September 2024 Grocery Challenge

thriftwizard

£58.38 spent over the last couple of days, on a small top-up of non-perishables from L!dls and a couple of essentials from W8rose. There will be more spent tomorrow & Friday, but this should be a much quieter & cheaper weekend than the last few have been! (Although it's entirely possible that DS2 & family will appear at some stage...) There have been a few treats bought for OH, who is struggling a bit to get his head around what might have happened, but - why not?!

Luckily there's a fair bit of produce coming in from the allotment; although it's only a half-plot - actually a quarter by national standards - proximity means I can put a lot more time in up there & look after it a lot better. So beans - runner and French - courgettes & pattypans, beetroot, assorted tomatoes & aubergines are all keeping us going, with squashes fattening up, kale & Asturian tree cabbages putting on some serious growth now & leeks beginning to look a bit bigger than the surrounding grass! I will also have a fair amount of tomatillos to make a fermented salsa with. The transplanted rhubarb is doing well & will be cropping next spring & my neighbour, the site manager, has said I can help myself to their blackberries. The greenhouse, although pretty decrepit, is an absolute delight; our garden is very shady so I've never really had much success with tomatoes (or any success at all with aubergines) before and I'm thrilled with how well they've done, and are still doing, up there. It's my first year there so there wont be a lot to preserve or freeze, but there will be fresh leaves & leeks at least over winter & more to look forward to in spring.

crazybunnylady4

evening all.

just popping in to declare £88.38 spent on a home delivery from Mr T (arrived yesterday). 

Also lunch/coffee/takeout wise I have managed to spend £80.41 in the first 4 days of September! £34.21 of this is takeaway. I really need to stop myself and get into the habit of cooking more - but then I have had 5 shifts in a row Saturday through Wednesday and have been absolutely exhausted on arriving home.  Plus Mum has not been well so looking after her means no energy for anything else. 

So overall £88.38/£400 and £80.41/£220. 

Empty_Purse

Hello! New poster here. I’d love to give this challenge a go, starting this month with seeing if I can actually stick to a budget (!) and then gradually cutting back in future months. Could you put me down for £200, please?  Budget is for one person and includes food, supermarket delivery costs (I don’t have a car) and milkman.  I’m used to buying whatever I fancy and is convenient, without meal planning, so I think the first couple of months are going to be quite tough ….

LotsOfTea

I'm going to try and avoid big shops this month and just buy what I need when I need it. I'm near shops because of work 2 days a week so I can pick up anything we need (as long as it's not too heavy!) and not end up buying too much to make an internet shop "worthwhile". 

With that in mind I spent £20.07 in total today topping up veg and bread supplies. The only things I bought that weren't on my list were a jar of olives which I fancied and some chocolate to make some tiffin-type squares which I'm pretty sure I've got all the other ingredients for. 

I'm really trying to use up stores from the freezer and cupboards this month as there's too much stuff that's been in there far too long so hopefully that will help the budget. 

£20.07/£250

LadyWithAPlan

Sorry late in to post

Sept £180 + £20 bulk please can I add?

Was away a lot in Aug so £166.50 and no bulk .

So far  £32.47 spent  in Sept and I am  also aiming to eat the freezer down a I can hardly see what is in there. Pulled out a YS pork joint from freezer  so that is still going 2 days on. It had been in there since May so time to get these stores eaten down.
I paired it with beans (refried  and black eyes fried in soices with fresh herbs), guac, salsa, lots of greens inc Kale and cucumber. 

I had gone down to £140/£150 but I am deliberately eating more pulses as on second week of the 4 hr body nutrition plan and loving it so far. So it may shift my  food budget. It is limiting my junk spend already.

My easiest local shop is now Morries - which I walk past after the gym -  I do have a local aldi but its 15 min walk in a busy area I try to avoid so.

@EmptyPurse I have found as a single person this thread to be v helpful and learnt loads from more experienced food budgeters on here. so good luck!

t14cy_t

please can you put me down for £100 for september? this is for 2 adults, 1 large dog, 15 chickens and a rooster!!  £25 spent this week on dog food and a few bits. freezer is groaning. i do use olio when i can too.

thriftwizard

Ooooer - £85.60 spent over the last couple of days, between the butcher, W8rose & the market, including the fishmonger. More than I would like; I'm almost halfway through the money and only 6 days into the month! That said, we really shouldn't need anything now until next Thursday/Friday, fingers crossed, and stocks are high in the freezer & store-cupboard. 

otb666

266/550 just over 2 weeks left and still picking loads of blackberries such a good year for it.  I will most probably be away for last 2 weeks So the other 2 adults left in house will most probably destroy my budget but cant be helped as family needs my help with newest grandchild. I know its a bit off topic but did a SAR request for HMRC to see if I had any missing pensions Which I have just received and confirmed I did not as there was a 5 year cut off and I only stayed in jobs for 3 years on average. But good to see I did it via this link that pension board gave me https://www.tax.service.gov.uk/shortforms/form/DPU_SAR_NI?_ga=2.230026460.1544670040.1621021753-1315656139.1609178084

carboot_karaoke

Evening all, what a busy week!! with kids returning to school.

I've got lots of spends to declare but for ease I'll give you the total figure

New Total 
£165.56/£600

Some of this shopping has come from an Aldi l don't normally use, twice this week I've gone in at about 11am-12 ish and there has been loads of reduced meat.
I resisted getting carried away, as the freezer is already quite full, but I'm definitely going to pop in next week to see if its always like this, l brought multiple packets of 750g 5% fat mince beef @ £2.49, 12 meatballs @ £1.50, 1kg Chicken drumsticks @ £99p . Just seasoned 2kg of the chicken ready to make a curry next week.

To try and keep on track I've also drawn up a months food plan and thanks to all the reduced meat l don't think ill have a lot more to buy to see us through to the end of the month.

The only thing that might de rail me is kids school dinners. I've put £10 onto my child's account as emergency occasional treat money. So far only £1.40 has been spent, but some of my friends told me they pay £25 a week for one child   

Brie

Not posting my shopping budget* but just wanted to share something I discovered yesterday (also posted on the decluttering board!!)

My OH decided when we were out wandering about Lidl (as you do) that we should have "that boxed taco thing that we have in the cupboard".  So we bought some chicken thighs as we know that's the only thing that we need to add. 

Got home and went to prep things and I saw that the box had BBD of November 2023.  Oops!  Decided that it didn't need to be an issue so opened up the pack.  Inside as usual there was the pack of spice mix, bottle of salsa and a pack of tortillas.  And it was only the tortillas that were out of date.  And as luck would have it I had some tortillas bought a few days earlier. 

Now the tortillas looked ok (not green or anything) so I opened them up and peeled off the two outer ones which looked a bit stale.  And the rest looked fine.  Long story short - we ate the rest of the tortillas and are still alive.  So don't be too quick to chuck something like this - even if the tortillas weren't edible the rest was well within BBDs so could be used for something.  

Have a great MSE Grocery month!!

*I confess I don't know how much we spend each month on food other than it's a lot.  And I can't try to start budgeting this month as I'm away and will be stocking up on foreign stuff that I can't buy in the UK.  Mostly things I shouldn't be eating like Fudgeos and butter tarts.