Live on £4000 for a year - Part 2

Frugaldom

Hi Fruguys and gals, hope you are all having a lovely weekend.

Funbrum - CONGRATULATIONS on quitting your job, if it benefits your health then it can only be the right thing to do. If you have an OH then it just means there needs to be some readjustment and your job is now to ensure that what money is available covers all the bills. That's the way I see it - the housekeeping and shoestring budgeting combination is a fulltime job in itself and if you are happy to see it that way then any problems are far easier to solve. dd to that the opportunity of earning a bit extra from home and you should, hopefully, be feeling a whole lot better soon. It isn't too late to plant up some salady stuff, potatoes and winter veggies in buckets and I have an electric meter chart that I fill in every morning and evening (we're on white meter). Most things can be minimised and it probably won't take long to see what your job was costing you if you had to run a car.

Prudent - Asda pizza base mixes for 19p? :eek: I need some of that! I could do pizzas for the party I'm waiting for a £10 Asda voucher from my Euroffice points, hoping it arrives this week before we do the party food shop. Fingers crossed!

I can't wait for my potatoes and peppers to be ready for picking! £1.60 for 3 baking potatoes and £1.59 for 3 peppers! I am dreading doing the party shop and have been trying to work it out by calculating my own spends. Over a year, if I spend an average of £10 per week on 3 of us, that's roughly 92p per person per day. If I allow half of that for breakfast & lunch, then that's 46p per head when buying carefully using BOGOF, 3 for 2, half price and whoopsies. I doubt very much if I'll be able to do that for the party, especially as I'll not be baking the bread for the sandwiches and it'll need to be nice bread. So... my plan today is to guesstimate the food costs for my frugal cold buffet 'menu'. I've decided on the following:

spicey chicken wings, thighs, drumsticks
sandwiches - 3 types - grated cheese, cooked ham & tuna mayonnaise
pasta salads - various
eggs marie rose with fresh lemon garnish
egg mayonnaise with fresh parsley garnish
prawns marie rose with fresh lemon garnish
mixed salad bowls
carrot/cucumber/celery sticks & dips
potato salad (using homegrown new potatoes, hopefully)
coleslaw
rice salads - various
cocktail sausages
assorted cocktail sticks - ham, pineapple, cheese, pickle etc
fruit salad kebabs - strawberries, grapes, pineapple chunks
melon wedges served with cocktail cherries
marshmallow top hats (there are kids going, honest )
giant jelly beans
assorted crisps & savoury snacks
peanuts, mixed nuts & raisins (need to keep these seperate)

Personalised labelling on chocolate biscuits - pinched the idea from and eBid seller - must get the labels done asap!

Can anyone add to the above? It needs to be suitable for cold buffet, plus suitable for vegans, vegetarians & allergy sufferers. I'll be including chicken, ham and tuna in other dishes.

smartt21

Hello!
I am a real newbie & am just getting my head around this site, especially the forums. I don't know if I qualify for this thread as I am actually debt free (but completely skint!). However, as my income has now dropped by 90% (choose job or health & sanity) and I have 2 strapping DS's, 2 dogs, 1 cat and me to feed etc on about £20 a week, I need all the help I can get to stay that way.
So please can I join??:D

whitewing

smartt21 - yes, we love new challengees joining. Keeps us old timers motivated.

And being debt-free is fine (to any other lurkers who are thinking about joining). We only -ONLY! - have our mortgage.

Let us have your challenge total (£2000?) and Nyk will give you a number.

sukielou75

Hi Nyk,
I guess it would depend on how strict the vegetarians are but I would check that the cheese for the sandwhiches and the cocktail sticks is not made from animal rennet, it will say on the pack if it is suitable for vegetarians, also some vegetarians will not eat eggs and the one’s that do will usually only eat free range eggs, also the Jelly beans and anything Jelly-like will usually be made from gelatine which is not suitable for vegetarians or vegans, maybe use something like the Birds trifle in a pack which is suitable for vegetarians and if you only use the jelly that would be suitable for vegans (it‘s just the custard and cream topping that makes it un suitable). Maybe you could try a Mexican and Mediterranean theme, something like:
Stuffed peppers (with rice, tomatoes, courgettes etc) that would be suitable for Vege’s, vegans and wheat and gluten free diets.
Mediterranean roasted vegetable cous cous salad (suitable for Vege’s and vegans)
Falafels with a cucumber and mint yoghurt dip (suitable for Vege’s and vegans could have houmous dip instead).
Roasted vegetable Corn tortilla wraps with sour cream (suitable for vege’s, I seem to remember that Discovery do a wheat and gluten free corn tortilla and vegan’s could have a guacamole or salsa dips, some commercially made dips may contain milk or yoghurt though.
Maybe it would be helpful to have a section for the special diets or label the food that is free from wheat, nuts, meat etc.
Hope some of this helps.

DdraigGoch

Welcome, Smart21 :hello:

I don't think that the DFW thead is totally for those who have debts and want rid of them, I believe it's also for those who "wannabe" STAYING DF At least, that's how I read it. Here's hoping that you join us and believe us, we'll be interested in any hints and tips you might bring - always on the lookout for new ideas

I managed to have a rather impressive looking meal for lunch today:j.

I laid the table with the best china, glass, linen etc and offered Shredded Chicken with Micro Greens and Herb Salad, Apple Balsamic & Greek Olive Oil Dressing, Classic Free Range Mayonnaise, freshly ground 3 pepper and Halen M!n organic salt condiments, followed by a Continental Cherry Sauce Anglais Tart, accompanied by Ginger and Lemongrass Cordial.

It went down a storm :cool:

and cost me not a penny! :rotfl: Literally, not one penny. Explanation? I worked from my pantry and garden, plus I was given the chicken and flan when I helped a friend out doing some catering last week:T. The cordial was from our wedding, the greenery was my first homegrown anything in years:j So, quite pleased with myself today.

I've done an entire month's menus so I'm hoping that I stick to it:rolleyes:. If I do I can at last start to get a proper handle on our spending. The electricity and insurances are next to be looked at very hard, then it's the petrol. That's a hard one, living 6 miles from town with no neighbours and a teenage daughter.

Can someone point me towards Nyk's Interest Beater thread, please as I think I've come up with a wheeze that might work for me - have to check the rules first though!

Hope I've not rambled too much and that everyone has a really good week this week.

DG

Frugaldom

smartt21 wrote: »

Hello!
I am a real newbie & am just getting my head around this site, especially the forums. I don't know if I qualify for this thread as I am actually debt free (but completely skint!). However, as my income has now dropped by 90% (choose job or health & sanity) and I have 2 strapping DS's, 2 dogs, 1 cat and me to feed etc on about £20 a week, I need all the help I can get to stay that way.
So please can I join??:D

Hi there, Smartt21

Before we go about initiating you into the challenge, you have only mentioned your grocery spend of £20 per week, so I am wondering if you have mistaken us for the grocery challenge, which many of us are also taking part in? It's exclusively for groceries, which we count as food, drinks, toiletries, laundry & cleaning products etc. The link for this month's grocery challenge is here and there should soon be a new one for July. You can join as many challenges as you like, so if you want to try living on £2000 (+ child benefit if your DS's qualify) then let me know. The £2000 would represent 1st July to 31st December and would include everything except rent/mortgage, council tax and water. And you don't need to be in debt to join, several of us have no debt, we do this challenge to prevent debt and to do some moneysaving. Welcome on board and feel free to join us here and in the grocery challenge (and any others ).

Further to my earlier frugal party posting, I have just listed the items through Mr T's site and it comes out at approximately £160. I have already spent about £100 on tableware, decorations, and basic cooking & baking ingredients, plus there'll be all the little things that I'll remember as I go along. So, I am setting myself a total budget of £300 and as it's all coming out of my cashback and vouchers savings, it should have no impact whatsoever on my 4k challenge. I will now go and check through my 2008 spending diary and deduct anything party related, so this challenge shows a true reflection on the real cost of living. Hopefully, I'll have a little more left than I thought - fingers crossed again

Ddraig - here's the link to the Interest Beater Challenge thread - good luck

Soukielou - I don't even know if there are any vegetarians/vegans or allergy sufferers attending the party, but I will be labelling the dishes so everyone knows what's included. I know about the gelatin etc and am just trying to keep things simple with a few meat free dishes. I'm thinking along the lines of lots of different smaller dishes rather than huge bowlfuls of the same things, that way I can offend nobody, hopefully. I learned my lesson when doing the food for an exhibition last year, thought I had everything covered and then along came a severe diabetic who couldn't drink anything, let along eat anything, and I hadn't laid on bottled water, only cordials, wine and fruit juice! OOPS!

DdraigGoch

Thanks - have posted.

Janey51

Afternoon from a frugalite who is feeling very sorry for herself
I was rushing about this morning getting things ready for DH so he had everything within reach when he managed to get up when I cracked my toe on a step :eek:
It is now a fetching shade of plum highlighted with black and a touch of purple. Being a pessimist, I think it is broken :rolleyes: . As a former nurse, I know that the only treatment is strapping and much gnashing of teeth.
It is very very tender and I had a really busy shift at work.
So now it's ow:eek: ow :eek: ow :eek:

Haven't done much frugalling today. Freezer is jam packed so if we have a power cut I'm stuffed.

Funbrum hope you are feeling better.
Mumzy when my eldest son was bed-wetting, I got a "star" chart from the GP. Every night he was dry, he got a blue star and every 3rd night, a gold one. Worked surprisingly well. Of course, that was over 30 yrs ago.
bails I am trying to look after myself but there are so many other people to think about as well The dietitian told me to eat more....first time I've been told that in 50 yrs :rotfl: So I went out and bought 2 big packs of Rich Tea and scoffed most of them in 3 days
shaz 20kg of rice:eek: Good God woman. Did you use a JCB to get it home :rotfl:
smartt21 Welcome...even if you have stumbled on us by mistake...give it a go. You are very much needed.
whitewing your good, better, best way of looking at things is lovely. Struggling to find a "best" in the Janey household today though.
nyk your buffet looks lovely. I used to have a book called "Posh Nosh" which had great cheapie recipes in. I remember I made Cheats Coronation Chicken and people were fighting over it.
DdG Your elegant dining makes my mashed bananas on toast look almost Oliver Twist-like :rotfl:

whitewing

Janey - ouch. have a hug from the whitewing household
Nyk - your buffet sounds great. Shall be nicking it for my wedding, lol.
DdG - yum.
Bedwetters' parents - a yes from me for sticker charts.
Everyone else - hello.

Good: blue skies
Better: made an apple, cinnamon and sultana crumble with the dregs of the freezer.
Best: Went for a long, sunny walk with H2B and had a good supportive chat about the job situation. He is very proud that he is enabling me to take a firm stand against the company. We feel really lucky that being on this challenge has enabled us to make choices, even with a relatively low income. Thank you all so much.

sophiesmum_2

Went to asda for the oldies stuff for tea and picked up some of the pizza base mixes 19p a box so bought 5 , then they also had some other strange offers on storecupboard stuff which i also picked up - 250g packs of dried peas with steeping tablets for 4p each(2010 date) bought 10, whitworths seed peal tapioca 375g packs 22p, bought 5, whitworths dried onions 40g packs 7p bought 5, and pearce duffs blancmange packs 4x1 pint sachets 22p pack bought 5. All have dates up to 2010 so no idea why they have suddenly started reducing odd things like these.
My total haul came to £3.90:D

Contingency fund now stands at £93.20 (just had to go and check)