March 2019 Grocery Challenge

K9sandFelines

Two Aldi spends that need adding from the 7th - £13.11 and today (21st) - £7.28

So £20.39.

Struggling to stay within budget, as have another shop to be done at Ocado for about £40.

LauraWxx

Hi, I’m planning to join the April challenge. Just meal planning and shopping planning for the first few weeks of the month and wondering what is the general consensus with veg? But fresh easy week as part of weekly shops or buy frozen/freeze fresh?

VickyV

LauraWxx, I personally don't really like frozen veg (except peas) so I buy fresh but I expect it works out cheaper to buy frozen, as long as it gets used up. Just do whatever suits you, we all do our own thing!

Just need to add this week's big shop and a shop on Monday to buy things for veggie lunches. £33.15 to add taking me to £175.87 so far. Hoping to spend next to nothing this week and just pick up a few bits next Friday.

Vicky x

Suffolk_lass

LauraWxx wrote: »

Hi, I’m planning to join the April challenge. Just meal planning and shopping planning for the first few weeks of the month and wondering what is the general consensus with veg? But fresh easy week as part of weekly shops or buy frozen/freeze fresh?

I do a mixture - I always buy the cheap fresh veg in season (loads of buttered leeks and calabrese/cauliflower cheese at the moment!) and buy fresh veg on offer, rather than a set recipe - and I keep peas, spinach, broccoli and sweetcorn in my freezer - all bought from the frozen counter. I only freeze certain fresh veg - like a punnet of posh tomatoes that were YS to 20p and things like chillies (stops the stingy oil thing when you prep them) and ginger.

Lifeisforliving19

Just a quick update as we enter the last week of the month. Stocked up on fruit and veg yesterday from my lovely man in the village and a couple of bits in Co-op....only go in there if I am desperate.....total spend yesterday was £11.42......this brings my running total for month to £149.57/£180.. Really pleased with how its going this month and hope I can stay just about in budget. We have plenty in the freezer for this week, so the only thing I may need to get is some meat, but that won't amount to much.

Merlin's_Beard

thriftwizard - hope you are on the mend!

LauraWxx - tends to be a mixure. Mainly fresh, but some things I buy frozen because there's only one of me so it's more convenient and it means I'm not eating the same thing over and over. I just literally can't bear the thought of having to eat a whole cauliflower by myself. batch cook and can take the monotony to a certain degree, especially after a 12 hour shift, but I've got to draw the line somewhere!

I'm declaring at £158.25/£100 for March.:eek:

This is, I'll admit, a teensy bit over.... Not only that, but I've decimated the leftover money from Jan-March and I'm still £45.87 short of where I should be.

But my freezer is chock full of stuff, my cupboards are rammed full, so hopefully I can repay that debt to my rollover fund in the next few months as I work my way through them, assuming that prices don't shoot up through the roof.

pamsdish

£64 Between Lidl and Morries should carry me through to April, need to add £4 spent on odds during the week too.

flubberyzing

£12.64 in Tescos, on things for the week. I'll try and get a bit more out of the budget next weekend, as that'll be the 31st... I'll only need food up until the 4th April anyway, as I'll be on holiday for the next 10 days after that, and that's pretty much all food paid for already.

I usually make my last full week of the month "things on toast" week anyway, to keep costs down. So it'll be eggs/beans/cheese on toast sort of meals. It's just me to feed, so no one complains!

thriftwizard

Thank you, Merlin's Beard, I'm doing just fine now! Healthwise, anyway, though the budget is in serious doubt as I'm still fairly well in the dark when it comes to who's spent what, where, when & on what!

Adding £42 to the total for market spends this weekend; I missed the main food market on Friday to dash down West to see my mother, deliberately didn't go yesterday because it's the main "car boot" day & I need more stock/craft supplies like I need a hole in my head (as well as in my abdomen!) and just bought the necessities today. But was given two paw-paw/papayas that the stallholder thought might have "gone over - for the chickens" - one is just perfectly ripe & is mostly in my dehydrator, though some of it is in DD2, and the other is sat to ripen on the conservatory windowsill. There also were two mangoes in the fruit bowl from last weekend (3 for £1) which had also ripened to perfection - yum!

ditty1234

So I started out with good intentions and what should be a reasonable budget but not separating out entertaining etc. So my challenge is to still keep almost everthing on the list of what my budget covers, but to keep squeezing it down.
So after last weekend I have £11 of food on the go, £10 for school lunches and a £45 food shop yesterday so I'm coming in at 315. This is the end of March shopping and includes some food that runs into April. Freezer is fairly full and it's a balanced picture of everything we eat and drink.
Going forwards I am just noting that my shops have £30 and £45 for the last two weeks and that is by just simplifying menu without really cutting stuff out. This makes me optimistic that I will be able to pretty much stay within budget going forwards.