October 2018 Grocery Challenge

PipneyJane

Afternoon All

Thriftwizard - I hope your hubby is feeling considerably better now.

Medsdemon - I’m sorry to read about your moggy. My condolences.

First spends of the month for us today. We went to Lidl, decided it was too busy, MrT’s - where we couldn’t find half the things on our list - and then back to Lidl to see if we could pick up the things we couldn’t find in MrT’s.

Am I the only one who has noticed that many of Mr T’s cheaper items/cheaper brands are disappearing? They had no value pasta, while the value squash was marked down for clearance and their value baked beans disappeared weeks ago. Presumably, all of these brands will reappear in Jacks, while the main-brand shops will stock labels with a bigger markup. (Come in suckers.....). In the meantime, Lidl’s range of groceries seem to have expanded.

Anyway, we ended up spending £14.08 in Lidl and £45.88 in Mr T’s. The latter included 2 bottles of cooking gin for £10 each, which will be used for sloe gin. (I harvested a bag full of sloes yesterday.) These two spends bring our total so far for the month to £59.96/£158.10, leaving £98.14 for the rest of the month.

- Pip

Merlin's_Beard

Pipney - some of those value brands are reappearing in slightly fancier packets with a different brand name to make them look less value-y.

Off the top of my head:

Rosedene Farm for fresh fruit/veg has been around for a while.
Suntrail Farms is for some fresh stuff as well.
Growers Harvest for tins/stores
Hearty Food Co. - stores inc pasta
Stockwell

They all seem to be more or less the same price, though I don't know what will happen if Jacks stores spread all over the country.

PipneyJane

Merlin's_Beard wrote: »

Pipney - some of those value brands are reappearing in slightly fancier packets with a different brand name to make them look less value-y.

Off the top of my head:

Rosedene Farm for fresh fruit/veg has been around for a while.
Suntrail Farms is for some fresh stuff as well.
Growers Harvest for tins/stores
Hearty Food Co. - stores inc pasta
Stockwell

They all seem to be more or less the same price, though I don't know what will happen if Jacks stores spread all over the country.

Thanks Merlin. I knew about Rosedene Farms and suspected the same re Stockwell (we tried their baked beans today), but I didn’t know about the others. Regardless of the label, our supermarket shop will still be driven by price and if MrT doesn’t have what we want at the price we want to pay, we’ll go elsewhere.

- Pip

thriftwizard

Thanks for all the good wishes for OH - he seems to be back to normal now, and is beside himself with glee because DS2 completed his first marathon today; they're in competition now!

An NSD today, as predicted; hopefully tomorrow will be as well. Must go to the allotment & work out what's still producing, and what should come out now. Not to mention, enlarge the "tunnel" for the Brussel Sprouts, which seem to be galloping upwards now. Fingers crossed I got them in in time to have some at Christmas!

JingsMyBucket

Evening all. I bounced around the stores this morning running my food errands and was extremely mindful as I was doing so. I kept making mental adjustments and realizing, "I don't really need this" or "There's a cheaper option I can get". So, at least that's progress. Another thing is that I feel like I'm losing my taste for shopping or again, I may be losing my taste for consumerism? I keep reminding myself that everything that's on sale will be on sale again at some point again in the future so MEH, I'll just save my budget in the meantime.

Earlier today I was flipping through this week's Lidl flyer and the only thing that interested me was the 2-for-1 laundry detergent for €10. I'm even hesitating on that since I'd like to see how far we can go with this last bit we have.

€3.51 at Delhaize for a red bell pepper, 2x small ramen, a lime and a carton of coconut milk.
€2.89 at Carrefour for mushrooms and butter
€5.24 for 1.3kg of ground beef at the halal store
€0.70 for parsley and cilantro at the halal store

TOTALS SO FAR:
€91.95 / €300.00
2/12 NSD

The ground beef was used in three ways: the bulk of it for a simple ground beef and mushroom stroganoff; a portion browned to be used later; and the last part shaped into 3 burgers which are in the fridge and ready for frying this week. The browned beef I'll probably stick in the freezer for soups or tacos later. Tomorrow I'll roast a spaghetti squash to use it the next few days. Monday is likely to be a NSD and Tuesday I'll head to Lidl for the detergent and fruit. Delhaize has a 2 + 1 sale on canned tomatoes so I may stop by there too.

Have a good night everyone and good luck this week!

Hopeless_Case

I've spent £31.28 over the weekend - I think my very low spend of last month is catching up with me a bit, plus also a £15 birthday present came out of this budget and a super-expensive chocolate cheesecake, and I'll do my best to keep within budget

£90.64 out of £200 spent, 20 days to go...

luckofthe_irish

Morning all!

I hope everyone had a lovely weekend! It was an anniversary weekend for me so my lovely boyfriend treated me to a meal out on Saturday complete with prosecco cocktails. Feeling very spoilt!

Big shop done in Ald* for me this week - £28.84. I have a couple of bits to pick up in Lidl this week but that usually comes to under £2. Slightly over budget still but I had to get dishwasher tablets and chia seeds which I wasn't anticipating to need this week!

So total stands at: £65.76/£125

pamsdish

[QUOTE=PipneyJane;

Am I the only one who has noticed that many of Mr T’s cheaper items/cheaper brands are disappearing? They had no value pasta, while the value squash was marked down for clearance and their value baked beans disappeared weeks ago. Presumably, all of these brands will reappear in Jacks, while the main-brand shops will stock labels with a bigger markup. (Come in suckers.....).

- Pip[/QUOTE]

I buy/bought tescos own 85% plain choc 100g £1, it`s been replaced by think 90%, 80g £1.20 :mad: back to Aldi mosser roth for me.

medsdemon

Good morning everyone.

Quick nip to Ald* this morning as I was pretty much out of milk, bananas and toilet roll, which might have ended up a tragedy ��. Also bought some apples, half price salad and half price corn on cobs, carrots, avocados, sour cream, yoghurts and cereal bars. Spent £12.25, but forgot sweeteners and nail varnish remover, so I may have a poddle into town later for those. Then I should be pretty much okay for the rest of the week.

Have a bean chilli in the slow cooker which we’ll have with brown rice and salad tonight, and inside a kind of enchilada concoction tomorrow night.

Rest of week, I’ll do a chicken casserole in the slow cooker, a spicy lentil soup for lunches, and an omelette or pancakes of some kind as I bought lots of super cheap eggs at the weekend.

Will try and aim to shop again on Friday and make it a biggish one so I’m not going near one at the weekend ��

CRANKY40

An NSD for me today. I'm making a list of things that we're getting near the end of ready for shopping on Friday. I have one egg left due to using 4 making the Christmas cake on Friday so fingers crossed it will last as long as nobody has a sudden craving for egg based meals. I make a big square Christmas cake then cut it into 4 mini ones. One for me and a small cake for some of my crimbo cake loving friends. I'm decorating three of the squares with nuts, cherries and a glaze this year, so only one to ice and I have all the stuff in as I bought extra for some I did during the summer.

The HT had jacket potato with beans, sausage and cheese tonight. I seem to be full of cold again (I haven't been near anyone else for a week because I wasn't well so goodness knows how). This is week three now. Due to the aforementioned return of the virus I have had 2 custard creams, a mini pepperami left over from the school holidays and a hot toddy for my tea.