November 2025 Grocery Challenge

itsthelittlethings

69p spring onions, 9.36 Asda, cheese for lunches, cheese for macaroni cheese, kombucha.

£85.16/£250.

Quite a lot spend this weekend but have filled the freezer with batch cooking for the month.

Quantaqa

Hello @JingsMyBucket, thank you for taking over rhe running of the thread from this month. Huge thanks to @elsiepac for running the thread for the past few years.

I've been away from the forum for a few months due to health issues but I'm wanting to dip my toe back in and take part in the challenge this month.  

Please put me down for £180 for November.

My month runs from 25th to 25th and budget includes food, cleaning and laundry bits.

CoffeeSonata

Please put me down for £350 a month 

@JingsMyBucket thanks so much for taking over the thread and to @elsiepac for running it for so long! 

I'm rejoining again, after a long break from the challenge, not from budgeting but in some months even from keeping a close eye on it, and things becoming quite difficult. 
This may not be that challenging at £350, but things & my brain are somewhat awol and crazy so trying to be realistic whilst getting into the swing again and seeing what is possible at the moment and reduce gradually. 

This is for 2 adults food, and fresh food/top up for 2 x hungry cats.  
Generally cleaning comes out of another budget in bulk as does cat food/litter. However, any top ups of those comes from groceries, as does fresh food for cats (so chicken, fish).

Eating out will have to come from food budget if it's happening beacuse it's can't cook/won't cook.
Partner is buying work lunches at supermarkets a lot and that is coming out of their own money. 
However, the aim is to get organisation back that it's less likely they want to /need to go find lunch, and it's coming from home and out the normal food budget. 


£350 is what I absolutely CANNOT go over. 
Realistically with Christmas and brithdays all happening in my family Nov-Feb I need to save as much as I can and spend as little as I can with current energy levels.

I'd like to spend closer to £300 but we'll see. Most my problem grocery shopping and batch cooking/planning  is energy, random days being hit with pain/migraines knocking out planning and food making, and motivation/brain capacity to actually organise.  

Any lunch ideas that could be made in batch or mostly prepped for a few days at a time,  for someone who does not really like sandwiches, and has about 20 minutes to eat it which includes being able to heat up anything needed and eat welcome.

  (Partner does eat sandwiches, just maybe once a week max. Likes wraps a little more though. Things like rice/fried rice/noodles currently work reasonably well too but still need more interesting  ideas! )

PipneyJane

@CoffeeSonata sounds like you have a lot on your plate.

Re suggestions for lunches, I’m assuming your partner has access to a microwave, yes?  There are only two of us, too, so you might want to do what we do, which is cook 4-portion dinners and fill two lunchboxes while dishing up dinner.  (It also helps with portion control.).  We use Lock-n-Lock boxes, which are watertight, freezer and microwave safe.  To reheat, remove the lid and zap for two minutes.  

I’ll freeze any excess portions, for the days after we have something that doesn’t give leftovers.  Frozen lunchboxes get defrosted overnight before work, so that they don’t take too long to zap at lunchtime.

HTH

- Pip

Nelliegrace

Thank you @JingsMyBucket.The grocery challenge makes me more aware of my excessive shopping and hoarding habits. 

30 days hath November, so at £5 a day, £150 for groceries for the two of us. 

The small freezer is full with meat, fish, some cheese and butter. The pantry is well stocked. The hens gave us 10 eggs last week. We have a lot of apples stored. DH makes all of our bread in the breadmaker, and makes our daily glass of kefir. 

mandco

Thanks for taking over the thread @JingsMyBucket

£800 again for nov please. 

Freezer is pretty much full though it’s lots of odds & ends/random stuff and needs running down to make space for Xmas so going to try and meal plan around what in there and come in closer to £700 - any savings this month will roll over to dec to help with the extra Xmas food costs '

Suffolk_lass

Thanks Jings and well done for stepping up - feel free to modify the links at the front over time, some of which is  old but food, others of which need a little overhaul.

Over here, we've agreed to make do for the rest of the month and we both want to lose another lump off our waistlines, so smaller plates, and eating what we have in are the order of the day. This means my end of October spend for the year so far is £2386.32 out of my £3000 annual budget which is 79.54%. 20% over two months should work but one of those includes Chrimbo. [blue shrieky emoji!]

We will aim to stay under £250 for November, in order to have a bit more in there for Christmas. 

LotsOfTea

Thanks for taking over running the thread @JingsMyBucket. 

I'm going to go for £300 again this month please for 2 adults and a teen. 

I'm hoping to come in well under budget this month as I really need to create some space in the freezer to cope with the festive season and so hopefully I won't be buying anywhere near as much. 

Soontobeoap

I have stocked up on nectar price lamb and pork ( half price) already. I Went to find the chickens that  were a half price nectar offer but couldn't find them last week. Can someone give me the heads up if they see another chicken or a beef offer as well as gammon. I think it has happened in November the last couple of years. Thank you. All of the half price roasting joints will set me up not only with roasts but pies, stews, meat noodles, rice and pasta and plenty of cold meat too . We are away for Christmas and for January and the first week in Feb so along with a bit of fish and some mince and bacon I am hoping that the joints will see us through the winter months.

Only £50 left in this year's budget ( which obviously isn't going to happen) so I am hoping with 5 weeks out next year I will be able to stick to the same budget as this year.

JingsMyBucket

Budgets updated to here! You're welcome everybody and a big thanks to @elsiepac who's been carrying the flag for 10 years now!

I'm still trying to decide what our budget for November will be...