June 2025 Grocery Challenge

Nelliegrace

Grocery Budget for June £150.

Shopping for the week on the way home after a lovely afternoon at David Austin Roses.

I was going to buy soft cheese, but when did manufacturers start adulterating it with the citrus fibre, a waste product of the citrus juicing process? What if the labelling laws insisted on the word ADULTERATED in bold, red letters when a the food, drink and tobacco industry have added stuff to food to increase profits. I won’t buy chocolate with added soya lecithin, or sausages with bamboo fibre.

It is an old problem, the Victorians tried to improve standards by An Act for Preventing the Adulteration of Articles of Food and Drink, (6th August 1860.) Now tiny letters on the back of a packet seem to make extra ingredients legal.

I bought Mascarpone, and shall freeze some portions because it goes off quickly once it is opened. The lid is just foil now.

£19.41 spent.

Total Spent £44.89

JingsMyBucket

Evening, grocery folk! Tesco sent the receipt for the delivery coming tonight. It came to £105.27 and covered a lot of bulk items that I can only get at Tesco. I’m planning to stay away from there for the remainder of the month and only shop in M & S and Lidl until the end. 

The order covers the usual vast quantities of various yoghurts, 48 rolls of toilet paper (2 packs £11), herbs, butter, milk, 1kg pork shoulder steaks (I won’t have to lug these from Lidl), sausages and bacon, smoked salmon, Boursin cheese (on sale!), 2 packs of sliced ham, 2 rolls of shortcrust pastry, mushrooms, onions, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, frozen spinach and cubed butternut squash, frozen fish fingers, ice cream cones, frozen croissants, frozen waffles, canned peaches & pears, granola, bananas and oranges, bouillon powder, some other treats, bleach, and HG mould spray. 

The only things we may need this coming week would be eggs, berries, and coffee, I think. The garden’s raised beds have started producing salad leaves and I think carrots are coming up next. I’ll check with Mr. Jings as that’s his domain. 

I need to do some stocktaking and meal planning to get my head around using our resources the rest of the month. 

£243.04 / £325 spent. £81.96 total remaining.  

K9sandFelines

Just used a £10 off code to buy some things from Just Eat. This voucher is only applicable at S@insbury's; so I've  tried to keep it the best value as possible. I'd go out to Aldi, but my ankles and knees have swollen up, so trying to keep off my feet as much as possible. As I have no other means to get stuff; this seemed like the best option and it's nigh on the same price when all added up, as i just did a rough check on Aldi.co.uk
After this, I am going to try and only use The Bread and Butter thing and Heron. Unless it's something like soya milk, which is cheapest at Aldi or Tesco. 

These are today's spends : 

Edited to say, sweet potatoes were out of stock; so they part refunded some of the service charge and item amount

goldfinches

Afternoon all and I hope the weather is as nice for you as it is here today; positively postcard perfect blue sky with fluffy white clouds and golden sunshine.

I have two occasions of temptation to confess to today and thankyou to @LadyWithAPlan for your kind words about my falling so frequently, much appreciated.

First I went to Sainby's where the bulk fund bought 4x Mutti chopped tomatoes (Nectar Price £1) and 3x Gold Blend Intense (Nectar Price £6.75) which I notice has been reduced from 200g to 190g in the jar very quietly but was still better value per 100g than the refill pouches. I also bought fresh tomatoes and ys mushrooms for £1.78.
Then I went to Waitflower to buy Fairy non-bio powder after spending ages comparing prices online because each of the supermarkets seems to stock a different sized box which I assume is to make it difficult to do direct price comparisons! I also bought red and green chicory and spent £12.40 in total.

That makes my new GC total £94.66/£150 which is rather a long way ahead of where I ought to be so I'll have to be a bit creative about the menu this week.
The Bulk Buy Fund now stands at £73.23.

I need to buy some lettuce and a cucumber as well as a small amount of Roquefort for the chicory salad and will need more milk tomorrow but otherwise I hope that's it for the week. Excitingly my salad leaves on my allotment are going great guns and will soon be large enough to start picking which should reduce the ongoing costs somewhat.

My meal plan this week is to bake some bread, make hummus, make coleslaw with vinaigrette, make marinated tofu skewers to go under the grill, make a carrot and red lentil dip and a white bean and garlic dip and have all those in various combinations with salads for lunch and dinner. Breakfast is always fruit and yoghurt and at the moment I am eating the gooseberries and a few early raspberries from my allotment.

For baking this week I'm wondering about these chocolate chip cookies, Surina Seghal's No-bake Dark Chocolate and Nut Tart or Nigella's Bitter Orange no-churn ice cream made with the Coconut Collab Vegan Cream I bought the other day and using up the ys oranges and limes I have.

t14cy_t

£77/£33 oops. luckily olio is helping tremendously!! another collecion yesterday!!

themsthebreaks

I have an Asda delivery arriving today, with a spend of £88.86, so my total for the month now, is £204.89/400.00. Half way through the month, and I am very pleased with this 😊 A lot has been achieved by using up what’s already in the food cupboards. As that dwindles, we will spend more on our monthly groceries, but for now, I’m happy with our efforts to keep costs down 😊

Suffolk_lass

Gosh, the price of chopped tinned tomatoes has taken me by surprise. I last bought them when I could get them for 33p a tin (440g). I have been making my own for the last (probably) three years, and bottling it and have run out after last year's poor harvest here. Even the Morries OB are 45p on special offer in packs of four

TravelCrystal

Good morning guys 
Just a few things to mention.
@Suffolk_lass I was amazed how the tomatoes had gone up. I bought 6 at farm foods the other day, can’t remember how much they were but cheaper than Lidl’s

We are lucky now a few things are ready to pick in the garden. We have had a really good crop of strawberries, sugar snap peas and lettuce which I have to keep picking. Hopefully later on some cherry tomatoes. Broad beans should be ready from next week onwards. A bit of advice please? Is it best to blanch then freeze or can I just throw them straight in. Thanks in advance.

Went to Lidl on Saturday, first shop this month so had a free cake. 😊
Bought 2 lots of frozen fruit, eggs, veg, yoghurt (on offer on my app) 
Bleach, milk, coffee, cereal (as feeling a bit lazy)
Tartare sauce, baked beans, ketchup and both chicken and beef gravy granules. Mushrooms, margarine, fresh fruit and vegetables.
£29.63  spent 
Fingers crossed I can stay within budget.
We have guests at the weekend but apart from buying a lemon or lime for my fruit Charlotte/Betty and milk, shouldn’t need anything for a while.

I hope everyone is enjoying the sunshine.

Total so far this month £367.22/£400

T.C

Soontobeoap

£3.50 spent on basics in Aldi yesterday. We are looking a bit bare in the freezer and deidge now. Quite a few heavy meals in there roasts etc. had beef yesterday and making up pies and pasties today with leftovers but we are fancying lighter meals. Hoping to keep away from the big supermarkets for a while longer though. Shopping from stores has been fun but I am beginning to get a bit wobbly about not having any stores behind me.
Having said that the freezer is still half ill so is the tin cupboard and the baking cupboard is still looking good. It's the fridge that gets so empty. I see a beans on toast meal coming up one day this week!

Suffolk_lass

TravelCrystal said:

We are lucky now a few things are ready to pick in the garden. We have had a really good crop of strawberries, sugar snap peas and lettuce which I have to keep picking. Hopefully later on some cherry tomatoes. Broad beans should be ready from next week onwards. A bit of advice please? Is it best to blanch then freeze or can I just throw them straight in. Thanks in advance.

When I freeze broad beans I peel the outer skin of each bean and freeze them raw. I think it's a cheffy leftover to use them peeled, but it does mean there is no need to blanch them before freezing as you are losing anything potentially tough.
Us too in the garden with mizuma, pak choi and lettuce threatening to go to seed, gooseberries and blackcurrants are ripening, garlic drying, radishes and cos lettuces going mad!

It'll be a while before my tomatoes ripen this year!