May 2022 Grocery Challenge

ClaireT131

Morning!

I did my weekly shop yesterday - we are having an eat out of the freezer week, but I still spent a lot for that I think. I spent £57.48 but there were a couple of items they didn't have, which I will need to get on a top up shop at some point this week. We also had a takeaway last night, so in total for the month I am at £79.23/£360.00.

I'm planning to take the boys out for Hotdogs tomorrow when we go into town, but apart from that, I hope I have got enough in the house to see them through the week.  I'll still have some freezer food in for next week and won't need to get much, is any, HH stuff in next weeks shop, so I'm hoping for another £60-£65 spend next week - I didn't factor in this is a 5 week month, so I'm having to make everything stretch!

Anyhow, hope you all have a lovely Sunday!

Naturelover22

Hello,

Sat down with my husband for our end of month meeting! Looked over the shock of last month and we have agreed a new budget which we will aim to achieve. The freezer is full of random things so we are going make a meal plan this week to use some of those.

1st May to 31st May £385 2 adults, 2 cats and 3 guinea pigs.
Food, household and bedding/litter for animals.

diminua

£30 spent on bread, salad veg, smoked salmon, orange juice, tinned fish, eggs, honey, coffee, washing up liquid, raisins, mozzarella and brazil nuts. I wanted vegetable oil too, but there was only olive oil, so that will have to wait. 

ClaireT131

Back again! Spotted a £10 off £50 shop in the Food Warehouse, so an unexpected spend today thinking ahead for the next couple of weeks. I think I have managed to get quite a lot for my money though. I just need to see how it translates into meals. The offer is on until tomorrow so I'll go back tomorrow and do another shop to make the most of the savings.

Now at £115.77/£360.00 which is until 27 May so I just need to be sure to use what I have brought and stick to my meal planning!

DawnW

Just realised I haven't joined the May thread yet - 8 pages in already and it is only the 1st!

My budget for May will be £250 to cover groceries, dog food, toiletries and cleaning items

First spend of the month was today at the market, £2.00 for tomatoes and £5 for 3 x 300g blocks of posh branded cheese. Nothing else will be needed until Wednesday when I do the weekly shop.

I made a vegetarian pie yesterday, which actually looks quite nice, despite the fact that it all went a bit wrong. I only ever buy filo pastry, specifically to make a Greek style pie with home grown spinach and feta (or the cheap supermarket equivalent). One packet of filo is enough for 2 spinach pies, and it makes for a couple of cheap meals with spinach that grows like weeds in the garden. Other than that we make do with home made shortcrust when pastry is called for. But when I got my 'filo' out of the fridge, it turned out that I had bought puff pastry by mistake, a ready rolled sheet which wasn't big enough to both line the pie dish and cover it. Then the spinach seemed rather tough and leathery when I cooked it. It was the last cut of the season, and the plants have now been composted. Now I am not at all sure what a puff pastry version of my normal filo spinach pie would be like, especially with past-its-best spinach. I therefore decided to jazz it up a bit by adding half a jar of lurking sundried tomatoes and a sauteed onion, lined the dish, filled it with the spinach, feta, tomato and onion mixture, laid the leftover strips of pastry over it in a rough sort of  lattice pattern, brushed it all over with egg and baked it. It looks quite nice, so I am hoping that it is, as it will be dinner tonight!

mrs_motivated

First day of the month for me and the first shop after payday which is always a big stock up shop.  Lots of fish and meat was bought for the freezer, so shouldn’t need to buy more for at least 3 weeks so not to unhappy with the big spend.  The budget feeds 2 of us, but I’m trying to buy extra to stock the pantry up when things are on offer etc.

122.69/400

I should probably add, the budget includes food, cleaning products and toiletries.  It doesn’t include dog food as they are fed raw which arrives frozen and is purchased monthly online. Also doesn’t include eating out which to be honest isn’t that often anyway.

joedenise

@elsiepac - sorry but can I change my budget for May to £200 please.

Thank you.

Greying_Pilgrim

Ranking tea as 'successful'.   LG munched their plant-based 'meat' balls and declared them delish (whilst the adults silently recalled the first few times these spheres were met with suspicious sniffs and tears...🙄🤣).  I bought the dough balls from MrA's YS'd section back in March.  They were that Xpress pizza restaurant brand.  Mea culpa, I thought they were dough balls with the garlic butter already inside, but they had a garlic dip in the pack with them.  Can't say as I'm sold - although LG gamely munched them (without the garlic dip), and liked them.  But I'm glad I only paid 53p for 8 of them, as they are alot more expensive normally 😬 There was dip left over, so that was mopped up with an inexpensive slice of MrL wholemeal bread 😊

I made sponge cake with a handful of sultanas and the last of the glace cherries chopped up into it to fill the oven.  LG had a slice of HM lemon cake and some greek yoghurt for pud.  The doughballs won't be appearing in my shopping basket again - YS'd or otherwise - I'll stick with conventional garlic bread in future.  The sponge cake is cooling, and then will be sliced up and put into the cake tin for snacks this week.

Lunch was pea soup - made with 3 tins of MrL marrowfat peas.  2 tins were blitzed with onion, garlic and stock and then the 3rd tin was added towards the end of cooking to add interest and 'heft' 😉A spoonful of mint sauce was swirled through with seasoning at the end.  Just the job on such a cold, dreich day. LG had a cheese sandwich.

No shopping done/no money spent today.

Greying X

ragz_2

£450 again please

Didn't manage it last month, but I didn't factor in school holidays, Easter eggs and a bulk buy of something that will last months. We still threw away some fruit and veg, so need to be less idealistic and more realistic re what will get eaten and meal plan more specifically. Thanks for the thread, huge help to read everyone's posts.

Greying my DCs will eat chickpeas in things like curry or casserole, but DH can't stand them, so we tend not to use them. Those dough balls sound like a rip off, even at 53p! For such a cheap thing to make, they don't half have a mark up on them. 
Your meals are so inspiring, I have a pantry full of pulses and no clue how to even cook most of them! I now have an instant pot so really should get on that. 

Dawn your pie sounds delicious! 

I've done Bolognese pasta for the DCs for dinner as there was a tub in the freezer that wasn't enough for a meal for everyone but too much for a portion, so it meant I could use some old non-GF pasta up as DH wasn't eating dinner. I tend to cook GF pasta for everyone, especially as MrA price it so reasonably (though this has gone up a LOT in the last 4 months) and we still had a load of normal cheap penne in the store cupboard.

We all had a massive breakfast (stayed at not-so-premium Inn last night for wedding) so wasn't going to cook a big dinner, DH will eat random stuff later and I've had enough snacks on the journey to not need dinner.

Back to low carb tomorrow after most of April off, but at least I stocked up on low carb rolls and bread last month so that will do for days we don't have much in that I can eat. Pulses don't really fit with low carb, but I will have some if I manage to make edible recipes. 

Blackcats

I've been reading and keeping track of my spends but for no particular reason I didn't post in April.
however human grocery budget came in below but feline budget came in above their budget.  
Meal plan is 
M - left over roast beef with 3 veg mash (all veggies from olio) with left over carrots, broccoli and cauliflower.
Tue - Caribbean chicken curry - this was a free gift from Oca do where I get my dad's shopping from.  The thought of my 94 year old dad being dished up a chicken curry makes me smile, so I'm going to use it.
wed - Singapore style noodles - using a bargain pak choi, carrots, peppers, spring onions and a few pieces of chicken from Tuesday's curry
thurs - shakshuka with sourdough toast (got a loaf from olio that is crammed into the freezer
fri - egg and chips 
sat - fakeaway night - homemade pizza and homemade coleslaw 

we have strawberries, raspberries, bananas, apples and oranges so plenty of yummy fruit.
also have potatoes, carrots, onions, swede, pak Choi, red chillis, frozen peas and corn so will only buy what we need and hopefully keep the first week of the month's spends low.
cats are well stocked up too 😸

Please can you put me down for £300 for humans - felines have a separate budget which they consistently ignore