October 2026 Grocery Challenge

TravelCrystal

Many thanks @JingsMyBucket for the new thread. Count me in please.
Still away on our little holiday and have spent more than I would like but should still be in budget.
Welcome @navelorange1, just had my Ocado delivery a few days ago, not everything is expensive, check out the prices against a supermarket if you have time. I do an order via their app then check off the cheaper items that are available to me in Lidl’s. Surprisingly some on Ocado are cheaper, and for us I like theirs and M and S fruit and vegetables quality, definitely lasts longer in our fridge.

Spent £93.46 on the last delivery which included bin bags, cheese, fruit and vegetables both frozen and fresh, duck breasts for Christmas, sausages, crème fraiche, mushrooms, mustard, Tom sauce, marmalade, muesli, granola, 2kg of chicken breast, bread flour, vegetable oil, washing up gloves, milk, pasta, eggs and crisps.

I also did a Lidl shop £27.66 using a £5 off voucher if you spent £30 which included frozen haddock, washing up liquid, cheese, pizza, rice, butter, granola, tuna, puff pastry, and condiments.

My next Ocado order is mid October where I have ordered a Christmas cake and pudding. One of my kind neighbours will be keeping it for me and has had strict instructions not to let me near the cake until just before Christmas as I can’t be trusted not to eat it sooner 🤭

Have a great rest of the weekend folks, off to lunch shortly with my son and partner, who live nearby our holiday cottage. Very lucky as we only see them a few times a year

T.C

mandco

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82149700#Comment_82149700

I have a list of Xmas essentials everything from household & store cupboards basics to sweet treats & buffet supplies then I try to buy a couple of bits off it each week looking out for any offers - 1/2 price, buy x get x free ect if there’s no offers ill pick something that generally doesn’t get offers on the aim is to have the bulk of the essentials covered by dec and while yes it bumps the budget a little now there far less to buy come December so there’s more spends for the extras needed and some luxuries plus I can roll over into January when moneys tighter with lower requirements.
cant remember when the main meat deals were last year - though pretty sure they started quite a while before Xmas as I brought some & froze them as back ups/additional roast and the dates were no where near Xmas.

I’m another who is also trying to build a small emergency situation essentials stash - realised while we’d be ok for a short time with what we have in if we couldn’t get out I don’t really have any no cooking required tins/packets in stock so need to rectify that and/or get a means of heating things as we’re all electric.I generally have a 6pk of water in but want to add to that as We had a couple of water outages lately due to burst pipes locally -it’s surprising how much water you actually get though

Picked up 3 x 4pk of j2o sparkling cans in my local sains express today to put away as they were reduced to clear @ £1.80 which is about 1/2 the usual price they are ideal for the kids and non drinkers over Xmas. Also picked up a couple of the 95p Cadburys choc bags for stocking/hamper fillers in Tesco express

merida88

Thanks for the new thread @JingsMyBucket !

Please can I go for £500 again?

It's a long month, we're having work done in the house so I can foresee convenience trumping cost at points, and I want to start stocking up for christmas… only four of us for the actual day but we'll have various bits of family in and out over the festive period, with all sorts of dietary concerns (mine included).

thriftwizard

Thank you for our new thread, @JingsMyBucket! I seem to be more on top of things now after the mad chaos of June, July & August; what with trading, demonstrating, archaeology & a new grandson I did lose the plot a few times. So please put me down for

£450

again; whilst I managed to stay well under in September, I'll be feeding anything up to 14 for a few days towards the end of the month. DS3 is currently popping in for dinner & games about once a week and may or may not appear for Sunday lunches too, DD1 is with us next weekend etc. etc. September was relatively quiet on the family front, which did help me stick to my menu plans. But October seems to be gearing up to be different…

mandco

So I don’t forget £62.42 on bulk buy forage for the buns - needed to get some this month anyway but got sent an 1 day offer for 20% off £80 spend so stocked up. might split this rather than adding all to this month? as it should last them till the end of the year.

TravelCrystal

Back from our break now so updating on the spends so far. £97.55 spent dining out for 3 days which includes tonight’s snack and £1 spent earlier on air freshener. Brings Octobers total so far to £219.67

This brings my remaining annual spends left to £639.05 which is very doable.

T.C

P.s Collecting kitten later today 🐈‍⬛

leftatthetrafficlights

I'm in again please @JingsMyBucket 😁

£350 for the month - I've lost the plot on September unfortunately, lots going on over the past 10 days but I'll be keeping a very close eye on October's cash! 😉

Quantaqa

Hi @JingsMyBucket, please put me down for £160 this month.

We have stocked up on meat as our town butcher is closing so we've a freezer full. We hopefully won't need the full £160 this month as a result but its been budgeted for just in case.

Thanks again for running the thread.

Finstickle

Paid yesterday, today is day 2 with no spends so far, considering my recent trend this is a positive!

I will be trying to shop my cupboards \ freezer as much as possible this month.

Total

£0/£350

PipneyJane

@JingsMyBucket we have £40.10 to roll over from September, so please put my budget down as:

£220.10

Our “month” will run from tomorrow until 30th November. We will be in Australia for almost a month, 23rd October to 20th November, so it makes sense to stretch this budget out over two months.

• Pip