January 2024 Grocery Challenge

GolfR

Thanks for the warm welcome @Soontobeoap

I had to buy 4pt milk today as my daughter has drunk three large glasses since last night. She’s still not eating much since being ill with covid so I’m happy for her to get some nutrition this way. I needed petrol so I combined the two and got the milk in the petrol station instead of going into the shop which I know always ends in me spending more. That takes my spend so far this pay period to £101.47.

I’ll probably need to get my Asda order delivered on Thursday or Friday instead of Sunday as my son decided this morning he wants scrambled eggs on toast for breakfast before school this week as he’s bored of his usual sultana bran which leaves me with not enough bread for breakfast and his sandwiches for the rest of this week. Unless I can trust myself to go to the shop in the morning and just buy bread! I shall report back with my results  

Soontobeoap

Forgot I had a meeting tonight. Had planned hm chicken pie with roast pots and veg but not enough time to cook it so went to Sainsburys whilst in town and picked up some chips to go with the pie. Also found fish, bread and eggs cheaper than on my tesco order . Unfortunately DH was with me, and added tortilla chip  digestive biscuits and butter. £19.65 spent. Items removed from online order tommorrow. 

keggie

Second proper shop of 2014 today.

Did fairly well last week as made meals for the freezer and managed breakfast out on Sunday (had been to a wedding on the Saturday and stayed over) and still kept well below the £80 budget.

Today was Aldi £24 and Lidl £10 after round ups. Hope to stay spend free for the rest of the week save unless we need emergency milk etc.

So Jan W2 £34/£80 MTD £80/£320

sarahj1986

sarahj1986 said:

sarahj1986 said:

sarahj1986 said:

sarahj1986 said:

sarahj1986 said:

Good evening 

I’m starting this again. Things have been all over the place! Moved home in August, daughter started school in September and our son was born in October. I’ve let things slide and honestly when I look at my bank transactions I’m disgusted in our food shop spending. We have a holiday booked for August, we need to cut back in order to pay for that 

As I have a newborn, he is breastfed but his nappies, wipes plus all our toiletries, household cleaning are included on this budget. We start giving him solids in April. 

Factoring all that in I’m going for £360 a month, ideally less but I think around £80 a week is right, some weeks will be more, others less. I’m determined to do it 

so @elsiepac I’m down for £360 per month 

First spend today 

£13.52 spent 

made up of the following 

£2.25 in Poundland on Barney and Party rings, neither on CC so cheapest in there

£4,90 on toothpaste and a new toothbrush for my daughter. I always let her pick her toothbrush and the toothpaste for her is safe price as Tesco and the sensitive toothpaste is cheaper there than Tesco 

£6.37 M&S. I find their beans are the nicest, 50p a tin but still decent price, plus bread and milk (same price as Tesco) and some tea cakes I found reduced to 92p a pack 

£346.58 left big shop due tomorrow 

£73.43 spent

£12.69 in Morrisons. My daughter loves the weetabix melts, only place I can find them locally. They aren’t cheap either £3 for a small box. Plus I’d forgotten to order honey, soy and cornflour 

£60.74 Tesco delivery due shortly. My husband is doing dry January so about £15 of that is a few packs of 0% beer for him that will last a few weeks. Plus nappies, wipes, some household items, 

£273.15 left 

£11.70 spent 

£5 at a cafe that does a kinda “cake and savoury” sale every day. So we got 4 items for £5

£3 in Poundland on Skinny bars usually £1.25 everywhere else

£3.70 in Tesco on reduced sausages 

£261.45 left but we dont need a massive shop next week as we’ve got loads in - don’t need crisps, snacks, toiletries, cleaning stuff, toilet roll. We will need fresh things like fruit, veg, milk. We have a lot of frozen meat/fish so should be ok there. 

£49.35 spent

I went over to Lidl for a change. I picked up a few bits not on the list but reduced/on offer and will get used. We will only need milk and maybe bread till next week and potatoes as I couldn’t carry them home (although I only need to carry thrm
over the road) 

£212.10 left 

£5.36 spent 

unexpected of sorts. I pop into M&S often because they can have decent reductions. I got 2 nice pizzas and 2x6 potato skins for £5.36 which is good for M&S. I don’t even think Lidl would be that cheap for what I got. That’s an easy freezer meal one night 

£206.74 left 

purplefran

I finally found some Seville oranges in my local farm shop yesterday and they were cheaper per kilo than Sainsbury’s, so that was a bonus! I popped into Tesco to pick up a prescription and they had Richmond 8 pack of thick sausages reduced to £1 and plant chef nuggets reduced to £1.04 so picked up some for me and OH to freeze and spent another £5.06.

London_1

Good morning chums ,bit of a frosty one this morning Brr. I survived Dobbies unscathed yesterday ,very little in the way of reductions in the W8rose outlet there.Even the reductions have gone up.One lady was looking at the reduced stuff and said goodness even reduced they are still pricy I look ,didn't see anything I wanted so walked away so I am still on  9/10 NSDs for January. 

My slow cooked Chicken Tikka was nice, and I managed 5 takeaway sized portions cooked, cooled and frozen so plenty of easy meals in the freezer. I used the last hour before decanting it to chuck a tin of new potatoes in as well to bulk it out a bit and use up a tin from my tinned stocks

I shall reorganise the freezer stocks today and stash all the freezer meals in one basket and list what I have left and what I can cook with it. I'm pretty sure I have enough in there for the rest of this month at least.

Which means it will only be a minimal shop this month At the moment on my shopping list I have butter, cheese,a light bulb, squirty cream, and maybe a loaf of brown bread.  Not really much of a list as yet, plus some vegetables, depending on prices I like to get what's in season, maybe a savoy cabbage, and a cauliflower and some swede.But I have enough at the moment to see me until next Monday as nothing on the list is urgent at the moment.:)

I'm meeting eldest DD at lunchtime as she has found someone for my electric typewriter and its going to aa good home of a small charity so I'm pleased about that as its never been used and I didn't want it to go to the tip.

Right time for some more coffee to keep me warm

Have a good frugally day chums and keep wrapped up as It's pretty nippy here in Kent at the moment

  JackieO xx 

SausageDogSandwich

Morning all, hope everyone is well. Just popping by to say my total so far is £120.19/300 spent. This has been a tesc delivery on 29th dec and 7th jan then husband spending on “healthy snacks”. I’ll have to get a few bits at the end of the week like fruit and salad but hoping that’s all until delivery on Tuesday from sains. 

elsiepac

Budgets updated to here

Finally caught up lol - I previously did that amazing thing I've done before where I leave the budget comment unsaved and then the computer reboots for updates and I lose an hours work! Saved now, I promise!

Lovely to see all the new and returning faces!

My budget is always £300 a month which includes my bulk buys - I have a massive indulgence included in there which is my coffee, about £35 a month.  I don't drink alcohol so I justify it that way haha.

So far I'm doing ok - just took a peek and my bulk buys were £61.46 total, and I've done 4 trips to the shops since 28 December when my budget started, but they were literally 28th, 29th and 31st Dec, and then the 2nd was just for some chillies and Allspice so just a top up.  On those 4 shops I've spent £97.04. I do still have things in from them that need using very imminently now - pushing the boundaries of "fresh" veg lol, but realistically I could last until the weekend before necessity kicks in. I will use the last of my fruit today though and I am out of bread and baked beans, so I *may* do a little top up tonight.

I've started back at SW and so I'm really focussing on that rather than budgeting, however it seems to be falling into place rather nicely!

£158.50 / £300 - 3 weeks to go

GolfR

Morning all. Called into Tesco after the school run for bread and found the loaf my son likes YS’d from £1.65 to £1.14 so that went straight into my trolley! I went through my asda delivery this morning to see what is cheaper at Tesco so I bought those and knocked them off my asda order and also means I can push that back to Sunday as originally planned. I spotted a £1 off £6 coupon on my Tesco app for laundry detergent and I was needing that soon so I got two 1.8l bottles of tesco brand. I use white vinegar as softener which I have plenty of so I’ll be fine for a good six months there at least. I also got some YS cherry tomatoes for 67p and a 59p avocado.

When I read this thread before joining I noticed someone saying they made their own kefir and this intrigued me as store bought kefir is so expensive but I do like it and its benefits. I’m still educating myself on it but I know I need organic whole milk and luckily I found a YS 4pt there for 82p down from £2 so I put that in the freezer ready for the time I start.

On a non grocery topic, my Emma budgeting app was due to be paid for at the end of the month so I cancelled that saving myself £23 a year and instead I started it in a blank notebook that I already had. Also cancelled Netflix saving myself £8 a month

Current monthly total £122.66/£300.

JingsMyBucket

Hi all, this thread is moving so quickly! We've had a few purchases since my last update. 

Final total of £49.73 for our Morrisons delivery last week. I ordered lamb stewing meat/bones and they tried to sub it with cubed lamb and I returned it to the driver. We restocked our paper towels which should last us another 6 months; yoghurt, stock cubes, a huge block of cheddar which I'll divvy into 3 and freeze 2 blocks, herbs, eggs, some grains for the pantry and other bits. Seriously not much for nearly £50. 

On Saturday we visited a butchery in a nearby town and spent £45.96. We got a 4 rib eye steaks (1kg) deal for £16. Those steaks look wonderful too. We also got a whole chicken, streaky bacon, Ayrshire bacon (both the back and streaky are attached into one big piece), potato scones, a scotch pie, big jar o' honey, and finally some lamb bones. They conferred with the head butcher on premises and he got to sawing up loads of ribs for me and I could see him at work. They ended up giving me about 3 – 4 kg of of meaty lamb bones for only £1.50! They were out of beef bones but they told me come back any time when most of the guys are in and they'll likely have some. 

The chicken was delicious and has already made several meals. I'm going to cook the bones and remaining meat bits into a soup tomorrow. 

£30.21 spent in M & S yesterday on pineapple spears, 2 bags of clementines, strawberries, bananas, lime, tomatoes, little gem lettuce, dinosaur kale (cavolo Nero to you lot), 3 for £8 deli items, milk, and some bread. 

£166.63 / £330 spent so far. £163.37 remaining 

I'm slowly assembling a Tesco order for the 21st and it should run about £80. That would leave me with about £80 to cover the other weeks. We should be fine as long as we keep our top ups to about £20 each.