to spend £280 a week to feed a family of 5?

[TempleOfBlooms]

I spend about £280 a week on food. This includes my work lunches which tend to be salads from places like Leon plus coffees etc. The rest is food eaten at home.

Breakfast for all five of us tends to be things like Bircher muesli or chia based stuff with fruits and nuts. Fresh juice too.

Lunches in summer are usually a selection of dips and cheese and meats and salads.

Dinner is usually fish or chicken with a selection of salads and grilled veg.

So fresh food but not caviar or ridiculous indulgences.

It seems like everyone else on here can feed a family of four on tiny amounts. How? We certainly could eat more cheaply but that would mean fewer veg, fewer fruits, less fish etc.

Is it really so unusual to spend so much on food? I never see anyone else admit to it.

Me Too, I buy masa harina and make my own tortillas (and that is a not-so-stealth-boast).

They do make the best tortilla chips though if you let them go stale for a day and then deep-fry them.

(I eat mutton and hogget too, struggle to get goat though, so buy a load when I see it and bung it in the freezer).

You can still buy work lunches relatively cheaply- just get a Boots meal deal or one from Tesco- about £3-£4.

That’s what- £15-£20 a week- not a huge amount

And I’m sure people buy microwave rice and frozen jacket potatoes because it saves time? I use microwave rice, not to save time but because I’m the only one eating it so it’s not worth boiling rice just for me (making a pan dirty, cooking too much).

Family of three, plus a dog and two cats. We don't spend that a month.

SusanneLinder

What’s to say she can’t also have a “fuck off amazing holiday” AND eat like this?

Seems like a lot but if you have the money I can't see a major issue. We spend around £60 a week on the main shop and another £15ish on fruit bread and milk top ups.
Typical food for adults and DC would be:

Breakfast: granola, weetabix or eggs.
Lunch: sandwiches - cheese/ham salad or peanut butter. Cereal bars and fruit.

Dinner- spag Bol, fish pie,mushroom stroganoff, veggie sausages, jacket potatoes, versions of fish and rice, versions of chicken and rice, casseroles, pasta bakes.

Kids will have an oven pizza on Friday.

I also keep in after-school snacks for the DC which is packs of mini breadsticks or maltloaf bars.

We keep costs down by not eating meat every day (only 3 times per week), jacket potatoes and beans/cheese/tuna once a week and not using expensive ingredients often- most meals I make can be done for around £6.

There is no real point to this thread, it like saying I spend £500 a month on clothes or £10000 on holidays, there will always be people who spend more or less.

I probably spend £10 a day on lunch and coffee.. I don't have time in the morning to prepare and better things to docwith my evenings. No idea what pur total weekly bill is. £200 maybe? Not including family meals out.
If you can afford it, why not? Not sure what the OP's point is?

This is definitely a stealth boast from the OP. Like so many posters have suggested it's a ridiculous amount of money, I wouldn't spend this on principle, and yes OP, we could easily afford it.

For me, maybe brought up in a working class home with girls' grammar school food science education, the whole issue of eating well is not down to finances but education. I, like many other MMetters, can make a delicious meal from a cheap cut of meat and vegetables, pulses etc.

Surely the top restaurants that produce food such as lamb shank, oxtail, beef cheeks, pork belly are evidence of this? All things we cook at home. For peanuts.

You can keep your quinoa and corn fed chicken with edamame bean salad. Do you really think it's going to change your life to opt for that over two slices of hovis with cheese and tomato?

Tesco or boots meal deal? If the OP is enjoying Leon (which I do too, delicious) then a Tesco or Boots meal day is not going to be be an enjoyable experience

In fact i think I’d prefer to go workout lunch than have a boots meal deal. Tescos at a push, but boots? Foul.

That amount seems absurd to me, I'd resent how long I had to work JUST to pay for food, but whatever floats your boat. I'd much rather have the more extravagant meals twice a week, normal weekday meals the rest of the week, and have extra holiday but hey ho!

I don't understand the purpose of your post OP. Surely one cuts one's coat according to one's cloth? Just like some people drive Nissan Micras and some Masaratis, people spend varying amounts of money on food according to their means and their spending values. We are a family of 4 and cat. Average weekly spend £120 including all sorts of fruit and veg (though I have to pull you up on the idea that here are "nice tomatoes to be had in Sainsbury's). We could spend less than that and have done in leaner years financially and we could probably spend what you do if we had that kind of income.

You can keep your quinoa and corn fed chicken with edamame bean salad. Do you really think it's going to change your life to opt for that over two slices of hovis with cheese and tomato?

Thank you poster. That actually made me laugh out loud. You refer to your grammar school education but display a quite astonishing level of daftness!

I would have to agree, the boots ones are pretty rank. Never set foot in Tesco's if I can avoid it. M and S have nice lunch stuff. Or street food.

Given that that would be my whole income then obviously I have to shop differently! That can't be surprising to you OP?

I do often wonder on such threads if people add in any meals out, takeaways, pets etc. My two cats budget is 25% of my total which is a bit embarrassing! I have lunch or a coffee out max twice a month but I do admit to a diet coke habit. Probably up to £200/month including 10% food bank contribution and up to £20 monthly meals or coffees out.

Sprinkles, I feel you're being deliberately obtuse.

I've said twice now it's NOT HARD, IF YOU HAVE THE INCLINATION.

To learn how to cook, but see Chavtastic up-thread, she doesn't even know where to start (Pm me ^Chavrastic* if you want some pointers or help).

And I don't think many of the people who cook for a living would take kindly to you saying their amazing and hard-won skills are akin to riding a bike, there's wobbling through the park and then there's winning the Tour de France.

They're hardly comparable.

And with all due respect, £5,200 isn’t going to get any family a fuck off amazing holiday. 2 weeks on a Greek island, maybe

I don’t add pet food into our food budget. We buy it separately (online) rather than from the supermarket so it wouldn’t occur to me for it to be part of our food budget. It’s the ‘pet’ line in our budget which includes insurance etc.

Thats what I spend on a family of 3 and 4 at the weekends, for a month.
Why are you surprised that people only earn this to pay for all their bills.
Are there really such dense high earners, gosh, I'm surprised.

£150-£175 a week , sometimes cheaper for a family of six and we eat very well.

Wow. Thats alot. Are you eating out alot.

Totally agree Totally I cook and eat like you and I would just begrudge spending money like water on posh ingredients every day.

I'd cook a piece of gammon and that would do many meals (ham salad, homemade coleslaw, new potatoes etc. Chicken and ham pie using the gammon. Sandwiches with the ham etc. Omelettes)

OP If you want to spend so much money on food, go ahead! But please don't imagine that those who aren't spending ridiculous amounts are doing without fresh veg or whatever. I buy my veg at a market, dead cheap, I buy carefully and put effort into cooking.

Is it a problem to you to spend so much? If not, crack on!

I think the thing with cooking is that yes, most of us, with enough skills, time and patience could cook delicious, healthy and delightful home cooked meals.
But frankly, I don't have the time. Life is short. Good food, prepared or at least semi prepared by others, for a more expensive price tag is a compromise.
There was a thread a week or so ago about whether you would rather have more time or money. It's just another way to buy time.

Believe or not hairyhands I wasn’t even responding to you

Sorry OP I like a good Bircher muesli and chia pudding but I don't feel the need to blast out about it...I think you knew what you were walking in to here.