September 2021 Grocery Challenge

jozbo

@goldfinches I haven’t tried the Asda GF flour yet but the pasta and white rolls are ace ! Have just used up the doves farm flour so will be testing the plain Asda GF flour soon and will let you know
NSD yesterday but today £14 in Aldi on sausages, shower gel, cider and various other bits including spray paint which is coming out of a different budget.
long story short I have £52.69 remaining for the month and a full freezer and wet of cupboards…

BadBookkeeper

£222.59/£320

Weekly shopping £80.41 so over by 41p but still on track to stay in budget this month.

scotmumof3

Finally out of self isolation and a spend of £25 at T3sco today 😊

Couldsavemore

138/200

done the weekly shop.. spent more than I wanted to but Aldy had vegan mayo and other salad dressings so stocked up as way cheaper than in other supermarkets.

@scotmumof3 I hope you enjoyed your freedom. My son is out of isolation tomorrow so will be dragging him out.

goldfinches

@jozbo - thanks for the info, looking forward to hearing your next instalment.
@scotmumof3 - glad to hear you're getting out and about.

I popped into M*rks today to buy more flowers, onions and bread and snapped up y/s radishes, exotic mushrooms and grapes as well as a sneaky bag of crisps for £18.35 and then bought some cheap beer at Mr T's on the way home for £4.50 so that makes my new total £95.76/£120 and my average daily spend £5.32. 

Mrs_Cheshire

Hi all, spends this week have increased our total to £240.16/£350. We've still got plenty in but will need more veg & milk this coming week. 

jozbo

@goldfinches we tested the GF plain flour from Asda today and was good… made scones and I would say the flour was a bit tougher/stickier than GF doves farm but once cooked no noticeable difference. For 50ish pence a bag it’s definitely worth it considering doves farm is about £1.75 for the same size.
good news today I found a forgotten supermarket gift  card in my purse with a balance of over £10! That is really going to help at the end of this month.
still eating our way through the cupboards and freezer. Monthly meal plan has helped a lot.

nannygladys

thriftwizard - my butternuts haven't done as well this year, but the smaller pumpkins  and leeks are ok at the moment.

jozbo - my dd buys her gf flour from mossers and makes cakes etc, I don't think she has made pastry, although a$da sell puff gf pastry in their fridges, but she hasn't tried it yet. Her partner is coeliac so she doesn't buy 'normal' cake/pastry stuff now only gf, but is still learning what's good and what's not. I didn't realise how many products have wheat in them, things you wouldn't expect it has been an eye opener and I can appreciate how difficult it is to do a 'normal' shop.

Nannyg

Suffolk_lass

nannygladys said:

thriftwizard - my butternuts haven't done as well this year, but the smaller pumpkins  and leeks are ok at the moment.

jozbo - my dd buys her gf flour from mossers and makes cakes etc, I don't think she has made pastry, although a$da sell puff gf pastry in their fridges, but she hasn't tried it yet. Her partner is coeliac so she doesn't buy 'normal' cake/pastry stuff now only gf, but is still learning what's good and what's not. I didn't realise how many products have wheat in them, things you wouldn't expect it has been an eye opener and I can appreciate how difficult it is to do a 'normal' shop.

Nannyg

Yes, who knew sausages are not GF unless specifically made to be?!

Blimey @elsiepac, who are you and what have you done with her? talk about a change in attitude to shopping, stores and spending this month! Full blown body-shock but on one level commendable, on another, not sustainable. Proven that you can deny yourself for a couple of months but then the "I'm entitled to a treat" thing kicks in. I was wondering what stir-fry oil is? I stir-fry using a mix of sunflower (high temperature) and sesame (flavour) and it works brilliantly as the sunflower fries at a high temperature and stops any stickiness that I got when using olive oil.

Re deodorants it is a very personal thing but Dove is PETA approved and claims to be vegan (although Unilever as a whole are not) and do an aerosol version if that is your thing.

I find the best way to save money is to shop less frequently than I used to - and pad things out with red lentils! tasty, cheap and filling.

I need to be super-savvy as I have a glut of veg from the garden (still) with my pumpkins (2 huge, 1 small) butternut squashes (3 gargantuan, 4 smaller) and green courgettes all harvested, and courgettes nearly all frozen having been prepped for soup. Only now my freezers are full and my fridge stuffed, and I have a trug full of yellow courgettes and Tromboncino to do something with. I will just have to make chopped tomato sauce and passata with the frozen tomatoes, to make more room

PipneyJane

Afternoon All

How did I get to be over a week and 10 pages behind?  I have one spend to declare, £22.69 in L!dl last Saturday (11th).  That is the total after utilising the £5 off voucher.  It was a struggle to get to the £25 total but we did find some Silicon “lids” to cover bowls, etc, which looked interesting so invested £7.99 on those.  Sadly, the largest ones in the set aren’t large enough to go over my salad bowls or my plastic mixing bowls, but now I know who makes them so can source them from elsewhere.  (Cling film does not cling to either the salad bowls or the mixing bowls.  Anyway, these are greener.) 

The above brings our spend for September to £72.10/£146.90, leaving £74.80 for the rest of the month.  I am not certain how much more we will spend.  We’re away for this coming week, staying in a holiday cottage with friends, and food for that will come from the Running Away Fund (holiday budget).  Before we left on Friday, I cooked up and froze six tubs of Base (fried onions and mushrooms), in order to clear out the fridge.   I also froze a litre of milk and the remains of the cooking bacon.

@jozbo Welcome.  My sister raved about the GF bread she made in her bread maker.  She loved it so much that, every time she made it, she ate the entire loaf in one sitting.  (In the end, she gave away the bread maker, to avoid temptation.). She’s in Australia, so I won’t give you a recommendation for GF flour.

@Suffolk_lass - you can use butternut squash in any recipe that calls for pumpkin:  pumpkin soup, pumpkin pie, pumpkin scones, curries, etc.  I can’t link to it but there is a Pumpkin Bread cake recipe on my blog which is scrummy.  Once upon a time, I bought a jar of “Pumpkin Butter” from Williams Sonoma in Miami.  It’s a variant on lemon curd and tasted lovely.

@scotmumof3 - I hope you weren’t too poorly with Covid.  I’m glad you had a store cupboard to raid.

Who was looking for GF Lentils?  There is no reason on earth why lentils should contain gluten - or any kind of flour - so just buy a bag of whichever brand is on special.   (Incidentally, I was surprised to see that at least one variety of L!dl’s sausages are made with GF Flour but not advertised as such.  It was the only non-meat ingredient.)

- Pip

ETA  of course, you can always roast butternut squash, the way the Australians roast pumpkin.  Just cut into wedges and place alongside your joint for the last 1-1.5hrs.  Season, baste and turn it over just like you would your roast potatoes.  (Don’t parboil first.  Butternut is full of water and will turn to mush.  It makes great mash, though.).