Feeling Worried

suziebear1985

Hi Everyone,

I've definately started to notice the difference in my food shop recently. I've always been quite careful with my budget and have always budgeted £60 per week for food for my family of four. I shop at Aldi and take my own bags. Over the past few months I've noticed that I don't seem to be able to stretch my budget as far as I used to. I haven't bought anything different and we aren't eating more so I'm assuming the cost of food has just been increasing. For a few months I increased the budget to £65 which seemed to work OK even though it was tight however I'm now struggling to keep it Below £70. I always plan meals in advance and I'd just like some tips or advice as to what I can do to keep the cost down. The only thing I know I could change is we like fresh fruit and meat, I don't tend to cook anything frozen but I might start having to.

Thanks

MysteryMe

I'd try and list a typical weeks shop, without that info it is difficult for people to offer suggestions on where savings could be had.  

MandM90

Food is absolutely getting more expensive. Do you do ‘reverse meal planning’ to plan meals around what you have? Do you live somewhere where Olio operates? I used to be a food waste hero and gave away mountains of free food every weekend.

Could you consider two meat free nights a week? E.g. lentil Bolognese, bean chilli, chickpea curry…probably about as cheap as meals get!

EriSteadyGo

I can say from experience that the frozen mince they sell in Ald1 is pretty cost effective, cooks from frozen and tastes pretty good. Frozen fruit is usually better cooked in something though as it loses texture. I remember the aforementioned supermarket selling frozen salmon and chicken fillets and stuff too, which were heaps cheaper than fresh and again, pretty tasty. Maybe swap one in and see if you really notice it?

suziebear1985

I'll go and find my receipt and then post my shop. I'm definately willing to have meat free nights I'm just not sure where to start with lentils etc is there any recommendations for good recipes?

Auntycaz

suziebear1985 said:

I'll go and find my receipt and then post my shop. I'm definately willing to have meat free nights I'm just not sure where to start with lentils etc is there any recommendations for good recipes?

If you look at the monthly grocery challenge threads they have recipes on the first page and there are lots of friendly helpful people.

newlywed

I’ve noticed the increases too. Some time back I worked out roughly what each meal cost and was quite surprised at some of the results and so swapped some meals from weekly to monthly instead.

have been thinking I ought to do the same thing again. 

Toonie

Prices are definitely increasing. I've noticed my partner and I are spending more for the two of us, we mostly shop in Aldi too (with occasional trips to Sainsbury).

A good tip for using lentils, is to start off slowly. You can reduce the amount of meat you use and add in some lentils so that it's not too sudden a change and gradually increase the amount you use. I use oats similarly for things like cottage pie (I can't eat lentils alas) and also add in grated carrot where possible as it melts in when slow cooking and increases the volume without too much flavour change.

thriftwizard

Yes, food's gone, and still is going, up. Not reflected in official figures, of course, but despite increasing my grocery budget twice in the last year - to be fair, once was because DS3 was returning home after 10 years of living mostly away - I'm struggling to keep within my self-set targets again. The increases were very noticeable in spring; I buy a lot of our fresh food at a local market, and prices, whilst overall cheaper than supermarkets, are more volatile & respond quicker to conditions in the wider economy. Every spring there's a big price hike when the "new season" stuff starts to come in, but it usually falls back down again a few weeks later. This year, it didn't.

Do come & join us on the Grocery Challenge thread. People post there for all sorts of reasons; some have just £50 to feed their family until the end of the month, others just enjoy the challenge, but everyone's helpful & friendly. I started off years ago struggling to feed 7 (2 adults, 5 teens, often more!) on one wage, but we're down to 5 adults now and trying to keep to my budget so we can save for other things has become a useful habit, rather than absolute necessity.

maisie_cat

As meat is the expensive item I tend to batch cook a 4 portion meal into a 6 or 8 adding chickpeas (we eats lots of these) as well as other beans and pulses. We eat lots of one pot pressure cooker meals so many them go further is easy.
We currently have squash from the garden and I'm adding them as well to add bulk and to make meat free versions of meals. 
Prices have increased for some things, but not so much the basics I've noticed.

MandM90

Try something like this:
https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/lentil-ragu

Dried red lentils are cheap and don’t need soaking or cooking for very long compared to whole green lentils.