250 pound weekly shopping/food

[Whome91]

Please try not to judge. We are a family of 5 two adults 7 4 and 7 months kids. Some of that is takeaways that me and dh have at night. I have a Diet Coke habit (20 for cans) I cook meat for the kids most nights. It’s including nappies for two kids in full term and baby milk. Help please

I feel bad about 1 can of Pepsi Max most days but 10 a day! You are pickling yourself

That’s before anything else

Adds up, its only 2 of us but about £100 per week, but that's also including fish monger and butcher and home made lunch boxes for the week. Funniest thing I saw in Waitrose today, a "guacamole kit" for £1.70, 1 small lime, small bunch of coriander, 1 garlic clove and 1 small green chilli, and they only had one left...

Also bucking the trend. I easily spend £200 a week. Normally at sainsburys. We are 3 Adults, 3 kids between ages of 8-10. Cat and a dog. One DD and DH are gluten free and that's expensive. I went to Aldi last week avoided the fatal middle aisle and spent £100. But still have to go to sainsburys to get the things that Aldi don't have mostly gluten free food. So spent another £50 but have the hassle and time of shopping twice. We entertain a lot and I cook everything from scratch. Meat box monthly, wine delivery when needed... I don't get people who spent £20 a week. No idea what you're eating.

@Chocowoka I gave up on Aldi, I sometimes go there for bits if I'm skint at the end of the month, but ours always bruises the fruit - but you don't realise it's been thrown at 90mph onto the shelves until 2 days after you've bought it. Also, pet food and washing detergent - we all like our own brands and I can't be doing with going to 3 separate shops for the best deals.
ASDA is way cheaper - for me anyway - I use M&S and Waitrose at Christmas and I've price compared Sainsburys with own brands and I can't believe how much more Sainsburys is.
Lidl is better imo than Aldi - but each to their own - we all buy different things. One shop is easiest though I'd say.

10 cans a day means you are drinking 3.3 litres of diet coke a day.
I don't think I drink that in all liquids in a day! I know this sounds weird but, to try an cut down the number of cans you drink, use a small glass and pour out half a can at a time?

If you aren't a confident cook, maybe look out some youtube cooking channels? There are some really easy recipes to follow and as you gain confidence, maybe you can try new stuff?

Is this post for real ?!?!

Cannot cook
Addition to coke (fizzy type)
Wine addition
Takeaways often

🙄

Is this post for real ?!?!

I'm putting money on a pisstake that reached 9 pages.

Bravo

Wow. Op...asda is vvv expensive.
it really isn't
Aldi and Lidl are cheapest but Asda is not far behind. Suggesting that waitrose might be cheaper is laughable. Just looking at a few standard own brand items - 500g pasta in asda is 53p and in waitrose is 89p. 200g soft cheese is 69p in asda, £1.10 In waitrose. 120g ham is £1.90 in asda and £2.99 in waitrose.
Those were the first 3 items I looked up but I imagine it's the same for most things.

OP you really need to get cooking and cutback on drinks if you want to save money. Cooking for yourself also is much healthier.

I call piss take too. ''Twas the 6 sausages that over egged it for me combined with the normal weight.

@BercowsFlyingFlamingo
No way can ppl eat this volume of crap and not be overweight, over 22l of cola, wine, takeaways every week, I don’t think Id have the energy to go to work!!

Piss take or not, we were spending a fortune on food too. Between dh's lunches £30/week, ds1 & ds2s school lunches £30/week, couple of bottles of wine £15/week, one take away £20, gluten free food for ds2 £10, we we're up to £105 per week before I stepped into Tesco, where I'd spend about £85 in a main shop and £10 in a top up. If you add in trips to the odd cafe here and there - it all adds up.

You know it’s bad when people start to call piss take. Bloody hell

Oh dear OP, head in the sand much. Great advice here, meal planning is your friend & ditch the takeaways that’s awful.

get yourself a slow cooker if you cant cook, i wont say im great at cooking but i love the slow cooker, there is plenty of slow cooking pages/groups on facebook or online you dont need to do anything apart from put it in turn it on, if you get one big enough for all of you then you can all eat the same and at different times, we are a family of 3 and spend around £200 a month that includes meat, toiletries etc
i will make things in the slow cooker like gammon joint, whole chicken, beef, spag bol. meal plan around a slow cooker and buy enough meals so you dont have to go to the shops daily unless its for milk and bread etc only take enough money for what you need so you cant overspend

Blow the cost I'm just worried about hobbies 6 sausages- how?

Husbands not hobbies!

I don’t think that’s huge? We do £100-£150 for 2 of us (we have a baby but BF and cloth nappies so nothing for the baby in that)

Premade mash is much cheaper and just as nice if you buy frozen. Someone has probably mentioned this ready, though.

You know that you buy convenience foods, though, so it shouldn't take an Internet forum to tell you how to shave some off your bills. If you need to learn to cook, youtube is your friend.

As I the only one reason thinking is could eat 6 sausages'? 🙈 I don't, but I do have four if it's dinner, and two if it's breakfast.

Surely you know how to make mash potato rather than buy it!

10 cans of coke a day!!! That's 3.5L nearly - your bowels must be fucked with all that aspartame - bet you shit through the eye of a needle.

£40 a week on wine and
TEN CANS OF COKE EVERY DAY
If you can read, you can cook. Even if you can’t read, you can follow a YouTube video, ‘I can’t cook’ is unacceptable when you’ve chosen to have three kids, but you and your husband are paying to kill yourselves with your bizarre choices to glug litres of coke every day and eat enormous quantities of shite food.

OP
Here is a simple one for you to try if you have a casserole dish.

I checked the price on the ASDA website
One pack prepared casserole veg 75p
One 600g pack boneless chicken thighs £2.99
One packet ASDA chicken casserole sauce mix 23p
Just under £4

Put the veg in a casserole
Put the chicken on top
Mix up the sauce and pour it over
Stick it in the oven for 90min

Your food shop isn't the problem, it's the other stuff. If you put the money issue aside, are you happy with your lifestyle? I'd be absolutely shitting myself about the example I was setting my children. Do they drink coke too? How often do you all sit down together for a family meal. What will you tell them when they realise that other kids share dinner with their parents?

@Whome91

Drinking 3 litres of Diet Coke could make you seriously unwell. Honestly! It’s really concerning.