November 2017 Grocery Challenge

armchairexpert

We bought a leg ham on the weekend - $25 for a 4kg ham - and it's almost all gone! Ridiculous. It's just because it's there, people are helping themselves to a thick slice for a snack, putting some in a potato salad or an omelette, and we've ended up going through way more meat than we would have otherwise.

Delicious, though. I'm about to use the last of it for lunch and then make the bone into a lentil and ham soup.

I'm at $925/$1000 and therefore I won't make budget this month. I think I'm going to drop out for December, because Mr E's family are coming for Christmas and he likes to push the boat out a bit and be a generous host and it's just going to make me anxious if I have a budget goal. So, see you in the New Year!

elsiepac

Small spends last night on apple + cinnamon "tea", broccoli, asparagus and something else that I seem to have forgotten.

Definitely don't need anything else today, and today is also last day of the budget.

Declaring OVER at £192.22 / £165

Leftover black-eyed bean stew for tea tonight - made it in the slow cooker all day yesterday and it was very tasty.
Next week's meal plan includes I think 3 meals from the freezer - I've managed to stock it up with individual portions of batch cooked stuff, which is great, but I have more to go in and I need some pots back :rotfl:

On the menu this week to be cooked from scratch, will be Creamy Chilli Tomato and and Courgette Pasta (Friday night), White Bean and Potato Stew (Saturday night), Tortilla Soup (for work lunches next week), Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Stew (Monday night) and Thai Peanut Noodle Salad (Wednesday night - I'll adapt this to a warm dish if the weather is nasty!). Tonight, Fri + Sat lunch, Sunday night, and Tuesday night are all leftovers from the fridge or freezer meals, with fresh veg.

All this looks exotic I guess, but actually I'm only really buying the fresh ingredients for them, not the big ticket stuff, and some I already have in anyway.


...............................£165 Budget
Date.......Shop......Amount....Remaining
26 Oct.....Sains.....£29.55....£135.45(WEEK 1)
26 Oct.....A1d1......£00.65....£134.80(WEEK 1)
27 Oct.....Tesc0.....£00.50....£134.30(WEEK 1)
27 Oct.....Fete......£00.50....£133.80(WEEK 1)
30 Oct.....Co-0p.....£04.70....£129.10(WEEK 1)
02 Nov.....Tesc0.....£13.12....£115.98(WEEK 2)
02 Nov.....M&5.......£10.21....£105.77(WEEK 2)
02 Nov.....A1d1......£04.93....£100.84(WEEK 2)
05 Nov.....Tesc0.....£06.59.....£94.25(WEEK 2)
05 Nov.....M&S.......£02.31.....£91.94(WEEK 2)
07 Nov.....M&S.......£04.65.....£87.29(WEEK 2)
08 Nov.....Tesc0.....£02.10.....£85.19(WEEK 2)
09 Nov.....Tesc0.....£02.75.....£82.44(WEEK 3)
09 Nov.....Ald1......£04.49.....£77.95(WEEK 3)
09 Nov.....Tesc0.....£15.79.....£62.16(WEEK 3)
10 Nov.....H&B.......£12.46.....£49.70(WEEK 3)
10 Nov.....M&S.......£06.20.....£43.50(WEEK 3)
11 Nov.....M&S.......£09.50.....£34.00(WEEK 3)
11 Nov.....Tesc0.....£08.25.....£25.75(WEEK 3)
15 Nov.....Tesc0.....£39.63....-£13.88(WEEK 4)
20 Nov.....Tesc0.....£08.59....-£22.47(WEEK 4)
23 Nov.....Tesc0.....£04.75....-£27.22(WEEK 4)

Doom_and_Gloom

I'm slightly over budget right now for my personal budget, may need a few more items. Hoping I can get what I need only by spending £1.10 if I have to as that is the left over from the bulk and would keep us in the total month budget at least.

I made stew in the multi cooker on the slow cooker setting over night. No guess what I'll be eating tonight and for a few days dinners.
OH cooked a pizza last night, half yesterday and half for today.

Bulk - £28.45/£30.
OH - £47.37/£50. £2.63 left.
Me - £30.45/£30. - £0.45; looks like I'm eating into what was left of bulk, opps. But our overall budget may pan out for the month.

Total budget
£106.27/£110.
£3.73 left.

YorksLass

Mrs_Cheshire wrote: »

Just waiting for my bacon and lentil soup to finish cooking, put leek and swede in it so hopefully it'll turn out ok. Oh my, soup was delicious, amazingly filling and I've got loads left!

Maiden_Mum wrote: »

YorksLass - thank you for the bacon & lentil soup recipe. I made it a couple of days ago and had it for dinner tonight & it was very nice.

pamsdish wrote: »

Yorks Lass printed off the soup recipe thanks.

Glad you all enjoyed it! I can't take credit for the recipe though, it came from a cheapy paperback I bought on holiday called "Soups for Every Season". I'm working my way through it and am doing a mushroom & herb soup for next week.

Week 3 spends came in at a total of £65.28, £42.70 of which was for an online delivery yesterday. Most of this was for store cupboard items that I'd run out of, or was about to. I used a £10 MOC, a small refund voucher from my last delivery and also got 3 freebies - a 6-pack of sweet chilli flavoured multigrain snacks, a Greek yogurt with honey and a box of milk & dark chocolate thin cookies. A couple of Xmas items sneaked in too - a jar of mincemeat and a vac pack of cooked and peeled chestnuts.

That still leaves me with £18.12 in the budget for Week 4 but apart from milk I shouldn't need anything else. Right, off to do next week's meal plan now and will be yanking yet more stuff out of the freezer!

XSpender

I haven't spent anything else since my last post and the final week of this looooonnnnnnggggg months challenge begins tomorrow.

I only have a short list of fruit, tissues, beer, wraps, ice cream, milk and apple juice for next week. The wraps and ice cream are for Saturday's night dinner as DH has promised DS his favourite enchiladas and posh ice cream for passing his stage 6 swimming and getting a good report from his teacher. He's only 7.

I am really pleased with what we have eaten this week although we have not always stuck to the meal plan I haven't bought any extra meals.

Tonight I have used up 3 very overripe bananas in banana loaf and, when I couldn't find any veggie burgers in the freezer, have rustled up AGCJ famous carrot, cumin and bean burgers; 1 for tonight and 3 for the freezer.

caronc

£20 today bring the total to £116/£120. This should be me for November.

XSpender

After making veggie burgers from scratch last night because I couldn't find any SW ones in the freezer, I found a box when I went to freeze the remaining home made ones. Wont be buying any more after I've eaten this last box as the homemade ones were just as nice and really cheap to make.

£22.13 spent is Asda today on apples, bananas, bread, wraps, beer, milk, frozen sweetcorn, apple juice, tissues and ice cream. Oh and some pork crackling snack for DH.

DH had suggested posh ice cream for a treat on Saturday but I couldn't find a flavour we would all like, that was GF and nut free and for a price I was willing to pay so bought 3 tubs of soft scoop that will last us for ages as I needed vanilla anyway to go with apple crumble on Sunday.

I am over budget at £517/£500 and my challenge ends on Thursday 30th. I cannot see us needing anything else this weekend, I am away for 2 nights next week and I have a £25 meal allowance to spend that will help cover some basics for the end of the week and December.

BrassicWoman

Budget TOTALLY BLOWN! Have lots of yummy things for Xmas and a lot of healthy prepared meals because STRESSED. Health over money decision.

PipneyJane

On Thursday, we were lucky enough to get last minute tickets to the recording of the latest episode of The Now Show. (The BBC notified me by text at 10am; doors opened at 6.45pm.). DH popped into Mr T’s to buy wraps, salad and meat to make us a picnic supper, to eat in the queue before the show. He also scored some y/s mushrooms. £5.85 spent. That was after a visit to Costco to pick up tissues - on special - £9.33 spent for 12 packs.

After the recording is when the big spend happened. There is a L!dl near us that stays open until 11pm, so we stopped there to see if they had any bargains. They had air-dried Spanish ham, big ones in the Aisle of Surprises, with smaller ones stashed further along near the Christmas cake. DH stood in front of the large ham for a couple of minutes trying to rationalise buying one. They are legs of ham, with a display stand and a knife. There is no way we could justify a whole leg of ham; we’d be eating it for months, so when we saw the smaller - 1kg - ones, it practically bought itself. Like the larger hams, it came with a stand/carving board and a knife. Total spend in L!dl was £21.41 but £14.99 of that was for the ham, which was paid for by the meat fund.

The above brings our Grocery Challenge spend to £92.91/£155.69, leaving £62.78 left in the kitty for the rest of the month. (Actually, it’s less than that once you deduct the 2p, 5p and £2 coins we collect. The latter goes into the “running away fund” for holidays.)

[Deleted User]

Had a few spends, £4.75 in Sainsbobs on dairy free cheese & Vegenaise and £3 at the market on 4kg of onions, tomatoes and 2 pineapples. Gonna make some onion & garlic soup, trying anti-inflammatory food. Not too sure if tomatoes are, too much conflicting information out there - does anyone know ?? I may venture to get some turmeric tomorrow and maybe some broccoli to try some soup recipes (anti inflammatory) and that is mostly my spends done for the month. Off to update sig.