April 2023 Grocery Challenge

Nelliegrace

@PipneyJane I save any meat fat, clarifying it and using it to sauté vegetables for soups and stews.

Daisy Dog gets the safe scrapings from dinner plates, and pans, then I wipe off any remaining grease with a small cotton rag and bin it. It saves the sink and sewer getting clogged with fat from the washing up. Our domestic waste fuels the local power station.

I keep a pot of cut up cotton scraps, squares of very old cotton tee shirts or old cotton socks, just to use and throw away, instead of paper towels. We used to get through a lot cleaning up after two elderly cats. 

Suffolk_lass

@PipneyJane Butternut Fingers recipe, as requested - it's a very old recipe (in imperial) - if you want to convert it 25g=1oz

Line or grease an 8" (20cm) square tin
Oven on 180c (350F) or baking oven if using a range

Ingredients
9oz SR Flour
6oz Butter or non dairy spread like Stork
small pinch of salt grains in with the flour
5oz demerara sugar (original recipe was 6, but too sweet for us) - the dem adds a bit of a crunch
2oz each of dried fruit (sultanas or mixed over here), glace cherries and nuts (walnut pieces or pecans here) - I wash and dry these
2 eggs
2 tablespoons of milk or non-dairy of your choice

Method

• Rub the fat into the flour (and salt, which is optional if you are low sodium)
• Stir in the sugar (keep a spoonful back) dry fruit and nuts (you can omit the nuts if you want - the original recipe had almond flakes on top)
• Mix the eggs and milk and add these so the dough is quite stiff but soft enough to squidge - and don't scrape the egg and milk bowl as you need to use a bit to glaze the top, esp if you are adding nuts or another topping
• Into the tin with it and squidge it out then paint the top with the remnants of the milk/egg mix and sprinkle on the last spoonful of sugar (and almond flakes if you didn't put nuts in) 
• Cook for about 30-35 mins until the top is springy, and no wobble. Leave in the tin to cool for about 10 minutes then cut into fingers (I usually get 20 out of this size pan). 

Things I changed -
I upped the ingredients by 1/3 (and 1 egg - it used to be 1 large egg, and an extra tablespoon of milk, but eggs here are various sizes),
I mix the nuts in as I found they fell off if just topped.
I increased the pan from 6" square to 8"
I reduced the sugar a bit and often forget to keep any back for the topping
I added walnuts and I don't bother to chop the glace cherries, they break up a bit when the wet ingredients are added

Basically it is a great little use up bits recipe for a teatime treat. I keep meaning to freeze some but it never lasts long enough here.

Cocobeans

Spent £8.60 yesterday on some soft drinks to go with our takeaway last night. My dad and step mum are down and always come round with a takeaway as a treat for us. They also always bring us a box of Yorkshire Teabags - they live in Yorkshire and its like a bit of a tradition now even tho it's widely available in all supermarkets!

£8.60 / £250 spent 

diminua

First spend of the month in JS - bread, milk.... all the usual suspects except I'm moving away from broccoli and carrots and roasties and towards salad veg and baby potatoes.  I probably need some fish or veg pies at some point, and probably eggs as well as I'm down to the last one. £22.34.

[Deleted User]

We are on track this month so far. I only know that because I had £20 left in my weekly budget for last week. I haven't added up any spends as we've been extra busy as OHs Dad is in hospital with pnemonia. Trying to get organised with meals for the week ahead today as they've been all over the place the last few days. 

AnnabelSaves

First time joining. Please put me down for £600. It's a huge amount for 2 people plus a cat, especially when we've got a freezer full and I can cook. We've been pretty well off for a few years and it just hasn't been a focus, but with my husband out of work and spiralling house costs we've sat down and done a budget. 

So far spent £43.98 on cat litter, a feliway diffuser and some gravy granules when we'd run out last night. Had overnight oats in the office today, along with some pitta breads filled with a tinned salmon pesto mix I made last night. Snack was an apple and a chocolate bar I had in the fridge. Tonight is chicken meatballs and cous cous with hummus. 

Thought ahead for once and booked a Tesco delivery slot for Thursday. 

sarahj1986

Yes please let me do this again

last 2 weeks of March went a bit iffy because I wasn’t very well



£250 

Adorian

Although I've spent £15 already (fancy yellow cherry tomatoes to stop me going and buying snacks at the corner shop plus 2 bottles of M&S Fizzero in anticipation of an evening round at a friend's), I've also scored a stew pack, 3 small savoy cabbages and a pack of chicken slices from Olio. I've frozen the chicken and made split pea soup from a large jar of split peas I found in the cupboard along with the onions & some of the carrots from the stew pack and 3 stock cubes I had in the cupboard (could've just done 2). That is 6 soup meals, including one for work at the office tomorrow. I've also defrosted some sausages I got from Olio a while ago and am making a Riverford recipe: pan-fried sausages with cabbage and apples (I have a couple of apples that are past their best) this evening, which will do 4 meals - I'll make mash with the swede from the stew pack to go with it. I've no room in the freezer currently so I will be eating the same things every day for a while, including a lot of porridge breakfasts with either banana (I have 2 left) or syrup or honey (I have loads), and lunch/dinner of the soup and the sausages. I love savoy cabbage so may well be eating a lot of that for snacks, sauteed in butter with garlic, until it's all gone.

I discovered a small loaf of cinnamon raisin bread whilst trying to reorganise the freezer so that's potentially next week's breakfasts sorted too! I'm pretty good with eating the same things for a few days so I have high hopes that I won't need to buy any additional groceries for the next 2 weeks at least. If Olio is my friend, I may go even longer. Let's see how it works out!

K9sandFelines

 £120 for me please @elsiepac .

I've forgotten whether I'm running 13th to 12th or 1st to end of month; so I need to  check that ✅

Soontobeoap

Having started the month really well with an Aldi shop we had an order delivered from Tesco. It was for £137.67 which I didnt think was too bad as washing powder, razor blades and toilet rolls were £30.00. This was to set us up for this week and next week when visitors are coming. In theory all we needed to buy was fruit and veg. Well the best laid plans did not work as we have both been laid up with covid for 3 days. It knocked us flat. I really dont know what happened to Saturday and Sunday. We are both off our food and dont fancy anything that we have in the house. So tonight I have put in a small tesco order of tempting little bits to come tomorrow. I had given myself a big budget this month but was really hoping to be inside target. Looking on the bright side we are drinking loads but not eating much so we will have lots of food left for later in the month.

I am also really annoyed that the lasagna that I took out of the freezer for Saturday had to be binned. Non of our neighbours eat pasta and they probably would not have wanted it from a covid house anyway. That is the first food item that I have thrown out since a half loaf of bread about 8 months ago. 

Welcome @AnnabelSaves. Although you wont believe it from this post, I got my monthly bill for 2 down from an average of around £300 a month to nearer £200 a month last year. It is becoming harder to keep costs down but you will find some great tips on here. I have really started to enjoy cooking again.