To ask for help with groceries?

[FGSholdthedoor]

Had a few very unexpected outgoings this month, car breakdown (cost hundreds), vet bills etc and I am left really short until end of next week.
I've been making do but the fridge and cupboards are looking empty so I need to pull up my big girl pants and do a full food shop for the family to last until next Thursday.

We have no meat left at all. About 8 cans of tomatoes in the pantry and lots of rice.

There's me, DH and DS (3). We need everything milk, bread, fruit, veg, snacks etc.
We cannot afford to buy lunches out and coffees/treats on the go so want to buy some alternatives we can take from home in the morning instead.

My budget is a whopping £55...
I'm thinking of raiding Aldi.

Help please?

We're not in poverty , my children are well fed and healthy and happy. We just manage our money really well

icanhear, you feed your whole family for £5 per week, it's horrible, yet possible and at the same time your children are well fed?
You say it's not poverty, it's choice. Why do you choose to do something that's horrible?

We're just not well off only young and have to scrimp sometimes the number is not exactly fiver. But close enough then of course on e every few months we stock up on Tins, frozen food, then the weekly shop is milk bread ext etc.. it's horrible because of course I would love to go and spend loads of money on loads of food like goodies but of course bills need paying. My children are happy and healthy just want to put that out there hha . But it is possible to live on hardly any money

Thankfully it's winter so you can get away with lots of soups and casseroles which are both cheap to make. Just buy lots of lentils to add to everything plus some basic veg and then the milk. You can save money by making the bread yourself (very easy). Just make sure you buy a bag of greens or sone broccoli as well. And don't let anything go to waste. A lot of vegetable 'scraps' can be used for cooking. For example you can boil broccoli stalks in some veg stock then purée and add some cream to make really nice soup or you can use potato skins to make potato skins. If you have juicer you can put any scraps you have in there to make some everything juice (the skins for f fruit and veg are usually the most nutritious bit anyway.

That sounds like a good shop to me OP 👍🏻

I’m sorry but I did have a slight laugh at someone who was panicking at not being able to afford much shopping coming back with a Spanish meat platter & brioche buns

Sounds like you’ll be fine op sounds just like our normal weekly shop & theres 4 of us (not including baby)

Ican what do you buy that costs a fiver and lasts a week - genuine question, not being snarky x

Milk, bread, fruit, veg, cereal everything else is frozen or tinned and we only drink water..I'll be a millionaire one day and buy fresh chicken and fancey spices...ahh one day 😅

So how much do you usually spend on food op? I can only spend up to £45 a week for 3 of us to include cleaning stuff, washing powder, toiletries so I had to laugh at your £55 dilemma.

@hmmwhatatodo TBH I would say we usually spend around 45- 50 per week that includes dog food, nappies, cleaning stuff, , meat etc
I realise I was panicking for no reason really I think all it is I've been doing a lot of top up shops and kept up to date with everything and I've let it all slip recently so we've ended up with empty cupboards and fridge/freezer so I needed one big shop to restock and also ran out of dog food completely which we buy in bulk packaging as it's cheaper. I was thinking it would be a lot more than it was.