January 2023 Grocery Challenge

sams247

Very keen to get going on this....

My small plusses are - I have a bag of potatoes that I bought for 16p from M&S sale.  Plus I also bought a chocolate gateaux from then reduced from £7.50 to £1.75.  I cut this into 16 pieces and put 15 of them in the freezer for work days.  The other one is for my 'celebration' tonight of the New Year.  I am working so solo party for me.....

My areas of challenge are - I only have a tiny kitchen with an under counter fridge and letterbox freezer (currently full of cake and fish fingers and vegan burgers).  I have zero room for a freezer, so the days of batch cooking are gone sadly.   I try hard not to eat bread....... I dont eat red meat.  I cant eat chickpeas (sobs as I adore hummus) and I have no microwave.   

Here goes.    

JingsMyBucket

@PipneyJane we just returned from a Morrison's trip and I asked at the fish counter for whole salmon. They don't have any right now and won't have any whole ones for sale until February (likely Valentine's Day!  ) but they could cut it down into steaks for me if so desired. The attendant said it's usually £6.99/kg but the price could change by February. Sizes are usually 3 – 4 kg, so that's really not too shabby to have fresh whole salmon. The alternative was ordering from Goldstein's down in London: https://goldsteinsalmon.com/. I am absolutely enraptured by their smoked salmon and want to try it. Maybe later in the year.  

Anyway, thank you for that suggestion as it's put another source on my radar. Unfortunately, we're not near a Waitrose anymore so that isn't an option now. 

try_harder

First grocery shop for 2023 for us too ..Came in at £19.30 ..Hopefully that should last us for four days .£35.70 left for the rest of the week ..I just need to buy a couple of things now for the food bank to add to some bits i have left over from Christmas

MissRikkiC

Hello everyone and happy NYE! 

We are staying home and relaxing, the children are asleep and we have no desire to cook at all. We have food in and a couple of take aways local but we really didn’t want much at all; so agreed that a take away was a waste of money. Hub cooked a pasta dish with fennel and chorizo, both of which were from stocks and it was lovely. 

We are starting this month with a very low budget. We’re using stocks that we’ve picked up from Olio and frozen, along with a few good deals we had last month on things like chicken and butter to manage but at £150 it will be a challenge. 

This is for 2 adults, a baby and a toddler. Everyone now eating means there will be waste (and the dog will be happy for scraps!) so not an ideal month to have less funds however we’re on the penultimate month of maternity pay, our savings have been depleted and we have no choice. 

This covers food, cleaning items and household stuff like loo roll and laundry powder. 

We are already a week into our budget and have spent a grand total of £4.99/£150 so with 3 weeks left I feel it should be okay. 

MissRikkiC

Hi @elsiepac budget for January of £150 please. 

KajiKita

Sent back a sub of still water for sparkling but also had a couple of other small spends I had forgotten about till now so my spend to date is:

£103.47 from a target of £500.

KK

sarahj1986

Hello all!!

Happy New Year!!

First resolution is setting January’s food budget 

£250

I have a few joints of beef and pork in the freezer from the Tesco club offer. Plus I found mince lamb reduced and pork meatballs reduced. I’m going into town Tuesday see if I can find anything else and post a parcel. 

FoxFace

Good morning and Happy New Year to you all

I did our first shop of the year yesterday, and spent £55.89p. A little over the planned budget, but this is why I kept a £50 contingency fund for January, whilst we settle on a reasonable budget for us. We had crept up to spending over £100 per week, so still a massive improvement and I am happy with the pull back.

So I have £44.11p in the cash budget, and no plans for further spends this week. 

Menu plan is all set to go, feeling motivated to make the best of this year. Have a great day everyone:)

LLM2018

Hello.

Had a voucher for a free pastry at Lidl so made use of that and only spent £1.30 when I was there.

So total spends so far 29.81/100

LLM

white-rabbit_2-2

I’m hoping to do January for four adults with a fully stocked store cupboard and £114 in Tesco gift cards