August 2021 Grocery Challenge

mdvb

Hi everyone, I'd like to join too please 😊

I'm a brand new member who has been lurking a while. I'm a SAHM to a 2.5yo with another baby on the way in November. Husband left a well-paid job in engineering when our toddler was 6 weeks old to requalify as a teacher and money is tight, but it was 100% worth it!

This month, we have 4 weekly shops (Wednesday is click&collect day) and we're aiming for £280 total. Last month was £380 with 5 weeks, so it feels achievable, fingers crossed🤞

We used to be completely vegan, but after some health issues leading to me cutting out gluten, we are now mostly whole food plant-based with occasional eggs and fish/seafood. I would have thought a pescatarian/plant-based diet for 2 non-drinkers and a toddler was pretty cheap but we've been spending a lot 🙈 Love the GF flour chat, thanks for the book recommendation @LunaCatty! Will definitely do some research.

Looking forward to seeing how other people get on and hopefully learning some tips x

JingsMyBucket

Evening all, just a quick check in before I fall out of the habit. We’ve spent money at three places on Sunday and Monday. £5.89 for some lamb neck at the farmers market on Sunday. We were there to collect some veg we ordered (in July) from another farmer and passed a good lamb stall. 

Monday I collected a July order from Holland & Barrett and bought a big container of Swiss Marigold dried stock and some red sticker almonds. We spent £6.57 there. Afterward we stopped at M & S for milk, fruit and a couple other things for £14.73. 

Total spent so far is £27.19 / £400 with £372.81 remaining. 

I think I may aim toward £60/week spending with room for a bit of stock up. We mostly plow through yoghurt and berries really. Tomorrow I’m going to make vegetable bean and ham soup along with a vegetable bulgur salad. Those should last us a few days as neither of us is feeling well right now. 

CCW007

We get a veg box every fortnight which is due this Friday, added a huge block of cheese which I will grate and freeze in portions.

Total spend £52.43 / £250.

Finstickle

Could I be put down for £545 this month please?
Not sure how well that's estimated as we have a couple of festivals as well as a holiday this month, but will see how we go.  I do have a seperate budget for spend at the festivals, but there always seems to be pre-spending!!

We started badly as we were poorly on Sunday and couldn't shop as planned which meant our £10 Lidl voucher expired before we got to use it      We didn't hit the £200 limit until late in July which means I must have been doing a lot of Tesco top-ups which do have an impact for us, so aim for this month is less of them.

£27.94 spent at Tesco - mostly on drink and snacks for the first of our festivals
£71.15 at Lidl yesterday which seemed alot for the amount I got.

 - Looking at the receipt:
 - I seem to have picked up chocolate that must have been on offer last tie but not any more as £1.99 a bar!!!!  It is gorgeous (caramelised almolds and sea salt) but I didn't intend to pay that
- £3.09 on oaty bars for DD - I'm sure they're usually cheaper
- £7.66 on sliced sandwich meats - this is pure laziness!! I used to get a gammon/chicken and cook off so that's definitly something to restart


Lesson 1 for the week - Double check prices!! There were a few other things that were more expensive than I thought as well
Lesson 2 for the week - Don't be so lazy :-)
Lesson 3 for the week - you cannot rest on your laurels, even if you think you're pretty frugal it's easy to slip into convenience mode

£99.09/£545

nannygladys

Nothing spent yesterday and nothing will be spent today either. Oh had free coffee yesterday at No's but didn't get anything else! Being so good it's frightening - it probably won't last for the whole month though lol!!
Nannyg

mumof3.12kindebt

Went over budget this week 
Total spent £130 

Left £110 

threepenny_bit

$7.35 spent on 2 x shower gel 

ms_iiwii

£90.32 at Big Tees today filling up the new fridge freezer so £81.61 left for the month but we did pretty well with buying meals and not so much snacky stuff so should keep us going for the next 2 weeks with maybe some top ups for milk/bread/fruit. They had no kitten food so need to go somewhere else to get that too, but overall pretty pleased with the amount we got for the price!

CCW007

£15.18 at local Co-op today, total spend £67.65 / £250.

MissRikkiC

We have been spending this month although im not sure how since i did a really solid meal plan!

I allowed for cooking for friends at the weekend using breadcrumbs which id salvaged from a load of rolls i'd have otherwise chucked out after a bbq, and chicken from the freezer yet still somehow eaten well into our budget despite not having got that much extra!

Im definitely going to have to check to make sure I have accounted for everything corrected. I know of £12 thats over and above for medicine supplies for the MIL however im not sure of much else which isnt usual BAU!

Anyway, currently at an eye watering £206/£230 and due to currently self isolating (all negative at home but contact with a positive patient 0!) there is a shop arriving from 0cad0 (cheapest delivery!) tomorrow for supplies which are more expensive than what we would buy from aldi (beer, squash, potatoes, baby snacks, etc). 

I have meal planned well into next week and will need things such as milk, veg etc probably next week however the basics genuinely surprise me at their cost! Prices seem high for everything right now!

Anyway off to check if that £206 is accurate! Wish me luck