To think it would be almost impossible to do a family shop in Waitrose for £50

[MarioandLuigi]

Mum in the playground (who is a bit boastful) was proudly telling us all today that she does the weekly shop for all her family (2 adults and 4 children) at Waitrose and only spends £50. One of the other Mums asked her if that was everything and she said yes.

AIBU to be a bit

I'm happy to drink cheap plonk, dh is a wine snob.

Some nice wines on 2 for £10 in Waitrose at the moment, but I do know what you mean!

Mumblechum1 has hit the nail on the head really - perfectly possible to do a family shop for £50.00 but it lasts for two to three days max if a few essentials such as wine, beer and ice-cream are thrown in. I can stretch it to 3 days if no cleaning stuff or toiletries are cat food are added.

I could feed myself and 3 teen offspring on £50 pw no problem - but that would mean never taking them shopping with me, when they come to the supermarket suddenly the cost shoots up to £100 + because they grab the convenience bags of salad and treat themselves to sundried tomatoes in olive oil hand pressed by virgins. When I shop and get their deodorant they get the value brand - I have noticed they prefer Dove! (lets not mention the hair products).

I confess to growing my own veggies - though only tomatoes, beans, courgettes and squash this year - have saved a fortune on tomatoes I suspect.

I think one key thing is having the resources to buy some basics (that will store) in bulk - like rice, pasta, porridge, cleaning stuff etc. bought a huge sack of potatoes from lidl for only a few pounds - but used the huge ones as baked potatoes and the smaller ones roasted or in soups - still getting through them and that was 2 weeks ago. Going to shop last thing at night, or early in the morning is key to meat buying - last thing for bargains and early morning for "stock" bones - which you use either for stock or to feed the dogs! one pack of lamb bones for 58p does one dog (raw, must be raw!) nicely for 2 meals (there is stiff competition for these so be willing to elbow old ladies out of the way!)

wish I had a waitrose near by... I love waitrose!

Jareth that's Halloween for you

Hardgoing I'll put the kettle on

Meal planning is amazing for slashing costs and is quite fun too. We ended up not eating until about 10 each night because I would put off and put off going and staring blankly into the fridge plus I was getting irrationally annoyed with DH pestering me to know what was for dinner. Also I struggle to come up with interesting veggie stuff and we now eat with 3 yo DD at 6 pm so I need to have some idea what I'm doing. Atm I'm working through a couple of new cookery books plus some from the library - I go through and see what I'd like to cook then see what I'd have left over from each one and find another recipe that will use that up eg tonight we had fried halloumi in a pitta with salad and houmous (Friday night staple in this house :)) so in a couple of days I'll have halloumi with couscous for lunch or summat.

Also find that not going in the supermarket makes a huge difference, hence doing an online Ocado shop (I got a free delivery pass via Groupon a while back) - don't pick up all the extra little treats that supermarkets are designed to fool you into getting plus I know exactly how much it will be and can put stuff back easily if it goes over budget.

My £46 didn't contain many toiletries etc except some handwash granted but we don't need any this fortnight except maybe a pack of nappies for DS but he's in cloth during the day most of the time and might try overnight as well. No pets and DH takes homemade (or very very cheap tinned) soup into work for lunch.

I think people underestimate how much they have already as well. A few months ago we were on the way to the supermarket to do a weekly shop when our card got declined on the way. We were into our overdraft but still £75 off our limit and remained that way for the rest of the month so not sure what happened there but the point is the fridge was empty and we were a week off payday and had zero way of buying any food. We managed to get a week's worth of food out of the cupboard/freezer and midway through the week DH found a tenner so spent £6 on fuel to get to work and £4 on some fresh fruit :)