April 2008 Grocery Challenge

Girl_least_likely_to

Hi All :wave:

I am still grinning from my visit to Asda last night . I spent £18.03 altogether, however £6.42 went on the following whoopsied items;

Beef joint reduced for £1.20
2 lots of 4 x pork chops for £1.90
Beef meatloaf in tom sauce 55p
Prawn toast 33p
Stroganoff sauce 20p
Beef mince hotpot ready meal 25p
Huge tub of Humous 30p (BBD is 13th May)
Miso & veg soup 58p (BBD is 24th April)
2 lots of 9 mini bread rolls 10p
24 pack white bread rolls 20p
White loaf 16p

I’ve not had that kind of haul for a good while and my freezer is now full and the beef joint that should have been £6.41 :eek: is now in the oven and the rest will be use in a hot pot tomorrow and on OH’s whoopsied white rolls for his lunch

Did I remember saying I was worried about my freezer starting to look empty :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: ?

I’d never been to this particular Asda in the evening before, I can see it becoming a regular Monday night event :cool: .


Anyone know what I can do with the Stroganoff sauce, I've never had it before

mandy_moo_1 wrote: »

does anyone know where the cheapest pasta is at the mo, cos i think thats going to go up as well, and i want to stock up on it a bit, cos it always has a long shelf life

I got 3kg of penne for £2.55 from Asda last night. The twists were £2.97 I think.

Savvy_sewing

Well I went to Lidl with the twins and the two babies. Not sure I am happy or not really. I spent £147.26 in one fail swoop. However on looking at my receipt I notice that the offer of 8 orange juices for £5.99 in a box didnt happen and I was charged 99p for each of the juices. So that was £1.93 more than I should have paid. then I have also noticed on the shopping receipt 2 entries that say "store leaflets at 59p entered twice.!! Cant think what on earth they are? If I shop in there again I will be watching the bill before I leave the shop. I will see what all the ingredients manage to make later on. I think I spent a lot more than I would have done if I went on my own. However I also got the babies nappies, baby wipes, and farley rusks etc. So technically the girls should have paid for them too.

SAVVYMUMMY_2

victory wrote: »

It is refreshing in a way to read this as I am sure I am on around the prices you are saying but others are on so much less that it makes me wonder if I am doing it wrong and I worry, I reckon (I have only just started so have no concrete proof) that my food bill is £100 a week so £400 a month but i am going to bring it down each month, next aiming for £300, don't know if I can manage it but that is the whole point of the GC:D

Hi victory, I too have just started this month. Did spend well over £400+ a month on food for the 4 of us and I knew we were spending far tooooo much and wasting far tooo much, so decided for this month to bring my monthly groceries to £300. I think I am doing well(especially as it`s a big drop of £100), and this thread has given me so much inspiration. BIG THANKS TO EVERYONE.

I am now much more careful with food and checking prices out, but with the price of food going up alot not sure how much more I will be able to bring my target down to. Hoping alittle bit more and it should help that I am now starting to grow my own veg. So I am sure you could bring your target down more, maybe start off with another £50 instead of £100 and see how you go from there.

clair2305

Girl_least_likely_to wrote: »

Hi All :wave:

I am still grinning from my visit to Asda last night . I spent £18.03 altogether, however £6.42 went on the following whoopsied items;

Beef joint reduced for £1.20
2 lots of 4 x pork chops for £1.90
Beef meatloaf in tom sauce 55p
Prawn toast 33p
Stroganoff sauce 20p
Beef mince hotpot ready meal 25p
Huge tub of Humous 30p (BBD is 13th May)
Miso & veg soup 58p (BBD is 24th April)
2 lots of 9 mini bread rolls 10p
24 pack white bread rolls 20p
White loaf 16p

I’ve not had that kind of haul for a good while and my freezer is now full and the beef joint that should have been £6.41 :eek: is now in the oven and the rest will be use in a hot pot tomorrow and on OH’s whoopsied white rolls for his lunch

Did I remember saying I was worried about my freezer starting to look empty :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: ?

I’d never been to this particular Asda in the evening before, I can see it becoming a regular Monday night event :cool: .


Anyone know what I can do with the Stroganoff sauce, I've never had it before




I got 3kg of penne for £2.55 from Asda last night. The twists were £2.97 I think.

I miss Asda's, really I do. My nearest Asda's is about 30 mins drive away from home and about 45 mins from work and the last thing I want to do after work is drive there....but I miss it.

When I lived in London I used Asda's and when I moved but still worked in London, I used to do my shopping on my way home as I still went past it, but my "local" Asda's isn't local like I said above, not even for a big weekly/fortnightly/monthly shop.... I also miss popping in like I did and getting the deals and the whoopsies. And another moan, Asda don't deliver in my area yet - boo hoo

At the moment, I end up doing my shopping in Mr T's, Mr S's and Aldi's, which realistically is prob taking more time than one monthly trip to Asda....I don't know, all I know is I miss Asda....

MRSMCAWBER

Evening everyone :hello:

Well my nip into the naffi didn't cost me much...just €2 :rotfl: there was very little that i don't already get cheaper in the other German shops anyway... So i came away with 4 X 500g tubs of organic dairy free soya spread @ 50c each:T -now im normally a butter girl -but i thought this would be fine as an emergancy standby..and it says its fine for baking so its going to be tucked in the freezer later

Hubby treated me to the good food magazine and gardeners world mag -as he is away for a couple of days tomorrow (a golfing competition) so he got me them to keep me amused:p .. best of all the gardening 1 has 4 lots of seed free inside :j ..

• garden pearl tomatoes
• sweet gren basil
• oriental mixed salad leaves
• and Anaheim chilli peppers

So thats some more seeds to set tomorrow in my apotment :rotfl: .... from my gardening budget i picked up 3 tomato plants... im growing everything from seed and don't usually buy plants -but at 50c each I figured i may as well
Hopefully i will be spending tomorow in the garden.... please let the rain stay away -if only for a few hours
Oh and lots of the seeds i threw in a cottage cheese pot to grow are now through...9 so far :j

right i had better go and add to my signature..have a good evening everyone

EGON -hope your little ones are better soon:D

candygirl

Had another NSD day, and have plenty in the freezer and cupboards, so I might make my target again this month:j :j It's hard trying not to spend when i'm off work though:o

JennyBee_2

gunsandbanjos wrote: »

Could i please have the recipe:D

Sure!

Ingredients:
1 tbsp oil
8 sausages (although I only had 7!)
1 onion (sliced)
2 celery sticks (sliced)
2 fresh thyme sprigs (didn't have any so they didn't go in!!)
2 tbsp tomato puree (I used leftover passata!)
1 tbsp flour
150ml red wine
600ml hot chicken or veg stock
Can of Haricot of Cannellini beans, drained and rinsed


Heat the oil, add the sausages and brown until golden all over. Remove them with and set aside. Add the onion, celery (or mushrooms as we didn't have any celery!) and thyme to the pan and cook, stirring for 5 minutes. Add the tomato puree and flour and cook for a minute. Pour in the red wine, bring to the boil and bubble until reduced by two thirds. Add the stock, bring back to the boil and reduce the heat to a fast simmer.

Halve each sausage diagonally (we just chopped them up!) and return to the pan, simmer for 15 mins until they're cooked through and the sauce has thickened up slightly. Stir in the beans and cook for a further 5 minutes.


The sauce didn't actually thicken up that much but we had it with mash so it didn't matter. Plus it meant that I could be a bit crazy and freeze the left over sauce (fully labelled so I know what on earth it is!!)

It was very nice!

A NSD for me today, made a nice salad for lunch and was in meetings all day so couldn't even get out the office into the sunshine at lunchtime!

Oh well, now it looks like it's going to rain I have to go off and play netball! Will catch up with you all later!

PS - very excited as my baby parsnip seeds have started to shoot!!! Also planning ahead to start buying dried stuff for our holiday in July. Two weeks in the South of France but we're driving so will be able to take loads of stuff and hopefully still stay on track!!

JennyBee_2

Just realised that it's pay day next Thursday! Woohoo!

JennyBee_2

And also realised that we won't need to buy food for about a week in May as my sister is getting married which means that there'll be loads of people about and my mum will be producing food in vast quantities! (she used to own a restaurant so always makes in bulk!!)

rosieben

I've shopped locally today and hope that will be the last till May. I'm still emptying my store cupboard and freezer prior to house move, using up long life milk, frozen and tinned veg and fruit.

I've checked out what I have in the cupboards and freezer and made a list of meals that will see me to about 7th May. I might have to lay out for a few bananas to see me through and maybe a tub of clover but that's all.

My total so far is £12.48 of £20 budget so doing ok.

Sorry, I still haven't had chance to catch up on all the posts here, but good luck everyone