To wonder why people do "top-up" shops

[RedSkyAtNight]

Just as the title says really. I've read a few threads where people either mention a fortune doing a top-up shop or mention doing a top-up shop as a job that needs doing in the week.

We shop once a week and buy enough food for the week. We then don't buy any more food until the following week. Other than folks who have very little storage (or possibly very large families?) I can't really understand the need to do a top-up shop. I mean obviously if you want to go and get something different to what you have in, that's fine. But why do it if you see it as a chore?

I do it because: I like my milk, veg, fruit and bread fresh; I go to different shops for certain products or to get specific bargains; I occasionally run out of something mid week; I actually quite enjoy doing top up shops.

I would be more surprised by anyone who didn't need to- I need to top up on milk and fruit as it runs out before the end of the week but if I bought it all at the beginning I would risk it going bad.
Also I never know who is going to decide that they love bananas that week and eat them every day so I'll run out when I'm not expecting to!

We plan meals for the week and shop accordingly. However, each week's plan is is written up on a whiteboard on the fridge, and not carved in stone, and is sometimes < whispers> changed, necessitating a mid -week shop. What's not to get?

MitzyLeFrouf I think it's more a symptom of disappearing high streets and homogeneous supermarkets, coupled with much better cold storage facilities at home.

When I was little, my nanna didn't do a weekly shop. We would go to the butcher on Saturday for the joint, which did Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. Then we'd go again on Wednesday for sausages, meat for pie or mince which would do the rest of the week. All vegetables or salad came from the garden, milk came from the milkman. Bread and cake was home made. Pretty much all we got from the supermarket was cheese, eggs, fruit and baking and cooking ingredients like flour, butter, salt etc. We ate plain, hearty food, all home made with no frozen or convenience food available.

I have no idea how anyone could buy enough milk, bread, fruit and veg for a week in one go. And never run out of anything?

We just pop into the shops whenever we need stuff, we only do a big storecupboard shop about once a week. We like fresh food, I don't want bread I bought a week ago!

Sounds like a goady/stealth boast thread to me. YABU, BTW.

DH sometimes pops out if we've all drunk more milk than I could fit in the fridge. Or if I forgot foil or something in the online shop. Or if we fancy crusty rolls.

I note that the OP hasn't come back to explain WHY it's any of her business.

Wombling, sorry, not, didn't mean to. The point I was making was that I menu plan and overall it probably doesn't save me effort at all vs a once a week top-up .. but as I hate shopping, it's worth it for me, as I would prefer to spend time planning than spend time shopping.

Apologies if it was clumsily worded - iI was trying to respond to the OP''s point about top-up shopping being 'a chore'. Top up shopping and menu planning are both chores, but I like one more than the other, so i do the one like more. Does that make sense?

I love shopping daily, why eat fruit that has been in the fridge all week when you can eat fresh every day

A lot of fruit on sale in the shops will be the same fruit on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday, may have been stored for weeks before it got to the shop and half of it isn't ripe when you buy it anyway. So it doesn't matter when you buy it.

And if you have paid for it anyway, does it matter whether it ends up in the bin before it's eaten, or in the sewer after it's been digested

Of course it matters. The more that is wasted, the more that needs to be produced, stored, shipped etc and that has an environmental cost.

It's saddening to see people use their comparative wealth (and if you can waste food with so little thought, you must be quite well off) to act in such a selfish manner.

Because neither of us drive so we're limited to what we can physically carry.

HTH

I don't understand why you don't understand.

This. Especially when salads, most fruit, veg, milk when opened, bread etc. last no more than 2-3 days and a week is 7 days.

I have a mahoosive store cupboard and a chest freezer, both of which are groaningly full.

But I still shop nearly every day as I am a useless fecker.

"Compleetly agree if you have a chest freezer and mainly eat tinned food though"

We eat fresh food daily, and well exceed the 5 a day thing. tinned tomatoes, yes, tinned pulses, yes - those are the only tins that UI have in

We have a fridge - freezer plus a separate freezer with 4 drawers, though - and probably more to the point, 90% of the space in those freezer compartments are empty by the end of the week. They're not used for 'long term' storage, but for preserving fresh food within a week.

I like doing top up shops. We like fresh bread etc and we live in a town, partly as we actively choose to be close to shops and other facilities. We don't absolutely need to do it - I could shop once weekly, but there are lots of things in life which make it a bit more pleasant.

Some fruits, humous, lettuce, herbs are always on my top up list. I do my main internet shop with Tesco and my top up at Sainsburys or Waitrose both of which I drive past on my way home. They stock different brands and more interesting things so I can factor in a few treats that way. They have different special offers so I can be sure to get two dibbs at those too. Another factor is that if I got all the "nice" things on a Friday or Saturday there would be none left by Monday, so I tend to buy some of them mid week to ensure we are not living on pulses and salad.

I'll be doing a t"top up shop" on my way home this evening. I will be buying milk (we get through about 4 pints a day when DD is home from uni and my fridge isn't big enough to hold a weeks worth of milk as well as everything else), bread (I toasted the last two slices of the loaf I bought on Monday yesterday), eggs (I had half a dozen delivered with my "big shop" on Monday but DD is home and has made cakes AND we both had scrambled eggs for lunch yesterday - I also want to make cakes tomorrow) and some fresh deli items for tomorrow's lunch. I am having a "big shop" delivered tomorrow evening but I will still be "topping up" fresh stuff during the week.

prima this!

School ingredients, maybe a lack of storage space, fancy something off the cuff. There'll be loads of reasons

Of course it matters. The more that is wasted, the more that needs to be produced, stored, shipped etc and that has an environmental cost.

It's saddening to see people use their comparative wealth (and if you can waste food with so little thought, you must be quite well off) to act in such a selfish manner

You can look at this two ways.
1 The more I buy, the better that is for British farmers. I make a point of trying to buy only UK produce and not veg that has done 1000s of air miles. And it's not 'wasted'. It's not like buying a car , or a new TV or a new smartphone , then buying a different one even though there is nothing wrong with the original, you just fancy a change. It's buying something because the original item is no longer fit for its purpose- to keep me healthy!

2 You don't have to be wealthy to throw away what, 30p worth of cabbage?

I think buying fresh produce and COMPOSTING the old stuff is far less wasteful than buying a cup of coffee as a takeaway and filling landfills with plastic cups- which I bet you do without thinking!

I usually go twice a week otherwise stuff runs out or goes off. I don't have a massive freezer so can't store too much. I make packed lunches for 3 people everyday! Plus everyone in my house eats a lot!

cantkeepawayforever fair enough 😁

Several people have said the OP is a "stealth boast". While it shows a lack of lateral thinking, I'm not seeing how it's boasting.

Having read it again, I think it's more that the OP Is trying to understand why it is one of the oft-quoted jobs that people use to justify what they actually do all week. Given that it takes about 15 minutes to buy some milk, the OP does actually have a point.

Because salad and fruit and veg go off after a few days.

Because you run out of essentials (cooking oil, kitchen roll, washing powder, etc) mid week

Because your DS asks if his gf can stay for tea and you need to buy extra.

I can't really see why this is difficult to understand!

I do a big shop roughly every 10 days (working around my shifts). Meat etc can be frozen, store cupboard stuff is fine, but need fresh bread, fresh veg/fruit etc. And we can get through 8 pints of milk in a couple of days.

Because I like fresh food.

And some days I fancy something for dinner that we don't have, so I stop at the shop on the way home from work.

Also, I find there's more waste if i obsessively meal plan. Like things come up in the evenings that mean i don't cook what I intended to cook, then I don't get the chance for a few days and stuff goes off.