaning up the bottom of the fridge the dog was trying to get at the spilt milk and somehow between me moving him away and him trying to get the milk half an opened packet of stir fry mix (allocated for supper another night) fell on the floor and had to be binned. So I'm down a pint of milk, a fish supper and a stir fry supper and the fish supper would have been my most expensive supper out of the lot. I'm wondering if the fish did not keep very well because the fridge is quite full so as to avoid keep going to the supermarket, and so it's maybe not as cold as it could be in there. It's an old built in fridge and I have to make do as it's in a studio flat where I stay through work. I guess I'm not really going to get away with not going shopping very often as will need to know fresh ingredients will last. It's definitely a challenge the no freezer thing as I'm getting very bored of chick peas and lentils already an so the temptation of chocolate and wine lures as a kind of treat for eating repetitive meals!

Anyway, I am now in a position where I only have £15 a week until the end of the month so this will be interesting to say the least, but I am determined not to give in unless I really have to. I don't think I'll be eating as healthily as I'd like to on that but let's see!

Well done to everyone who is doing this, it's really interesting reading other people's journey!


Update:


Last spends:
£55.90 (£5.05 unnecessary on wine and chocolate)
Since then:
Local shop for bread and milk yesterday:
£10.09 (£6.49 unnecessary on wine and chocolate)
Top up shop as I was in town so avoided drive to supermarket:
£17.25 (£1.35 unnecessary on chocolate muffins and carrier bags)


Total spends GC JAN 2017 - £83.24 (£12.89 unnecessary)/£130
Leaving £46.76 until end of month (or £15.58 a week) :rotfl:
Wasted/spoiled- £3 fish; 50p stir fry; 50p milk;
Indulgence - £1.35 cakes/bags; £9.54 wine; £2 choc

pajama

Was pleased with my spends last week, £70.23. I set my budget at £90 per week for 4 this includes all toiletries and cleaning.

Think I shall reduce my weekly amount if my spends keep being lower than my budget. Today I had a total spend of £66.10. I spent £3.85 in Holland & B and £62.25 in Aldi. Will have to buy some toiletries and loo roll Friday when I visit Home Bs but must be very strict with myself as that shop just continually calls out "buy me"

Franalamadingdong

Sitesafe, we eat a lot of fish, especially if I find it reduced to clear from the counter. Without a freezer I recommend eating fish on the day of purchase. If you get a freezer in the future either eat or freeze on day of purchase. You could always used tinned fish. We're having salmon and pea risotto tonight using tinned salmon - I've never used tinned salmon this way so we will see if it works. Most importantly fish should never smell of fish. If it's fresh it doesn't smell, if it smells do not eat it. Sorry to hear of your subsequent disasters too!

No spends from us again. To be fair we are usually a once a weeker. Although I'm picking up mum tomorrow and I am tempted to pop into the new butchers.