April 2022 Grocery Challenge

ancientmum

Fruit and veg at the market on Saturday came to £6.30: a head of broccoli, potatoes, carrots, apples, clementines and grapes.  

Doom_and_Gloom

£79.53 spent between Superdr@g, A&C, O~box and Mr S.
Did well at Mr S as we saved £18.21 by buying reductions. The most amazing reduction were beyond burgers for 20p so burgers tonight with salad. 

£79.53/£165.
£85.47 left.

GreenCat80

I popped into Lidl for milk and cucumber and ended up spending £14.02 😱 the school holidays are expensive, the kids just don’t stop eating 😅

Smoosh

We spent £32.70 the other day on dog food and treats. £11.99 of that was on a chew treat that should last him a couple of months, so I may reimburse that from my own money - undecided at the moment.

Usual weekly shop today. £13.60 on 4 litres of fizzy drink, 6 pork belly slices (YS - £1.50), 5 pork kebabs (YS - £1.50), 8 chicken kebabs (YS - £2), a pack of vegan "prawns" (YS - 70p), a pizza (YS - 60p), 2 corner yoghurts (YS - 20p each), 4 Greek yoghurts (YS - 40p), a pack of iced fingers (YS - 10p), a loaf of bread (YS - 20p), 5 assorted croissants (YS - 10p each), 2 Portuguese custard tarts (YS - 10p), 2 lemon buns (YS - 10p), salted caramel and chocolate cookies (YS - 10p), 4 strawberry and white chocolate muffins (YS - 10p), 3 cheese and tomato flatbreads (YS - 10p each), 12 pancakes (YS - 20p), 6 rolls (YS - 10p), 2 packs of sushi (YS - 50p each) and 2 strawberry and cream tarts (YS - 70p).

Total spend on YS items was £10.60 with an original cost of £47.70 😱

In the next shop we spent £22.40 on 2 bottles of shower gel, 1 litre of juice, a bottle of hand soap, 8 litres of fizzy drink, 6 pints of milk, Quorn chicken, soy sauce, a tin of coconut milk, 20 coffee pods, mushrooms, 500g pasta, 1 pepper, 1 sweet potato, 1 dried pasta with sauce packet, broccoli, a bag of salad leaves, double cream, 6 bags of crisps, 9 toilet rolls and a big punnet of strawberries (YS - 73p).

Meal plan:
1. Pizza (YS for OH and I made a "pizza" using a panini as a base)
2. Peanut butter curry with Quorn chicken, pepper, broccoli, mushrooms, carrot (YS) and rice
3. Creamy mushroom pasta
4. Sloppy joes with Quorn mince in YS buns, served with fries
5. Takeaway fish and chips
6. & 7. Away for the weekend

Breakfasts: Yoghurt, croissants or porridge

Lunches: OH still has loads in the freezer from our YS shop last week - curries and gnocchi and he's going to make a sweet potato and chicken (YS) salad. Tomorrow he'll be using up the YS sushi. I've got flatbreads, potato skins and pasta.

Snacks: many YS bakery items! And strawberries ☺️

£110.14/£200

2 more shops to go and we will need cat food and litter, should be doable. 

K9sandFelines

K9sandFelines said:

I'm not sure what system to do this month, as I am having to do the 13th to the 12th of the following month, but I forgot this, and went and waited til April the 1st instead of starting on 13th of March.

My head has been all over the place.

I am now drawing cash out and using that only. Just because my income has fell drastically., and obviously everything has gone up.
I've been averaging £170 a month these past two months, so I'm gonna try and drop that even more to £160 a month; but theoretically I'm trying to get it much lower.

So I have had a rethink and I'm dropping the budget even further. I am going to do 1st to 12th of April as £40. I have just under a tenner left; but shouldn't need much else. Also, as it's my first time at keeping it this low, I'm going easy on myself. This is just for food at the mo, until I get the hang of it. 
I went into Waitrose today and saw a few offers and YS bits that were too good to miss out on. However, I have both Dds and GD here tomorrow as its Dd2's birthday, and I've also had to buy extra birthday food bits; but I have not included those bits in this budget. Those other bits will feed us and keep in the freezer for other meals. I also qualified for two Waitrose deals for the very first time. One being £2.50 off 16 toilet rolls (and they were also on offer); so they came to £6.75 in total (I think). They last ages (about two months); as there's mostly just me here and DD2 for work of a weekend; and then occasionally DD1 and GD. That's including using them instead of tissues aswell!! So hopefully, I shouldn't need anymore til almost June. 
I'm going to start my month again from the 13th of April to the 12th of May with an £80 budget. So in effect, roughly £20 a week. In theory, I am not sure how I will document this? Maybe just weekly? 

K9sandFelines

My meal plan (Vegan) if anyone is interested, is as follows:
Today : Savoury lentils (basically potatoes, brown lentils, carrot and parsnip done in the instant Pot, then add gravy powder). I was going to have sprouts, but it was lovely on its own. 
Tomorrow: Kyivs (they've changed the name in support of Ukraine), homemade chips and peas. Or if we are full from party bits, then I will omit the chips and maybe add broccoli to the peas.
Weds :  Punch jerk sweet potato nachos (this is a Lidl recipe) 
Thurs : Lamb style shawarma in pitta
Fri: Chilli and rice 
Sat : Swedish style meatballs with mash, red cabbage and parsnips w. Lingon Berry sauce. (This is dependant on whether I have potatoes left or if they've been used for the chips on Tues).
Sun : Wagamama Raisukaree curry with rice

wannalot

Hello all

I did my second shop of the month tonight, mainly at Lidl. I definitely picked the wrong time to go though. The shelves were pretty empty, although I managed to get most of what I needed.

The bigger problem is that LIDL (although cheaper than my usual Tesco) is quite far from my home, and I ended up waiting over an hour for a bus home. I don’t know whether I can bear doing that again! I’ll try going much earlier in the day next time.

Anyway, I spent £20.72 in Lidl on milk, diet coke, cabbage, cheddar, Goat’s cheese, eggs, salad leaves, mushrooms, brie, a red pepper, garlic, butter. This also includes batteries (although I wasn’t really sure whether to include these in my grocery budget. I’m still thinking about that!) 

And then went into Tesco for some broccoli (which Lidl was out of) and spent £2.94 on  broccoli, 2 bottles of soft drinks, and greek yogurt.

So I have £65.86 left in my budget, which will be fine as long as I keep focused. I now have plenty of meat, cold meat and cheese, so any more spends this week will be on some fresh veg, milk and maybe more eggs. 

Meals for the next few days will be based around chilli bake and a pot of chilli I made on Sunday.

kacie

Popped into Aldi yesterday £6.33 spent, but shouldn't need anything more this week now, and very little needed next week. 

goldfinches

I managed a NSD yesterday by dint of making a loaf of bread instead of going to the shops to buy some so I'm quite pleased about that. I also made myself a nice side dish which used up some leeks, a lentil pouch, 2 lemons, some sour cream and some rather elderly dijon mustard and the fridge is starting to look quite bare.

Has anyone bought any of the Aldee cast iron casseroles, I've been dithering over whether to get one for ages now. My main worry is the oven temperature guide they give which says a maximum of 250 Centigrade which wouldn't be high enough for quite a lot of the recipes I've made recently but I find having the white/cream background really helpful when cooking so I'm very tempted. Comments from any who've tried them already would be very welcome to help me stop faffing around, thankyou.

Soontobeoap

Hi all. Looks like more and more of us are joining in. Thanks again @elsiepac .

£1.15 spent on milk yesterday. Not quite as panicky about my initial spend at the beginning of this month now although it will still be very tight. I am going to swap ham for sausages in the ham, bubble and squeak, jacket potatoes meal that I planned for Thursday as the ham has not stretched as far as I had hoped. 😞. 

Good news is that the cut and come again lettuce seeds that were left over from last year have sprouted. Must remember to plant another lot in a couple of weeks to help me through the summer.

love reading everyone else’s journey and learning from the experts.