May 2008 Grocery Challenge

MRSMCAWBER

Hi Shaz..

yep..hubby is REME he had done his 22years but they offered him an extension so we snatched their hands off ..that will be 8 years of someone else paying our mortgage and a guaranteed income was to good to miss especially when they let us pick where we wanted to go..so Germany it was for No car tax, TV liecence tax free fuel and much better pay for being abroad :j

Im sure your son will have a great time.. at least he is going into a profession where the chances for promotion and better pay are always there..not to mention the chance to travel.. obviously not always to places you or he will want him to go... but hopefully by the time he passes out things will have calmed down a little

well the cake is out of the oven and has been tried..purely for research purposes you understand ..its quite dense (no reflection on the chef of course:rotfl: ) but i don't like "airy fairy" cakes anyway... its rather tasty-even hubby had a piece and liked it :j ..its only come out about 1.5" deep though.. so i guess i could double the mix next time.. mind i think i will leave it as it as i like it.. just incase anyone is interested....here is the "[STRIKE]concotion[/STRIKE] recipe"
It was going to be shaz' branflake recipe until i went in the cupboard and couldn't find the bran flakes i have been avoiding for yonks and i have cut down the sugar as im still in the midst of losing weight

• 1 cup allbran -nasty nasty stuff
• 1/2 cup caster sugar -i used golden as it was what i found 1st:p
• 1 cup skimmed milk
• 1 cup sultanas
• 2 chunks of stem ginger -chopped
• about 1 doz 1/2 wallnuts chopped
• 2tbs desicated coconut -mine was sweetened
• 1tsp mixed spice
• 1 cup SR flour

1. like the bran flake recipe its whack everything but the flour in a bowl and mix then leave to stand so it all goes soggy,
2. mix in the flour
3. pour into a lined 2lb loaf tin
4. bake for 50 mins gas 3

i used greaseproof as id run out of silicone paper but did find it stok a bit -but it didn't pull lumps off the cake when i eventually piddled it off:D

im chuffed that i now have a recipe that can make allbran edible..what with that and making the humble courgette into muffins im happy and when i find those branflake that will be another recipe i wil be trying :j

right of to put lunch out.... made a yummy yummy ham pasta salad and it should be chilled through by now nomnomnom

have a god afternoon all

Flylady_Flower

savingfortravel wrote: »

Hi Denise

Regarding your question-Well when I first came to this thread I thought OH meant old husband.. don't ask me why... so as I'm not married (yet) I thought OB could be used for my boyfriend (old boyfriend).
Then one day the penny dropped OH means other half...
By then OB quite liked his name so I kept it.

SFT

Ha, got it, that's cool :cool: . I thought it might have something to do with boyfriend but had to ask.

I was confused on quite a few - some people put DD1 or DS2 (I am PRESUMING they mean darling daughter 1 and darling son 2 ) then others put DD14 which I presume means darling daughter who's 14??? but as long as we get the gist eh!

enjoy the rest of your weekend.
Denise

Rowan9

Well, went out for the Sunday papers and ended up with some cooked chicken, bread, Cornish pasties, crisps and more - and a packet of sour fizzy sweeties even managed to sneak in! I'm eating them at the moment and must say they are very delicious. So...not very OS but have only parted with £14.04, including S Times, and OH's beer which i don't take out of budget. I blame this hot weather. It has frazzled my poor brain into thinking it wants junk food.
w

Fi27

Hiya everyone

I'm over my budget but it was a trifle unrealisitc in the first place so hey ho :rolleyes: I'm on target to do the same as last month and i was happy with last months spend so i should be the same with this months, just a 5 week month instead of a 4. I had hoped to do a little better this month but never mind, theres always next month

I've not been as organised this month though and have been rather distracted by other things which meant less time devoted to OS and GC

I took cash out of the bank at the start of the month and used a seperate grocery purse. I'm not sure it made much difference, apart from me having to gaurd it as certain others thought it was rather handy to snaffle the change for bus fares, coffee money and the odd sweetie or ice cream :rolleyes: There have been a few mystery spends i should think! Maybe i should try it again next month and include £20 for [strike]squandering [/strike] miscellanous spends or sommat?

On the plus side i have stocked up on quite a bit which will help towards next months budget, all the bogofs & 2 for 1's etc that we use. I did a big tesco shop on line which i got delivered on Friday. I am hoping to only need a few fresh bits and pieces now unitl the 23rd.


Good luck to everyone else on the CG, hope you are all doing well.

Fi x

angelatgraceland

Boomdocker wrote: »

I have just lost my long post twice!! Not sure what happened there. So now in a nutshell I wanted to share a website that I enjoy, it is American and there is a small 'faith' message however it is well worth dipping in and having a look. There is a recipe section and a homemaking ideas underpinned with a thrifty, no waste, moneysaving tone. https://www.hillybillyhousewife.com

If you know you are going to submit a long post, type it out in word first, save it, then copy and paste it onto here! Ive had th same problem in the past-spent about 15 mins typing-only to lose it!

victory

afternoon:D at the boot fair today the man was selling in the see through boxes that look like the take away chinese plastic containers they give you for 50p/80p/£1 all sorts of lentils/brown rice/banana chips/pineapple , cashew nuts, almonds ,other nuts for recipes etc for much cheaper than the shops would sell so that is worth thinking about, also they had bowls for £1 of bananas, toms,pineapple, grapes very good prices considering how mucvh they have gone up in the shops:eek:

Toms 50p a pot to grow loads of car boot sales bargains, never actually bought any of them apart from £2 for a bean bag (wanted the balls in them because they are so expensive to replace)

earthmother

End of week two for me now.

I had a bulk delivery earlier in the week - a chunk went against next month, leaving around £50 to account to this month. Add some extra shopping this week - hubby and elder two kids have been ill/off-colour and off some foods, so a bit extra spending again on fruit, smoothies etc, and medicines - and my overall spend is now up to £237.81.

That leaves me with around £50 (plus milk tokens) for the next three weeks. If the house stays well, then considering what I have in the larder, I can hopefully do it (or at least be a heck of a lot closer than previous months), but if anyone else falls ill (and two of us have escaped so far), then I'll go over.

Here goes

victory

RECIPE FOR CORN BEEF POTATO PIE-

Potatoes, boil and mash along with a chopped onion, a dash of worcestershire sauce, you can add carrots or other veg if you wish, a tin of corn beef, mash it all up,allow to cool and put it into the pastry I used Jusroll but if anyone knows of any cheaper ready made pastry £1.30 a box it was I bought 2 ,well MIL did so that doesn't come into my GC budget(I have tried and tried making pastry but am rubbish at it) would appreciate it:D gas mark 180 mark 4 for 45/50 mins until the pastry is golden...

Amazing really kids hate corn beef, not partial to pots but they love this pie:rolleyes:

mandy_moo_1

denisefowler wrote: »

I was confused on quite a few - some people put DD1 or DS2 (I am PRESUMING they mean darling daughter 1 and darling son 2 ) then others put DD14 which I presume means darling daughter who's 14??? but as long as we get the gist eh!

enjoy the rest of your weekend.
Denise

i'm one of the ones that puts DS14 or DD17, and no, it doesn't mean i have 14 sons & 17 daughters!! :rotfl:its their ages

anyhooo...... had a good trip to Mr M's.......managed to pick up some whoopsies for the princely sum of 9p each :j i got 2 bottles of Surf Small & Mighty (the pink one), couple of bags of giant cashew nuts, 2 x 1kg bags pasta, beans and tomatoes. i also got a couple more tubs of U.Butterly cos it was still only 52p. i only spent £1.94! i was well chuffed with the surf liquid cos its usually about £3 a bottle.....well out of my budget! and i love the smell

had some HM soup out of the freezer with a HM roll, and we're having HM fish & chips for tea. DD17 is at her friend's till late tonight, so i only have to feed myself and DS14.

made a chocolatey yogurt cake yesterday, so we can have that for pudding

hope everyone's having a good day, its still really misty here

pinklady1985

wow finally read through all this lol

i'll def be joining next month and will lurk this one and add up how much i normally spend
have got some great idea already and tried a few recipes suprisingly the kids love the home baked stuff and ask for it over the shop bought (3 kids aged 4 and under so a lot of snacking lol)

read a lot about bread makers and wondered if anyone could point me in the right direction of a good one? we get through a lot of bread and rolls esp for the kids when at nursery and i begrudge paying £1.35 a loaf in the corner shop

steph