October 2019 Grocery Challenge

shopaholicnumber1

Had a little trip to A1di on way home at the start of the week - must get more organised! As needed dog food. I did pick up a couple of bits and bobs for work lunches too as there isn't many leftovers from my evening meals as they are leftovers to begin with! I also grabbed 2 choccy oranges for 99p each and one of their nice reed diffusers for £3.49 ready for DCs Xmas stockings, but have included that in the grocery spend even though it should technically come out of the Xmas pot. That brings my spend so far to £168.78/£225.

I also confess, thanks to Mr T sending me an online voucher for £31 for unused delivery pass credit (now cancelled!) I placed an order for delivery Thursday night in anticipation of DS coming home from uni for the weekend. Did have a bit of a spend on treats and meals he wouldn't normally have at uni (both for financial reasons and a bit of an inability to cook!) so did spend a bit. Also took the opportunity to stock up on some toiletry things I can't get in A1di plus some Xmas bits on offer - shop came to a whopping £50.43 but does include 6 bottles of prosecco for Xmas which were on offer and came to £27 so technically the actual grocery spend was £23.43. That should be it for the rest of the month though (unless the dog is greedy again next week!). So not sure whether to count the prosecco from my Xmas budget or grocery budget :undecided Will decide on Thursday after it's all arrived! Feel like I need permission from this board to not count it as groceries! :rotfl:

Vanlady

£185.10/£210 nsd 12/16

Hi shopaholicnumber1,
You're doing so well:p

I personally don't include alcohol in my grocery challenge budget, but I would say; if you prefer to do that, add it on to your Xmas budget. I probably wouldn't add the reed diffusers on either as it sounds like they're Xmas pressies.
I bought a kitchen knife the other day but I'm not including it in my challenge.
But Mr van did buy some sausagemeat stuffing for xmad, now in the freezer the other day from his fave butcher, so I'm going to add that to my Dec challenge.

£3.10 spent today. Taking advantage of morries offer of veg at 30p plus some marigold Swiss vegetable bouillon.
Has anyone noticed the rise in 'vegan' products the sm are now selling/promoting/jumping on the bandwagon? The likes of mcvitieeees biscuits, veg stock cubes, even quorn etc. If the ingredients include palm oil, I don't buy it. Too much deforestation/animal extinction involved, too many grey areas , so contradictory in my opinion.

Ps i'm not a vegan but probably would be if it wasn't for Mr van; but we do eat a lot of vegan and vegetarian foods.

elsiepac

Final spend last night of £1.74 on peppers and mushrooms in L1dl.Had a not very SW friendly one pot peanut noodles, which was delicious. I think this puts me on about £10 over budget overall for October, which could be worse. Novembers aim is to share my money out better over the month!

Vanlady wrote: »

Has anyone noticed the rise in 'vegan' products the sm are now selling/promoting/jumping on the bandwagon? The likes of mcvitieeees biscuits, veg stock cubes, even quorn etc. If the ingredients include palm oil, I don't buy it. Too much deforestation/animal extinction involved, too many grey areas , so contradictory in my opinion.

Ps i'm not a vegan but probably would be if it wasn't for Mr van; but we do eat a lot of vegan and vegetarian foods.

Yes, so many vegan products available now. sadly most with a premium price tag so as to make the really good ones (I mean ones that you could feasibly work into a meal plan, not the more junky stuff) unaffordable as a regular part of planning.
I do like to try new products when they come out though as it's so important to show there's a market for them! Re palm oil I usually avoid it but I find some things have a sustainable label for it, like you say, a grey area indeed.

zafiro1984

Since joining this thread (this time) things have settled down.

The urge to go shopping most days has almost disappeared. I now do my main shopping just once a week armed with a list. I usually go to Li... first and then onto Tes or sains to buy what Lidl doesn't have. I know I'm mising out on yellow stickers but I think it suits me better as I don't impulse buy and therefore in the long run it probably saves me money.

One thing I'm doing is making one thing each week towards Christmas and i freeze it, plus one thing each week from things off the veg plot. Last week was Christmas puddings and courgette and ginger jam and this week I'm making cinnamon icecream and rosehip and orange marmalade. It makes my shopping a bit more varied which I think also helps.

Total this month is 182.24/225 with just one more main shop to do before the end of the month

Crowdpleaser

Finally declaring

349/325[/COLOR]

Could it have been better? Yes. Could it have been worse? Oh yes. It made me not dash to the shops for stuff when we made do with what we had.

On to November!

pamsdish

£6.73 Yesterday in Morries y.s. courgettes, y.s. pork ribs and 6 tins of mulligatawny soup while on 6 for £4, ready for the cold weather.

borollan

Im going to have a go at this
Just been reading your posts and its an eye opener

thriftwizard

Welcome, borollan, it's a very worthwhile thing to do.

I'm cautiously all-in for October, having spent £75 between the market, the butchers, the bakers & the supermarket today. The meal-plan's sorted for the week, I'm £2-something within my budget, BUT we may yet run out of something before payday next Thursday. Fingers crossed it's something small & inexpensive!

Vanlady

£207.10/£210 nsd 13/16

Welcome Borollan, this challenge is definately an eye opener!

An Aldeee shop done yesterday brings me to 3 quid or so just under my target, I'm gobsmacked with that as I honestly thought I might go well over this month.
Still a few days to go and we will need some milk and fresh f n veg before 1st Nov so we'll see. I might try to sneak to the shops without Mr van noticing as he is a bad influence on me:D

jam2019

A final spend of £11.56 brings my total to £47.85 / £40 - would have been bang on, but I had to buy tea and laundry detergent unexpectedly. Should mean my spend for November also goes down by the same!