advice to cut down on food budget?

Sea_Shell

How much are you spending on groceries as a percentage of your total monthly expenditure??

Have you already tackled the "low hanging fruit" of savings in your budget elsewhere?

We spend approx £200-£210 per month too (Aldi, 2 adults) and have been asked WOW, how do you spend so little!!?

euronorris

Make your own pizza bases?


Recipe I use:

• 800 g chapatti flour (because I accidentally bought 20kg once and now I am working through the stash! Lol) – 28p (£3.50 for 10kg in Tesco at the moment)
• 200 g fine ground semolina flour – 40p (£1 for 500g in Sainsburys)
• 1 level tablespoon salt – Less than 1p (18p for 500g in Lidl)
• 2x7 g sachets of dried yeast – 15p (44p for a pack of 6 x 7g sachets in Lidl)
• 1 tablespoon sugar – 1p (64p a kg in Lidl – thought you can currently get Tate & Lyle for 49p/50p a kg in Savers/B&M)
• 650ml tap water
  Total per batch – 85p. Makes 8 pizza bases, so 10.6p per pizza base.

bouicca21

OTT but when I cleaned my cupboards I found a packet of creamed coconut which is out of date. Use or bin?

PipneyJane

bouicca21 wrote: »

OTT but when I cleaned my cupboards I found a packet of creamed coconut which is out of date. Use or bin?

Is it sealed? Has anything seeped out? Puffy?

If the latter two, bin. If it smells OK and isn't growing something, use it. Creamed coconut is a bit like lard - it keeps for years if properly stored.

HTH

- Pip

Fire_Fox

bouicca21 wrote: »

OTT but when I cleaned my cupboards I found a packet of creamed coconut which is out of date. Use or bin?

EAT IT.

Block creamed coconut has a low water content so not the best haven for bugs. High saturated fat content which is stable, won't oxidise and go rancid like certain vegetable oils. A sealed pack with limited oxygen further limits the opportunity for spoilage.

I have used sealed packs a couple of years out of date, and I am still pontificating.

Working_Mum

When I needed to trim my food budget to the bone a few years ago I did all of the usual stuff like meal planning/shopping at L1dl etc but when I needed to go further I did a little Excel spreadsheet and broke down my till receipts a little further and forensically examined them.

I split up the spends into meat/ tinned/ food/ treats / fruit/ cleaning/ toiletries/ alcohol etc and was amazed that little non-essential things had crept in!

I immediately stopped spending on non- essentials and sought out cheaper alternatives to what I was spending and checked recipes for lower priced alternatives or swaps to make my food go further.

I thought I was coming from a frugal base but this little exercise showed me where I could save pennies and it was at a time when every penny counted!!

Good luck

ceb1995

trailingspouse wrote: »

We talk a lot on here about meal planning, spending diaries and so on - but I think a waste diary might be a good idea for you. How much do you throw out? If you are regularly buying something and not finishing it before it goes off, stop buying it.


Also - portion control. Could you just be making too much food?


I do a roast chicken dinner every week (I live on my own) - then I use up the rest of the chicken during the week. I find it extremely economical.

Only thing I throw out is if I ve baked too much cake really. I eat a bit more than I used but I d lost weight last year when I shouldn't have so I think portion wise we re okay.

ceb1995

MovingForwards wrote: »

I buy frozen pizzas when they are on special offer (under £3 for 2), I also keep pies (under £3 for pack of 4), wedges (£1) etc in for my junk food days.

As you are buying peppers and slicing them how does the cost compare to a bag or 3 of frozen ones (£1 each)

I buy a joint of meat or whole chicken, as well as two other packs of meat for £10; leftover joint or chicken is used a day or two after, turned into something else and bulked out with veg.

My fresh fruit and veg purchases are based on what special offers in the shop on the day I do my shopping.

Coconut milk is occasionally on offer, make sure you check the 'world foods' section in Asda.

For anything going into a liquid base eg spag bol, curry, stew, soup etc buy the value brands.

Do you look at the reduced sections in Asda? You can fill your freezer with meat/fish and save money.

What tea / coffee / biscuits and other treats do you buy?

(I just spent under £28 in Morrison's after work, on a week of meat / veg / fruit and bags of chocolate - they were on special offer and without them I would have spent £23)

I ve checked the weight of the peppers I get Vs the Asda frozen and I get more out of it. I will make sure to look at the veg special buys this week to see what I can cook with them.
I buy decaf tea, coffee and two packs of biscuits a week otherwise I bake something with value brand ingredients.
I seem to keep timing it badly to pick things up from the reduced section.

ceb1995

MovingForwards wrote: »

I buy frozen pizzas when they are on special offer (under £3 for 2), I also keep pies (under £3 for pack of 4), wedges (£1) etc in for my junk food days.

Fire_Fox wrote: »

Block creamed coconut, unsweetened dessicated coconut or coconut milk powder (World Foods aisle of the supermarket or an Asian/ Middle Eastern grocers) all work out cheaper than tinned coconut milk. The first two include the beneficial fibre, whereas the milk does not.

Please consider the UK official healthy eating guidelines when reducing your grocery spend: MSE advice is sometimes out of step with this. Sounds like you are doing really well in certain areas - especially fruit and veg - so it would be a shame to lose that.

Limit refined/ processed/ white wheat products and potatoes without their skins. Experts say 'most' of our grains and other starches should be whole.

You might cut down on muscle meat - chicken, beef - portion size and/ or frequency. Dairy products and fish supply nutrients essential for health that are in few other foods, so experts have set daily and weekly targets for each. Not so for muscle meat.

Instead of the late shift junk meals/ your lunches you might have eggs (boiled, omelette, scrambled, poached), or batch cook then freeze individual portions of bolognese, stew/ casserole, curry, chilli con carne, soup ....

Fruit is a step towards "at least five a day". Not in the same category as salty/ fatty/ sugary/ processed snacks (crisps, cakes, biscuits, crackers, snack bars, instant pasta, instant noodles).

Reasonably priced, nutrient dense wholefoods include: frozen vegetables, frozen berry mixes, root vegetables, canned beans and lentils, dried beans and lentils, brown rice, porridge oats, canned oily fish, frozen fish fillets, whole eggs, organ meats such as liver, certain nuts and seeds.

HTH!

In all honesty, I m only a fan of veg, can't stand brown rice or most pulses. I have had a vit d deficiency in the past so do try to get as much of that as I can.

falcieri

I have a policy of never buying brand foods - saver and own brand only. Aldi only challenge branded products so instantly you are paying more than you need to anyway. I buy mostly from Morrisons and mostly yellow sticker items which saved me £52 this month. I also buy certain items from Lidl that are regularly cheaper than Morrisons. My food budget is £70 max a month. I have recently moved from a low calorie diet to a low carb diet and I have found cutting out all the cheap refined crap has not impacted my budget though I am buying a lot more yellow sticker foods.



To keep in budget I always stick to my list and my set rules about yellow sticker buys and I keep a spreadsheet for my monthly shop. I didn't think Aldi were very impressive. The only thing they sell which I found challenged prices in my regular supermarkets was chorizo so I've stopped bothering with them. Lidl challenge most of Aldi's prices anyway.