February 2020 Grocery Challenge

jam2019

£5.78 spent today! A slightly more substantial shop than usual comprising 2pt milk, frozen veg, fresh fruit and veg, some painkillers (this week has been very headachey ) and a box of teabags. I'm stepping away from my usual yorkshire tea to try Asda's everyday tea bags - given how much cheaper they are I'm hoping they taste good.
This week looks like it'll be mostly egg fried rice of various descriptions, with a pub meal planned for monday as a treat.

Rowan9

Spent £10 in Lddll taking me up to £190/£200. Was under last month. Really hoping to squeeze through this month. 

StripeyTightsSpottySocks

Feb £88.93/of £100 Month (Annual 27 Dec 19 - 26 Dec 20) £77.77/£1,325 cat food £56.15
Spent out of £100: Jan £77.77 Feb £
Jan cat food £71.33, Feb £

£8.10 spent on cat food today.
£13.28 on food shop today i got lots of fresh fruit - wasn't on the list but i thought there was room in the budget and i do very much enjoy fruit and veg and feel better for eating lots of it. Didn't get any veg though so that will be done in the next couple of days. For the £13.28 as well as fruit i got a block of cheese (tried several cheaper versions so now just stick to brands  ). Very cheap pancake mixes - i like to have them in so got a few after running out, a whole chicken, 3 lots of tom puree, mushrooms and oregano.

Oregano wasn't on the list this week but was cheap enough and i knew after cooking today it would be on the list for next week. The other not on the item list was another cake - which is very disappointing - the taste i mean & then the feeling it's a waste of money! I'm starting a bit of a health focus this week so last day for cake (unless a special occasion  ). 

This leaves me £11.07 in the budget for this week. I intend to use this to stock up on coffee, toiletries, get the veg needed and milk and bread.  This will take me pretty much up to the budget and I am aiming to come in on target. The stocking up now will make future weeks cheaper. 

My month runs until the 26th so just 3 days to go. I'll try and get the stocking up items in the morning then i'll know where i'm up to with everything - hopefully they still have these items in stock at these prices.

Doom_and_Gloom

PipneyJane (Pip)- it is an electric pressure cooker; pressure king pro 20 in 1 6L is the one that I have. So it doesn't just act like a pressure cooker. It has a cake setting which ment I didn't have to put the oven on just to make a cake. Sorry realise I said bread before but ment cake. OH uses them interchangeably as they are basically the same and he confused me. To be fair they are very simular.
I have a multicooker (tefel 8 in 1) also which can also make cake but I wanted to try the pressure cooker and found the results to be much better; pressure cooker cooked the cake more evenly than multicooker cakes of past.

Sorry if my previous post about cooking a cake in the pressure confused you. Should have stated it is electric so a different breed to the hob variety.

PipneyJane

Evening All

One spend to report from today:  £6.78 in Mr T’s, spent on 2L milk, 2x450ml tubs of Yeo Valley yoghurt, 2 boxes of mushrooms and 2 bags of mixed peppers.  That brings our monthly spend to £123.88/£132.20, leaving £6.32 for the remainder of the month.   I can’t see us doing another shop between now and payday (Friday), but you never know.

- Pip

Mrs_Cheshire

Hi all just had a delivery tonight, spent £35.35 on basic's for the week and some snacks which should last into next month. That leaves me with £10.54 till Saturday. I usually get a delivery on Thursday's to do us over the weekend, may do a click & collect as that's minimum £25 spend and I can allocate the extra to March's budget. Think I'm going to up the budget going onwards as £370 is a little tight for a family of 5, without cutting down loads on treats and some convenience.  

Finstickle

Final big shop of the month done, coming in at £520/£450 😭

Didn't check properly and bought a few things I didn't actually need plus doubled up on some items that in-laws brought with them.  Did also pick up some offers - items which will get used over the next month so worth buying. Also got taken out for breakfast this morning rather than feeding 6 so have bread etc in the freezer ready to see us through.  Also made a low cost bean based stew on Saturday which has given us unexpected leftovers so that's a bonus! 

1/4 of our spend is alcohol so plan is to drop the alcohol spend by £15 and the food spend by £15 in March. 
Meat is running low but hoping to make it stretch and do a big order in April when we get back from holiday. Might need a couple of buys to tide us over but will try and minimise. Heading into last 6 weeks of mat leave, really want to get on top of spending, preferably without impacting quality of life (or food) 😃

supersaver1000

I realised that my current month is a five week month, so that makes me feel so much better.  So my weekly average is spot on at £60 per week (I'm not changing the goal posts to fit - honest ).  That has included  spends like washing powder - which hasn't run out yet but was on offer so couldn't not buy.  Anything I buy from this point of the month, but don't use before payday, will come out of next month's budgeting.

Noticed some jars of organic coconut oil in Aldi.  Its great for your skin and at only £1.65 a jar (I think) its excellent value.  I'm going to stock up on another one before it runs out - add some essential oils to make a lovely moisturiser for feet and hands before bed.  

franby64

Thank you FoxFace, I'll have a look in B&M (though I haven't quite forgiven them for setting up in our old Woolworths).
Had an NSD yesterday but made up for it today!  I spent £10.64 on all our basics, bread milk, bananas, eggs, tea bags and potatoes. 
Nearly there!

Suffolk_lass

PipneyJane said:

Doom_and_Gloom said:

£1.84 spent today ☹️.
My last lot of bananas went very ripe so wanted to make banana bread to not waste them. Only didn't have any baking powder to make it so went out to get that. That and a couple of items later and I was able to make the cake in my pressure cooker. 
Banana cake is resting on the side now. OH keeps eyeing it up as although he doesn't like bananas on their own he loves banana cake. 

How do you make banana bread in a pressure cooker?
- Pip

That is exactly what I was thinking!