to think that £500 is far too much to spend on groceries in a month?

[fartlek]

I just totted up what I spent at supermarkets this month and realised that this is why I am £20 away from the end of my overdraft the day before payday. DH has also bought groceries this month so this isn't even our entire bill! We don't share accounts so it gets a bit murky as to who spends how much on what (this is a whole other thread to be started in relationships, we won't go there just now) but I'm pretty sure this is extortionate.
I have never been much of a budgetter when it comes to food shopping, I just buy what we need and try not to go for the most expensive item. What do others spend if I may ask?

It's probably above average but there's a lot of people on here who's idea of normal basic shopping is organic everything from Waitrose and claim that they couldn't possibly feed their families a healthy diet on less than £200 pw and if you're spending less you must be living on processed rubbish from Farm Foods or not mentioning several takeaways a week.

If you're wasting bread, freeze it - it's fine for toast.
Watch Eat Well for Less - eye opening.

Think about what you waste and how to reduce it - there's a website - love food hate waste, look on there for tips.

Eat cheaper meat (thighs or whole chicken instead of breasts, shin, liver etc) or less of it and have a few simple meals like omelettes, baked potatoes, stews with lots of veg and beans, things like that.

Think about what you’re spending on extras that aren’t strictly necessary like bottled water, juice and pop, etc

We buy a mixture of convenience food and cook from scratch and yes, this includes all groceries, bog roll, cleaning supplies, booze etc but we don't drink masses. DS gets a packed lunch (pasta pesto, every day) but DH and I can't-be-arsed-making buy ours. We don't eat out very much and I try to cook from scratch at least 5 nights out of 7.

That seems high to me, but I'm not sure who you are buying for, or where you shop.

My partner does the food shop, but he does it based on the list I give him, and I never see the receipts. However, I estimate that he probably spends £40 - 50 a week, as that is what I used to spend when I was cooking for myself and my sister. Now i'm cooking for him and myself. We spend £10 on formula.

i think you need to check all your receipts. Is there anything you can cut out, is there anything you're not using, and it's then being wasted?

We probably spend around this when I factor in little mid-week top up shops. Today I spent £5 in Asda on bread, sports drinks for dp and a couple of bottles of Pepsi max. It all adds up.

How much are you spending on lunches - that can be loads. Are you saying you need to save money?

Things like toilet rolls and cleaning products can be a lot cheaper from places like Home Bargains. Or buy on offer - no real reason to ever pay full price for this sort of stuff - stock up when you see a deal. Same for things like tinned tomatoes, pasta etc.

I spend about £600 a month. That's for 6 of us- me, DH and 4 children aged between 16 and 12.

Me and DH spend approx £120-150 a month, 2 x 40ish tesco online shops, then another 40-60 on top ups in aldi or Sainsbury's (what we have locally). Then another £40ish a month on a meal out and a takeaway each month? This includes most cleaning products and household stuff, maybe £10ish spent in home bargains/wilko each month on shampoo/cleaning stuff etc.

£500 seems like a huge amount but it's easy to do!!
I meal plan at least one week at a time which helps shop sensibly, and minimises "there's nothing in for dinner let's go to Sainsbury's" £20 shops...

We spend about £700 a month for 4 adults plus two children aged 10 and 7. That isn't just food though, it includes household items and some toiletries. That's 2/3 Waitrose deliveries and the rest at Sainsbury's.

About £500 per month for 3 adults (Waitrose). That includes most toiletries but no alcohol as we don't drink.
We buy good food and cook properly. I have lived on a very strict budget in the past due to a controlling ex husband so I know how to budget but I don't have to now.

I do the scan and shop so I can add it all up as I go round the supermarket. I have a strict budget and put things back if I can't afford them, go for the cheapest deals and check out the reduced section.

It doesn't make for a very pleasant shopping experience. I always envy the people chucking stuff in their trolley without a care! It depends what you can afford. It is possible to stick to a small budget.

It might feel like a lot this month due to how you get paid; for example if you get paid on the last Friday of the month (or something similar) that means some months there are 4 weeks between paydays and some there are 5. This month there were 5.

So perhaps you usually spend closer to £400 per month and this month is £500 due to the "extra" week...?

We probably spend more than you for three of us, I've never kept track but pretty sure it would work out more. It would be easy to cut back I we needed to, but at the minute we don't. I'm vegetarian, but when the others eat meat it's from the local farm butcher. We like to have a range of different fruit and get through a lot of it. We buy good coffee and branded washing liquid (one I know I'm not allergic to). We buy stuff that's not essential, like loads of avocados and different dips/spreads and cheeses. I get DS an expensive natural peanut butter, cos he eats so much of it I want it to be as healthy as possible, etc.

If your shopping is anything like ours, you could probably cut it in half and still eat perfectly well. But you might not enjoy it as much.

I spend about £120 - £130 a week for me, DH, DS (4) and baby (6 months).
This does include baby formula, nappies, wipes, cleaning stuff, toiletries - pretty much everything you can buy from Asda.

I wish I was good at meal planning but I'm absolutely shite at it. I need to look for some ideas on quick and easy meals for the whole family - I'm back at work full time now so time is at a massive premium - and I'm bloody knackered so still haven't got round to it!

Costs vary for so many reasons (work, school dinners etc) so for us it works out about £60 per person per week inc all lunches. We get home delivery from Tesco and Waitrose and top up from other shops whilst out depending on what's convenient. I find Morrisons cheapest and best value all round, and less waste from Waitrose as we get things we can only get from there and really enjoy.

I'm in the south and I just worked out I spend about £390 excluding meals out and petrol. 2 adults, 1 child, 2 dogs and 2 cats.

I shop at Aldi though religiously and certainly don't make a point of buying budget. I cook from scratch though and am getting better about leftovers. But we changed from Sainsbury's to Aldi about 2 years ago and I would say my grocery bill has dropped EASILY a good third.

Sorry, BH weekend is Bank Holiday.

The B doesn't stand for Bumming.

Unfortunately.

I spend this - two adults two kids (11 and 13) one giant dog. This covers all drinks, snacks, DH's lunches, dog food, some wine, some gin, some toiletries, cleaning products etc. I meal plan, pretty much cook everything from scratch (thanks to my life changing instant pot) and shop online. I'm aware that I could get this down by about £60-£80 if I shopped at the amazing LIDL several miles away but I work full time, have a long commute and the last thing I enjoy doing on a weekend is pushing a trolley round a supermarket for at least an hour. Plus I can never get everything in Lidl so it means another trip to Sainsbury's after.

I am doing GoSober for October and will be interested to see the affect on the finances though also.

We spend under £200 for two p/m, but 1) we eat out a lot and 2) we don't drink / hardly ever. I alternate Waitrose with Aldi/Lidl.

Two easy things to try:

Work on cutting waste - things like bread and hard cheese can go in the freezer and actually be used straight from the freezer for toasting, grating etc. If you have a choice between fresh or frozen (meat, veg), choose frozen. It's as healthy and tasty, and it won't go off so quickly.

Aim for 1-2 cheap meals a week. Ours is a kind of dahl with lentils, a bit of chorizo, garlic, onions and veg stock, and then whatever veg is on the turn chucked in, cooked for 40 min or so. Serve with bread. It tastes fab and works out to about 70p a large portion.

Other cheap, tasty meals - jackets with beans, omelettes, soups.

We could afford to spend more on food but I enjoy saving the cash where I can.

Sounds about right to me.

Yes, see that is the thing, the convenience factor. When the only Aldi was 13 miles away then we did not go. Now there is one two blocks away and I go on the way home from work.

I think I might start paying more attention though because I can be pretty cavalier about groceries and DH's business is facing a lean few months.

I was able to save a lot and lose weight by portioning food. I purchased measuring cups from Walmart here for $2 each and use them all the time. It is shocking how big our portions have become. Now when serving up dinner its call from the cups and I easily get another two lunches out of what is left over. DH hated it for the first week and now, a month later, he is getting used to it.

Ours is about £400. It includes toiletries, cat/dog food and cleaning supplies. We just switched back to Tesco from Ocado to get it down a bit but I'm not too worried. We could get it down by using cheaper cuts or less meat if we needed to.

Brilliant idea on portioning. [off to look atAmazon]

We spend about the same, including most of our toiletries, cleaning products, and 1 bottle of wine a week (approx. £7). 2 adults and 1 child here.

TBH food inflation has been very high over the last few years. I've cut back massively on what we buy, especially meat, but if you cook from scratch and eat enough veg and fruit, then realistically you're looking at a shop that would have cost £80-100 five years ago now being £130-150. Food prices have been on a stealth inflation drive since the financial crisis (for various reasons; speculation in agricultural commodities, profit-chasing by supermarkets etc.).

I see people on MN claiming they spend £50-70 pounds a week, and I think, realistically, they must be eating quite cheap and processed food: there's no getting away from it.

We eat a lot of made from scratch lentil and vegetable stews, pulses, grains, mince dishes, pasta salads and sauces and so on. On average we eat one or two mince dishes a week, 2 chicken dishes and maybe a tuna pasta dish or fish fingers - everything else, including lunch, is veggie/pulses. (My luxury is that I normally do buy a free range chicken a week which lasts 2 meals, but I just won't buy battery chicken or battery chicken products no matter how cheap). We have a breadmaker (given to DH as a gift), and we buy flour etc. in bulk to make bread.

Overwhelmingly I find now that its the veggies and fruit that are the expensive things. I buy on special offers and shop about, but undoubtedly things have changed in the last 20 years and now if you cook from scratch and eat a good amount of veg it is much more expensive than buying pre-prepared food.

Despite all the narratives people come out with about it being cheap to eat lentil stews and poor people don't cook properly everyone in health and public policy knows that the reason poorer people are fatter and less healthy is that it's far cheaper if you don't eat well and don't buy much fruit and veg.

What we need in this country is a complete change in how food is made and sold.