April 2025 Grocery Challenge

GSDMum

First my excuses.... or.... things I hadn't accounted for: Easter, transitioning from winter warmer meals to lighter summer meals, filling up on staples that's run down. On hindsight my budget of £300 should have been a lot higher this month. 

Had a Tesco delivery today @ £90.04, plus last weeks over-budget of £42.22, my reconning means I'm now over-budget by £132.26. I was over in March too so I started this month on 28th March with a £140+ Tesco shop. I could analyse 'why' in more detail, but I'll not bore everyone 

Going forward, plan NOT to have another Tesco delivery until June , Aldi/Lidl shop really does keep my weekly spending down. I've enough heavy stuff, and favourite dog treats from Tesco to last us till June, so no excuses.

TravelCrystal

Many thanks again @goldfinches for the additional recipes. I will pass them on. Love a gingerbread cake 😊

Just been to Lidl’s to spend my £5 voucher and take advantage of the veg offers.
What an expensive shop it is 🤣🤣

3 x Greek yogurt
15 free range eggs, bread flour, milk, crème fraiche, mascarpone, 3 sweet peppers. Normal price potatoes, cauliflower, sweet potatoes and leeks.
2 x baked beans. I unwaxed lemons and bananas.
Offer veg, 2 x spring onions, carrots, parsnips and green beans.
Shopping pretty much accounted for this month £16.37 🤭

Total so far this month £137.97/£250

Have a good Easter everyone 

T.C

remmie

Well, I have blown the budget, as I guessed I would. Running at £323.68 at present.

I bought 2 legs of lamb and a beef joint, and lots of bargain veg, so I hope to have plenty to feed us in May. The beef will be cut up onto steaks and some diced for pies and casseroles. The lamb is being cooked and will be frozen sliced, with any scrappy bits used for shepherd pies.

£323.68/£300

goldfinches

TravelCrystal said:

Many thanks again @goldfinches for the additional recipes. I will pass them on. Love a gingerbread cake 😊

Just been to Lidl’s to spend my £5 voucher and take advantage of the veg offers.
What an expensive shop it is 🤣🤣

3 x Greek yogurt
15 free range eggs, bread flour, milk, crème fraiche, mascarpone, 3 sweet peppers. Normal price potatoes, cauliflower, sweet potatoes and leeks.
2 x baked beans. I unwaxed lemons and bananas.
Offer veg, 2 x spring onions, carrots, parsnips and green beans.
Shopping pretty much accounted for this month £16.37 🤭

Total so far this month £137.97/£250

Have a good Easter everyone 

T.C

PS You're welcome. I meant to say that for Nigella's luscious vegan gingerbread I use Doves Farm Freee plain flour which works very well there and the end result freezes beautifully too. 

JingsMyBucket

Howdy, here’s an update before I lose track of all these receipts. Our friends are here and this is most outdoorsy I’ve been in a while. 😂

£39.65 at M & S on Sunday morning for visiting friends: salads, bananas, strawberries, clementines, salad dressing, family size macaroni cheese, bread, butter, yoghurts, jam, eggs, etc. 

£23.94 at M & S that same trip for us: 1L olive oil, ready meals, and some other items I can’t remember. 

£30.51 at Tesco on Monday evening for some stock ups. 

£18.42 at a farm shop on Tuesday for local cheese, local ham, 2 packs of crisp bread, and a bag of local granola. 

£21.47 yesterday at M & S for some dinner food for Mr. Jings and myself. Bananas, clementines, a chicken curry ready meal, a daal, 2 packs of YS shrimp dumplings, spinach ravioli ready meal, and a pack of YS cheese scones. 

£12.50 at Iceland for a half price lamb leg. 

Our budget: £297.61 / £400 spent. £102.39 total remaining.  

Visiting Friends budget: £109.40 / £100 spent. £9.40 overspent  

We’re heading to Edinburgh tomorrow morning and Mr. Jings and I will spend Friday night there, checking out Saturday afternoon. We’ll leave our friends to the rest of their trip for the next couple of days. I can’t wait to get back to our routines and back to saving our money on food for a bit. It’s been expensive eating out but wonderful to see our friends. They’re loving Scotland. 🙂

t14cy_t

hoping olio comes up trumps later tonight. xx

otb666

500/600  I am on tract as only one shop required before my month end I go from 23rd to 23rd.  We have visitors on sunday/monday and I have not bought extra as was not sure if they were coming. Rather than rush out and do a mad shop I have decided to give £20 instead of 3 eggs and I will use macdonalds or dominoes for food. 

Quantaqa

Hi All, once again I have been rubbish and posting my shops as they happen.  Payday is on Thursday for me and I have £20 left unitl our new month starts.  Food plan done up to next week and there is enough in the house to make meals until after payday.  Some of that £20 will be spent on soft cheese/double cream to make a Choc Orange cheesecake to take to my sisters for Easter dinner.  I already have the Choc orange and other ingredients.  My two nieces are coming on Saturday to help make it .

Dinner for the next few days:
Friday - Pasta arabiatta with garlic bread
Saturday - Pie, beans and HM chips
Sunday - Meal with family
Monday - Chicken curry
Tuesday and Wed - HM Lasagne
Thursday - Soup and Pudding (TBC)

Doom_and_Gloom

Doom_and_Gloom said:

£249.60/£240
£9.60 over budget.

I knew we would go over budget this month. However this is a little worse than I was expecting. Thankfully the Mr S delivery last night means we are very stocked up. OH will need more bread and milk to cover the month which will likely be another £5.50. Although he has beef to cook for sandwiches he now has no beef for stir fries, his favourite go to dinner. He likes to select his own joints so he'll be going to a Mr S hopefully on Friday for their half price joints. If he goes on Friday I'm hoping he can pick us up some cheap vegetables too. I'd estimate that to come to another £30  .

£47.79 spent since last post  .
L!dl = £7.65. Got some of the 8p and 15p veg; potatoes x2, carrots x3, a swede and green beans x2. Also got 2 bulbs of garlic and the OH picked up 2 packs of kabanossi and a 1 Litre carton of caramel macchiato.
Waitr*se = £3.60 on egg noodles and a 250g double Gloucester cheese block.
Mr S = £36.54 on two large beef joints and a meat feast pizza (these are great to have for days the OH would be tempted by a takeaway otherwise so well worth the spend in my mind). The saving was £34.81 on the joints. He cuts them into steaks to freeze so can use them as steaks, however if he does a stir fry he cuts them into strips or chunks so has choices this way. I can't be too mad at this spend as it will save money over all. Hopefully it will last until beef joints go on a good offer again or OH is able to pick up a good reduction again.

£297.39/£240.
£57.39 over budget. 

mandco

Can I join?
Not going to post a budget this month as want to see what my total spend is and what to aim for going forward. My month runs mid month - mid month
we do have some food allergies that bump the costs and makes it harder to make cut backs/savings but my shopping bill just seems to keep increasing and I really want to get it under control.

payday this week and I’m already at a absolutely shocking spend of £342.91      That said said it includes my monthly payday bigger shop so once I break it down it’s not actually too bad as it does include some bulk buys which will last more than the month and some unexpected/one off spends.
groceries( just food/drink) £142.48
household ( cleaning products toiletries medicines ect) £42.40 
easter (Easter eggs extra joints of meat & treats for 6 additional guests too) £60.37
pets £72.25 nearly £40 of this is 10 days worth of a specialist diet the cat has been put on this week following an emergency vet visit (bulk buying going forward will reduce this a bit) plus the dogs food was 1/3 off so picked up 2 months worth.
bits I picked up for dd till she gets paid at the end of the month £25.41.
£124.78 of that is spends outside of the usual taking my basic spend down to £218.13 which isn’t quite so bad though the pets spends is going to increase dramatically going forward due to her new diet.