August 2017 Grocery Challenge

PipneyJane

Hi everyone.


Put me down for £120, please. That's groceries for me and DH. We should be able to stick to that this month, with some judicious eating out of the freezer.


Next month, we'll probably have to restock said freezer but there's at least £160 set aside in the "meat money" fund for that. We put aside £40/month for the butcher, which I don't include in the grocery challenge money.

PipneyJane

emmwri wrote: »

Wow £5 off £30 voucher at L!dl is amazing!!! Where can I find vouchers for L!dl?

I've started the challenge today but trying to use up what I have in before I do a shop. Running low on milk always seems to be where we fall down and end up going to the shops again! I know milk can be frozen but not sure on its shelf life once defrosted, so I've never tried it.

Slowly defrost the milk in the fridge and it'll last four or five days, easily, once defrosted in full. (It'll take 24 hours to defrost.) DH and I only get through about a litre a week so one of my penny-pinchers is to buy two litres for £1, decant half into a plastic litre bottle and freeze that. I also have "emergency milk" in the cupboard for those times where you run out. (That's long life SKIMMED milk. It doesn't have the after taste that other long life milk does, so tastes like fresh.)

DaisyWalker

Hope I'm following the guidelines by posting. I decided it's finally time to get my wild food spending under control so August will be mainly tracking what I spend (I really have no idea where to start guessing on a budget). Just wanted to check what I should include:

Should I include takeaways, sandwiches bought for lunch etc.? I want to reduce them, obviously, and when I do my grocery shopping will likely increase as I make more food myself. However it also seems a bit incongruous.

What about cleaning products, toiletries and other stuff for the home? How do people decide what to include and exclude?

How do I allow for vouchers? I have £9 off £60 at Tesco but I won't have that next month.

Sorry if these are stupid questions.

quintwins

DaisyWalker wrote: »

Hope I'm following the guidelines by posting. I decided it's finally time to get my wild food spending under control so August will be mainly tracking what I spend (I really have no idea where to start guessing on a budget). Just wanted to check what I should include:

Should I include takeaways, sandwiches bought for lunch etc.? I want to reduce them, obviously, and when I do my grocery shopping will likely increase as I make more food myself. However it also seems a bit incongruous.

What about cleaning products, toiletries and other stuff for the home? How do people decide what to include and exclude?

How do I allow for vouchers? I have £9 off £60 at Tesco but I won't have that next month.

Sorry if these are stupid questions.

Its up to you what you include, I include all food and cleaning products including takeaway. I only count the money I hand.

Wysiwyg49

Please add me in for £380 for August. We can but try!

Next week on a (UK) self catering holiday so any good budget ideas for that will be welcome...I'm hoping to avoid buying lunches when out and about especially.

PipneyJane

Wysiwyg49 wrote: »

Please add me in for £380 for August. We can but try!

Next week on a (UK) self catering holiday so any good budget ideas for that will be welcome...I'm hoping to avoid buying lunches when out and about especially.

How about wraps for lunchtimes? Scrape them with some mayonnaise, add a slice of meat from the Condemned Counter and a bit of salad, fold two sides in and then roll up. You can also mix a drained tin of tuna with a tin of bean "salad", for a different filling. (Drain the beans into a bowl and only add as much of the "dressing" as needed or this could get soggy.) Another favourite of ours are smoked salmon and cream cheese bagels - use salmon trimmings and value cream cheese. (NB: if you are buying Mr A's salmon "trimmings", they're almost mush so beat them together with the cream cheese before applying.)


HTH.

BrassicWoman

Day one: £2.20 spend, yogurt, rolls, peanut butter

Skintmama

Please could I be entered for £200 again?
This is for 3 adults - most meals including lunches/packed lunches. Sometimes DS eats elsewhere. This covers food groceries but not the milk bill. We are tracking entertainment spending separately.

Thank you

Off now to read how you have all been getting on in August!

PennyGrabber

Welcome DaisyWalker! Everyone sets their own rules for what to include, so have a think about what you'd prefer. For us, I include all food except takeaways, but not toiletries.

Nsd for me today, even though I went into a sm. been doing some sorting today, and am disgusted at how much stuff is in my house. Little and often is normally my motto, but we're having visitors over tomorrow and I've got the contents of my cupboard under the stairs all over the floor!! Anyway, I was so busy doing that, that I burnt the dinner . Oh well, we ate it anyway!!

Tomorrow is a treat dinner - pi33a 4ut with a sleepover guest for dd. I'll either have some of those leftovers, or some of my leftover celery soup.

Night all,

PG x

elf06

DAISYWALKER As has already been said - you decide what you want to include I include all food, shop bought alcohol, cleaning products and toiletries but do not include nights out (they are few and far between anyway) or dog food which I buy in bulk every 4-6 months. I DO include fresh fruit and veg for hammy but not the snakes food either (she only eats once a month and I buy her food in bulk too) so some pet food but mostly not!

Well I was beginning to become disheartened with my spends and lack of NSD's but I have reminded myself that I did forget about the school holidays and I also made it a long month for myself (nearly 6 weeks) so even if I am over I will not kick myself. I've not done the challenge for many years so I had to guess at something. I have fallen into the trap of buying lots of YS items for the freezer so I do have a large amount of dinners in there and I am taking LO for work night dinners so as not to keep buying rubbish sarnies at work. I've planned meals for the next 10 days around what I have in so any purchases now will be purely fresh bread, milk, possibly fruit and anything needed for baking or to eek out meals.

so far I've spend £88.17 of my £130 budget and I have 25 days remaining. Schools go back on 16th August though so that will help a smidge with DS's snacking! Why oh why do they become ever so hungry during the hols????

Anyway off to update my sig