May 2008 Grocery Challenge

catnap53

Well had a good week for not spending, nothing since Saturday. Free Cravendale milk thanks to leaflet through the door. Took lunch to work for 3 days and was on a course for two days where lunch was provided, although there wasn't much of it to go round. Today I took what was supposed to be chicken and broccoli soup, just lots of each in a chicken stock, but unfortunately some of the stock escaped, still it was really nice.

Using up old stuff from the freezer tonight, peppered chicken with chunky chips for the men. I cooked a vintage lasagne ready meal, (don't buy them any more) but it was obviously too old and didn't look good, so I binned it. Got the room in the freezer now though, and it was never going to improve, so at least I tried. I compensated with some ratatouille that I had made a few days ago, sprinkled just a little grated mixed cheese on top and stole a few of the chips to go with it. Cheesecake for desert, not cheap or healthy, but had it in for a while.

DD was in bed when I came in, busy week preparing her artwork for GCSE, so hasn't had anything yet.

Cottage pie last night, it felt really extravagant using Aberdeen Angus mince for it, but it wasn't really expensive as a Costco bulk buy, and no fat to waste!

I bought a frost free freezer last year and it really needs me to be more organised about stock rotation than I could get away with using the old one.

Need a few bits and pieces tomorrow, need to be strong though, might just go to Aldi where I won't get too tempted.

Think I'll have a Bailey's now, I am sure I was told it goes off quickly once it has been opened!

angelatgraceland

clair2305 wrote: »

....was a nightmare, arrived there at 6pm and wandered round for two hours!!

No whoopsies at all!! Not on bread, meat, anything!!!

And to be honest, considering the only meat I bought was chicken wings, belly strips and some steak (£8) and I didn't need toilet rolls (because of the Charmin offer last month), I'm a bit surprised at the total.

I buy loads of smartprice items, the UHT milk, most tins, also bought smartprice pasta (we'll see how that is).

As last month we were talking about the price of bread, pasta, rice, I'll let everyone know that Asda Basmati Rice 1kg used to be 97p, now a whopping £1.47 :eek: and their pasta used to be 3 for £1, now one 500g bag is 67p :eek: :eek: and bread, well the shelves were nearly empty and i had to buy their bulk standard break (not smartprice) and that was 65p a loaf.

I got my bags of value pasta for just 19p per packet!
Ordinary long grain rice about 47p ikg
This was also Adsa.

angchris

no spends for me since i last went shopping on the 25th, have ran out of bananas now but thats no big deal as theres plenty of other fruit left and im not going shopping just for those. am still managing to eat from home and resisted the temptation of a takeaway tonight. i made a peach cobbler for pudding and it was delish, it was nice easy and most importantly cheap!! heres the recipe...

PEACH COBBLER
1 tin of value sliced peaches 16p
115g of butter/marg 30p?
125 sr flour 3p
200g sugar 16p
1g salt 1p
235 ml milk 15p?
total = 81p

heat your oven up to 200c, put the butter in your dish and put in the oven to melt, once melted take out of oven and put tin of peaches into butter including the syrup/juice and space out the peaches.
mix all the other ingredients together in a bowl till you get a firmish batter then pour that evenly over your butter/peaches. it does look really odd but dont mix it, just stick it straight in the oven 200c for 35 mins or take it out once it looks golden and cooked.
this did 4 of us a huge portion each with ice cream or custard, oh asked for more as he really liked the buttery gooey caramalised peaches at the bottom.

angelatgraceland

Today was the last day of my first week of the GC. Came in at £65.55 this week for food so I have £9.45 over to add to next weeks should I need it.
Would have had more but ended up buying a meal deal of sarnies in superdrug as I was very hungry at the end of a long day and I had to take things back to M&S to change them(used up some gift vouchers originally).
I will have to set myself a clothing budget though soon I think as im getting rather tempted by the sale items in the store where I work! Bought 2 nice tshirts for £12 at work then 2 more in Asda tonight for £12 so nothing expensive. Probably nothing up by a lot of people and its half of my summer wardrobe anyhow. So Im happy at the end of this week and only plan on buying the milk which i didnt buy today and some fruit tomorrow. I will try to wait until Monday to do my main shop-it stretches the money out!

angelatgraceland

klane wrote: »

Am I too late to join in? If not, please add me too... for £180.

Never too late to join! Maybe start from tomorrow? Good luck however you do it!

hollyh

Congratulations to Searching Me :j

recovering_spendaholic

Can I join in? I am trying for £450 this month, including £60 for dog food for our dog who has special food because he has colitis. I have my little notebook and pen ready to jot down every penny I spend so here's hoping that I can come in under budget for the first time ever - I normally go wildly over-budget!

debbym

SAV3R wrote: »

I can also recommend checking receipts before leaving, we once bought a pack of tortilla wraps, they came up at £30:eek: :eek: :eek: we did spot it and get it refunded. Some of the stores give a refund and vouchers as an apology. I agree they must get a lot of extra revenue this way, not everyone thinks to check.

Always worth double checking on the whoopsies as if it is part of a multipack that you are buying due to it being damaged you can get charged full price if not careful. Waitrose did that to me - bought some now separate tins of alcohol from split four packs and was charged the full four pack price for each one:eek: Sometimes the barcode reader picks up the old sticker see...

moo2moo

Ventured into Poundland yesterday for the first time ever. Its normally well out of my way and they charge for parking but I had to kill 45 minutes between an appointment and the school run so I dragged my eldest for a very long walk from the free car park at the otherside of town. I was quite surprised, it wasn't as cheap as I expected. But then it was nearly all big name brands and I rarely buy them anyway. Why pay £1 for shampoo when Tescos 50p stuff is just as good... anyway I finally emerged after 2 complete circuits of the shop having spent £6. 4 bottles of washing up liquid for £2, cling film because Tescos is stupidly expensive and I get through loads and the remainder things for the kids lunches.

The chickens went into mass production earlier in the week so I've bartered via Freecycle for homemade jam and marmalade so I'm stocked up on that for the next few months, have also managed to set up a long term egg for veg swap for the summer so that should help too.

Off to bake some of Twinks Hobnobs to take to a friends for lunch, I was going to make them last night but there wouldn't have been any left this morning.

Enjoy the sunny weather!

Penny-Pincher!!

Went to Bromley yesterday and managed to get 3lbs of Satsumas and a large container of mixed seedless grapes for £2.00.

This week we have only spent £21.00, but OH is buying some lovely steak fr dinner later which will be about £6.00 for the 3 of us and have chips, onion rings, salad and garlic bread in...yummy!

PP
xx