March 2023 Grocery Challenge

[Deleted User]

Declaring my first spends of the month.  

£32.58 between Lidl and Aldi.  Used the £5 off a £25 spend at Lidl
£20 to guy at work who has a small farm.  This is set aside and I get lovely organic free range eggs off him until my 'account' needs topping up.  Total to date = £52.58

elsiepac

Budgets updated to here

I'm in for £300 this month - partially due to bulk things needed and partially due to changing how I eat a bit and it's a bit more expensive.  Saying that though, everything is such a stretch at the moment, cucumbers 75p each... broccoli 79p... I know there are "temporary" shortages of some things which can't be helped of course, but as I'm having to replace carbs with veggies in my diet (well, the majority of), and eat more (vegan) protein, it's proving somewhat costly. And I'm not even getting the more expensive end of the scale things, my diet isn't made of extravagant foods. Ugh, sorry for rant!! Meal planning will indeed be key...

KajiKita

Haven’t started well - my month runs from the 25th (payday) to the 24th but have already spent £211 of my 

£500 target 

😳

A lot of that is for ingredients for batch cooking and restocking so I am hoping that I can get closer this month than last ….

KK

Ginmonster

I'm in again for £250 for the month please. 

My plan is to shop locally as much as possible and even more importantly shop my cupboards first! I'm working on a meal plan to start using everything up. I really have got too much stuff in the cupboards and am going to try and run it all down and restock when there's a clean slate. I definitely have anxiety hoarding but too much stuff in the cupboard doesn't actually help. It just makes everything harder to find. I'm off to make a start by clearing out one cupboard at a time and making an inventory. I think I'm going to horrify myself at how much stuff is hiding in there!

Nelliegrace

I shall set our usual budget of £30 a week, so £135 for the month for the two of us.

We are using the average UK Wartime rations, allowing £2.50 each for meat. (We have given up our egg ration, and would have been allowed to buy a ration of chicken food instead.) As an invalid I would be allowed extra milk. 

• Bacon & Ham         4 oz
• Other meat            value of 1 shilling and 2 pence (equivalent to 2 chops)
• Butter                      2 oz
• Cheese                     2 oz
• Margarine              4 oz
• Cooking fat            4 oz
• Milk                       3 pints
• Sugar                    8 oz
• Preserves            1 lb every 2 months
• Tea                        2 oz
• Eggs                     1 fresh egg (plus allowance of dried egg)
• Sweets                  12 oz every 4 weeks

Rationing ensured that everyone could buy the essentials, and prices were controlled. Foods where supply could not be guaranteed were rationed by points, 16, later 24, a month per person. A pound of lentils or dried beans was 2 points, a tin of baked beans was 4 points. The number of points changed according to availability. Bread was not rationed until after the war, when the food supply was reduced further. 

We are shopping from the store cupboard and freezer first, a well stocked pantry is like money in the bank. It has to be used wisely and not wasted.

We should have only fresh milk and yoghurt, fruit and vegetables to buy. We make our own kefir, and the hens are laying well. Meat, fish, cheese, and butter are all in the freezer in ration portions. I take out the butter and cheese for the week and when it’s gone, it’s gone. It saves a lot of money, DH used to cut thick chunks of cheese from the block for one sandwich.

I have lots of stored apples in the garage which need using, and damsons and blackberries in the freezer. The daily dog walks in summer resulted in kilos of free blackberries. We have pockets full of useful little plastic bags. 

poppingjay

£150

Please may I join for March 🙂 There's me, a nearly 47 year old frazzled nurse and my 21 year old hollow legged son. I'll be ordering from Asda this evening as soon as my wages hit the bank. I'll collect it after work. It'll be about £30, plus a fiver I spent on the way home. Budget based on what I can afford, but that's a ramble for another post. We eat most things and I'm not a terrible cook so it should be doable. Will give actual totals tomorrow. Thanks 👍

nat21luv

I was only saying to my partner this evening that I’m going to do a grocery challenge for March to run the freezers down- and here you are!

2 adults,
1 child who eats more than adults,
5 cats
2 dogs.

Put me down for £250. I bought lots of cat food last month whilst on offer so may not need any for a while. At £8 for 6 tins (2 days worth) I’m very glad about that! 

Soontobeoap

Welcome @poppingjay. @nat21luv,  welcome too. There are loads of ideas to spread your money a bit further on this forum. Hope you enjoy joining in. 

atrixa

£148.50 for me please

I'll try to continue my yellow sticker streak on bread.

savingforhouse

£500.00
Hi we are going to give this a try for March, guestimating at £500 though sure I currently spend more. This is for all food/toiletries, plus one (older child) in full time nappies. 3 adults/2 kids veggie/vegan family. One child has issues with textures so will only eat "beige" food. We are also lucky enough to have a wonderful zero waste network, so can often get free food too. Have quite a bit in the freezer and cupboards already.