December 2017 Grocery Challenge

Mrs_Cheshire

Spent £99.22 in Ald! today, that included meat/fish for the weekend and most of next week, fruit/veg, bread products, jars/tins for the store cupboard, all the diary and cold meat for sandwiches.
I also got some different mince pies, flavoured cream for Christmas puddings, bits for boxing day buffet.
Need to write my updated grocery list so I only buy what I actually need next week.

thriftwizard

I've added £90 to cover what I spent at the market today (<£60) and at the Grocers of Eastern Promise (>£30) in the big city yesterday; it's a rough estimate but fairly accurate; possibly a little over in that some of it (at least £10) should definitely have come out of the Christmas money. It's going to be a close-run thing; I'm hoping that the festive leftovers will carry us through until payday on the 29th! But pet, livestock, cleaning & toiletry supplies are all holding out well, as are the flour, oats & general baking basics. The killer item, if any, will be butter; it's touch & go whether I have enough. If the girls get baking, as they often do, the budget is under serious threat...

starting_again_in_the_sun

Spent 20.65€ yesterday and 13.83 € today. Leaving about 20€ until next Friday. I have 16€ in my purse so will try to make that last!

Think I will allow us a 50€ maximum extra fund for Christmas as we were under budget for presents. I'll keep track of it this week and add the remainder to next month's budget.

We are having katsu curry for Christmas dinner . Need to find a nice dessert which I can make in the slow cooker.

JingsMyBucket

Morning everyone! A quick update before we run out to IKEA. Yesterday I had two shopping spends.

€10.83 at an Asian supermarket for tofu, tons of ramen, and a bag of fresh super hot Thai chilis.

€7.83 at Lidl for chicken legs, mozzarella, salami, canned tomatoes, and some milk.

I jerked/marinated the tofu last night along with some chicken legs for me. Those and frozen string beans will be our lunches when we return from IKEA. After lunch I'll need to do a bit of grocery shopping to buy eggs and other things for OH to pack. He's going to Scotland tomorrow and needs some traveling food.

TOTALS SO FAR:
€92.86 / €350.00 for groceries
3 NSD
£179.86 / £200 London stocking up fund

PipneyJane

Good morning Everyone

Two more spends to report. I forgot when I was doing the numbers on Thursday that DH went to Lidl earlier in the week. He bought two of their Salmon En Croute (the big, pastry encompassed logs of salmon), as well as some chocolate* and toiletries. He spent £13.95 in the process.

On my way home from work yesterday, the bad traffic pushed me towards my local Sainsbugs. I rarely go there - I find them more expensive - but I needed to get some sliced meat for DH’s lunches so I took the hint from the Fates. Since Sainsbugs and MrT use the same suppliers for most of their own brand products, I took a wander through their toiletries section. I’m on the lookout for Basics/Value Baby Lotion, which MrT used to sell for 25p but Value products appear to have vanished**. In the entire toiletries section, I only spotted one Basics product: a bottle of foam bath. Has anyone else noticed this phenomenon?

Anyway, I spent £9.42 on some sliced chicken and two packets of smoked salmon trimmings. (£3 each. Extortionate, but the first time I’ve found smoked salmon trimmings in months.)

The above spends brings my totals to: £106.53/£162.70, leaving £56.17 left to spend, of which £12 is cash and the remainder is Clubcard vouchers. That should see us through the rest of the month, with some left over. Apart from milk (possibly but I have long-life in the cupboard), yoghurt and DH’s lunch stuff (wraps, salad, sliced meats, bananas), we don’t have that much left to purchase. We’ve already done the big shop.

- Pip


* Unfortunately, we will have to buy more chocolate at some point this weekend - I need to make chocolate brownies tomorrow for a choir social on Monday, and want to make coconut rough to take into work, but a certain “chocolate monster” has already eaten half of it. (DH is knackered from work, so I can’t really complain that he’s polished off so much.)

** I’ve mentioned the disappearance of Value toiletries before. We only noticed in October, when DH wanted some more body wash. I have managed to find some, so now have a small stockpile: a couple of bottles of Value shampoo, some foam bath (we use it as hand wash), and six bottles of body wash.

Merlin's_Beard

Well, today brought it up to £92.34/£100 so I can feel failure coming on...

And that's not including a wine order that comes to £54.98 :eek::eek::eek:

(twelve bottles, just over £4.50 each... I'll tell myself it's a bargain! :rotfl:)

Mrs_Cheshire

Went to H*ron foods this afternoon, to pick up some cheap snacks for the kids and a couple of diary bits. Spent £14.81

Just been to get a a few bits for Christmas meals from Mr T's, had a voucher for £4 off £30 and my husband works for them so we get staff discount too, and vouchers for specific Christmas bits. Not sure the checkout operator was very pleased with me though, I got her to do a sub total and I left the unnecessary bits as I've got another voucher to use next week.
Got some batteries too for all the Christmas decorations!
Should have cost £31.58 but after discounts and all coupons came to 16.18, pretty pleased with that!

Mrs_Cheshire

Merlin's_Beard wrote: »

Well, today brought it up to £92.34/£100 so I can feel failure coming on...

And that's not including a wine order that comes to £54.98 :eek::eek::eek:

(twelve bottles, just over £4.50 each... I'll tell myself it's a bargain! :rotfl:)

Don't worry too much, Will you drink all the wine this month?

JingsMyBucket

Turns today was a NSD after all. Both of us conked out on the sofa after coming home and I didn't get to the shops before they closed. No matter though as OH still has fruit and cheese to take with him tomorrow.

I need to sit down and plan out my spends for the next couple weeks. I just realized I won't have enough salt to last through Christmas, need to buy butter, etc.

TOTALS SO FAR:
4 NSD
€92.86 / €350.00 for groceries
£179.86 / £200 London stocking up fund

K.Mack

Hi everyone,

I have been eating out of the cupboards and freezer this week. I'm surpised at how well I did without going to the shop! I needed to empty the freezer as it needed defrosting so have been improvising.
Had a shop today of 38.71 which should see us through until the new budget starts! Fingers crossed!!
New total is £132.74. Means I have 17.26 to last until the 28th. Totally doable right..?