To ask what people actually BUY on their weekly shop?

[BillHadersNewWife]

I struggle with getting enough to last for the week. There's DH and I but he works away Monday to Friday mostly and there are two DD's aged 15 and 11.

We eat what most people eat for meals...roasts, curries, home made burgers, salads, homemade pizza, baked potatoes, spag bol...that kind of thing.

I don't like buying a lot of crap snacks so tend to get fruit, eggs, cheese, plain crackers, instant noodles...also jam and peanut butter.

But what am I missing that my DD"s are always complaining their friends have WAY more nice food in their fridges?

I also struggle finding both girls things for packed lunches that they will actually eat.

Last week I gave up and got them those protein milkshakes on one day because I was so desparate for them to actually eat something during the day!

If I gave them something like Nutella sandwiches, crisps etc they'd eat that but nothing healthy!

I am going shopping tomorrow and want to reduce the time I visit the shops AGAIN during the week after my 'big shop'. Any ideas on what I am missing from my list?

I get stuff for dd like

Avocado hummus or smashed avocado
Toaster waffles
Onion bajis
Vegi pakoras
Porridge sachets

That’s the sort of stuff she snacks on.

TRash that sounds good but my DD's are older. I am not telling a 15 year old she can have "two snacks".

They don't overeat...both are very slim. It's only with icecream and bloody crisps they do tend to overeat them a bit.

My teen DC is similar... hates sandwiches. I give enough money for 3-4 school meals... DC also has to make own lunches for the other days. Usually that involves pasta chicken & wraps as staples. My DC also have are allowed to cook once a week. They are involved in the planning & have a say what they want to eat. No negotiations, it took some time and a few beans on toast days for them to realise. We have mainly "healthy" meals but I do buy some junk- when it's gone it's gone!

Oh and lots of berries, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries. Melon slices.

At those ages my DC were responsible for their own packed lunches and I told them they could either use up what I bought or suggest something different.

They will both eat wraps or bagels in preference to bread sandwiches.
DD won't eat fruit full stop and DS won't eat it at school.
I'll make flapjacks and put in lots of dried fruit - they are both happy to eat those.

However DS's typical lunch consists of a wrap or a bagel (nothing else). DD's consists of wrap/bagel plus packet of crisps plus flapjack.

They have healthy evening meals and DS fills up on fruit smoothies and yogurts when he gets home. Both would rather eat nothing than eat something they don't like (tbh don't blame them).

I'd perhaps fret less and let them find their own way.

As for weekly shopping, I do a weekly meal plan and make sure there is enough food for every meal. Yes, it might mean by the end of the week, we don't have any "favourites" left, but there is plenty of food.

Plain pasta or pasta with cheese is always available, which they will both fill up on if necessary.

My kids school does not allow cakes, biscuits, sweets, crisps, Nutella, popcorn, jelly. nuts. If the kids take them, the teacher replaces them with a piece of fruit and sends it home with a note telling you not to pack it again!

As a result my kids don’t expect any sweet food or treat style food.

Snack wise, I regularly buy
Breadsticks
Tuc crackers
Crisps
Popcorn
Cooked sliced chicken (sweet chilli, chinese style, or chargrilled)
Cherry tomatoes
Apples
Bananas
Marmite flatbreads
Tinned tuna (DS1 eats it straight from the tin with celery as a spoon [boak] not expecting that to be a hit with most others!)

Occasionally get Soba noodle cups for DS1 but not every week. Chocolate, biscuits, or sweets I usually get every couple of weeks and they've learnt that if they don't make it last, I won't replace it early!

Why not roast a chicken/ham etc and have that in sandwiches instead.

I think part of this is your restrictive nature (how much better is Nutella than processed meat) but rigidity as well. You know the answer to the first question is how you adapt around it.

Cakes/pies bake with them as well. A traybake cake lasts a week

you're not asking them to eat leftover snails

Nutella with some decent bread on school days really isn't the end of the world, I'm guessing the rest of their diet is pretty good so having a crap lunch 5 days a week will balance out.

Crap food is better than no food.

I guess a sausage roll or scotch pie is out of the question then?! You seem quite rigid too.

I meal plan with the help of the family, then but what we need for meals, all my kids have school dinner and we get a weekly fruit and veg box, the only 'snacks' we have are what I bake or the kids always ask for toast if they're hungry between meals.

I was spending about £150 a week on food for the 6 of us, now I'm down to £40-£50 a week and everyone still eats well.

The meal plan includes what we have in our full freezer and pantry.

Agree you need to bake more if you want snacks and to avoid buying them premade!
Flapjacks, simple buns, traybakes, fruit loaf, biscuits/cookies.
I feel your pain with non sandwich eaters unless it has Nutella... I have one like that. And he has allergies making his options more restrictive.
Things he takes are sausage rolls (homemade or bought depending on my time!) cooked meats like roast chicken pieces, ham, beef, spicy chicken, chicken tikka skewers and then crunchy veg sticks. Crackers. Popcorn. Few crisps. Fruit. Yoghurt tubes . Brownie. Malt loaf. (Not all at the same time!!)

My eldest is 11 but I still will when older. This is before dinner and is a rule to make sure they don't fill up before dinner. I make it as quickly as I can after we get in but having been at work all day I can't magic it up the instant we walk through the door. If they are still hungry after dinner they can have more.

What do they order from the bakery?
Can you do a version of that?

I’ve recently had the “everyone else has” from my dd (11). Seems mainly to be a desire for crisps and pot noodles to be in the house! I get kind of baked crisps and things to try to be a bit better.

They have these freeze dried fruit snacks that are nice - don’t know if I’m allowed to put a link?

If dd has a packed lunch it’s rare so she might have a “fancy” sandwich like blt, or else something like cheese and tomato. Then some kind of cut up veg like carrots, maybe hummus dip, some grapes. Grapes always seem popular at any age!

Ds is younger (6) but he really loves hummus and breadsticks, anything involving cream cheese, yoghurts. He’d eat crap if allowed though!

Crackers are always good as others have said!

Tiger bloody cream buns! No...I can't make those.

My teens would like to live on Pringles, pizza & biscuits.

As your children what they would like to eat. What you've said sounds quite reasonable to me but we all like different things.

I've never had Nutella - I don't like nuts anyway - but looked it up and it says it has a lot of sugar so not to eat too much. If they like it, they could have it sometimes, a little of what you fancy is good.

The dinners you cook sound pretty good to me but your girls are old enough to do a bit of cooking sometimes, especially if they want something different. My son was and is a great cook.

Packed lunches were always two sandwiches - he liked cheese and pickle (Branston), would sometimes have ham - an apple, fruit juice and a type of biscuit, usually Penguin, maybe a yogurt. Everyone else had the same with different sandwich fillings (I remember one of his friends always had peanut butter). I never worried too much because growing kids burn up food quickly (i would have worried if he was forever eating sweets and crisps but he wasn't), and we always had a good nutritious meal together in the evening.

This will pass op but do involve your children in preparing meals, it will be good for them and you might discover some new things that you like.

The only time I've ever had babybel was on an aircraft plus Bel Paese. but I also looked both up and they seem nutritious so go for it. There's a good range of baby bel too.

Do your children eat breakfast at home before school? Porridge, an egg, toast - do they like Marmite? That is very nutritious. I know many kids have breakfast club at school now. I would have liked that because I couldn't stomach food until I'd been up a while, son was the same.

popcorn I get the sort you pop yourself and that's something they do eat sometimes but it's a pain to make

It takes all of a few minutes.

Sounds like 'friends have better fridges' is probably in the catergory of 'friends have cooler mums/better clothes/all the tech ' . They also have the influence of social media that we didn't have in our day i.e. Instagram going on about vegan diets, cleansing, protein smoothies, clean eating.

Do your daughters come shopping with you? Could they be dragged along ? But be open and honest and let them know what the weekly budget is... They'll soon learn how quickly that 'desirable stuff' costs and there budget won't stretch to a whole weeks worth of that food!

There are compromises... Get them a big tub of protein powder.... Have a quick Google yourself and find some healthy smoothie recipes so they can indulge in the protein smoothie trend whilst still getting fruits/veggies, fibre etc . As a starter - protein powder, some kind of milk (dairy or otherwise) some oats, a banana and some spinach.

Nutella is relatively high in sugar compared to other spreads... Maybe switch to another brand that's lower sugar and then they'll eat the stuff? If you have a blender you can actually have a bit if fun and they can make their own darn nut spread 😁

I'm a super clean eating vegetarian and I can see absolutely nothing wrong with what you're serving for meals.... But I'm an adult not a grumpy teen and a tween who likes to follow her sister in trends!

I don’t see the problem with telling your 15 year old she can only have two snacks before dinner?

I realised when DS was 18m old that i was inadvertently teaching him to love junk & snacks by buying all these organix crisps and chewy bars and popcorn & the like, so i just stopped buying them. There's salady bits & fruit if he is desperate for a snack, plus he can have half a slice of bread if he is really hungry. Its completely fine to not buy a lot of processed crap, my mum never did and as an adult I enjoy cooking from scratch and buy very few processed things.

Can you encourage them to get involved in food prep/cooking?

We have a lot of crap. Snacks but it lasts ages. Inc in that. Ice gems, cookies, jammie dodgers, crisp, the small choc bars like breakaway, cereal bars, biscuits etc

Obviously we have the cheeses and fruit etc etc.
But as kids we always had a junk cupboard and I kind of inherited that way of doing it.

When I used to limit ds he would nag nag nag for more. In the end I said carry on but when it's gone it won't get replaced until xx date..

He now has free choice over it but never over Indulges even the 2 Yr old doesn't. She may have 1 item every 2 days more as a 'bribe' to sit in pushchair if we're on a time restriction.
I went thro the cupboard the other day and some actual only has fab and March date so shows its been there a while.

Crisps and pringles on the other hand.. When there's a stash of them they vanish like magic! Mainly ds and dh. (who if given the choice would eat 30 bags in a week) so I only put a few in basket and rest hidden.

None are overweight, all healthy and exercise so. It doesn't worry me.