August 2017 Grocery Challenge

Ginmonster

Elsiepac and Save Dosh - I've got soup envy! All those soups you're making sound delicious.

PipneyJane

euronorris wrote: »

Should only need to top up milk and fruit over the weekend. And I'm going to try making my own bread this weekend with chapatti flour as I've still got masses of that to work through! haha. It worked well with] the pizza base recipe, so fingers crossed!

The bread should be lovely, almost-but-not-quite wholemeal in appearance, with a texture closer to white bread. I make mine with chapatti flour all the time, since it's the only flour I have in stock. (It's cheaper to use it for everything. Also, less storage space needed.)

We spent another £15.07 in Mr T on Tuesday night, which brings my total spend to £36.75 out of £105, leaving me £68.25 for the rest of the month. (Apologies, if I've just blinded you - I'm still trying to figure out formatting/swapping colours etc from the iPad. :eek: )

£3 of that spend was for sympathy cards. A friend's dad passed away and it's quite hard finding a good sympathy card that isn't cloyingly sentimental. A further £7 was for picnic supplies (we had another Prom on Wednesday night) and £1.64 was for 2 packets of Grapenuts cereal, marked down by 50%. The rest was on chocolate - got to keep DH the Chocolate Monster fed - and biscuits/treats.

It's the 11th of the month and we still have to do a "proper shop". It's amazing how it gets frittered away... £68.25... Hmmm.....

PipneyJane

Suffolk_lass wrote: »

Which sm is French-owned in the UK? I have ordered stuff on-line from Channel Islands before now and it was from a Carrefour associated company but I wasn't aware of any others in UK

Please, please, please tell me we're being invaded by Carrefour or SuperU! I love them both! I know the French generally pay more for food than we do - although not for everything - but I love their attitude to food. (Buy local. Buy quality. Spend wisely.). In every supermarket, you can buy local produce. The fruit and veg have large signs saying country - or even region - of origin. The meat is often clearly marked up, too.

zafiro1984

French supermarket - sorry my mistake. The one I went to was one of the newer but cheaper supermarkets. It just that we have some very close french friends and they won't shop anywhere else. When we visit them it is their biggest supermarket and I just presumed it was french owned - sorry.

I'd be interested to know whether folk count toiletries and cleaning stuff in their grocery challenge.
I believe the average for a family of four is around £84 a week, does anyone know if that includes these items.
There's only two of us plus a dog so our weekly spend should come in at £42. I never seem to get anywhere near that and I'm not wasteful and grow quite a lot of fruit and veg

caronc

£10 today mainly on bits to take to friends tomorrow. Main shop booked for Monday. Total so far £44/£120.

quintwins

£17.08 spent last night on bread, milk,cereal, butter. yogurts and cheese. bringing me to £103.42

Doom_and_Gloom

Since last post we've spent £36.61.
A lot of that was on fresh fruit and vegetables.

Yesterday made vegetable stew with vegan sausages cut up to go further:beer:. 2 portions went into the freezer that we are trying to eat through, opps. The rest is in the fridge to be eaten over the next few days. I'll be having it with extra vegetables; peas, sweetcorn, courgetti and avocado.

£99.88/£155.
£55.12 left.

In effect we have £15.12 left for the next 7 days, then £20 for each of the two lots of days after. Should be possible. As I said we are trying to eat through the freezer so fresh produce is the main spends right now.

Merlin's_Beard

£16.44 spent today on a supermarket shop, and I planned to spent £10 so not too bad for me!

That brings me up to £65.34/£100 for this month, so £34.66 left for probably two more weekly shops, so basically same again twice over.

Zafiro1984 - I do count toiletries/cleaning in my shop, because mine is "supermarket + any other food/drink" (that's not socialising/going out food), and my budget comes in at £20-25 a week for one person -
but everyone here is different. Some will, some won't. Basically, whatever floats your boat. It's your budget, and it's not a competition with anyone except perhaps yourself (and maybe a battle of wits against the supermarkets!)

Suffolk_lass

PipneyJane wrote: »

Please, please, please tell me we're being invaded by Carrefour or SuperU! I love them both! I know the French generally pay more for food than we do - although not for everything - but I love their attitude to food. (Buy local. Buy quality. Spend wisely.). In every supermarket, you can buy local produce. The fruit and veg have large signs saying country - or even region - of origin. The meat is often clearly marked up, too.

zafiro1984 wrote: »

French supermarket - sorry my mistake. The one I went to was one of the newer but cheaper supermarkets. It just that we have some very close french friends and they won't shop anywhere else. When we visit them it is their biggest supermarket and I just presumed it was french owned - sorry.

I'd be interested to know whether folk count toiletries and cleaning stuff in their grocery challenge.
I believe the average for a family of four is around £84 a week, does anyone know if that includes these items.
There's only two of us plus a dog so our weekly spend should come in at £42. I never seem to get anywhere near that and I'm not wasteful and grow quite a lot of fruit and veg

Don't worry Zaf - it's probably for the best - you can already sense PJ and I would be in there, indulging in French goodies (I especially like the little petits fours sweet pastry cases that you can pass off as your own...)


I include everything food wise and everything from the SM - so if DH goes to Pets at Home, I don't count it, but if I get Cat Litter and food in Morries, I do. In similar vein, if I buy toiletries in SM I count them, but not my Boots Face Cream.


We allow £3000 pa for two adults and a hungry cat, plus occasional visits from DS for meals. I also grow F&V. Crucially, I work on £200 per calendar month plus £400p.a for stores and £200 extra for Christmas. It is pretty tight this year, despite big veg contribution from the garden. I NEVER pay full price for cleaning materials, loo roll, kitchen paper, laundry detergent, tins or toiletries - that is what my stores fund pays for. I remain a brand snob for certain things - eggs, milk always organic, good coffee - and that is how I just about manage it. Italy is so expensive this year - everything except salad is much more expensive and the exchange rate is pants. So much for bringing a couple of cases of wine home!

Doom_and_Gloom

OH went shopping when he got home so another £3.90 spent. He got two pizzas (one 14" and one 10"), bread and cheese for that. The pizzas went in the freezer. We are both as bad as each other, we know we need to eat out of it and not add but...no I have no excuse.

£103.78/£155.
£51.22 left