April 2008 Grocery Challenge

Welshlassie

annaangeluk wrote: »

Hi,

I've been lurking round the grocery challenge boards for the last few months but this month I'm definitely going to join in!! My month started 31st March to 30th April. Im setting myself £100 total and that's for myself (currently doing weight watchers) my 6 year old daughter (has school lunches that I pay for so I don't know if I should include that? ) and a very skinny kitten!

Went shopping on monday and spent £28 which included cat food for the whole month. I'm raiding the freezer and finding all sorts of goodies that I'd forgotten about!! Tomorrow's tea is a massive piece of monkfish that asda reduced to 10p!!

I've had 2 no spend days and feeling quite virtuous, thing is though I have quite a problem with wasting money:o . I'm not in any debt thankfully but I am really aware that I use shopping as an emotional pick me up and the first thing I will do if I'm bored is go shopping. I don't spend huge amounts of money but it's little bits that add up over the month and it's nearly always on stuff I don't need/want etc. I'll regularly pop into the supermarket for milk and come out with 20 quids worth of crap!!! :eek:

How can I get out of that habit?????

Anna x

Get out of the habit by only taking the amount of cash you need to the supermarket and NO cards.

I used to be dreadful, but I get more of a buzz now at having money left over at the end of the month from my groceries budget than spending it on useless carp.

Kaz2904

I updated my sig last night. I spent £2 on a hair dye (fab purple streaks!) and 2 tubs of extra chewing gum. Not sure how much they are usually but know the dye should be £7 odd and the gum was £1 for 120 pieces so well chuffed.
Noticed that I am becoming a big chubba so need to cut down my calories and carbs and get more excercise.
Hope everyone's well?

mrs-moneypenny

sashanut, the cheapest soya milk i've found is aldi long life its either 55p or 59p a litre against alpro at around £1.30.

hoping for an NSD today here, looking out the window i think i'll be drying the washing under the extention as it looks like rain

faye1978

annaangeluk wrote: »

Hi,

I've had 2 no spend days and feeling quite virtuous, thing is though I have quite a problem with wasting money:o . I'm not in any debt thankfully but I am really aware that I use shopping as an emotional pick me up and the first thing I will do if I'm bored is go shopping. I don't spend huge amounts of money but it's little bits that add up over the month and it's nearly always on stuff I don't need/want etc. I'll regularly pop into the supermarket for milk and come out with 20 quids worth of crap!!! :eek:

How can I get out of that habit?????

Anna x

Hi Anna,
I do exactly the same and got into £5k of debt. If OH knew he'd be furious as he doesn't believe in debt. I live right next to a massive shopping centre and sometimes, if I'm low, I'll go for a day out there and just SPEND. On stuff I dont need/want even.

I really wish I knew how to get out of this habit, seriously considering paying out for hypnosis.....

On a lighter note, I am REALLY REALLY going to try to do the challenge this month - I usually get to half way through the month and blow it but I'm determined. I have so much stuff in my cupboard I could use but I still go and spend £80 odd a WEEK for 2 of us!!!!!

NO MORE:beer:

faye1978

mrs-moneypenny wrote: »

sashanut, the cheapest soya milk i've found is aldi long life its either 55p or 59p a litre against alpro at around £1.30.

hoping for an NSD today here, looking out the window i think i'll be drying the washing under the extention as it looks like rain

I stopped eating dairy for medical reasons andhave to say I have Alpro Soya as I think the taste is FAR Better than ANY of the others. I now don't buy yogurts (and I used to have a lot) and don't buy cheese as much either so I figure that the extra for Alpro isn't really as I am saving on other products (And I buy the longlife UHT stuff so it doesn't go off)

WelshWoofer

nicky1306 wrote: »

Wow what a day!!

oh and parsnips at sainsburys are bogoff, so i'll be making curried parsnip and potatoe soup for lunches to go in the freezer for oh, does anyone know if you can freeze scones, after baking???

Hi Nicky,
Please could you post the recipe for the parsnip and potato soup? Sounds yummy and I'm useless in the kitchen but willing to have a go!

Thanks
Rachel.

clair2305

Hi, an update from me. Spent £8.65 yesterday on fruit n veg at the market, so am up for £68.65 of my £130 budget...feeling confident.

Chargrilled and froze some aubergine last nite, does anyone know if i can freeze mushrooms and tomatoes? Or is there something I have to do to them first?

Cheers

nicky1306

Hi Rachel,

Of course here is the recipie for curried parsnip and potato soup, I'm afraid I'm not good at extact amounts as I just chucked it all together last week to use up veg we had left, but it's dead simple!:j

When I made it these are the rough quantities I made, we got 4 large bowls out of it.

3 Potato's
1 VERY large parsnip from our veg box ( I weighed it out of curiosity and it weighed 1lb 6oz!!!)
1x Onion or leek chopped.
Olive oill.
Curry Powder.

1. Dice the potato and parsnip into chunks.
2. Soften the chopped leeks and or onions in a sauce pan with the oill.
3. Add the potato and parsnip mixture to the onion and add 1-2 tsp of curry powder depending on how hot you like it.
4. Cover the potato,onion and parsnips with vegetable or chicken stock( I used half of each)
5. Boil the soup until the parsnip and potato are cooked.
6. Blend until smooth. (you can leave chunky if you like)
Serve with sum crusty bread and butter-yum!!:D

Hope you like it!!

Casperthefriendlyghost

Hi everyone

well the April grocery challenge has grown so much so fast! Haven't had time to catch up yet as I had an operation on Tuesday and am having another one tomorrow so when I come home next I will have some time to catch up completely and read everything in my own time lol. Have only spent £0.37 on a loaf of bread so far this month due to not being well and I made sure in March that I had enough food in so that I didn't have to go out unnecessarily when I wasn't feeling up to it. Well done to everyone, good luck and chat again soon.

Cheers
Casper
x x x

toniwoty2009

hello all :wave:
i joined the march GC but didn't do much lurkign on the board. pretty useless result actually. mind OH has agreed to join in this month too - last month i sent him to mr t for milk and he returned with about £20 of total carp. plus he phones about once a week on way home and says "whats for dinner? shall we get {insert relevant takeaway}" :rolleyes: and silly me says yeah ok so sometimes whatever i'd got out goes to waste too. this month no more takeaways, should help the weight loss too
i've meal planned for the month and had a big mr t delivery of meat etc. plan to go to aldi once/week to buy fruit, veg, milk and bread. should manage £250 easily to feed me, OH and DS (2 and half yr old).

i will be lurking this month and no doubt asking lots of advice!;)

thank you all in advance