What will you be stocking up on 'Just in case ' ?

Slinky

This Thursday I actually bought loose tomatoes for the first time in Tesco in about 6 weeks. I only need 1 for an omelette and 2 to go with tonight's treat steaks. No point in buying a packet of them as not eating salad at the moment. Most weeks in the winter I only buy 1 loose tomato.

YorksLass

Not exactly a deliberate "stocking up" but today I got the following from the Co-op as they were on the clearance shelf at half price or less: a jar of their own mincemeat, a branded jar each of horseradish sauce and tartar sauce and a branded raspberry conserve.  All dated well into 2023 and the conserve is dated Jan 2024.  Now in my pantry.  

C_J

No sunflower or vegetable oil at all in my local Aldi today.

joedenise

YorksLass said:

Not exactly a deliberate "stocking up" but today I got the following from the Co-op as they were on the clearance shelf at half price or less: a jar of their own mincemeat, a branded jar each of horseradish sauce and tartar sauce and a branded raspberry conserve.  All dated well into 2023 and the conserve is dated Jan 2024.  Now in my pantry.  

All definitely worth stocking up on if you'l use them - I'd use the horseradish and tartare but not the raspberry conserve.

Spendless

OrkneyStar said:

Spendless said:

mumf said:

I work in food retail,and when Sunday trading was revised in 1993, it opened the floodgates for weird working hours for everyone. Frankly,the shops should be shut  on a Sunday. 

I would agree with this. In the early 80s when I was at sixth form I had a Saturday job at BHS foodhall. 

Roll forward years and my own kids couldn't find the same because the grocery stores had their staff working Saturday or Sunday plus hours in the week. 

The 'Saturday job' at least in my area, disappeared. 

In my area there are still lots of younger folk working part time in shops/cafes. Local shops/cafes employ school pupils from age 14, for limited hours, and also bigger places like the Coop and Tesco offer part time contracts for over 16's.  Grocery staff will still need time off, they don't work all the weekdays, plus all the weekend days, unless they are doing overtime, so there is still room for part time jobs. 

Sorry, just catching up with this but this will be geographical area specific. I remember when I fist discovered the 'Saturday job' like I had didn't exist anymore where I live. I was buying some clothes for my eldest to take onto a school residential in yr6 (he's now 22) and got into conversation with the cashier (one of the big name supermarkets)  who said how busy it had been on the weekend and also said that ALL staff were required to work either a Saturday OR Sunday. Most retail staff here are part time. That's something else that's changed since I was young, so it's not like they're only getting 2 full days off in a working week. The cashier went onto say how that had cause an issue with her then older teenage boys who were struggling to find work because the availability needed was also during the week when they had school/work and not just 'weekend staff'. I can't think of a single cafe here that is open after around 3pm-ish. The town centre is closed 5/5.30. It's a struggle to find a coffee shop open past 4pm, certainly no independants do. 

The shops that sell alcohol prefer 18+. Often you only see job adverts asking for above 18 for this reason. That's also true of other age restricted goods. Last year at 18 DD got a p-time job in a chain bargain store. Though there was an under 18 there she was given less hours (was summer hols so not education related as to why) because if they put her on the tills there was less she was allowed to put through eg glue based items or dinner knives. 

Like I say it's area specific though. When DD was in yr11 I attended with her an evening at school about how to make the most of the year that was left and they had a guest speaker who had either won or been a finalist in The Apprentice. One of the questions she asked was who had a p-time job. No one put their hand up. She said it was the first place she'd been to that that had happened. It didn't surprise me one bit. When DD went to sixth form college, she commuted and was the only one on her course without a part-time job. Why? Because the others all lived in large cities and/or tourist areas and there was more availability in their area. 

London_1

I used to buy a tin of the cherry filling one years ago when the children were small ,and make a four little pasties with some puff pastry and freeze them, and with what was left over I would mix in with ordinary vanilla basic ice cream mix so we would have cherry flavoured ice cream. I thnk back then a small tub of plain ice cream was about a pound, but turned into really nice ice cream with the half a tin of left over tinned cherry mix . A lot cheaper than buying fancy flavoured ice cream  

GaleSF63

YorksLass said:

Not exactly a deliberate "stocking up" but today I got the following from the Co-op as they were on the clearance shelf at half price or less: a jar of their own mincemeat, a branded jar each of horseradish sauce and tartar sauce and a branded raspberry conserve.  All dated well into 2023 and the conserve is dated Jan 2024.  Now in my pantry.  

They probably won't put mincemeat on the shelves again till near the end of the year so it will be out of date. 
I often use out of date mincemeat - including when it's been opened (and I don't keep it in the fridge), and it gets rather dry in the jar but there's no difference when I use it. 

London_1

GaleSF63 said:

YorksLass said:

Not exactly a deliberate "stocking up" but today I got the following from the Co-op as they were on the clearance shelf at half price or less: a jar of their own mincemeat, a branded jar each of horseradish sauce and tartar sauce and a branded raspberry conserve.  All dated well into 2023 and the conserve is dated Jan 2024.  Now in my pantry.  

They probably won't put mincemeat on the shelves again till near the end of the year so it will be out of date. 
I often use out of date mincemeat - including when it's been opened (and I don't keep it in the fridge), and it gets rather dry in the jar but there's no difference when I use it. 

I used a jar a few weeks ago that I found at the back of the cupboard and it  was dated 2020 and it was fine it was a Robertsons 'posh' one and I think I got it reduced for about 20p and stuck it at the back of my cupboard on the top shelf  but it made a delicius tart and was perfectly Ok as it had not been opened.I usually look for reduced ones in January along with the 'fancy stuffing mixes' which haven't been bought and also get reduced well in the supermarkets.

Just walked across to my little local precinct to pick up my prescription and thought I'd have a mosey around the Tesco metro there.Nothing really caught my eye as the prices are always expensive there in comparison to the Large tesco about a mile away. But looking on the reduced tins bit I found a small hoard.
 I got
2 x tins of tesco spag hoops                   52p
 1 x tin of chopped tomatoes                  18p
4x tinned pack of Heinz spag hoops £1. 87
1 x tin Tesco Chicken curry                £1,04
                                                   Total £3.61.

They are all very long dated 2023/24 but had the odd dent in the tins, and as I don't eat the tins I am happy to tuck them away in my tin stash. I can have the tinned spag on toast as a lunchtime snack.I usually have a slice of cheese on toast with half a tin on top, pretty filling for me as I don't eat a great deal at lunchtime as a rule so one tin will easily do two lunches so around 12 lunchtime light meals the tinned tomatoes will always get used in chilli's of lasagnes and the tinned curry one of the ladies at my coffee morning said she had tried it on a jacket potato and it was really nice .So again half a tin on a jacket spud and the other half maybe when I am making pasties will make me a couple of small pasties so for my little haul of tins I can have at least 14 light meals. for under £4.00 and have some change left over to go into the jar  

A small saving but quite a good result I think. 

JackieO xx

YorksLass

If your jar of mincemeat has been opened and gone a bit dry, tip the contents into a bowl and mix in a bit of water (or fruit juice, brandy or rum - if you want to be extravagant!) and it will be fine.  It would have to be very, very, very out of date for it to be unusable.  Mine doesn't go in the fridge either, it just sits in the cupboard until needed.

Frugalista

GaleSF63 said:

YorksLass said:

Not exactly a deliberate "stocking up" but today I got the following from the Co-op as they were on the clearance shelf at half price or less: a jar of their own mincemeat, a branded jar each of horseradish sauce and tartar sauce and a branded raspberry conserve.  All dated well into 2023 and the conserve is dated Jan 2024.  Now in my pantry.  

They probably won't put mincemeat on the shelves again till near the end of the year so it will be out of date. 
I often use out of date mincemeat - including when it's been opened (and I don't keep it in the fridge), and it gets rather dry in the jar but there's no difference when I use it. 

Sorry to labour the point but it won't be "out of date" - it will simply be past its "best before" date and will keep OK for years.  Ask me how I know!