October 2023 Grocery Challenge

goldfinches

@thriftwizard - sorry to hear of your family death and diagnosis not to mention the additional transport and supply issues. Sending hugs (()).

@LadyWithAPlan - I haven't bought the Philip Khoury book as I'm not convinced of its value yet. EatYourBooks has a free membership option as well as a paid one and they publish selected preview recipes from new publications so that interested members can try before they buy. I find it very useful especially if the recipe author is someone new to me, some authors write recipes I find very easy to follow and others don't.

If you're looking for a knockout vegan cake I can thoroughly recommend Meera Sodha's vegan gluten free banana bread and her chocolate cake with sprinkles which is delicious made with Doves Farm Freee flour. I do sympathise with you over flying and needing a gluten-free diet, flying while vegetarian used to be dreadfully difficult but has got easier over the years, let's hope the same thing happens for coeliacs too.

I can claim another NSD for yesterday and a supermarket free day today although I did spend rather a lot in a charity shop but that's another story.

Soontobeoap

Oh dear, another £20.00 spent yesterday as we needed milk, juice and bread. Aldi had half price mushrooms and spring onions so the meal plan got changed and I needed some soya sauce and a few other cheap bits to support it. We have been very busy this week and so have gone off plan, eating beans on toast, mushrooms on toast and pizza for the last 3 days main meals. We seem to have had a bit of a vegetarian week! Egg sandwiches alongside leftovers from family stay at weekend have also kept us going at lunch time, so we should enter November with a good supply of food in the store cupboard and freezer. No visits to us planned at moment and we have several outings planned where it is our turn to be fed. I am hoping that I will be able to set a smaller budget for next month so that I can go comfortably into December and keep my food costs under last years if possible.🤞

One good thing is that we havnt had to put the heating on yet. 

SausageDogSandwich

Morning all, just catching up with everything. Had my bowel resection surgery on Tuesday and got out of there on Friday morning, I’m not one for hospitals   Husband didn’t spend a lot while I’ve been out of action as I did a big shop before I went in. He is in charge on the shopping for the week though, so we will see how that goes. I can’t face thinking about meal planning, shopping and eating to much at the moment but will try to keep on track.
£228.51/350

Pennypincin

Sorry to hear that things are tough at the moment for people.
Sending hugs and hope things improve soon.
I spent £2.50 in Tesco yesterday, plus a small spend in Morrisons Friday.
I've around £10.20 in the food budget and will add it to the bulk food fund.
I really like hearing what people are cooking and the recipe's.
It's really inspiring.

Blackcats

I've not been keeping track of spends very well in October.  My grocery pot looks fuller than I think it should so I'm not posting a total.
I will focus far more in November and keep myself accountable by posting after each spend.  That might also deter me from popping into the local shop which mostly seems to be for maltezers 

goldfinches

I'm claiming another NSD which is again due to the weather which poured down here today so instead of going out and spending money I did a small amount of housework and made some food for the coming week which was all to the good really.
I now have four portions of soup, four of red cabbage, 5 of rye rolls, 3 of roast courgette and 4 of barley milk drink in the fridge and when I've eaten those I already have almost all the ingredients to make this stuffed pumpkin recipe which I'm really looking forward to trying.

Suffolk_lass

I'm moving over to November after today and have just made a beef casserole with slightly sad fridge veg, red lentils and some homegrown onions tromboncino and butternut. It's in the slow cooker for the day and I will decide when it gets closer to supper time whether to make a scone topping, or even a couple of dumplings (which DH likes, but I never have) or just leave it as is .

It's a no spend day for me so my annual running total is £2265.07 for 2023, leaving £734.93 for November and December, without breaking in to my £500 theoretical contingency fund. I don't know how many we shall be for the festive period yet but I daresay people will tell me at some point.

Living out of our storecupboard and freezer is definitely helping, and the garden produce freezer may well see us well into winter. Just as well as we will be turning the electric aga on on Wednesday, so bottled gas (domino hob and oil (heating) use will fall and all those laundry things will go up as I have somewhere to dry stuff again, as well as easy cooking.

Pennypincin

A £7.52 spend to declare.
A tiny amount of loose veg and fruit, 6 free range eggs, a tin of budget veg soup and 2 bags of quorn products on offer.

diminua

Declaring at £69.69 over. Some of this is because things have gone up, and some of it is small extravagances and not bringing lunches in. 

Florenceem

I ended my 4 week grocery spend at £93.69/£100.