June 2020 Grocery Challenge

borscht

My side-hustle money total from May is £113.95, so that's my budget for June's groceries. 
The side-hustle is mostly money from surveys, and from rounding up spending automatically over the month. I also got £25 car insurance refund from my insurance company because of the Coronavirus, so I added that to the pot. 
I figure that allocating the money to groceries - and not adding anything else - is one way of restricting the budget somewhat!

CRANKY40

pamsdish said:

CRANKY40 said:

if I stand up for more than 20 minutes, I'm ok walking or running but standing still is a big problem.

If I stand still too long my back goes into spasm, i.e waiting for my turn in the butchers Wednesday, back very sore that evening, then had to lie flat 2 hrs Thursday with a hot wheat bag, great in this weather.

Oh dear, that's not good. The last time it happened I was standing at a funeral but I managed to get outside in time and sit on the floor. That was bad enough - I'd be so embarassed if I was in a queue and it happened. Shopping late in the afternoon isn't that bad anyway. Not as much choice probably but it's very quiet. 

XSpender

£5 spent in local Tesc0 on large bottle of fizzy drink because it was hot and 1001 which was on my list and I forgot in Morrie’s on Saturday.

£75.03/£360 - Groceries
£0.00/£40 - Bulk Fund

Mrs_Cheshire

PandoraTundra said:

I'm new! We spend an absolutely ridiculous amount of money on groceries/household stuff each month, so I thought I'd try this out. I'm cutting us down to £120/week and will keep shaving off more each month as we get used to it. Put me down for £480 please  
We're two adults and two kids (3 year old and 9 month old). Our month is from 1-30 June.

Welcome, do you meal plan at all? That has helped me save so much money and now I'm taking it one step further by batch cooking easily freezable bits of meals to save time on nights when we've got loads on. For example, I buy 750g on lean mince and make a bolognese sauce with 500g and eat 1 portion and freeze the other to make a lasange or enchilada's at a later date. the other 250g will be made into a cottage pie mix which is frozen, then on the day of eating I'll defrost and add mash potato and heat through in the oven. HTH

sarahj1986

Hello all

Could I be added to the list again please?
€300 for June 

I had to suspend mine in March due to the lock down here in Spain. I couldn’t use my usual supermarkets due to the restrictions and my husband was doing the shopping and he’s guilty of picking up things we don’t need. He is  now back at work (kind of) and I’ve been in the supermarkets by myself and we are allowed to go further so I can visit the ones I like. 

I’ve spent €8.50 today on tuna, veg and water €291.50 left

borscht

Is anyone trying No Spending Days to see how long their fridge/freezer/cupboards will last? 
I'm thinking of challenging myself to see how long I can manage before I do grocery shopping.

PipneyJane

CRANKY40 said:

I've been going to our nearest supermarket every now and then. It's probably one of the dearest (Sainsbugs) but around 3:30pm there's no queue which is important as if I stand up for more than 20 minutes or so I pass out. I have no idea why it happens but I have no wish to make a total show of myself (I'm ok walking or running but standing still is a big problem). I'm otherwise healthy and the doctor doesn't seem that interested in finding out the cause. Anyhow, I'd like to get a grip of the spending now. It hasn't been too bad and it's been affordable as like a lot of people I have redirected the entertainment budget and combined it with the grocery budget but I feel that now things are settling down a bit I could do better.  

@CRANKY40 - nag the doctor to investigate you for a condition called POTS:  Postural Othostatic Tachycardia Syndrome.  Here's a link to an article about it on WebMD.  (It explains POTS better than I can.)   One of my best friends has it and used to regularly pass out on the Tube.   She went through merry hell to get a diagnosis and now has a blue badge.

An old soldier's trick for standing guard and waiting around for any length of time, is to rock forward and back on the balls of your feet. 

HTH

- Pip

pamsdish

borscht said:

Is anyone trying No Spending Days to see how long their fridge/freezer/cupboards will last? 
I'm thinking of challenging myself to see how long I can manage before I do grocery shopping.

I have been doing that since New Year,
JAN        21 NSD
FEB        21 NSD
MARCH  24 NSD
APRIL     26 NSD
MAY        24 NSD
Roughly 4 days between each shop

SJAllicat

Hello everyone, another lovely day here in Scotland again. I’m sure when I came home from Portugal I made a wrong turn and it’s not actually Scotland 😂.

First spend of June ( back to once a week trial with a meal plan to control spending). £43.35 spent in A*dis. That should last us till next week. Trying to healthier too and not drink as much ( alcohol ). 

So that’s £208.65 left from our £250 Budget. 

Meal plan
M feta and red pepper tortilla with salad
T chicken & noodle stir fry
W caper lemon and tomato spaghetti
T tacos with H/m guacamole and h/m sweet corn, tomato, pepper salsa

F GF fish cakes/vegan steak bake, mushy peas and chips
S Chickpea, potato and spinach curry and whole grain rice 

S gammon joint, roast potatoes, roast carrots and broccoli 
M L/o gammon possibly make a pasta bake. 

Breakfasts are porridge, yoghurts, toast, or eggs
lunches are h/m soup, Cheese and pickle sandwiches or toasties, Leftovers, beans on toast or some kind of salad.

all this is fluid so no set days really, will eat what we fancy from those selections.

ill be making more sauerkraut too ( good as a veg in burgers, sarnies on salads etc )

im trying to use things in my freezer and not feel I have to buy the whole weeks food in the shop. Also I was lucky and got some really cheap yoghurts, gf rolls, cheese & feta cheese From Moggies yesterday ( as 5p and 10p prices ) so they are supplementing me at the start of the new month. 

Good luck everyone. We can do it 😊🙌

CRANKY40

Thanks Pip. I googled it and added hypermobility into the parameters. When something like normality returns I'll go and see the gp again. 

No spend day today. The weather guess says that the weather will be cooler on Wednesday. That means I can put off buying fresh salad stuff for a couple of days and make do with veg out of the freezer instead. The weather guess isn't renowned for being right though (BBC weather app on my phone because it was quick and easy to look at).