Two food shopping trips a week?

[Coffee234]

Hi. I know this isn't a big issue.
Just wanted to see what people thought and what you will be doing.
I usually do one big click and collect shop and then a small (fruit and milk) shop a few days later. No chance of getting a click and collect slot and I'm thinking it should go to the more needy anyway.

So do you think one big shop and one little shop is ok with the current lockdown.
How are you going to plan you essential food shop now?
?

This thread is crazy! Can’t people alter their eating habits? (I do realise that some people are extremely restricted due to illness, allergies etc, I’m not talking about them).

Eat what you have in the house, if you can’t get what you’d like, get something else and don’t make another trip. Yes if you don’t have a freezer it’s harder but food storage space doesn’t have to be in a kitchen. Dry goods, tins, even veg, can be kept in a box under the bed or something.

The internet is full of resources for cooking - ingredient substitutes, frugal recipes, all kinds of things.

As a pp said, it’s time to get creative. Not spread the virus because you have to have a certain type of out of season fruit or can’t survive a day without eggs.

If I go on my own and manage to buy nappies, my shopping capacity is reduced and no way I can buy for the whole family for the week. Also hard to get fruit which lasts more than 3-4 days, and I would definitely not want meat in the fridge for that long, so two shopping trips for us it is.

We're getting as much as possible delivered, using milk and more and a local veg box scheme.

We also have a lot of tinned and dry goods already as we go to Costco once a month.

I hope that we can last a long time without having to go to a shop.

We've been doing way more food shopping than normal because of all the stockpiling- we can't seem to get enough food in one shop at the minute. I think in the last week we did 5 trips to 4 different shops. We have enough to get us through most of this week now though.

Hoping it all settles down soon so we can go back to one or two trips.

Not sure where you’re shopping but fresh fruit should not only last two days... That is extremely poor quality. We always have a fruit bowl full of things such as apples, pears, oranges, bananas and plums which always last at least a week if my DC haven’t demolished them all by then that is . Grapes also last in the fridge. Berries have the shortest shelf life but you can buy frozen ones for smoothies and such, we have a few bags of frozen fruit for that purpose.

What's this nonsense about fruit not lasting a whole week?

I've got some apples on my counter that are fine from two weeks ago and showing no signs of detriment. The bananas that arrived a week ago are spotty but fine. The grapes in the fridge slightly on the less crisp side, also fine.

You can either eat fruit slightly less fresh than you prefer it, or eat less fruit.

If I go on my own and manage to buy nappies, my shopping capacity is reduced and no way I can buy for the whole family for the week. Also hard to get fruit which lasts more than 3-4 days, and I would definitely not want meat in the fridge for that long, so two shopping trips for us it is

Buy cloth nappies. Fruit lasts at least a week in the fridge, so does meat.

Everyone needs to stop making excuses. We all need to change the way we live or we’re not going to get through this. Forget the way we’ve lived for the last 20 years, the reality is different now, get used to it.

We're doing the shopping for 2 families who are isolating as well as for ourselves.

We'll do our best to minimise trips but there's no chance we'll manage with less than three trips a week I reckon with shelves being empty and limits on what you can buy at once.

Honestly I despair of people. Yes of course I understand if you have no transport and are restricted in what you can carry. But other than for this small group of people, nobody else needs to be going out frequently to shop.

For the majority of people no eggs means you do without eggs. And every time you go out you pick up extra bits to extend the period between shopping visits. I fully accept I haven't seen the state of the shops for the past fortnight but I can't believe that there is "nothing" at all in the supermarkets. People talking about "needing" short life fresh fruit every day (which must mean out of season berries) need to take a long hard look at themselves.

@HasaDigaEebowai I went to a big supermarket on Thursday on my lunch break to get a sandwich. I've never seen anything like it (hadn't been for a bit), the washing powder aisle was completely bare, all the soft drinks, squashes, water gone. Every single piece of fresh fruit & veg gone except for the lunch bits eg apple bag. All biscuits & tea bags gone, the entire aisle of crisps, crackers etc, gone. I was gobsmacked!

i fully accept I haven't seen the state of the shops for the past fortnight but I can't believe that there is "nothing" at all in the supermarket

Last week there was absolutely no fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, fresh meat, milk, butter, cheese, pasta, tinned veg, toilet roll, nappies, baby wipes or bread in ours.

happymummy12345

Of course he must go if you have nothing in the house. Hopefully, he will be able t get all that is necessary in the first shop he goes in, but food shopping is essential in a situation like yours.

@SchadenfreudePersonified thank you. I just wanted to make sure he can just go and there was nothing else he would need to do before he does (like in other countries),

@HasaDigaEebowai when I went to the shops last Wednesday there was no:

• milk
• loaves of bread
• almost no fruit
• a bit of salad
• very little fresh meat
• canned soups, tomatoes, tuna, or fruit
• eggs
• pasta and pasta sauces
• rice and curry sauces
• lentils
• almost no cereal (they had shreddies and cornflakes)
• almost no crackers or biscuits

The freezer section was totally empty. Even ice cream was gone!

I did manage to buy some salad, a fresh bread roll (although the bakery section was very low on stock), some picnic chicken bite things, a bottle of pineapple juice, my usual pack of yakult, a box of shreddies, a bottle of squash, and a box of chocolate fingers.

I'd challenge anyone to do a full weekly shop when upwards of 75% of food staples can't be obtained.

Perhaps I could have walked the length of the street and looked in all the other shops (including the tiny and often crowded butchers and greengrocers) but common sense would suggest it's less risky to go to the nearest shop twice a week and eat a bit oddly rather than do one big shop where you have to pull in every single establishment on the high street.

If you go out and discover they have no eggs that day, you will want to go back again.

I honestly cannot believe the stupidity of people 🤦🏼‍♀️

Boris advises to only go to the shops once a week.

Oh I can.

There's a reason why police, heavy fine and jail had to be imposed abroad. People "foreigners" are just as stupid as we are.

@PeterPanGoesWrong can you please link to where he has said only go to the shops once a week? Because I watched the full statement last night and he said no such thing. He said you should only leave your house to buy essentials such as food and medicine. He did not say once a week.

PeterPanGoesWrong somehow I doubt Boris is trekking out to the shops and trying to find any combination of food that'll feed three familes for a week.

Plus I'm trying to add a little extra to each shop so that if any of my household develops a cough or fever, the two vulnerable households relying on us to bring them food won't have to risk going out and can manage on what they have.

In a perfect world with full shelves and no restrictions, no doubt this would be possible but you do the best you can within the restrictions and to me, one family going out three times and staying inside the rest of the time is equivalent to three people from each family going out once.

There are 5 of us here and I cannot get away with only one food shop p/w (wish I could TBH)! There is not enough room in the freezer or to store fruit/veg without it going off mid week .An alternative would be to collect groceries when you are at the fuel station. (Again only rarely as have filled up car now and only using essential journeys )I think 2 shops a week are fine .Try to get medicines at the same time if you can.

I think Boris actually said as infrequently as possible .

or to store fruit/veg without it going off mid week

you can spend a couple of days without fresh veg. You don't need a fridge for everything either.

People looking for excuses always find some. You'll only be happy when a strict lock down is put in place.

There is not enough room in the freezer or to store fruit/veg without it going off mid week

Where on earth do you buy fruit and veg from that it doesn’t last 3-4 days without going off?

9 people to feed here, no chance I can only go out once a week, even if the shops had full stocks the limits applied wouldn’t allow me to buy what I needed

Nobody actually needs to eat fruit at all