September 2022 Grocery Challenge

Auti

LadyWithAPlan said:

Saturday  Spending day so NSD 5/16 still

Grocery spending Sep 22 GC £51.81/£160  + £15/55.50 bulk - all paid from cash

Last shop was Sunday  so a week later was good, no top ups,  helped by freezer & previous batch cooking. I still have loads veg from last week and apples from FM orchard. I did empty fridge out before I left for 3 weeks in August so I am actively having to start fridge from scratch and stores are down.

Sains had really good reductions   £4 to 88p etc for lasagne etc  - about 6.45pm  after my swim- but a lot had wheat in - so had to ignore -  still  YS oriental  veg stir-fry 44p, mushroom stir fry 39p  and 4 courgettes  34p  - came to £1.17

Coop - bought lots of reduced meat and fish inc GF baked fish, GF fishcakes, a piece of  YS sirloin ( a treat I rarely buy), gf sausages, pork kebabs, organic potatoes, - all  50% + off - so have frozen loads.
Co-op came to 14.36 - 

Jackie O on here  has really put me off buying crisps! However I did buy  a reduced pack only as it had a competition on - still £1.50! ...so the competition was the reason/decider and budget comes  from a different pot than my grocery  pot. 

Actually if I bought ones with wheat in I could gift them in xmas hampers  as I cant eat the wheat...

I did look at the 150g packet  crisps ingredients and then tried a la Jackie O's mum to make 150g of an YS organic potato (I calculated as costing 11.14p  + electric after my 25p Coop veg offer and YS) into crisps! I tried super thin slicing and  sauteing them with spices - not quite the same though tasty but I am going to try and re-create potato crips at home again - I have a halogen oven so may try that next, They started out too damp cos of slicing them thinly, maybe I need to leave to dry for longer .- lovely but not that crispy --more like potato dauphoise without the cream and gruyere!  Maybe need to dry for longer first.

 The bought crisps were actually very sweet - sweet chilli flavour - i guess they stack them with sugar and salt to make them moreish..and make you buy them... ( I did intellectually know this but having  not had any all week (tx jackieo ;(()  I really could taste it. 
Expect many more  diary entries as I try to make artisan crisps from organic potatoes. Any advice? I dont want to have to dehydrate in oven as too expensive to run ...

Tortilla chips I can buy for 35P/40p - and seem more value  the lowest brand ones I prefer as just corn, oil and salt  - lIDL/ald*,, Sains - all do great cheap corn ones .. its these expensive flavoured potato ones I am recreating - I really like crunch in my food. (I have the proper masa corn flour soaked in limes and its super expensive so hopefully Jackie O's mum will not be carving off bits of corn to make a further point re tortilla chips!)

I also had 75p of Coop offer weekly vouchers so have added 75p to my mortgage unicorn pig  from my cash purse.

Also popped to tesco  as they had some GF and DF CB items but for 4 GF white buns - £2.90 down to £1.50 with CB .. still expensive and the gf bread I made  last week was super tasty, more nutritious, less rubbish in it and came to the same rough cost as the mix was YS. Plus a long queue so I left them.

I popped into Iceland but too much stuff and so much with wheat in - so did not buy anything - i will tell my parents about the oily fish deal.

My amazon deal of 2 x 1 kg of Lavazza coffee beans arrived- so finishing off all others first before I open one - it will stop me from going to the shops when I get near to running out of coffee. If I run out of DF milk I survive but never coffee,

I was reading on a pensions board  thread about how much people need to retire and what they spend and so it really seems my current goal of £160/month for me plus £30/bulk  on groceries is too high, this does not include cleaning stuff, toiletries, restaurants.  I don't buy much alcohol  for the home unless I am entertaining and that can go into treats pot. I do live in central London.
I am planning to keep cutting £10 a month off the main til it feels too hard. I am a meat eater, GF, Dairy sensitive, I should be 100% DF but sometimes a bit of chocolate or cheese creeps in and I regret it) so TGTG is no good often as it has wheat or dairy in them most the time. So DF and GF adds up.

I also have a detailed list now of what I do need to buy and stock up on. I am still not meal planning in a focused way but I do know what I mainly eat and do batch cook and freeze portions into smaller packages.

I went looking for YS meat and fish as knew what was in freezer/fridge/pantry as doing that 30 day to a clean organised home by  Katie Berry amazing book  - its changing my life.

Hi, I am GF and vegetarian and I wondered which bread recipe you use? I am struggling with bread but found M&S sourdough one is good but so expensive. If I could make the bread that should be cheaper I make cakes that get eaten by non GF child and taste good - though fruit goes to bottom. Also GF pastry is a disaster in any form so given up on that - do you make crumble if so do you have a crumble mix recipe? Sorry for so many questions and thank you

Doom_and_Gloom

£29.19 spent since the last post between A&C and Mr S.

£212.34/£285.
£72.66 left. 

goldfinches

I didn't fancy my planned dinner so treated myself to some rolls, salad and a piece of Stilton in Sains on my way back home this afternoon, I also spotted some YS passion fruit which I snapped up to use to make some treats. I was very pleased to run across a packet of 2 Dove bars as well so the soap shortage is now officially over in this neck of the woods, plus I used my Nectar points to pay for them which is all to the good.

Altogether I spent £8.43 which brings my total for this month to £38.44/£120 and my average daily spend is £3.20.

Suffolk_lass

@Auti if you want to stop the fruit sinking to the bottom, toss it in a little flour before you add it to the mix.

Over here we are still shopping from our shelves and like @cinnamon123 we try to stretch the gaps between shops by an extra day or two each time. I always buy off list in a shop so try to go as infrequently as possible to combat this.

I have shopped because I ran out of ordinary blended olive oil and went to Sains to buy this and their 5k bags of granulated sugar (we use this mostly for bee feed so not in GC). I also picked up 2 bags of cat litter - 10L for £1.95

I bought several stores items while there, including a spicy relish, some OB distilled clear vinegar, pickling spice, shallots and 3 kinds of pasta. I now have four jars of pickled onions in my pantry waiting for Christmas when they will mostly get used. £36.10

I also bought cheese, cream, butter, salad, veg and fruit from the grocery budget. £28.79

I am anticipating my big river delivery on Monday (maybe Tuesday with the bank holiday) which is 6 branded items in multiples larger than I am comfortable with - 6 jars of coffee, four boxes of tea, many rolls of toilet paper as the one I ordered is OOS, sanitary products and toothpaste - pet food is the other one but that is separately counted unless I buy things in the supermarket.

We are away from tomorrow for a few days and again next week so will try not to shop then and continue to cook from stores we take with us in the campervan. I hope milk delivery is the only other thing I will need to add.

katkin

Morning.

I spent £151.89 on the monthly Tesc* online order yesterday leaving £47.75 until the end of the month. This should be just enough to buy tops ups, milk, fresh items and any yellow-sticker bargains I can find.

This monthly shop included a lot more household item like washing powder, whitener, descaler, loo rolls and toiletries that meant I had to reduce spending on "nice" things and meat. I still managed to get a few extra items to add to stocks though. 

There were good deals on pork, cheese and club card offers. Butter is up again, cold meat is outrageous as is the cost of fruit!  

To reduce plastic use I moved over to using shampoo bars early this year, but they can be pricey so I was pleased to pick up a coconut & lychee one for £2.50. Hope it will be ok on my hair because now I have to use it up and they last months. 

Does anyone buy sacks of tatties? I'm wondering if this would be viable for mainly 2 people and occasional visitors. I'd hate to waste money on 25kg of potatoes if I couldn't look after them and use them up. 

If there's one thing I've learnt this summer is spend more time and effort on growing food. Gardening has always been a nice, hobby thing to do and we enjoy what produce we get from that, though this year hasn't been great, apart from strawberries, herbs and come n' cut again salad leaves. I really must be better planned, plant more food than flowers and make the most out of the space we have. 

elsiepac

Budgets updated to here

Crikey where is September going?!

I'm actually doing pretty well on grocery shopping this month and last, just haven't got myself together enough to post!

Loving everyone's tips, tricks and stories as always

London_1

Hello chums, well coffee morning went well at Dobbies and I thought I would have a quick nosey to see if they had any reductions in their food hall part .

I had a result as I got three boxes of Chicken and Chorizo empanadas (6 to a box) which are now decanted and portioned into my freezer. Cost £2.37.
4 nice Navel oranges reduced to 66p from £2.20  
A 500gm box of black grapes 78P reduced from  £2.60 total cost £3.81 instead of £7.17 So I'm more than happy with that.

The empanada's will do for three meals at least and the oranges were a good bargain, and the grapes a nice treat.

Sainsburys have the concession attached to Dobbies deli area, and often on a Tuesday they do have some decent reductions  so my September spends have risen slightly but to good advantage

I shall still do my shopping from my  list  tomorrow ,but will juggle it around a bit now i've got some extra fruit and three more meals in the freezer so hopefully it will be slightly less than expected.

JackieO xx


             September spends so far £8.90/£60.00 leaving me £51.10 and only 17 more days in September

                                                                               11/13 NSDs

mumtoomany

Hi all. We went to the grand opening of the new iceland warehouse this morning. I spent £45.35 there, but actually got £65.75 worth of shopping, as i had two £5 vouchers and also got the over 60's 10% discount. Also, while waiting in the queue, raffle tickets were given out, and OH won a 90 second trolley dash. So am extra £82.50 worth of food and washing liquid. Also a free tub of jelly beans, and crisps and sweets given out while we waited to pay. Glad we went. Also called in at Aldi, so total spent today is, £58.44. Total spends for the year to date, £2005.22/£2640. 
The problem now is the freezers are now full again! Need to start emptying again before the pigs arrive! Hugs, mumtoomany. xxx

FrugalThymes

@mumtoomany that sounds like a great trip, well done on your win and freebies! What was the first thing your husband headed to with the trolley dash? I bet it was really fun!

I had to add another £4 to the spends today; I forgot that my daughter's friend was coming over for dinner before Scouts and she's an incredibly picky eater. Luckily through trial and error we found out that there are a few things she loves and I can now make sure she leaves here with a full stomach- tonight's tea was fishfingers, potato poppers and peas that the kids bought on the way home from school. I let her serve herself from bowls on the table and she now eats a full dinner without me having to just smile and pretend I don't mind that I'm throwing most of a meal away because she was too shy to be honest about what she wanted. My two are absolute gannets, who have made friends with a lot of kids who have food issues over the years so I'm very relieved she's happy and fed! I'll just have to remember to get some more in by next Tuesday.

Today I listed a load of things on Facebk marketplace and have made a money jar with a superglued lid for any pennies we make that way. Savings in the jar will be used for something fun for the four of us, maybe Christmas markets or a day trip over to North Wales.

Another good day to be on Oli0 today - fruit loaf, croissants, soya milk and vegetable jerky. The jerky I thought I was asking for two small, one portion packs but DH came back from the collection with 4 x 100g bags! Resisting the urge to open one and putting them straight in the pantry cupboard for future picnics or scout hike/camp rations for our youngest.

£144.53/£200

pinkypig

Hello 
I have had a small spend today.  Managed to get a TGTG box from Morrisons.  I’ve reserved one after another in the last week and never got to pick one as they kept getting cancelled due to lack of surplus food.  This was worth waiting for. 2 cauliflower, 3 courgettes, green beans, rhubarb, 4 corn cobs, iceberg, Chinese leaves, celery, satsumas and a large punnet of raspberries . £3.09 well spent!  Need to re jig my meal plan a bit to make sure nothing goes to waste.
£74.09/£150 
PP x