March 2022 Grocery Challenge

Smoosh

We'll go for £200 again for 2 adults, a dog and a cat. Includes toiletries and cleaning products. I'll be keeping an eye on takeaway spends too, aiming to spend less than £50 per month on those.

I have left work now (last pay will be end March), so will really have to try and stick to the budget. 

MissRikkiC

atrixa said:

£5.38 spent in Mr M yesterday (laundry detergent and some yellow stickers for tea). Total now up to £47.69/£123.

This made my tired brain chuckle that you’d had washing powder and stickers for dinner 😂

[Deleted User]

Will go again for £100, for one adult female this month. Know it is a longer month, was tempted to try and go lower but aware it will be a busy month for me. Mr S shop ordered for Tues 1st March, with lots of heavy items, using voucher £12 off for £60 spend. I make dinners and lunch is usually left overs. 

Some of my meal plans for a pescatarian:
- Salmon and leek pasta bake
- Dhal, spinach, and rice
- Quorn/lentil spag bol
- Chickpea coconut curry and rice
- Chilli with kidney beans and rice
- Lentil, barley vegetable soup
- Leek, carrot, potatoe soup
- Tofu, veg, egg noodle stirfry
- Dessert - apple crumble/creme fraise

try_harder

Could i join in again please with £278 for the month .Thank you

wannalot

Hello all

Last month ended up in a bit of a disaster for me, alas. My budget wasn’t too bad, but I fell into spending quite a bit on takeaways, which was a terrible decision, in terms of both my wallet and my diet! Work was stressful, and that always makes me make poor decisions on my spending somehow.

Anyway, this month should be a little easier, so I’m going to try again, hopefully with more of a chance of keeping on track and on budget. I’ve decided to set a budget of 

£160 for just me and including all groceries, takeaways and household products. 

This should certainly be doable for me, and the only complication is that I have been offered a money-off coupon by a butcher, which delivers. It’s a decent amount off, but the place is pricey so I will only use it if I can find lots of decent special offers. If I do use it though, I will get enough meat to last a couple of months, so I’ll deduct the amount split over the next 2 or 3 months. 

Anyway, thanks everyone for posting: it’s very motivating! Good luck!

Prudent

Please can I join the challenge? I tried a few years ago, but tended to forget to collect or keep receipts. Last month I decided to use a separate current account for groceries and that worked well. 

I am aiming for £200 for two of us for food and cleaning/ laundry products. 

zafiro1984

Please put me down for £150 for this month.
I'm just going to check what I spent in Jan and Feb to see where I am for the year, as I have an annual food budget in my head. I do buy some items in bulk as it works out cheaper overall.

_Moving_On_Up_

Few good collections over the weekend with Olio. Got steak mince, chicken kievs, stuffed pasta x2, mushrooms, naan breads x3, garlic, strawberries, roast potatoes x3, bagels x2, sourdough x2, sliced bread, double cream, eggs and milk. Some was out of my allowance, but most was unrequested that I've been left with. Still have bread and other bits leftover but have absolutely no where to put it, my freezers are full! Also had a load of unrequested KFC so we had some of that yesterday with the roast potatoes and a salad. Doing another KFC collection tonight so might end up with leftovers from that again, will see.

Doing a meal plan now for the next few days to work around what I've collected, should hopefully mean a low spend week

Monday - lunch mushrooms on sourdough with prosciutto for us, bagel for the youngest with some strawbs, dinner will be spag bol
Tuesday - lunch bagels, dinner sea bass with stir fry veg for us, stuffed pasta for the boys 
Wednesday - lunch we'll have the other pack of stuffed pasta, dinner will be lasagne with salad

Puddings I made chocolate brownies which we'll have with the double cream. 

MissRikkiC

What a great haul from Olio @_Moving_On_Up_
whenever I get cream I stick it in the mixer for 5 minutes on medium to make butter. Always tastes yummy especially with some added extras 

Hoosrice

Great motivational posts as usual. Thanks @elsiepac for new thread. Not a great meal planner but am going to do some batch cooking so can have favourites in freezer . I’m a kind of decide on the day person. Have been using up freezer and cupboard stuff this week as totally overspent on holiday. Wish we had OLIO near us, as it sounds amazing. Have used TGTG at Gr**gs bakers for teats at weekend and have been happy with that. Tried one from M&S garage but wasn’t as good. Salad dated for that day picked up @10 at night...will stick to own YS bargain shopping from s/mats. Have a few coupons from surveys so will hopefully be within 160 budget this month. Bought partner sandwich maker so he’s happily living off cheap bread and fillings.