June 2022 Grocery Challenge

K9sandFelines

£19. 09 spent yesterday in A1di. I couldn't get greenbeans or sweet potatoes as both spaces were empty; but will survive without them.

Today, I've just managed a walk to Waitr*se (which is good going for me with my MH, to go out two days on the trot). That spend was £2.70, (with my Waitr*se vouchers). Kicking myself that I forgot to pick up the Cauldr*n tofu on offer to make Seitan! I might just have to go out again over the weekend or Monday, or ask DD2 when she is here; as she passes by there from the train station. 

DawnW

No spending today, spent a few hot hours this morning sorting through the fridge and cooking up veg, mainly from the Lidl's £1.50 box we picked up earlier in the week. I made:

A big vat of mixed veg soup - it isn't soup weather, so that will be going into the freezer.

A small tub of mashed swede, which will also be frozen

A small tub of tomato sauce, also freezer bound

A large tub of roasted peppers, aubergine and onion, which will be dinner tomorrow stirred into couscous with chopped fresh herbs and something on the side.

A cauliflower / pasta in cheese sauce bake thing, which was tonight's dinner. There is a little bit left which will do for someone's lunch tomorrow.

A couple of lemon drizzle cakes, now in the freezer.

Blanched a tray of mangetout from the garden

I have picked a big bowl of strawberries and a smaller one of loganberries.

I need to water the garden pots, but think I will do it later when it hopefully cools down a bit!

nannygladys

I was going to go shopping afternoon, but fell asleep!!!!! This is not like me at all, so I'm putting it down to the heat!! I'll shop tomorrow or may see how far I can last! 
Nannyg 

gill5blue

Could do better.- should be £50 per week
week to 9th June £71.30
week to 16th June £60.61

otb666

i am calling it for this month as caught covid at street party last sunday, only 5 people there and i did  not eat or drink but no masks worn. We are house bound for next 10 days So figures for June 421/600  We have all lost our appetites and off food

DawnW

@otb666 hope you are better soon

@gill5blue don't beat yourself up too much - our money is going nowhere as far as it did a short time ago. What you would normally have expected to cost £50 costs much more now.

PipneyJane

Soontobeoap said:

@Crazycatlady2,  I find that the vegetarian recipes on here would not be eaten by Mr Soontobe but still find some amazing simple ideas like omelette and chips and pasta dishes using very little meat. People on here are inspirational and you can make a lot of pasta food nearly as quickly as warming up a ready meal. I started off just trying one new recipe a fortnight and now my picky husband sometimes chooses to have cereal or beans on toast for his evening meal if we have to eat separately. I used to feel guilty (bought up to make sure that I looked after my husband) but it's healthy and doesn't happen often. Try making a tomato sauce base in bulk that you can use for bolognaise, pasta, lasagna or shepherd's pie. Freeze in meal size portions and you are part way there.

There are 2 of us. My budget is for all cosmetics, cleaning, toiletry and food. We don't eat out very often but that is a separate budget. If you are determined  you can cut your budget quite a bit although obviously some people are much better at it than others. I am a beginner. 

Would just like to know if others wash and reuse food bags. I have been doing so since January. My daughter thinks it's a step too far and my son who is in catering was concerned about bacteria. I soak them over night and then give them a thorough scrub. Also don't reuse ones that have previously had meat in. 

Excellent advice @soontobemrsg

When I have time and a glut of mushrooms, I fry up a load of onions, garlic and sliced mushrooms and freeze that in meal-quantity tubs as “Base”.  Virtually all my recipes start “fry onion with garlic add mushrooms” in the proportions of one medium sized onion (chopped)  to 1-2 cloves garlic (crushed) and 100-150g mushrooms (sliced).  If you want to build up your stash gradually, it takes less than 5 minutes to prepare a double quantity and the cooking time is about the same as a single quantity would be.

I wash and reuse food bags, but not the ones that have contained raw meat.  I don’t bother soaking them overnight - if they are mucky, they get binned.  I just turn them inside out, swish in the washing up water, give a wipe over with the sponge, another swish and position over a wooden spoon in the cutlery drainer.  The key re bugs is to ensure they are totally dry before you put them away.  Most bacteria need a damp environment to survive.

- Pip

ETA:  @Crazycatlady2, there are two of us in our household.  The grocery challenge budget of £140 covers everything bought at the supermarket - food, toiletries, cleaning stuff - but excludes meat bought at the butcher’s and alcohol.  We have separate budgets for those.  With the exception of cooking bacon, I only buy supermarket meat if it’s discounted (aka “YS” which means “yellow sticker”).

PipneyJane

Greying_Pilgrim said:

Morning GC'rs!


MissRikkiC - perhaps in future, it may be worth you growing your own Lupin beans?  Although I was interested to see that they are not advised to be eaten by people with peanut allergies, due to a similar compound being present in Lupin beans as is in peanuts.  I learn a new thing everyday!

Aiming for a NSD today.  

Will have to change the meal plan around a little.  We didn't have the smoked tofu buddha bowl on Monday, so that is now pencilled in for today, as it will enable me to make best use of items from the food table and last week's MrL box.  The stuff is still OK, but neither do i want food waste.  The lentil bake will keep in the freezer for another day.

Last night's soup was scrummy.  I cooked it in the PC, which worked beautifully.  I'm finding vegetarian food more flavourful cooked this way - in much the same way that a slow-cooker/slow cooking may enhance meaty stews and casseroles?? I made up some of the Zanzibar spice mix (anyone else get a B1lly J0el ear worm when they mention Zanzibar?  Nope?  Just me?  OK 😊), and have enough left over for another soup or another dish.  

I used one jar of bottled black eye beans in the soup.  I had got 2 jars 30% reduced in MrL a few weeks ago.  At 42p (reduced price) for 400g drained weight, they were cheaper than tinned, and I have to say, they were good.  As I cook dried beans too, I'm not sure they were any better than dried being home cooked, but they were good enough.  I appreciated the opportunity to try them out at a lower price.  I would certainly give consideration to buying them again (proper price is 59p), if dried beans weren't available, but I'm not sure that they are an economical option for me.  I think that the quality aspect of jarred beans (as discussed in the R4 Food Programme about beans), holds true though.

Greying X

What did they say, please, @Greying_Pilgrim?  The Food Programme is available as a podcast, so I’ve downloaded both episodes about beans (from 27th March and 3rd April), but other people may not be into podcasts.  (I do most of my listening that way and my queue has 453 programs in it. Gulp!)

- Pip

PipneyJane

@thriftwizard hope you all feel better soon and have no major effects.

I have a small spend to declare:  £5.38 on Thursday in L!dl.  DH popped in on his way home to pick up pizzas for dinner.  This was totally due to a lack of planning and forethought on my part, since I didn’t do a meal plan this week.

Someone - apologies that I’ve forgotten who - mentioned the “mental load” of the grocery challenge.  I actually find it less stressful to have a meal plan and a shopping list.  Admittedly, I only ever have a rough plan - e.g. Tuesday: something with mince - but even that helps because it means things get defrosted in time.  On the shopping list front, we keep a running list in a notepad in the kitchen; whenever something runs low or the last package is opened, it gets added to the list.  I’ll section up the page for MrT, L!dl and any other stores we need to visit.  (It might take us 3 months to get to W8trose, but their black beans are on the list.)

The above brings our total spend to £63.97/£140 leaving £76.03 for the rest of the month.

- Pip

Greying_Pilgrim

PipneyJane said:

What did they say, please, @Greying_Pilgrim?  The Food Programme is available as a podcast, so I’ve downloaded both episodes about beans (from 27th March and 3rd April), but other people may not be into podcasts.  (I do most of my listening that way and my queue has 453 programs in it. Gulp!)

- Pip

Hey hun, lovely to "see" you.

It was along the lines of the varieties and quality of beans that are bottled are generally higher than those that are tinned, so the resulting dish made with bottled beans should be more flavourful/the beans keep their shape etc.  Spanish bean bottlers tend to use beans grown either in Spain, or a small selection of countries, whereas they were explaining that tinned beans often come from countries with less history of growing beans, and that the varieties grown were selected on the basis of high yield/propensity to be processed etc.  The MrL bottled beans are spanish, and i did find them tasty, and they retained their shape in the soup, so in my humble opinion, they were a better product than the majority of tinned black eye beans that I have used.  However, I'm also a pragmatist, and whilst tasty food is great, my budget doesn't always stretch to purchasing bottled beans.  It was great to be able to try these beans for a slightly lower price.  I wouldn't be able to afford the beans from the UK company that is featured in the Food Programme podcast, irrespective of how wonderful they tasted.

Greying X