To think I could live on �20 - 25 per week?

[confusion77]

Is it realistic? If it were just me and the cat. The cat food costs 2.75 per fortnight for tins and 11 per month for biscuits approx. I could get cheaper biscuits for him i guess.

This would be for all food and stuff like shampoo shower gel, washing up liquid etc.

Not face creams make up or wine....

Frittata would use up eggs and is cheap and stores well.

The horse food place has chickens, so 6 properly free range eggs for 1 and they are blummin lovely. We have an abundance of blackberries and cooking apples at the field.

I used to manage. No reason i can't now. I'm just out of the habit.

Blackberry wine? Oooh we have sloes too.

There you go OP. You'll be fine. I've got some proper farm eggs in the fridge at the moment (a bit more expensive though) ,they're lovely.

Stewed apples and blackberries would go well with porridge or pancakes. Breakfast for a few pennies!

If it's just for food, I think you could manage. Particularly if you have a freezer and can batch cook.

The Old Style section of MSE forums is a good suggestion.
I'll second chicken thighs being better value than breasts.
If you've got a freezer you can look for offers on meat and freeze it. I don't think I've bought any that wasn't reduced for at least the last year. If you go in the evening when they yellow sticker it it can be really cheap.
Take a look at what's on offer for fruit and veg as well. Can sometimes be cheaper to buy what's on offer rather than meal plan rigidly.

I would say you can, dd and i had about that when xh left...

I saw it as £100 for the month, so did an online shop day after pay day, for all the fridge/freezer/household/cat stuff, to last me a month. I bought things like chickpeas, lentils, rice, pasta, tinned toms etc. This was approx £60. That then leaves £40 for fresh stuff, which I spent about £10 a week on. Lots of things which I would have normally bought fresh, I had frozen instead, which is cheaper.
It makes for some carbtastic meals, but overall, I think I ate better as I could buy no crap.
Bulk cook, freeze lots. Bulk things out with lentils. Lower expectations, e.g. dahl and rice does not need naan bread. Chuck any left over veg in everything. Eat leftovers, waste nothing. Just don't plan many dinner parties!

Any potential to rent out a toom in your house?

Not to purlt a downer on things but there was an article on BBC news to say interest rates set to remain 0.5% only until spring then increase and settle at approx 3%.

My intetest rate is nearing 7%. First time buyers, 5 yr fixed rate expires in just over a year.

I have a very large two bed house. So yes, could rent out a room. I have two large receptions and a reasonable kitchen. The 'small' bedroom is 14' by 12'. The bathroom is larger than average but only has a bath, no room for shoer, bath is under eves.

I do have a fridge freezer and large pantry.

I think, assuming just food shopping, I could do that for the family for a week. After a week I'd be getting severe rebellion.

It would be rather a boring menu. It would go something like:
Breakfast: Porridge (1.20 for 1kg) (sprinkle of sugar on top-got in cupboard)
Lunch: Economy bread (47p per loaf, about 3 in a week) jam (home made) or cheese (3.50 for 300g) sandwich/cheese on toast. Apple/cheap fruit for afters (say 5, not sure)
Dinner: Baked potato (3.39-5kg) with cheese )another 3.50 for 300g)and beans (1.20, 4 pack). Economy yoghurt/cheap ice lollies for pudding.

Actually make that rebellion after 3 days not a week.

Posted too soon: That comes to 19.20.
Perhaps add in economy marge for bread/jacket potatoes: 1.35 for 1kg, so should last more than one week.

Problem is that looks okay at the start of week 1. By the end of week 1 it's very boring. By week 2 you're desperate for something different. You do need a treat too. And I haven't put in toiletries etc.

Don't buy breakfast cereal. Eat porridge or muesli (maybe make your own, it might work out cheaper.)

Morrisons also sell 6 free range eggs for £1. Tesco sell a larger box that works out slightly cheaper per egg, if you think you would get though tyem before the use-by date.

Morrisons sell very cheap toilet cleaner, their basics range, I think it's about 27p.

Don't buy bath sponges, get a couple of cheap flannels & wash then when you wash your bath towels.

Buy full-fat or semi skimmed milk, it's more filling. However, if you're struggling to get through the milk before it goes off, remember that the lower fat the milk, the longer it will last, as it's the fat that goes off first. When I was at uni I used skimmed as it would keep 2 days longer than semi skimmed.

Dewee, you don't need to eat the same thing every day. There are quite a lot of cheap meals to make

Just shopping, for me and one cat. yep. I can do that. I love pasta and tomato sauce with tinned tomatoes, I could eat that every day without DH moaning 'not fucking pasta again'.

Is that per person or for your whole family though, DeWee? It's just the OP and the cat. And the cat doesn't sound too expensive. There's probably a bit more leeway in the budget than just a jacket potato and beans every night on that amount.

I doubt it - I live in one of the cheapest parts of the country (I bought my 3 bed house for £60,000) and I couldn't even without running my car. I can live on £50 a week (if im ill and not eating or leaving the house) but never lower than that

Things like lentils, split peas, kidney beans etc. make very cheap meals.
To me the secret of budget cooking is having at least a few basic herbs and spices.

If the OP's got a garden, she could probably grow some of those herbs, along with some veg.

I'd second your herbs and spices. You don't need to do a massive bulk buy and blow the entire weeks budget either. They'll last more than a week so you can build up a store cupboard slowly. Just gives you a bit more variety in what you can do with what you buy.

Batch cooking saves money, and freeze, so maybe the initial outlay costs a little more, but it can then work out really cheap

dhal is really quite cheap to cook, can freeze, so you can cook 4 meals worth. You can buy polenta and make a load of chapati and freeze to go with it.

spaghetti bolognaise, my DH prefers the unlean mince, and scoops the fat off, he says it tastes better! and it's cheaper. You can use a whole thingy of mince and that can be split into probably 6 or more dinners, and/or can be used to make lasagne for some variety.

Chilli - you can make this with some of the mix from above, or with kidney beans/no mince. One tin of kidney beans, bulked out with veg etc will make perhaps 3 meals. You don't even have to have rice etc with it, just some bread. Or have it on a jacket potato.

Soup. I love soup made with leftover veg, you can get an extra dinner out of leftovers at the end of most weeks in our house by making soup, enough for 2-4 servings. So you can freeze those not used, or have for lunch.

Shop at 5:30-6pm at sainsbos (in my area anyway) when the sell reduced items at silly prices. I have got a good few freezer things there - mash for 50p, ready meals for £1, deserts for not much (as you are allowed to enjoy the food too).

Porridge for breakfast. Might be boring, but it's my favourite brekky so I have it most days. Buy basics/cheap frozen fruit mix and add a handful to the porridge as it cooks for variety/fruit intake.

I also have a suspicion my cat eats from a neighbours house as he is bigger than he should be on what we feed him. So, if you can work that out for your cat, you can stop feeding him completely

I can feed me and the dog for £25 a week and he probably eats a lot more than your cat, I don't eat breakfast though and drink water unless I can afford wine (Aldis do some nice cheap wines btw so you might be able to squeeze in the odd bottle on that budget) If you are buying monthly and have a freezer then it's easy to have a bit of variety with £25 a week once you get the hang of meal planning, especially if you aren't too bothered about meat. Stock up on cleaning stuff though and replace bits as each runs out so you aren't buying all of it in the same week. I can feed the 4 of us and Dog on less than £50 a week.

I did grow up really poor though and every time one of these threads come up I'm shocked at the amount people spend a week so I guess I must be used to far less luxuries.

potato curry. That's cheap to cook. Easy to freeze.

Ok, making myself hungry now

Yes you can manage on this, but it takes careful planning. Forget about meat though. I used one of my gran's old recipe books when I had to live very cheaply. Lots of eggs, potatoes, also pulses and cheap bread.

Spaghetti bolognaise would be too expensive IMO.

Dhal, jacket potatoes and baked beans, pasta in a home made tomato sauce, cheese souffle, omlettes, porridge, cheese on toast, soup with lots of pulses in it, spaghetti with grated cheese on the top.

And you can buy very cheap toiletries. Family shampoo for example from ASDA.

I think I could do it if you mean just groceries.
I get a kick out of finding things cheap. I always have-although I don't begrudge paying more for nice things.

I think you can do it.

You have a neighbour with surplus veg who can teach you to grow your own.

Your parents will feed you on Sundays and give you lunch for Mondays.

You have blackberries and apples to make jam (I made 60 glasses last year from our garden and we've just eaten the last one - but I gave many away as presents and there is 5 of us).

You can asks for the face cream and wine as birthday presents.

If things get really tight you can cancel the gym.

You can do it. Keep your lovely house. Dump the husband.