to automatically ignore value brands

[somedayma]

I probably am BU because I could definitely do with saving some cash on my grocery shop. But I've had some v bad tesco value items in the past (soft rice crispies, plasticky tasting chocolate etc).

I was looking at value chicken breasts today, thinking 'they're probably going to taste the same as the other slightly more expensive ones once it's in a stew anyway'. but for some reason bought the more expensive ones anyway.

Value ready salted crisps taste the same as branded ones. Just FYI

that is an absolute outrage, did Asda not compensate you?

They offered me a £5 off my next online shop. . But they couldn't guarentee that they wouldn't take out another 'ghost payment' when I shopped. So I'm not about to risk it.

GuarAntee.

what an absolute disgrace, when was this, you really should take it further. i find an email to the MD often does the trick.

I had the same issue as hunty with asda, in 2009, they were utterly useless and I decided it was worth paying public transport ie. More, than risk the ghost payments again.

In my experience aldis generally better than lidl, because depending on location lidl can be pretty grim, aldi seems to be good across the board (we've lived inner city, suffolk and norfolk now and used 6 different aldis, only 2 lidls) but in places aldi is not as popular double check best before dates on fresh produce as they can be sort, in busier areas the turn overs quicker and you get longer dates.

I agree with value ketchup and brown sauce. Absolutly fine and very cheap in all the supermarkets.

The only problem is that the bottles have HUGE openings so the kids used to flood their food in sauce. I bought some of those retro tacky sauce dispensers from the pound shop and I put in them. Works a treat.

I dont like value krispies but the kids dont mind and will eat them. Their breakfast of choice is a mix of value krispies, cornflakes and bran flakes.
The cheaper cheerios are just as good and the real ones are really expensive.

We buy all value juice and lemonade because we mix it for a fizzy juice at meal times (not every meal). I wouldnt drink the lemonade on its own though bluegh.

I like value white bread for toast because I like my toast really crispy. Not so nice for sandwiches though.

You can add a bit of tomato sauce to the cheap beans and I think it makes them taste as good the others.

Sometimes we have to buy everything Value and tbh it can be a bit depressing. I find if you put it into nice bright containers it makes all the difference

Value chicken from tescos is fine (for us anyway), I used to buy free-range cornfed massaged with essential oils chickens when I could afford it but actually find they are less tasty and 'meaty' than the value ones

I do think about the welfare of the chickens and feel bad, and yes we could just choose to eat veg with a reduced water jus, or make one free range chicken last 10 meals by only having about 2 mouthfuls of chicken per meal, but we dont go out or spend anything on ourselves really, so our main pleasure is something nice to eat.

ok...i have read this thread & think i live on a different food shopping planet......

DP & i (no children yet) live on home delivered organic food & our weekly bill isapp. £55 per week (including laundry/cleaning products).

not including toiletries or toilet roll. we go to the supermarket every few months to buy dishwasher salt. etc.

we dont eat meat but do eat fish, but mainly tofu, beans , lentils, soya. we have a box of veg delivered which is supposed to feed a family of 4

DP is really good a making a meal from scratch really quickly (mess everywhere which i clean up when i get home from work at 9pm ....).

we live on stir fries, curries, pasta, stews. most people think we look 5-10yrs younger than we are. i think it is partly due to our diet.

global food prices are going to continuing to rise as our population grows & people in developing countries eat more meat & dairy products.

we eat really well & i dont see our diet as any sacrifice. i am quite greedy so like to eat a big plate of food & if a lot of my diet wasnt veg i would put on a lot of weight or have to go without.

When i do my Asda shop i end up getting things for other people too! My friend likes the value and cloudy lemonade, another friend likes their glamorgan sausages and Wilf's adopted Grandma likes the low salt crisps and biscuits!!! My local CO-OP seems to always have the big bags of 24 loo rolls at £5 at the moment which is great. I have to hide them in the airing cupboard though or they get Bumbled!!!!

I manage to do an £80 week shop at Sainsbos weekly using mostly the Basics range.I get 1 or 2 luxuries like Ecover,Lavazza,wine too.

The thing is Sainsbos are far beetter quality.I Tried Asda and Tescos value ranges and they weren't half as good and never in stock anyway.I refuse to pay Petit Filious prices when I know you can get the same for a few pence.

fab-

T bags 34p!!!!
Fruit and Fibre cereal bag
Cornflakes etc
cooking bacon(basically the same bacon but off cuts) fab on pizza,pasta sauce etc
fromage frais pack of 6-fantastic
smoked salmon(off cuts again)
cream cheese
cheddar
mozzarella
loo rolls
tin foil
chopped toms
fresh carrots,pots,onions(mixed sizes),bananas,peppers,toms, huge stir fry pack £1!!!!!
entire biscuit range
baked beans
tin sweet corn
rice
pork roast joint
fish fingers
fish cakes
nat yogurt
kitchen roll
glasses
custard
rice pudding
tinned peaches(diff sizes)
pancakes
crumpets
muffins
cooking baguettes
plenty more but I forget

not so good-

fresh ground coffee(I am a coffee snob but even so I don't like it)
meusli (not enough fruit in but I still get it and add banana or my own)
wash up sponges
w/m bread(but Im a bread snob)

I save a fortune

Op you're bonkers!

I LOVE Sainbury's value wine.
It comes in plastic bottles and that makes me laugh for some reason.
I always think of MN when I pick up my bottle of white and rose.

I am not a big wine drinker but I do love a wine slushy of an evening. cheapo wine poured over crushed ice (sometimes with a dash of cheapo lemonade added).

Yummmmmy

Is it nice?I've always avoided it due to the plastic bottle thing.How much is it?Is there a red?

I agree re ketchup,I just can't do the banging out of the glass bottle thing so get reg Sainsbos in the squeezy bottle.They so need to do a plastic value version.

As an aside isn't Marmite hellish expensive at the moment.Nearly as much as a bottle of wine!

good idea, mrsdevere, i must look out for one of those lovely retro bottles to decant the value ketchup into,

Actually Sainsbury's value wine in the plastic bottles is fantastic - especially the red. The Rose's not bad either - in a bottle for 3.99 I think. DH thinks it's OK and he insists in visiting vineyards and tasting and having it shipped home in case loads!

Ooh I will need to try the plastic bottle wine! Reminds me of holiday in Crete where you could go into shops and they had empty plastic bottles that you could fill yourself from giant barrels of wine!!

Aldi do a very nice white wine for £2.99 at the moment.

I don't drink a lot, but it's fine for unwinding in the evening.

Made a discovery today in Tesco. I would normally buy value cold meats like ham, chicken etc but today spotted a huge pack of Tulip naice ham offcuts a bit like the cooking bacon bits you get, for £2. it's all proper huge thick slices of proper ham and I am so impressed :) The pack is huge though and have split it up to freeze some but it'll last more than a week for our lunchtime sarnies for me and DP - and he has two rounds :) usually one pack of value ham will last 3 rounds of sandwiches.

£3.20.

Just bought two bottles to see me though the month.

When my late dh and i went to The Algarve in 1994 we made an interesting discovery, you got money back for returning your bottles to the shop!! We worked it so that every third day the next days bottle was free!

mrsheffley How can Marmite justify charging anything much for a by-product?

I'm a Marmite hater so it's okay for me. But if I was addicted I'd be furious.

Talking of marmite.

What the hell has happened to all the yeast extract you could buy instead of Marmite sticky caviar that cost a bloody fortune.

I used to get supermarket own brand but now i have to get vegimite because its that little bit cheaper but not much.

Is there some sort of Yeast Cartel?

sainsburys budget chocolate drink (79p?) is fantastic!

Good for you TheRealTillyMinto. I guess you put a lot of thought into the food you eat. So do I.

Like you I don't eat many dairy or processed foods. Unlike you I would not describe myself as greedy but eat a lot of animal protein which tends to be filling but expensive. Luckily, we're both blessed with youthful looks, or so our friends say.

However, most people when forced to budget, resort to getting their energy from high-fat foods that are cheap, filling but definitely don't make them look younger.

More importantly such diets result in them being poorly-nourished with all the concomitment implications for their health and cost to the NHS.

So they die young, don't leave a good-looking corpse and they're not even cheap. What bastards, eh?

limitedperiodonly its not really surprising that many people eat unhealthily - there is a vast industry convincing children and adults what is desirable food.

i read 'Not On the Label: What Really Goes into the Food on Your Plate' and it was a real eyeopenner.

Mechanically reclaimed meat sound relatively ok - some machine scraping off the remaining meat from the carcass? .... no....when the chicken carcass has been stripped, you force it through a giant sieve bones and all - and what come out the other side, is mechanically reclaimed meat.

doesnt sound very meaty to me....

real food is harder to make a profit from be it potato, meat, whatever because you cannot brand it in the same way. process it, split out the componants (feed some of the valuable ones to cattle), 'add value', package it up, spend on a marketing campaign.

and of course if the govt try to counteract all the unhealthy messages, they are being a 'nanny state'.

we are all told its all about choice but when i go to the supermarket, most of the food all looks the same.