February 2023 Grocery Challenge

Saver-upper

Needed to buy milk ( should have bought it in my top- up shop yesterday, really......). I had 14yo DD with me, who requested a small bag of mini eggs chocolate. I told her she'd batter get a packet for her 16yo sister as well. Completely forgot about the 19yo son still at home, so that was a saving 

Also bought some YS items. Total spend £10.53.

£202.79/£300

thriftwizard

Ooooer, it's all gone a bit mad here! Lost track rather over last weekend, when I was away. I thought I'd managed to keep it very frugal, spending £15.20 at the supermarket & about £20 at the market, but on looking at the bank account there are two £25+ supermarket transactions I hadn't bargained for - I must have been under-feeding the troops again, though he swears it was just a bit of sliced bread! So it's halfway through this weekend's shopping and I only have £75.86 left for the next 12 days; I'd expect to spend £30-£40 at the market tomorrow , so it's going to be tight... but stocks are still high & we wouldn't lack for anything much really. To be honest, some of that expenditure was Valentines purchases x 2 and things for my mothers 97th birthday yesterday - when I've worked out exactly how much, I might take it off, as they'd usually come under the "entertainment" and "birthday" funds.

I've been experimenting with "mesophilic" Langfil yogurt, which can be brewed at room temperature without fiddling about. Results so far are very good - tasty & useful. I'm not quite ready to abandon my shop-bought Greek yogurt altogether yet, but I could if I had to. Another few pounds saved per week...

Caroby

Another small spend in Aldi, £6.76 for 3 litres of oat milk, a wholemeal loaf, broccoli, porridge oats and a bar of chocolate. First time I've been in an Aldi with self serve tills, much better than the usual queues.
£71.94 left for last big shop.
£108.06 / £180.00

KajiKita

It’s going to be tight for me this month. When I totted up after last weekend’s groceries landed is that we have £97 for this week’s shop to come in under £500. 

I have enlisted Mr KK 😊 and he is eating from the freezer - I can’t though as I’ve eaten all my food! 

Loaded up the online trolley this evening, looked at the total in the checkout and thought “No!” 😂 Went back through the basket and stripped out all the things that I was buying because they are regulars for us and on offer, but they are not needed yet. Also stripped out some treat items - the chocolate stocks will be low! 😳😉 Then noticed a spare hair conditioner on the bookcase in the landing outside the bathroom …. so that was another £2 saved this week! 😊

KK

JingsMyBucket

Morning folks, this month has positively *flown* by. I checked this morning and realized I haven't updated since the 1st! I'm also catching up on the thread slowly and bit by bit. Since the beginning of the month we've spent £163.50 in various places and online. 

£235.78 / £330.00 spent so far. £94.22 remaining 

Yikes, that's not so much left, especially for only half way through the month. We've been a little bit profligate this month but prices have been rising on some of regular food. Fage Greek yoghurt has risen to £3.50/container and they've dropped from 500g to 450g. Last year we were paying £3 off sale for 500g. That said, one of my favourite scores has been the cooking bacon from Lidl – £1.79 for a kilo of it. I deliberately got two packages: one that looked like bacon chops and the other was all streaky bacon. Both have been divvied up and frozen. The freezer is pretty full right now. Thankfully we have about £20 in Tesco vouchers if we need a bit of leeway. 

I'll be getting a couple items like crème fraîche and pastry for a quiche, canned coconut milk, a sack of rice, etc. It's also Italian week at Lidl so will get a few treats. These will help over the next few days to make some meals. I tend to do a rough cooking plan and cook some basic components so we can put elements together as needed. 

COOKING PLAN FOR THE NEXT FEW DAYS:

Marinated chicken leg quarters with leftover roasted sweet potatoes and salad 

Vegetable and bacon quiche - that'll use up the cavolo nero, leeks, plus the last bits of frozen spinach & mushrooms. 

Instant Pot steel cut oatmeal 

Massaman curry 

Roasted pan vegetables 

Homemade pizza - we've got dough in the freezer, mozzarella in the fridge, sauce in the pantry and will just need to get some vegetables and sliced meats for toppings. 

---
Have a lovely Friday everyone and I'll keep catching up on the thread!

SausageDogSandwich

Spent £30.12 at farmfoods yesterday, was 32.12 but used the £2 voucher from the leaflet. Mostly on things that were wanted not needed but I did get milk  husbandspent1.80 at work on energy drinks also. Been in hospital all week with my nan so haven’t felt like eating or shopping, just making sure the kids are fed is all I can manage at the moment, so that’s helped with spending too. 

£84.82/200 spent. 

[Deleted User]

I'd like to join in here again as I need to get back on track badly.  My budget for February seemed to evaporate within 2 and a half weeks and I had to add extra money for the rest of the month.  I'll read along here for the rest of this month and join in properly in March.  Thank you @elsiepac for running the challange.

Ginmonster

Morning all!

I got a big shopping delivery today which is only my second shop of the month but one of the missing items was tomatoes and there was no substitution. I'm finding it hard to believe there were no tomatoes available at all! It's annoying because now I'll have to go to the shops which was precisely what I was trying to avoid by doing an online shop. Oh well, no sense moaning about what can't be changed. Just one more item to add to the 'to do' list.

I spent a total of £153.06 on the shop so I'm up to £161.31/£250 which is perfectly on track. 

joedenise

Another couple of shops done this week; spends so far this month £92.68/£200 leaving £107.32 for rest of the month.  Anything left over will be moved to the bulk fund as this is a budget which seems to be creeping up faster than the normal grocery shopping, which in itself is definitely rising fast, although not quite as fast as it has been.  I think I'm managing to keep it down this month as trying to use up as much as possible from my outside freezer so that I can empty and defrost it before my holiday in April.  Would like to be able to leave it empty and switched when we go away to save a few pennies!

Gettingmyshiztogether

Hello all,

Another weekly shop done in L!dl and S@inos. I was trying to get a few pantry items in l!dl to hit the 10% off coupon, but alas I only got to £88.86 in there. Would have been alright if they had everything that I needed! So I plan to nip back in this week to grab a few pantry items to make up the difference then bag the 10% off coupon for next week. 

Total standing at £288.23 / £420.00 for February 

Family of 4, 2 adults, 2 teens.