Should I use a food bank in my situation?

[Lionking1981]

I am 200 pounds down on my normal wages this month due to taking unpaid parental leave when my Dd was ill. Overspent the first week of the month trying to occupy the kids. Then my oven broke and had to replace it. Been living out the freezer and store cupboard since. To cut the story short, I now have 30 pounds to survive 10 days til payday. I have 3 small joints of lamb in the freezer, a box
of waffles and some fish fingers. A few tins of baked beans, tomatoes and soup in cupboard.

My friend says to go to the foodbank but I am super uncomfortable about it. We earn over 40k between us and i don't think food banks are there for people like us but it is going to be really hard to feed a family of 4 on this. However, we will be fine next month. Would you just make do for the 10 days?

Tough but doable in theory....never works out in practice for me though. Big bag of lentils is cheap and will do soup and dhal and pad out other meals. Lamb stew definitely on the menu. Jacket potatoes and beans/tuna. Egg and chips.

No, you shouldn't go to the food bank. As a PP said, you should have waited to buy a new oven. It sounds like you have plenty and will manage. It's worth having an emergency fund for the future.

Been there! Had to take our penny jar to Sainsbury to get it changed in their machine to buy food. £32.68 to last until a client condescended to pay. Oh and £10 of that went on petrol to get to another job to price it. Grim. We managed but God knows how.

Lamb roast could = 2-4 really good meals. Even a small joint. Roast. Cold cuts. Boil the bone - add tin Tom's beans veg -yum.

Spend on bread milk pasta rice. Tinned toms a money chicken and you'll be fine x

You will need a referral from a Health Visitor or similar who will want to know more about your financial situation.
You overspent on taking kids on days out and doesn't qualify as poverty in my book.

What a stress. Like others, I think you can probably just about do this.

I don't get the breezy "go to Aldi" advice though - not everyone has one round the corner!

Do you have a local selling site? Can you sell some old clothes/toys/ books? Even at a £1 an item, you may well get enough to help stretch your budget a bit further.

I know how crappy it is to suddenly find money tight in the summer hols. My ex has decided he can't afford to pay maintenance this month (but can afford to take the kids to Disneyland ) . I love the time capsule idea, definitely making that one of my plans!

Have you got a Waitrose near you, if you go in there in the late afternoon they sometimes have some really good reductions of good stuff that you could freeze to give a longer shelf life or for that evenings meal. you can sometimes get nice bakery items really cheap which can be frozen.

Tip for anyonecwith a penny jar - go at a quieter time and use a self service till - there's no commission taken that way....

Sorry OP, but it comes across like you want to use the food bank so you can free up the 30 quid for entertaining the kids? Or have I taken that wrongly? 30 quid should be plenty to top you up for 10 days of food, especially if you make creative use of the lamb you have in. If you need it for petrol to get to work or something then that's different. Either way, check nectar / boots card for points to help you through / shop at closing time for yellow sticker stuff and freeze to stetch the budget / ask if friends / family can lend you a small amount til next month / sell something on facebook or cash converters if you have anything to sell / ask the bank for a small temporary overdraft.

IMHO as much as I know anybody can have a cashflow crisis, I would imagine most people giving to the foodbank would imagine their donations are going to the truly needy rather than a household on a 40k income who spent too much of their budget this month keeping the kids entertained, and doesnt have any emergency money saved. If your oven was broken but the hob working personally Id have cooked my meals on the hob / microwave / slow cooker / air fryer if you have them for a while until I'd saved enough for a new one.

Also Metro bank doesn't charge commission for your penny jar.

That's a good suggestion about boots points/ tesco points etc. I once bought a bagful of sandwiches from boots with point swhen money was tight.

Bloody hell Is this real

I thought my weekly donations went to people who really needed it

Not over spenders who earn more than me.

Use the joints of lamb in your freezer

Op if you feel you need a food bank then please go.

And ignore the patronising comments.

Op. as others said £30 for 10 days is very easy to do (ldll) but if you really cant do it and need food go to the food bank and replace when youve money. Hope things improve.

For those saying do gooders on one pence for a week. Sadly dh and i had to survive on £25-30 per week food. It was do gooding, it was life. It was easy. I think I could have halfed that budget if no meat. I hate pasta so we had meat, fruit and veg. No extras. In fact we probably eat better on a limited budget than if you had extra money as you dont buy wine, choc, crisps etc

XxxWasnt do gooding (making up word but ipad fail) xxx

You are both on £40K per year and SERIOUSLY you need the foodbank? My god - some people have the gaulle.

Use what you have, buy cheap vegetables and stop taking away from people who really need it.

Fos, I use the self serve tills at Tesco and Waitrose with all the family's copper money as I don't want to pay to have it changed and I just make sure I go when it is quiet. If people don't like it that's just tough. I am not going to waste loose change.

You cannot just go to food banks. You have to be referred but if you are hungry knock on any church, mosque etc in the land and I am certain they will feed you unless you end up doing it all the time. Knock on my door and I'd give anyone a sandwich if they were hungry or let them use my hedge. Don't discount the wilds. Every single day for the last mnoth I have gathered blackberries to eat. We have the best wild blackberry crop for years in the UK.

Yes I could live off what you have with the 2 lamb joints for that period but if you can't then do apply to an organisation that might give you access to a food bank.

Also remember most of us only really need one meal a day particularly those of us with weight to lose. The best thing most of us can do for our health is eat less for a month.

If you buy potatoes carrots onions pearl barley and something like broccoli, all relatively cheap, you can do a roast lamb dinner plus something like cottage pie and a broth with the leftovers. The lamb version of the Mumsnet chicken.

That's how people used to eat when they didn't have much money. Might need to make the meat portions quite small but needs must.

'Sadly DH and I had to survive on £25-30 food a week'

Are you for real? That's a perfectly acceptable food budget for two people if you shop carefully. When you're looking at £5-10 a week, THAT'S 'surviving'.

OP I think you know you're unreasonable for considering a food bank. Overspending is a really terrible excuse. You'll just have to make do, like so many have before you, and budget more carefully next month.

Go to the food Bank and then make a donation when you have some money. They are there to help people who need it. I couldn't make £30 stretch for 10 days for a family of 4! What if there something else crops up - periods, running out toothpaste, shampoo, you need to catch a bus somewhere anything that might cost a couple of quid. Three meals a day on a budget of £3????
No one there will judge you. Google your local one and find out how you can be refered. I would usually say ask at school but as it's the holidays I am not sure - am guessing it's not easy just to see your GPS.

I'm with the others in that you would need to be referred and £30 should be fine.

Also this in our area is really tough for food banks at this time of year. It's before harvest festival, when they get a huge boost, it's summer and warm which makes people think less about people in need... And all those families that survive term time with free school meals suddenly have to feed more mouths.
Our local one is giving out as things come in, and could give out two or three times as much if they only had it.
Having £30 (and some lamb joints!) would be luxury for a lot of their clients.

I'd have cooked on the hob till' I had saved oven money.

You are assuming that the op has a fitted kitchen with separate oven and hob, loads of people have a free-standing cooker, if the oven part is broken, chances are the hob is as well.

£30 for 10 days is fine. Also if you earn 40k you will have an overdraft. No foodbanks are not for people like you.

My food budget for the week is £30 every week, for me and 3 kids.

I think you could do it, do you have an aldi nearby?
Don't buy any meat, it's expensive.
Buy:
Pasta
Tinned tomatoes
Baked beans
Frozen veg,
Potatoes
Bread
Eggs
Cheese
Milk
Cheap weetabix
Apples

There's loads you can make with these. And you will have change for anything you need to top up.

It doesn't matter what the reason is, if you can't afford to feed your DC you can ask to be referred.

I think it's unlikely you'd get a referral though. You should try and stretch the £30 until payday. It's doable but dull. If you completely run out before then, that's the time to ask for a referral. You only get 3 days worth of food anyway.

I think yabu to use a food bank for poor budgeting. You have a good income. Get a short term over draft to last you until pay day. Have a look if there is a trash cafe/junk food based near you. They have lots of fresh food and you can pay as you feel in time donated to the project of money.

Food banks are awful and really only for serious desperation.