How long do you think you could not go to the supermarket?

[laughoutquiet]

How many days do you think you (or whoever does the shopping) could manage without going? It's just me and DH.

Due to long running furlough and limited funds, I thought I'd see what I could do. Pre-covid I was a lazy planner and used to go for small (but relatively expensive!) shops every couple of days. Lockdown has forced me into going once a week and now I have a proper freezer too.

I'm going to try 2 weeks. I haven't especially shopped for this, the fridge is not full to the gunnels but the freezer is around half full. Dry store about average. No takeaways allowed.

Shite, I just thought about milk

It depends what you mean by not going to the supermarket. We have been using local shops in person, along with milkman and veg deliveries. Inwent to Tesco mast week which was my fkrst time since before xmas.

@starfishmummy

It depends what you mean by not going to the supermarket. We have been using local shops in person, along with milkman and veg deliveries. Inwent to Tesco mast week which was my fkrst time since before xmas.

I'm planning on not doing any shopping. Delivered or otherwise.

If one good thing has came out of lockdown is that I am much more conscious of food planning and food waste.

I try to have two weeks worth of food in at any time in case I get a notification that I need to self isolate and for whatever reason cannot get a delivery slot. No Deliveroo here to get basics

A friend of mine had that happen to her and she couldn’t get a slot for three days and had minimal in her cupboards as was about to go shopping.

So have enough in freezer and cupboards for two weeks, use almond milk so that has long dates. All I really go out for in between is fresh fruit. If I had to skip that as isolating it wouldn’t be a deal breaker

Four months

I go once every few months

I shop in Costco every 4/5 months for dry goods, and cheese and freezer stuff

I get a weekly fruit and veg box with eggs delivered

I get milk , butter, yogurts, fresh orange juice delivered weekly

I make my own bread daily in bread maker

I hardly go to shops at all, it's great.

Pretty much during the pandemic by using online deliveries we very rarely go to the shop now. Ive been in a supermarket less than 5 times in over a year I would say. Get an online grocery delivery on the same day every week and that sees us through without needing to go near a shop in-between times. Could probably stretch it to a 2 weekly online shop to be honest but only have a tiny kitchen with a tiny fridge freezer so not much storage which is the issue more than anything else. We also don't use fresh milk as we use plant based long life milks so that's another bonus otherwise we would have to grab fresh milk.
I don't think I will ever revert back to just nipping into the shops again because as others have said...popping in for one things tends to end up £20. Our shopping bill has been significantly reduced with meal planning and avoiding the shops.

Easily a month, except for milk, but we have a milk man. 2 fully stocked freezers of meat and veg, could make bread.

I have fridge freezer for everyday use them a large chest freezer full of joints of meat and veg and cooking apples I have frozed from the garden. I have storage as shelving, 3 of them in garage full of dried goods eg pasta, lentils, rice, yeast, powdered milk and flour etc. I also keep in 24 long life milk and lots of toilet rolls and cleaning products. I think I could go for 6-8 weeks if I had just had a large fresh shop with lots of salad things and fruit. I buy frozen raspberries and mango chunks, tinned pineapple and peaches, not as nice as fresh but it would keep us going. I have loads of frozen vegetables, carrots, peppers, peas, sweetcorn and loads of spices and herbs too. I always have s good stock of cheese and eggs too. If I was very careful with I could make those last 4 weeks.

We normally shop every 6 days, but with our cupboards usually quite full we could go more if we needed to.

We couldn't routinely shop every 14 days though, without changing our diet. Not enough freezer space for the bread is the limiting factor.

2 adults. And we like our sandwiches.

@DDIJ do you mean actually two years doing no food shopping at all? Or that you would pick up perishable food from small shops or markets?

We could last for a few weeks with frozen and packaged food, but fresh stuff we have to shop for once a week.

@DDIJ sorry I didn't realise I'd skipped a couple of pages, I just saw your reply to a pp upthread

We grow a lot of our own veg, so I'm still on onions, potato etc from the shed, beans and peas in the freezer (carrots have run out)
I buy twice weekly bread and milk from the local shop, meat once a week from the butchers and visit the supermarket every 10 days or so.

Surely popping out only costs more if you are buying more expensive food? Otherwise whatever you buy today you don't have to buy with your weekly shop so it will balance out. The milk thing is not a problem for us as we buy it weekly from a local dairy, if we do run out then we just don't have milk.

Height of Lockdown 1 I could have lasted a month if we weren't bothered about fresh fruit (I always kept a supply of frozen veg in the chest freezer). Now probably a week at a push - I've really slacked lately.

@Ariela

We grow a lot of our own veg, so I'm still on onions, potato etc from the shed, beans and peas in the freezer (carrots have run out) I buy twice weekly bread and milk from the local shop, meat once a week from the butchers and visit the supermarket every 10 days or so.

I would love to grow my own veg. I currently only have a rosemary plant which was great with yesterdays lamb 😂 - would definitely like to grow more than herbs, though wouldn't know where to start!

We have a corner shop literally at the end of our very small street. Bizarrely, it has saved us a fortune. Because we can just nip out at any time for milk and bread and because it's small and over priced for everything else, we don't spend £20 a time on bits like we did at the supermarket.

We have gone 4-5 weeks often!
I have a stash of uht and oat milk always and use it after the fresh runs out. I always have loads anyway. Make bread when i need it. Buy a lot if hard fruit and veg which lasts ages and have cans, dry and freezer stash.
Started when i was shielding but now a habit
You'd think it sounds ridiculous but really isnt. Eat wild dried mushtoom risottos and prawn risottos as always have ingredients. Many pasta dishes with stuff from freezern meat and fish (have more than i always think even though its an undercounter one) and veg ones too. i do buy duplicates of things like squash and pasta when shopping, always have though so si kind of prepared for it

I freeze bread, milk, meat, veg and some fruit. Flour, coffee & sugar etc keep in air-tight jars. ( When milk defrosts, just give it a shake)

The only things I would miss are fresh fruit & salad. In the summer I grow a lot of our own salad, so fresh fruit would be my limiting factor. Assuming a large enough freezer, two weeks should be easy.

If I could make all the decisions about food, and our milk man still delivered, about a month. In non zombie conditions, my family would revolt - the last couple of weeks would be pure randomness from the freezer and cupboards, and they would have run out of snacks long ago!

Our freezer is low, I'm due to re-fill from the butchers this week. We also don't have a huge amount of fruit/veg. I'd say a week, though we would run out of milk sooner. Normally I'd say at least two weeks of good decent meals. Possibly more only really running out of fresh fruit. We would also have to play freezer surprise for a few days but I know we have a few decent portions of meals in there.

We did a no spend lent, so 6 weeks. I grew fresh stuff on the window ledge (not very successful), used long life milk, ate veg from the freezer and fruit from tins.

We did fine.

Dh and the kids would manage 2 weeks I think. We're not big bread or milk eaters, although we'd run out of fruit and veg.
I'd not manage long at all. I eat 100% paleo diet and as a result, nothing processed or long life really, so I need to shop weekly and plan my food or I run out! I'd really struggle if fruit and veg was limited.

My cupboards used to be well stocked but I just don't use things like pasta, rice, tinned beans etc anymore so they have gradually been whittled away and not replaced.

We have been shopping once a fortnight since lockdown started. We have a big chest freezer so all the meat goes in there. I get a delivery of fruit/veg/milk once a week but only tend to spend about £10.

I'll be honest it's saved us a fortune!

I don't like frozen milk. And frozen bread is only just ok. So we'd be popping to get bread and milk.
I have full cupboards, and 2 freezers, so can last many weeks.

We have weeks when we try hard to eat from the freezer. Sometimes we just have 'bits and bobs' - bits that need using up. Recently I found an unlabelled bag in the freezer we didn't even know what it was. Even after eating we weren't entirely sure!