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.

I can't make my mind up whether the OP is stealth boasting (doesn't EVERYONE eat salmon and artichokes for a midweek meal? ) or genuinely hasn't twigged that if you eat expensive food it costs a lot of money.
Equally, I would love to know where Scabberdsly shops, and wonder if she realises that if you leave off the two most expensive items on the list, it will cost less than if you leave them there.
Anyway, this thread shows great promise.

Scabbersley- that’s £140 for one meal a day though, you need to factor in the 2 others!

Camel - to be honest I do buy a fair amount of fruit (4yo goes through it!) But we don't really have any other snacks so maybe that's where It's working out. I'm not on a high income. I would spend more for better food if I had more, but still, probably not £30 on one meal. I do cook from scratch but can't always choose the 'better' food like cuts of meat etc. Frozen fresh food is my saviour.

£150 a week to feed 2 adults 2 teenage boys and 2 children. We eat a variety of food mainly fresh meat/veg we all have lunches from home though

Yanu if you can afford it and want to, but a grand and a half a month on food is extortionate

Op why would you include your lunch expenditure in this calculation?

Surely that's a cost of going to work?

Most people if asked what their food budget is would not include what they spend on salads etc on a work day, food budget is money spent feeding people at home ( seeing as you don't take your lunch to work I wouldn't class it the same )

So what exactly is the food/other items i.e. Toiletries/cleaning products etc amount?

That is likely to be different from your original figure.

We spend way to much money on food/drinks( soft drinks ) and toiletries/cleaning products etc but we don't have an extravagant lifestyle and we eat well. I also have to make 15 packed lunches a week which adds up 3 people x 5 days.

I am often intrigued by those who spend very little. I remember not too long ago on here reading that a single poster had just £11 food budget a week through necessity not choice and ate quite well, if a little repetitive. That is quite an achievement and I was ashamed about the amount I spend when I read that.

We spend about £250 a week on 4 people. If you want to eat things like wild caught salmon and free range organic meat it will cost about that much. If you're willing to forgo high quality meat you can save tons.

It's fine as long as you can afford it, but it's at least twice the national average (source - BBC Eat Well For Less, who always say that the average spend for a family of 4 is around £100) and you don't try to use your luxurious spending as evidence that eating well is expensive and that anyone who eats less must be eating a shit diet, because that's not true at all.

six salmon fillets. Two packs of mixed lettuce, some nice tomatoes, cucumber, goats cheese, artichoke hearts, olives, bread and walnut and it came to £30

That would cost about half that price in Aldi. OK, the salmon would be frozen, but it's wild Atlantic salmon so good quality.

People who spend less will be buying cheaper fruit, there's nothing wrong with frozen, or apples, bananas and oranges. You don't have to eat blueberries by the kilo to have a healthy diet. Cheaper fish - frozen salmon or canned mackerel is just as healthy as organic seabass from Waitrose at 5x the price. Cheaper veg too. Seasonal produce instead of piles of out of season imported varieties. Maybe they eat a higher amount of pulses rather than lots of meat and fish based meals? Still very healthy and a fraction of the price.

We spend about 160 a week at the supermarket which includes some pet food, cleaning materials, some cosmetics etc as well as food. There are 4 hungry adult sized peeps in the house. Good food is a priority, I was brought up thinking as much and still cook mostly from scratch.

So you're the person who eats Bircher muesli then!,

Sounds like you just want a boast about how much money you have and how you and your family eat soooo healthily.

We only eat high quality meat, but we don’t eat meat every day. That’s our compromise (and it’s better for you anyway).

I don’t think the OP is asking how to save on the food bill... or have I got that wrong?

If you have three large coffees a day that’s a tenner at least. I reckon 1/3 - 1/2 is coffee and lunches if that’s for two adults...

You will pass out if you shop at Aldi - SOOOOO cheap and quality really okay. But I go through a cycle of drifting back to Sainsburys and then back to Aldi, then back to Sainsburys (they're near each other...)

Fruit and veg are VERY cheap - a carrot for example? Cost it. Not expensive. Its all the other stuff.

Having chia based breakfasts suggests to me that you are probably buying lots of trendy food stuffs really not necessary (at least this is what I do...)

People live to their means so that’s why you could live happily on £60 a week with veg and fresh food cooked from scratch.

You just don’t need / want to. Pretty normal for most to spend to their means

We have £70 a week for 2 adults, can easily go over that - often do on ad-hoc stuff.

I simply don't understand how people feed families for less than that, I have tried to understand but I can't. I'm going on maternity leave soon so going to have to try harder!

If I had access to Leon, I would be there everyday too - Leeds doesn't have one yet so no temptation. Does seem like a good place to start scaling back on spending though.

Wishes she had some goats cheese and bread right now

We are at least 200 a week for two adults and a baby

We also have some stuff from Lidl or Aldi if I can get there

Good food and organic dairy is really important to me

Who knows what she wants? Just to give us a run down of her expensive meals.

It is clearly a colossal amount, but, if you can afford it, why does it trouble you so much that you want to ask about it on here, where there are clearly many posters who don't have that much per month, for their groceries ?

Btw I love the Leon chicken quinoa salad is is fabulous

I absolutely agree you don’t HAVE to eat a variety of fruits and veggies and can stick to the cheaper ones

When I was poor I was incredibly grateful for that, what I don’t understand is people who are on reasonable wages who still make a point of only spending £50 a week for a family of 5 to live off.

We cost £120 odd and that will obviously go up when smallest eats more food. I think that’s pretty reasonable tbh.

Fresh juice isn't all that good for you every day. Ton of sugar.

Sounds like you could save £100 a week easily and still eat very well.

You’re buying premium stuff it’s clear as a whistle why you spend so much more than someone spending the minimum

But who cares? If you can afford it what’s the point in scrimping? Enjoy the nicer food you buy and thank the universe you’re not scrimping and living on aldi tinned beans and worrying about how to afford your children’s food

op that is over FOURTEEN AND A HALF THOUSAND POUNDS per year on food

(I don't usually type in caps but )

SAUASAGE

I’m with you: we also don’t eat loads of snack type things. Just good quality food, lots of lovely fruits and veggies and a few mid range breakfast cereals for the kids to choose from