Realistically can I feed 5 for £150pw?

[PinkPinkPinkBlue]

Switching to Lidl/Aldi tomorrow (they are on same retail park) and would like to spend a maximum of £150 per week is this possible? Currently spending nearly double that at a major supermarket I no longer want to dip into savings each month to feed us. No alcohol but will need to include toiletries and cleaning supplies, any items I should give a miss and anything worth buying? We are a non fussy household but no fish/shellfish due to an allergy, I am happy to go into to both shops as they share a car park.

Drip drip drippity drip. This is the sort of stuff that needs to be in the OP. Otherwise it's just a flounce because nobody was impressed by your waitrose fruit consumption.
You've clearly got no intention of making any changes, nor do you need to. So no, you won't save £150 just by shopping aldi

I have a child with life-threatening allergies and I think this response is bang out of order. @AnnikaLowe was suggesting that you don’t need to provide exotic fruit worthy of a five-star hotel on demand to your children.

Thank you.

Exactly.

The OP mentioned E numbers as allergens.

My son has peanut allergy. We buy seed butters like sunflower and pumpkin , he can eat cashew also. Cream cheese on toast also popular. There’s various alternatives depending on allergies and preferences

Sausages are nice at Aldi and cheaper than you paid
i get a pork shoulder which is about £6 and makes enough pulled pork for 5-6 portions so way cheaper
get the wonky berries, they’re fine
big tub of Greek yoghurt is cheap
no individual portions of stuff

Also consider iceland for meat and £1 offers - I find you get a good variety for the price and they even do same day delivery. Most of the stuff is store cupboard stuff and not fresh, but the meat deals are great for freezer I find.

No fish or shellfish is mentioned specifically which is nothing to do with peanut butter or anything else

Fuck me, that escalated wildly. 😅

Meal plan

3 hearty meals a day

No snacks required

Drink tap water

Get your 5+ a day from veg not fruit.

We we went from £190 to £95 (for 4) at Tesco.

You've got plenty of spare money and you want to buy £50+ worth of fruit and £75+ worth of meat every week so just do that! What a pointless thread.

Yup, I should have RTFT

If you want to avoid UPF and e numbers you will need to bake your own bread and cakes and as pp have said that will be cheaper than posh fruit and olives for snacks

olives are likely to have e numbers in them as most shop stuff contains preservatives

Sorry - I said Fish Pie, missed that it was fish not just shellfish.

OP - are they up for making their own stuff?

My Dc blitzed up bowls of hummus from tinned chick peas - so much cheaper than little pots. They will also knock up flapjack, home made wedges in the air fryer etc.

Less I would say. If lentils / chickpeas / huge vegetable sides / bulk cooking become a staple

I resent the current price of food. I still have an Ocado order but only buy good value / decent offers / flash sales. Most of my money is spent at Aldi now. We have a Waitrose that does good reductions, so I get some things from there - much of our meat items, which I freeze and bring out over the week. The family seem quite happy with the variety of food.

We are now eating very little sugar and I bake some of my own stuff for treats.

Berries have been fairly good value recently, especially at Lidl/Aldi, and the kids like them - I don'tt buy sweets or biscuits so they might as well enjow berries!

I apologise @AnnikaLowe I clearly miss interpreted your post, I have said a few times I don’t buy certain things due to allergies and I thought you were saying by doing this I have lost perspective. My son is a nightmare to feed, he seems to collect allergies, the Greek yogurt I buy is dairy free hence the single pots and not the large family pot which is dairy based yogurt, yes more expensive but I can’t change it. I’ve said no fish due to the same dc and then told I should be giving them fish, no cereal, biscuits, crisps, etc due to the same dc so I buy the massive variety of fruit as it feels safe.

I buy hardly any cleaning products.
A good quality spray bottle for water, a bottle of tea tree oil, barman’s friend, hot water and dish soap can clean most things.
CHOICE reviews show that many cleaning products are inefficient and the spray bottles are very difficult to recycle.

Also not good to keep breathing in.
Saw on another thread fairy liquid does just as well if not better. Handy just to have 1 bottle.

I spend the same on Ocado online shop than I do at Aldi or Lidl if you buy ocados own branded fruit/veg meat and cupboard stuff

Also no squash etc as he has has an allergy to certain food colourings, so they mainly drink water but do sometimes juice oranges.

Yes, definitely possible! We made the switch a while back and our shop dropped by nearly half. Aldi/Lidl own brands are brilliant for cleaning stuff, fruit/veg, pasta, tins, and meat. I’d maybe skip branded snacks as they don’t save much. We’re a non-fussy household too, and it works well. I’ve even started using little AI helpers to plan meals based on what I’ve already got in the fridge — it’s saved me from chucking stuff out and kept us on budget. Honestly makes life a lot less stressful.

You can save money especially compared with Waitrose but whether you can half it I don't know. I get an online delivery from Sainsburys and buy bread, fruit and veg from lidl. I find Lidl and Aldi veg better than others.

That's a ridiculous amount of expensive fruit though. Yes it's nutritious and I don't care about sugar content as long as people aren't over weight and have good dental health, but that quantity is very much a luxury. I eat fruit but I try to choose what's seasonal and we also eat a lot of frozen fruit. Some is home grown and frozen and when that runs out I buy it. You could cut your fruit bill by buying what's cheap and seasonal rather than an around the world menu.

I get it when feeding teenagers.
maybe one small snack of half a carrot and a bit of hummus
This would be fine for a toddler but not for teenagers.

Mine are grown up but IME teenage boys are just bottomless pits and would snack on top of three huge meals.

If you're dealing with numerous allergies why did you describe yourselves as a "non fussy household but no fish/shellfish due to an allergy"... I can't imagine why you wouldn't lead with the very restricted diet...

If you enjoy stews or curries ( with simple spices), you can easily feed 5 on low budget with bread, rice on side. If you eat a big piece of meat with some veg on sides then budget will go up.
Also include lentils in your cooking, they don’t cost much.

do you know anyone with an allotment?
courgette and tomatos are glutting today.

eggs are a healthy, cheap form of protein and very versatile.

that's a lot of fruit. you don't need that much. that's way more than the recommended 2 portions. swap some out for veg (carrot, celery sticks).
you can easily half what you currently buy.
growing teens need calories, a toast with peanut butter is a good snack.