Family of 5 -very tight budget help

lilac_lady

If you feel your children will miss treats, try making home made crisps and cakes. The children would like helping you and won't realise that you're doing it to save money.

jo1972

Hiya,

We're also a family of five, DD1 15yrs, DS 5yrs, DD2 2yrs and a bird and some fish

We need to cut back drastically ourselves as I took a (very) large paycut for a better job situation a few months ago and things are starting to get very hard. I'll be interested in seeing your responses although I read this board regularly and already know about freezing extra, pack up lunches, using different shops for different stuff etc but have not been very efficient at using the information so far

Good luck

squeaky

There are a few threads around that can help you.

The grocery challenge is run monthly to help people gradually reduce their food budgets in a pain free way and you can find the current one as a sticky at the top of the board. Here:-

February 2008 Grocery Challenge


While this thread is for a family of three it's inspirational:-

sammy_kaye's £100 a month food budgetting


And this will also be very useful:-

Family of 5 'shop from home' food storage challenge...

anonymousie

All above is great advice.

My 2p worth of hints.

Agree shop at Aldi/lidl good stuff and cheaper too! Aldi bread mixes are lovely and 2 loaves from a 79p pack is both cheaper than "average" loaves and nicer- nice bread that you can eat heaps of makes you feel less deprived.

Porridge for breakfast-very cheap and filling. Teach the teens to make there own and they can have more as a snack anytime.

Lentil and pulse based meals are very cheap quailty protein- if your family "don't like" lentils a good handful in bolognese/stew/soup of any type will make it go further (a four person quantity esily becomes 5 hungry people worth) and they cook to nothing so you can't tell they are there!

a "hearty soup" meal a couple of times a week will stretch the budget too- say a chicken quater, a leek, some onion, potatoes- Yummy! Lentil soup with lentils + any veg is great too.

Hit your local market- I have a very large wheely trolly and if I take it into the market in Brum I can fill it full with fruit and veg for less than £10 (and that will include a doz eggs). Prices are along the lines of £1 for 8lbs potatoes or 5 of carrots/onions etc.

One of the "cheapy" freezer shops eg "Cool trader" will provide heaps of froz veg at good prices too- maybe not best quality, but if they are going in soup etc it wont notice.

You can do it! Eat up your stores first as well!