November 2007 Grocery Challenge

pippamannequin

Thankyou all for a lovely welcome .

Just done my shopping, still have to buy cat food and milk and bread through the week and any little incidentals that may crop up but managed to spend £16.60, that included a bogof on a big pack off toilet rolls so shouldnt need to buy again for a while! Hopefully I should be ok this week

millionaire_in_training

Jeezo. We are only on day 10 and I have spent nearly half of this months budget. I havent even been shopping this week yet :rotfl: . I have made a list and did a menu plan so really not needing that much. Right I need to knuckle down as I realy dont want to go over this as I have cut it down so I can allow myself an extra £50 next month. Its a good plan but I bet I fail :rotfl: .

pippamannequin

brummiebabe wrote: »

Just checking in with this weeks spending:o

We get through so much bread, milk & cheese that it's unbelievable really...my children just love toast, sandwiches, milk etc etc.....We can easily get through a loaf a day - & I only buy 'nice' bread (I know I could buy the cheap stuff but just don't like it:rotfl: !!)

Hi Brummiebabe, I know just what you mean about the bread and milk, my 2 boys go through 3 pints a day :eek: and my youngest eats plain slices of bread one after the other the way other kids munch through biscuits

tattycath

millionaire_in_training wrote: »

Jeezo. We are only on day 10 and I have spent nearly half of this months budget. I havent even been shopping this week yet :rotfl: . I have made a list and did a menu plan so really not needing that much. Right I need to knuckle down as I realy dont want to go over this as I have cut it down so I can allow myself an extra £50 next month. Its a good plan but I bet I fail :rotfl: .

It's a good plan and you will succeed!!! Positive mental attitude. and we're all here for support. I have spent nearly half my monthly budget already but I plan to use stuff out of freezer for a few days. When I go shopping I sometimes get carried away-and sometimes my OH wishes I had been carried away!!!:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: But i have a new masterplan. We get through loads of milk and we get long life so I normally get a dozen cartons at a time. Last time I went shopping I also got some dried milk that I can make up when I need to. I tested it in OHs cup of tea the other night and he never noticed. So when I have finished a litre I make up half a litre and put it in the (rinsed out) carton. Then when that has gone I open a new carton-means less shopping trips and less temptation.

lil_me

Congratulations Izoomzoom and family

pippamannequin

millionaire_in_training wrote: »

Jeezo. We are only on day 10 and I have spent nearly half of this months budget. I havent even been shopping this week yet :rotfl: . I have made a list and did a menu plan so really not needing that much. Right I need to knuckle down as I realy dont want to go over this as I have cut it down so I can allow myself an extra £50 next month. Its a good plan but I bet I fail :rotfl: .

Oh good luck I CANT fail otherwise I cant pay my rent!!

It's simply the biggest incentive i have!!

Shopped around and got quite a few bogofs, got a huge piece of beef topside from somerfields for £5.06 which was half price, can cut it into 3 and will do for Sunday dinners for the rest of the month, half price pizza, huge and was tonight's dinner with homemade garlic bread £1.99 and reduced french loaf 10p, got half price mince £1.00 will do for spag bol x 2, huge bag of chips 99p, chicken breasts for £2,a few other bits like fish fingers and potatoes and veg, cheap 16p orange and blackurrant,bargain toilet rolls on bogof. All fitted in with my menu planner which has a good few meat and veg meals that my kids love and a couple of quick meals like fish fingers and chips, but plenty in such a little shop and enough to do a few extra days in the coming weeks.
zzzzz do i sound soooo boring? :rolleyes: YES! sorry x

frankerooney

Well I only joined you all yesterday and today we got properly stuck in to the GC! We've never really shopped at Lidl before, though it's just up the road; just get everything from Mr T. So today I made a list (3 pages in small font!) of our Favourites list, the stuff we regularly buy, and we took it to Lidl and wrote down as many comparative prices as we could, til the 2-yr-old got fed up. I have yet to analyse that one (I do accounts for my job, can you tell?!!)

I also took a list of this week's T order and bought from Lidl anything that worked out cheaper. I bought these items:

1 tub natural yoghurt
1 white cabbage
3 onions
1 block butter
2 cartons uht milk
1 mango
1 courgette
1 refill pack Horlicks Light
2 gammon steaks
6 granny smiths apples
1 cheese sauce mix
6 free range eggs

... and saved £6.07 on the Tesco prices!!!

It was quite a time-consuming way of saving cash and we probably won't do it every week but it was a very interesting exercise.

rosieben

k60sav wrote: »

...
zzzzz do i sound soooo boring? :rolleyes: YES! sorry x

No, not in the least boring k, this is how we encourage and spur each other on. you had some great bargains there.

frankerooney wrote: »

Well I only joined you all yesterday and today we got properly stuck in to the GC! We've never really shopped at Lidl before, though it's just up the road; just get everything from Mr T. So today I made a list (3 pages in small font!) of our Favourites list, the stuff we regularly buy, and we took it to Lidl and wrote down as many comparative prices as we could,
...
It was quite a time-consuming way of saving cash and we probably won't do it every week but it was a very interesting exercise.

WTG Frankerooney - glad to see that you're getting into it well.

I recommend Lidl jam which is usually about 49p a jar, love the mixed berries one. I like some of their choc too so might have a visit before chrimbo, just to get something different.

TheBees

Jacks_xxx wrote: »

I keep meaning to ask this!

If you could just give one tip to help out your fellow Grocery Challengers - what would it be?

Love Jacks xxx

Teach your family to write down things that are runing out so that you can plan your weekly shop getting what you need and not having to nip out to the shops to get bits and pieces. Hope this helps!:rotfl:

tattycath

TheBees wrote: »

Teach your family to write down things that are runing out so that you can plan your weekly shop getting what you need and not having to nip out to the shops to get bits and pieces. Hope this helps!:rotfl:

Hi TheBees, The other day I decided to check my store cupboard to see what tins/packets of food I had in. My eldest DD wrote everything down and the quantities. I put it on an excel spreadsheet and now when anyone takes anything out of the cupboard they go into the spreadsheet on pc and write -1 or -2 etc next to the item, so now I know exactly what is left in the cupboard and what needs replacing. and when I have replaced the item I cross off the minus figures ready to start again!!!:p
Now I bet I sound really boring. but before I made a log of everything I had no idea what I did have and what had been used!!!

Went to Lidl tonight. It's a new one that's just opened. I only wanted a couple of items. The first thing I noticed was that they had no baskets-only trolleys. So I wandered round the store with my OH and we found a small empty cardboard box and we used that as our basket. Great tactic by Lidl-if I'd gone and got a small trolley we would have put all sorts of stuff (we didn't need) in!!!:eek: We still managed to spend £7.03 though!!! We bought
Bread
4 large pizzas
1 dozen eggs
cooking oil
2 tins rice pudding
We had pizza and chips for evening meal tonight. 1 large pizza (we got 2 in a box for £1.49 and I only used 1 of them) and I made the chips using 4 large potatoes that I bought the other day for 25p (for the 4). and that fed 3 of us-cheap meal or what!!!:j