May 2020 Grocery Challenge

Rowan9

Thanks for your post about your budgeting and supplies Pip

pamsdish

£16.10 in Aldi should keep me going, mostly veg and salads and bread products, needed to top up my nan breads, crumpets, and saw they had part baked sourdough rolls, I already had a pack of p.b. sourdough baguettes, really like those with a burger or hot dog.
I am trying to run down my store supplies pipneyjane, but like you always add to my list on my phone when I open the stock pack. A useful tip I read once was take a quick photograph of your fridge interior, a tip I should have remembered 2 weeks ago, got 2 trays of eggs 15s, and when I got home already had 2 in fridge and also the current eggs were sitting in their basket.

joedenise

A spend of £51.80 for a bulk online meat order, this however comes from a specific budget, it's slightly overspent for the month but the money is available elsewhere so will borrow from that for this month and repay at the end of the month.  Definitely no more met for the next couple of months, apart from a chicken which will come from the normal grocery budget as I buy that from the local butcher.

pamsdish

For the vegetarian amongst us, I am not, beetroot in Aldi super 6 and saved this recipe as it looked nice, I have just made the Jack Naylor beetroot and chickpea hummus, it is absolutely delicious, if anyone has any difficulty obtaining the recipe I can post it.

MrsSnowy

Our community were going to have a big street party,but of course its turned into an 'in your garden party, keep your distance' tea.  Even for just 2,we had to have a VE tea party,I thought I'd need some shopping.
However after a rummage in the cupboards I managed to rustle up a sponge,cheese scones,egg sandwiches,quiche(pastry out of the freezer) and sausage rolls. Just 3 sausage rolls as there was really only enough pastry for the quiche!!
Far too much food ,but the neighbours enjoyed the spares ...and so did the freezer!  Packaged out of temptations way
To counteract the carb overload I made granola for next weeks breakfasts .
I've managed to book a Morries slot on 18th May...flipping basket gets overloaded then emptied when I go mean....it's teetering at £138 at the moment...OMG. It will be pruned..
Keep safe
MrsS

Greenglockenspiel

£22.23 in Lidl today and also £12.58 in Tesco on the few bits I couldn’t get in Lidl so we’re now at £122.52/£200. As my month runs to the 23rd, this means we might meet my sneaky secret target of £150 rather than £200! I’ve only been going to the shop once a week so much less likely than usual to mess it up by popping in for one thing and spending £20. I think the Coronavirus has either stretched people’s finances (furlough/lack of income) or meant they are saving a lot of money by being at home and I am very fortunate to be in the latter camp.

JingsMyBucket

Great helpful posts @PipneyJane and @joedenise. 

My food delivery from FreshDirect arrived yesterday morning and it was $70.32 including a $4 tip. My freezer is stuffed full but I think I may head to Trader Joe’s over the weekend for things like toilet paper, etc. Yesterday I also put in an online order at Target for toiletries, laundry stuff, some food stuff like canned tomatoes as well as summer clothes. I’ll count up what arrives and add the GC relevant amount to my total next week. 

TOTALS SO FAR:
$279.75 / $450.00
5 / 10 NSD

Today I made baked cauliflower gnocchi from lots of different bits in the cupboard, fridge, and freezer including some mozzarella and hard Italian cheeses that were about to spoil. I sautéed some Italian sausage, added a couple garlic cloves and frozen spinach to the pan. Then I added most of a jar of marinara sauce and let it all bubble. There was water emitting from the spinach but I figured that would fine to have extra moisture for the baking process. 

While the sauce was cooking I cut the mini mozzarella balls in half and shaved the hard Italian cheese with a knife. Then I spread some olive oil in the glass dish, added the warmed gnocchi (was frozen) to dish and coated with with the olive oil. I added the sauce to the dish along with most of the hard cheese and some of the mozzarella, then mixed everything together. 

After that I topped the dish with the remaining mozzarella and hard cheese and baked it in the oven at 400F/200C for about 40 min. I left mine a bit too long so you can check for it around the 30min mark depending on your oven. It came out delicious though and I’m feeling quite virtuous for not letting food go to waste! 

@Suffolk_lass, I just thought, would you want me to add this to your reverse planning thread? 

SJAllicat

Well I am set to fail 😳. I set the budget at £200 but I think I underdid it as we include alcohol as well as food/cleaning/toiletries etc and because we’re not going out for drinks (which would have been under a different budget) we’re buying more alcohol for at home. 
Plus the cost of everything is slightly higher, and hubby has been doing the shopping every other week and doesn’t shop the same as me 🤨 ( he spent £77 yesterday at Moggies and £20 at al*is earlier in the week ). He spent so much on some things for branded when I’d have always bought the own brand version. Oh well, I’ll try to stick to as little as possible over but it’s scaring me that we’re only really at the start of May and I’m already at £161.57/£200 and there is only 2 of us now and no cat. It must be so expensive for families atm. 
We’ve got a lot in the cupboards, and don’t eat much meat, so I’m thinking I’ll just shop my cupboards and get inventive later in the month and try and not drink too much 😳. And I’ll also stick with al*i. As I seem to get so much more for my money , but the only bad thing is they don’t do much in the way of gluten free products for hubby. 
This could be an expensive month. 
A heads up if anyone is after GF products at good prices, Moggies have there big bag of gf oats on at £1.20 a bag instead of £3.50 amongst many other reduced products. 

@JingsMyBucket that looks delish 😋 

Suffolk_lass

JingsMyBucket said:

Great helpful posts @PipneyJane and @joedenise. 

Today I made baked cauliflower gnocchi from lots of different bits in the cupboard, fridge, and freezer including some mozzarella and hard Italian cheeses that were about to spoil. I sautéed some Italian sausage, added a couple garlic cloves and frozen spinach to the pan. Then I added most of a jar of marinara sauce and let it all bubble. There was water emitting from the spinach but I figured that would fine to have extra moisture for the baking process. 

While the sauce was cooking I cut the mini mozzarella balls in half and shaved the hard Italian cheese with a knife. Then I spread some olive oil in the glass dish, added the warmed gnocchi (was frozen) to dish and coated with with the olive oil. I added the sauce to the dish along with most of the hard cheese and some of the mozzarella, then mixed everything together. 

After that I topped the dish with the remaining mozzarella and hard cheese and baked it in the oven at 400F/200C for about 40 min. I left mine a bit too long so you can check for it around the 30min mark depending on your oven. It came out delicious though and I’m feeling quite virtuous for not letting food go to waste! 

@Suffolk_lass, I just thought, would you want me to add this to your reverse planning thread? 

Ooh yes please - it looks fab!

My cabbage/inner leaves off the cauliflower added to cauliflower cheese was great too - who does not love a cooked cheese supper?!

Pip is right about stores shopping - the only thing I would add is that when I add a pantry item to my list, it can stay there for months until that item is back on offer (coffee, laundry detergent and shower gloop are a few of those branded things) - I buy 6 when they are on offer and have not paid full price for years. I add them when I start the last but one and if I were to run out, my plan is to buy one at a time until they are back on offer. It is why I have an annual stores budget

XSpender

JingsMyBucket - I have everything in to copy that dish, it looks delicious 😋 

We are now at an eye watering £378.13 of my hopefully optimistic £400 budget 😱 This includes DS birthday party food ( for the 3 of us) and stuff to make a cake, VE Day bits and a donimoes for DS birthday treat.  The fridge and freezer are groaning with food and the only thing we need to buy next week is milk and coffee.  DH is going back to work at some point next week so the beer spends will drop,

We will not be under budget this month but if I could stay well under £500 I would be happy.

Today we will be eating leftovers from the party for lunch and there is enough donimoes leftover in the fridge to feed DS again tonight.  DH can have a frozen pizza and I am going to attempt to make a GF calzone. Tomorrow I want lots of veg to counteract the beige 🥬🥦🥕