AIBU to ask if you had £50 for a weekly food shop what would you buy?

[FuckingDiet]

This is not my situation and in no way a begging thread. Between now and the run up to Christmas we see a lot of these types of threads so I thought it would be a good idea to put all our advice in one place. That way if anybody is in need everything is in on place.

I will set a challenge of 3dc aged between 2-10 and 2 adults, your meal plan for the week, shopping list and where you would buy it from with a rough total. Lets see which one of us can come up with the best result.

you could find a copy of the 4 ingredient cookbook maybe, lots of easy and cheap meals in there (www.4ingredients.com.au/) would be easy to meal plan if you found a few easy meals that didnt take a ton of different ingredients

Use strong, mature cheddar. Adds tons of flavour and use less.

Forget meat (mostly) and bulk out with veg, beans and lentils. A huge root vegetable lasagne lasts for ages.

Chunks/slices/minced chorizo is absolutely brilliant for making things taste great and adding a 'meaty' feel.

If you want 'real' meat, then a shoulder of pork in a slow cooker makes a load of pulled pork for sandwiches, burgers, ragu, noodles, wraps, etc.

Learn to bake bread - it's easy and economical, and therapeutic if you have time for it.

A bag of decent porridge oats makes quick biscuits, breakfast, oatcakes, flapjacks etc.

Make flower honey - a bag of sugar simmered with dried/fresh edible flower heads and poured into jars. Three jars of honey for the price of a bag of sugar.

Yes to lentils!

I use those to bulk out loads, chilli, casserole, soup, bolognese etc means you get loads and have leftovers

I like this site for recipes as they have user ratings and comments attached. They also tell you how healthy recipes are.

www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/collection/cheap-eat

So far all from Aldi I have come up with this, it is a work in progress.
Sat:- sausage pasta bake
Sun:- chicken legs, spuds, broccoli, carrots and gravy
Mon:- chunky chicken and veg soup (made with the left over chicken)
Tues:- cottage pie
Wed:- pasta Bolognese
Thursday:- sausage, mash peas and gravy (poss carrots if any left after roast, soup and cottage pie)
Friday:- jackets and beans.

Breakfast is porridge half milk half water or jam on toast.

Lunch is sandwiches mainly, ham, cheese, or egg lettuce, cucumber and cherry toms available or egg/beans/jam on toast

Snacks are rich tea biscuits, plain digestive biscuits, apples, pears or bananas.
List total is £43 on my supermarket from Aldi but there is probably stuff I have forgotten as I take having stocked cupboards for granted.

List: pack of 12 value sausages
2.5kg white potatoes
Frozen Chicken legs average 8 per pack
Frozen peas
1kg carrots
750g minced beef
Pasta 500g
2x value pasta sauce
Onions loose x2
4 pack of beans
Cherry toms
Broccoli
Lettuce
Apples
Pears
Bananas
Chicken casserole mix (for soup stock)
Value grated cheese
Marg
Bread x4
Porridge
4 pints milk x3
Blackcurrant squash
400g wafer thin ham
Rice tea
Digestive
12 pack value kids yogurts
Large tub of Greek yogurt
Value jam
15 eggs
Gravy granules
Washing gel (cheapest outlay)
Value tea bags
Sugar

My DP makes a fab Suet Sausagemeat Supper - pack of sausagemeat, an onion, black pepper and dried sage. Flour, suet and water.
Makes the suet pastry, chills it, mixes the sausage meat with an onion, dried sage and black pepper. Rolls out the pastry, plonks the sausagemeat filling in the middle and rolls it up. Wraps in greaseproof paper and bakes it. We have it with baked beans (don't really need potatoes too as it's pretty filling. The whole meal easily comes in at under £3.00 and feeds three of us.
PS: brown sauce is an added bonus.

I would make batches of stock every weekend, one vegetable and one with lamb bones. I would use these stocks to make stews and soups all week with lentils/chickpeas/etc and seasonal vegetables.

I'd build up a full range of spices so I could vary the flavours. I'd do meat as a small side or stew addition every second day or so - I'm wary of super cheap meat, and would rather eat less meat overall but of a better quality.

I'd use potatoes and rice as my main carbs, bread only for breakfast ... unless I had a bread machine. Pasta once a week maybe.

I'd make up a batch of red sauce from tinned tomatoes every fortnight to freeze in small portions. This is a great way to add extra taste to things, and in the right quantity it just makes things more "flavourful" not necessarily tomatoey. It costs pennies to make.

I would struggle with the challenge of 50 quid for 5 people even doing all this though.

It's very hard to do for 3 meals a day for 5 people and including all non food household necessities (toilet paper, laundry detergent, household cleaning products, washing up liquid, tissues etc).

People who pop up on every grocery shopping thread claiming to spend this sort of amount,not think it's plenty, inevitably end up revealing if asked that they only have one meal per day six days a week and even then not always for the whole family to cover from the weekly shop. A lot of people spend very little on the weekly shop but more than double on daily school dinner/ after school club snack/ breakfast lunch and tea at nursery/ cooked canteen lunch for working parents / Starbucks coffee and pastry grabbed on the way to work/ weekly take away and don't see that very high expenditure as coming from the same pot!

Are the eggs mixed in with all the other stuff, or plonked in?
I used to use a very old Cranks vegetarian cook book, lots of really cheap and tasty recipes. In fact I think I'm gonna get it out of the cupboard and have a flick through. I'm getting bored of the same meals week in week out. I've got lazy and fat.

Lentils was mentioned up thread they actually work well in most recipes, do the liked of Aldi/Lidl sell them. I use Aldi regularly but not something I usually buy.

For cheese pudding that is , thread moving fast!

You only use bleach and washing up liquid for cleaning products. Not differentiated products. I used to do this. It is a bit harder to clean, but much cheaper. Toiletries can be cheap soap, shampoo and deodorant, and that is it.

I would check whoopsies at local supermarkets.
Our local ASDA price down the stock at 5-6pm to silly levels- so a bag of apples or a bag of potatoes for 10p. Ditto with milk, cheese, I have had amazing bargains.

katemustsew All stirred up together with a fork. I think original recipe said whisk eggs, but I just break eggs into bowl with other ingredients, and use a fork to break up eggs and mix it all together, It is basically a much easier cheese souffle. And a favourite in my house. I have a fan oven, so might take longer to cook in a normal oven though.

You can cut out a lot of the meat content. I would much rather have less meat and avoid value sausages and anything less than minced beef steak. A chicken can stretch to at least three meals if you want meat - roast, stir fry, risotto, for example and probably get some chicken sandwiches along the way.

You can't go wrong with chickpeas. Dried are obviously cheaper, but the amount of money saved can be negligible. Chickpea, tinned tomato and frozen spinach curry. Falafel burgers, or nuggets - one tin of chickpeas, red onion, flour, cumin and coriander.

But my main message would be better to have no meat than cheap meat. Just value the meat when you have it.

Shower gel 33p in Aldi just looked on my supermarket, toothpaste 69p, deodorant was 69p as well. Cheapest shampoo and conditioner was 49p each and 12 value loo rolls were £1.99

Chicken drumsticks are also incredibly cheap, I bung them (skin removed) in the slow cooker with a ton of veg (really chunky veg) and add a tin of tomatoes and tin of butter beans plus the water from the butter beans plus a good shake of dried herbs. We have it with those cheap part baked baguettes. It's one of my 'pretty decent' dinners for under a fiver.

I do this all the time. 3 keys for us are:

simple filling breakfasts - no cereal - porridge and stewed apples/pear/rhubarb (by the ooops it's going off stuff and stew then freeze) or homemade granary toast with peanut butter, boiled eggs and toast

Lunch is sandwiches or value wraps for DC - egg mayo (we keep hens so have a LOT of eggs), chopped up bits of chicken and mix with sweetcorn and mayo so you get about 4 butties per breast. DH and I have left overs reheated or soup.

Evenings - each week a large pot of either chilli, stew, or other one pot treat is made. It is served 2x that week and one meal frozen. An alternative frozen meal from a prev week is also eaten so that's 3 evenings. I do a whole chicken most weeks (left overs for sandwiches) and often we also have an evening meal of an omelette or baked potatoes one eve. On a Sat one the DC cooks - often pasta or homemade pizza and Sunday we have a full english breakfast and a roast every week.

Some really good ideas so far including things I wouldn't of thought of.

Home-made bread is good too. I continually have a batch of sourdough on the go. All you need for that, ultimately, is half a 3lb bag of bread flour. Better on the gut too, than normal bread.

I forgot pancakes - we eat pancakes and homemade waffles at least 3x a week for breakfast or lunch.

Lots of big pots of stuff like spag Bol and chilli con carne.

Casseroles or slow cooked food can be cheap and use scrag ends of meat.
Make your own bread if you have time.
Frozen fruit and veg where possible as is cheaper.
Make little cakes to eat with cheap ice cream block for puddings.
Noodles, egg fried rice.
Make your own burgers or meatballs. Can bulk out with some breadcrumbs or oats.

That's my normal budget. I buy:
Apples X2
Bannanas
Another fruit
Cabbage
Leeks
Broccoli
Little potatoes (lasts 2 weeks)
Carrots
Peppers
Onions (last a couple of weeks)
Salad bag

Bread X2
Biscuits
Chocolate/sweets
Pittas
Oats
Marmite (every 2 weeks)
Peanut butter (every 2 weeks)

15 eggs
Tinned toms x2
Beans
Some kind of tinned pulse
Microwave rice (I can't cook it for some reason)
Flour (lasts 3 weeks)
Sugar (I use granulated for everything, it's cheaper and always works. Lasts 3 weeks)
Cheap noodles
Crisps
Pasta

Mince
Chicken

Cheese
Butter
Ham/cooked meat xx
Baking fat (lasts 2 weeks)
Fromage Frais
Houmous
Enormous milk

Frozen peas
a frozen pizza
Fish fingers (lasts 2 weeks)

Baby wipes
Cleaning wipes
Bleach (every 2 weeks)
Loo roll (every 2 weeks)
Washing gel (every 2 weeks)
Washing up liquid (every 2 weeks)
Tin foil (every few weeks)
Bing bags (every few weeks)
Shower gel/shampoo/conditioner/hand soap (lasts 2/3 weeks)

Cat food
Cat biscuits

Juice boxes x 12
Bottle of squash

From that I'd make: bolognaise, chili, roast chicken, chicken soup (with toast for kids), fish fingers, potatoes and veg, pizza with salad bits and salad leaves, eggs, beans and toast.

Porridge, scrambled eggs, pancakes, toast for breakfast.

Sandwiches, crisps, veg sticks, biscuits, fromage Frais, eggs of some kind, soup, basterdised carbonarra (mature cheddar and ham) for lunches.

I also make a load of cakes of some kind.

This is for 2 adults, 2 kids. I don't eat the rice and have a slice of toast or potato salad with chilli, as the rice won't stretch and I begrudge buying more. I s'pose I'd need a second pizza for an extra child too, so an extra 95p. This always comes out at around £50 when you split the every few weeks things over different weeks, I'd never buy all of them in the same week only across the month. I shop in Aldi, it's fairly easy. I could make it all a lot cheaper if necessary.

Also if you are this poor, you don't buy separate tissues, or have coffees or meal out. A loaf of wholemeal bread in ALDI or LIDL - basic one - is very cheap. Buy and make sandwiches with it. Use any leftover bread to make a traditional bread and butter pudding - not fancy modern ones with cream.

Layer bread in a dish, and butter/marg each side slightly. Layer with dried fruit. Crach an egg in a bowl and whisk it with fork, add a bit of sugar and milk. Pour into dish with bread and butter. Milk mixture should nearly come up to the top of the bread - add more if necessary. Put in oven in low heat and serve with custard. Yummy.

You need to go back to traditional recipes if you want to eat fairly healthily and cheaply.

Can't see butter or toilet paper on your list. How many apples and pears will that money get?