How to reduce shopping bill please?

Merlot

You have had some excellent advice, I can feed a family of four and a dog for £35.00 p/week, (although If I include the wine its nearer £50).

As far as cleaning fluid - water them down to half, they are far too strong, and buy supermarket own brand - e.g tesco bathroom cleaner 60p mr muscle £1.00, or use vingear as suggested on Old Style. I use vingear for the softener, it works fine. As for soap powder I buy Tesco Value large box £1.41 and mix it a small box of whats ever cheapest, to get a smell in the box, never had a problem with stains not coming out.

I also use Tesco value Toliet Paper in the kids toliet, 4 rolls for 38p, they waste the stuff.

My only advice to you is do not buy BOGOF because you think it is a bargain, you can generally pick up the supermarket own brand for a third of the cost. e.gTesco liquid soap £0.45p, branded this week BOGOF £1.66, so cheaper to buy own brand.

You can tell I live on the old style board.

Verbatim

I make my own bread which is lovely and heavy wholemeal. Not everyone's choice I realize! You don't need a breadmaker just 3 tins per large bag of flour (charity shop or freecycle). I use veg and pulses a lot which is really healthy and buy little except meat and eggs that isn't value/basics. Porridge is great for breakfast, filling slow release and lowers colesterol I believe, and extremely cheap. I always have nice meat on sundays and if a roast and any leftover will freeze and make a casserole with kidney beans later. Many value items are the same as higher priced goods, just with different packaging. I was also once told that the value veg, esp carrots,are often "in conversion" to organic, no pesticides etc and therefoe not straight enough /evenly shaped for the premium range but not yet able to claim organic staus. So fewer pesticides/fertilisers, better for you AND much cheaper. Win win.

I had up to 4 foreign students last year when I was paying off the ccs plus 3 adults in the family in the family and aimed to spend around £60 a week I gave the students breakfast and dinner with 2 courses daily and fed the family healthy packed lunches too. I have loads of recipes if anyone needs them, but many do not involve meat!

Merlot

My top tip is buy a slow cooker, not expensive to buy now, and you can buy cheaper cuts of meat, eg brisket. and you can make several portions of eg. chilli in the sc and freeze them and reheat in microwave, really handy if you are short of time, as I am after spending the day reading this website.

beanielou

Love that Merlot that 'you are short of time,as I am after spending the day reading this website'

Tibbie's_mum

RAS wrote: »

Hi

One idea from Mel Bartholomew of Square foot gardening, for dealing with small amounts of left overs.

He suggest working out a few favourite recipes form left overs and then starting a box for each in the freezer. So say you like fried rice, each time you have a bit of left over corn, peas and chicken say, you add it to the stirfry box until you have enough for a meal. Or add layers of left-over veg to a tub that will turn into vegtable soup sometime in the next three weeks.

That's a fantastic idea, thanks for passing it on. I can't bear throwing food away and we end up having some really strange concoctions, maybe this will overcome that, my OH will be relieved!

dan832947

online shopping is great, you can sit in the comfort of your own home and plan meals around evrything that is on offer, you can also go to the cupboard and check if you already have somthing. We have cut our bills from £80 Pw down to £40.