we are just sat making a meal plan now.
we all have the same meals i.e same breakfast, same sarnie filling….
with the exception of a few sweet bits for my daughter i cant see why it cost’s so much.

How big are your portions? Obviously if they are big you have to buy more.

Ah, meal plan – there’s the problem. Get back from a ride, take a quick look in the freezer to see what’s left, pop it in the oven, job done 😉 . To be fair I used to do meal plans year’s ago . . . I was so organised . . . the house was so clean . . . looks at bikes and muddy kitchen floor . . . middle age ain’t so bad 😆

We tend to spend about £250 a month, which is good as we do buy mostly good quality meat and veg, I cook for a living so I’m always picking up bargains,plus I do all the cooking in the house, the trick is also if your going to be braising something for 5 hours in the oven why not get the following days dinner in there too, buy cheap cuts of good quality meat,you’ll save on electric/gas,the problem is I love shit like crisps and Haribo, right I’m off for some Hula Hoops.

I’m with you on the crisp saleem but haven’t brought any since 2 month ago when I ate two 150g bags a Kettles one after the other and was going to start on the third 🙁

Don’t know what I spend but it won’t be any more than about £250 for food in a month as I shop in bulk at Costco, divide the meat and freeze and get your chums to rear lambs and pigs for the freezer. Then buy fresh stuff from the market and bake, just had pumpkin curry, home grown, whopper, we’ll be eating it for weeks yet. Got 4 chickens that lay 28 eggs a week too. Spend Family Allowance on Gin….

teagirl……………… 😆

Hendricks or Bombay Saphire 😕 😕

Bombay Sapphire, of course! The Gov’t. pay me well for 3 kids 🙂 for now…

2 adults + 2 teenagers I’m happy if its under £150

We average about 50 quid a week between two of us, not limited to food, but normal household stuff as well, e.g. washing powder, shower gel etc.

Doesn’t include my Friday bacon roll at work 🙂

That’s not even being particularly cost conscious, although I do always compare prices rather than picking the same brand off the shelf and bulk buy when stuff is on offer. It could be cut further if we had to.

We’ve recently started planning menus for the week. So Monday we’ll have $blah for tea, etc. Then, shopped for ingredients for those menus.

It’s made two big differences for me; first, it’s massively reduced my shopping bill, I’m loathe to say ‘halved’ but it’s not probably far off; second, it means I’m doing a weekly shopping run rather than going every other sodding day cos we’ve run out of something.

Thankfully, I may have overestimated but not by much. I reckon this would be my typical spend

Milk £2
Eggs £2
Apple/Orange Juice £4
Musili Bars £5
Nuts/Seeds £4
Olives £5
Hummus £3
Parma Ham £6
Roast Ham £4
Fruit (Bananas £2, Apples £4, Clementines 2 packs at the moment £4) = £10
Herbal Tea £1
Soup £1
Fish (Salmon) £10
Meat (Steak) £9
Chicken (£5)
Ready Meals (£4)
Prepared Vegetables/Lentil Salads etc (£10)
Yoghurt (£2)

I think this totals £87. Which is probably a good estimate. I typically shop 3 times a week and typically spend £30 +/- a little each time

Any ideas on how to reduce this would be gratefully appreciated.

Gary

lol @ £5 on olives

Without quantities GJP, it’s hard to see where the savings would be made

e.g. Apples £4
If you’re buying a bag (5/6 apples) this is expensive, if you’re buying a kilo not so much

Bananas must be one of the cheapest foods going how many are you getting for £2

£30 on meat. There’s your problem, right there.

</ObligatoryVegetarianTroll>

As cougar says cut down on your meat or buy the cheaper cuts and slow cook them. Also they rip you off on prepared veg.

GJP – go apple scrumping.

£30 on meat. There’s your problem, right there.
</ObligatoryVegetarianTroll>

I’d agree. Cut out all the veg and you’re quids in. And not lost anything worthwhile.

£5 on seeds, are you a budgie?

Bunnyhop – Member
GJP – go apple scrumping.

What every week 😆

I think the Olives, Parma Ham and Hummus need to go – no more pre-evening meal snack for me for now on.

Olives £5

I remember a mate having a massive row with his dizzy girlfriend because she kept spending too much (of his) money on stuff like olives and that. Mostly on tasty fancy snacky things that she liked. Whilst she was sposed to be on a diet, and they were sposed to be trying to save money. And then he discovered that she was eating out a few times a week during the day, while he was taking sandwiches to work to save cash. She was very good at spending other people’s money…

GJP; that is a pretty fancy selection, from a relatively expensive shop. £10 on Salmon? Things is, you could get the same amount of nutrition for less than half the price of that lot, and still have a tasty and varied diet with good quality foods. And as for ‘prepared vegetables and salads’; you’re paying up to four or five times as much for the luxury of having them prepared for you. Ok if you’re in a rush, but just laziness otherwise.

TBH that’s mostly meat and tasty snacky type stuff. It’s a healthy range of foods, but a very spensive way to eat.

And you spend even more on food during the week?? If you can afford it, good luck to you!!

£5 on muesli bars is a bit silly though. 😆

That sounds like a lot! I don’t think I’ve ever spent more than £100 in a supermarket in one go in my life.

I don’t really know but I’d guess £60-70 ish for two and a bit.

Typical meal:

Meat = £2.50-£5
Jar of sauce = £1.80
Onion/pepper/beans/cihckpeas/frozen veg + seasonings = not much
Rice/Pasta/Spuds = 50p-£1

Make 3-4 portions.

I know a very naughty trick to get meat almost free at supermarkets… Works in all deli food

Elfinsafety et al, I will be the first to admit that when it comes to cooking I am lazy. And other than frying a steak or grilling some salmon I rarely cook for myself. I am not a great cook, but I can cook, but living alone I find it hard to find the motivation to cook for myself, especially during the week.

However, writing everything down, has been helpful to me, as I can now see where the money goes, and as you say there is a lot of spend on tasty snacky bites.

I’d say it’s good to learn a few simple recipes, that you can adapt to suit different moods and foods. Ask yer mum, dad, friends, etc, for a few tips. Cooking dosn’t have to be time consuming. I swear by stuff like noodles and pasta, which even an idiot can ‘cook’. With a pasta, you could make a very simple sauce with something like tomatoes, mushrooms and bacon. Bit of salt, pepper, garlic and oregano and basil- bosh. Very tasty, healthy and nutritious meal, takes as long as it takes to cook some pasta, basically. So, 15 mins or so. A baked potato is also piss easy to prepare; lovely with melted cheese and tomato slices, or tuna/sweetcorn etc. Again, very healthy and filling. Salads; what can go wrong with a salad??

As for meat; offal like liver and kidneys is actually more nutritious than steak, just as tasty imo, and far, far cheaper. £1.20 or so for a pound of kidneys. Lightly fried calves liver, done in garlic butter and served with rocket, new potatoes and green beans or something. Mmm. Or how about some prawns; very healthy, are prawns. And very versatile. Sooo easy to cook, too.

Cooking can be an enjoyable, satisfying activity. Nowt better than eating something gorgeous, that you’ve prepared yourself. Even better when you’ve someone to share it with, and impress…. 😉

C_G is eagerly awaiting the STW version of Come Dine With Me. 🙂

So … whose cooking and conviviality can I enjoy?

PS I will help load the dishwasher if that helps. 😉

Pop round to Chez Elfin, CG, for some quality grub, at very reasonable prices! 🙂

£5 on seeds, are you a budgie?

😆

Ta Elf, who else can be invited? Just imagine, a dinner party with all the STW legends. How cool would that be? 😆

No no; can you imagine the criticism and bitching? Ittud give me indigestion. 😯

about £35 a week for one. no junk, processed or ready meal type shite keeps the cost down.

Elf – OK I promise to behave. 🙄 Actually I reckon we had a few legends at my Mulled Wine Weekend. 😉

Ton, if thats enough for a whole week then probably not far off the mark.

£35 today in Tesco, for the contents of a well packed hand basket. Ok, so £3 was on a roll of tin-foil, but nowt else of high value.
I scanned down our full-shop receipt the other week & was amazed how few items cost less than £1 these days.

be wary of special offers, sometimes they’re not as good a deal as you’d think.

Go on then – explain how a jar of sauce at £1 rather than the usual £2 is not as a good a deal as you’d think 🙄

For a 13.5 stones person like me per week cost me around £20 – £25.

That includes fish, meat, grains, bread, veg and some junk food like bombay mix or jam or custard doughnuts.

😆

p/s: never touched ready meal for a long long time.

pp/s: Ton, for 3 person more than £80 is a lot.

Probably spend around £80 a week for 2 adults and 2 small kids – not counting booze.

Actually I would like to spend more!

We save some money through having an allotment, buying veg from a market stall on Saturdays, herbs and spices from a wholefoods shop, and we don’t eat a lot of meat.

We spend extra on bread from the local bakery @ £2 per loaf, organic milk and lots of olive oil + ingredients like pine nuts, olives etc.

I’d love to buy more fish and locally produyced organic meat, but it would be easy to add an extra £10 per meal to do that, so I don’t.

OTOH we could eat a lot more cheaply. If you cook from scratch and stick to basic veg/grains/pulses I reckon a family of 4 could live reasonably well (healthily) on about £30-40 a week – provided of course that someone has time to shop around and do a lot of cooking.

3 off us including 4 month old and cat.

on an expensive week, cleaning products, mrs shampoo, cat food etc it can be around £80

we dont buy drink anymore since the baby came along this used to ramp the cost up loads.

key to a cheap shop is have a list and stick to it.

also we used to have seperate bank accounts, used to take out £40 each before the shop and then have money left over whcih was spent on crap.

make your own sarnies for work aswell as already stated, save loads doing this

were also in the pricess of buying all fruit n veg from local market as supermarket stuff is generally sh*te

cut down on meat aswell, price if meat has gone mental.

just looked in the fridge
3 items added up to £25.
corn fed freerange chuck £7
pack of 3 sirloin steaks £8
brisket joint £9.40

think i have a idea why it is so dear now……………we must be spending £40ish a week on meat.

corn fed freerange chuck £7

Which is no different to a non free range corn fed chook at half that price…

All that organic/free range stuff is another con; blind tests would prove there is no difference in tastes. All meat sold in the UK has to pass pretty stringent hygiene/safety tests anyway. The only thing that will significantly alter the condition of meat is age of the animal and storage. The organic/free range bollocks is just to make you think you’re buying a ‘superior’ product. A nice bit of sirloin will be more tender and juicy than a bit of stewing beef, but that’s about it. If you know how to cook, you can turn the most unappealing tired old stuff into something really tasty.

‘This isn’t any old Marketing Bullshit; this is M+S Marketing Bullshit…’