January 2008 Grocery Challenge

carolt2

honeybe21 wrote: »

does anybody know how i can make cous cous lemon and corriander flavour i buy the cheap asda sachet packets and love them but not sure if it wud be cheaper to make my own???

hi Honeybe,

I would try grating some lemon zest into cous cous, add the stock/water and leave to absorb. You could add extra fresh lemon juice but it might make it abit too tangy.Then fork through to break up the granules add some fresh chopped corriander.

Not sure how much you pay for packets but you could make it in bulk and freeze into portions, will even the cost out.

carolt2

Well i have been lurking on this thread for a while now.
Thought I better start contributing as a thank for all advice given on here so far. It's a inspiring thread on how to save money on shopping as well as extra tips on how to stretch food out.;)

I'm a chef by trade and usually the last thing i think about when i get home is more cooking... but am making an extra effort. I know its late but i would like to join this challenge.
I have kept all reciepts and added them up. Ths figure is displayed on my whiteboard on the fridge to remind me
Grocery budget to cover all food,cleaning,pet food etc is £200 for this month.
Total Spend this month £122.73:eek:

scotrae

Hello Folks.

I've just updated the signature. We had to get more milk yesterday (kiddies wanted milkshake to go with the home-baed hobnobs, which proved a massive hit). DH was passing the farm shop on his way to his office, so I asked him to check on the price of the local dairy's milk - and found that it was 15p cheaper than Lidl for the 4-pinter. Result! I also asked him to investigate the price of a sack of spuds, which was £5, so we bought those too.

Obviously we've found it hard to stick to budget this week but for a family of four our budget was very ambitious, particularly as it was around 25% of our average spend lately. But we got lots of things this week that will last us through, like the bread and the potatoes.

DH isn't always 'on message' and did sneak a bag of the big crisps from Tesco the other day ... albeit on his card. But he applied to switch his cc through MSE yesterday and has arranged to sell his old phone to Mopay, which was paying £39 instead of the £20 or so that he'd have got on ebay. So the MSE ethic is rubbing off and making an impact in this house! I even managed to get a sample of Jelly Belly Beans via the Freebies forum and have reserved some of the 3 games for £3.49 from Argos for the year's birthday parties.

Has anyone made my OH's meatballs yet? Let us know what you thought!

In_Search_Of_Me

More thinking done & I've come o a compromise - veg wont be organic. I have an alloment & have been known in moments of frustration to get the weed killer out so its obviously not as important to me as I thought! Going for a no spender today although will look for wine making equipment online. Worked out that its half the price of shop brought, althoguh you do have the set up costs, but I quite enjyed making my first batch of merlot yesterday and am reliably informed that you can make wine out of almost anything which is great as allotmenteers always have a glut or sommat! Off to investigate!
A ps...re the meat thing...while putting the world to rights at the plot yesterday all of us cast our mind back to when we were growing up and meat was a treat, not an every day occurence! How often do people now have a basic supper of a boiled egg & toast these days? My grannys fave meal was beans she'd just picked from the garden with butter & black pepper, no doubt washed down with a G&T!!

orchid-96

Spent another £11.24 in Aldi yesterday instead of the fiver I thought it would be, however I hadn't really thought it through as I did need to get a couple of loaves of bread (I get their White Gold one at 69p which I think is good and it fits nicely in my toaster!!) and also we needed Lemonade (which is also cheaper there so I had not got it from Tesco)

The only 'treats' were a pack of 4 breaded camembert (as a treat to have a starter before our steak) also ds had 2 of them for his tea so it did feed him as well...and a pack of ice creams in wafers (pester power)..

The freezer bags were good value and although they had sold out of most of the veg I got a frozen pack of peas/beans which was really nice, also picked up a pack of salad pots and pears which were 39p each, I think they now have 6 fnv for sale at 39p which is good.....anyone got any good recipes with pears? they are a bit hard at the moment, but I would love to do a pudding of some sort with them that I could freeze...

Have a good Sunday all, hopefully a nsd for me today..

singlemum_4

Morning all, just to update went out with girls last night and spent £9 :mad:
will just have to be really,really good next week!!! Anyway off to make some bread and soup.Just found a receipe for leek, potato and stilton soup that Im going to try (still have loads of cheese in fridge)Have updated my sig:eek: hope Im gonna make the month!!

rigsby1967

I would like to join in the Jan grocery challenge but can someone point me in the right direction on how to do those cig things at the bottom of the posting.
Thanks
rigs.

brummiebabe

Spent £106.67 so far this week, but did do a big shop - which included contact lens solutions/nappies etc. Just over a week until payday & still have £99.54 left:T :T

FunBrum

Morning folks.

Will be putting another £30 into the 'gravy boat' today, as Sundays are our day for putting away the money for the forthcoming weeks food bill.

We've been quite good so far, but that probably is due to us feeding off the freezer and cupboards for a few weeks. Then, just topping up on essentials. Still, the extra pounds left over will be added to a freezer shop to stock up yet again.:j Hope that makes sense?

natzini

Hello all!
Didn't spend on food yesterday as my parents fed us for lunch and tea, which is great! Am going to stick the gloves on in a bit and sort the freezer out, with the radio on and a cuppa or two to keep me going! Then I'll menu plan-hopefully I'll only need to stock up on a chicken, bacon, milk and eggs next weekend, maybe something salad wise as that's one of my only ways to get OH to have his 5 a day, haha. I think that we should be able to get through the month on target, just need to stick to the menu plan and not give OH the run of the kitchen-I'll serve up the food and that's what he's having! He always said that he'd do the cooking when we moved in together, but that soon changed when he saw that I wanted to spend a certain amount per week and even since then I've cut it by £10 a week!! I need to make a list of the storecupboard stuff I need to buy at the start of the next month... if I don't have it this month and it's not essential, we won't get it!