Desperately need tips to reduce almost £800 per mth food bill.

[Mumof3almost4]

I am stressing about mat leave pay and how low it is.
Just going through my income/outgoings and my main drain is on food. We are a family of 5, two adults, DC 18, 15, 13.
I am spending between £700-£800 a month on food. Is this ridiculous?!
I do cook mostly from scratch but will use a few pasta jars etc. I shop at local market for fruit and veg and the butchers for meat. We all like a big evening meal usually with meat or chicken and I always make sure there's salad or veg on the plate. I shop at home bargains and Asda for cupboard stuff, mainly use the freezer for left overs and don't like to waste anything.
I do try and plan meals but I think I've got in a habit of not doing this properly and then money gets frittered nipping to the shop. I then spend £30 easily feather than just getting what I need.

Reading this back I know I need to get much much better organised but really need your tips on how??
How do you plan meals without getting bored of it being repetitive?
We all eat well, no fussy eaters apart from a dislike of cheese and eggs.
Any advice for me to save a massive chunk of money please??

Also I hate Aldi. I'd never get a full shop in there

I am gutted that we don’t have an Aldi here, and that Lidl is too inconvenient to get to as I don’t drive. A cab there would cost around £6 each way which kind of defeats the object, so I have to stick with sainsburys/Tesco for now.

@AlternativePerspective

I am gutted that we don’t have an Aldi here, and that Lidl is too inconvenient to get to as I don’t drive. A cab there would cost around £6 each way which kind of defeats the object, so I have to stick with sainsburys/Tesco for now.

I've recently started shopping at Sainsbury's and surprised by the amount of bargains there.

I currently have two shopping baskets, one on sainsburys and one on Tesco. Once I have finished adding all the things I am going to want I will book the slot and pay for the one which costs less.

@AlternativePerspective

I currently have two shopping baskets, one on sainsburys and one on Tesco. Once I have finished adding all the things I am going to want I will book the slot and pay for the one which costs less.

I actually went to the store and got lots of reduced price stuff. Huge sour dough pizzas for £1.25, veggie burgers for £1 and ready meals that were £4, reduced to a pound. I tend to just put stuff in the freezer and use through the week. I have 3 teenagers at home and they eat a lot. Also got one of those chinese ready meals in a bag which was £4 and will be just as good as our usual take away, so will save on us not getting a take away next friday ! I got nice bread for 40p, it all goes in the freezer. Our local coop is also good for bargains, especially fruit and veg and bakery items, artisan bouls reduced to 20p etc. I freeze it and freshen up in the oven when defrosted and serve with home made soup made from a chicken carcass.

DD back at uni . Went to Aldi for 2 adults, 1 DD16 plus a dog. £66 incl dog food, salmon, chicken mini fillets, lean pork mince and Italian chicken sausages and a chorizo, shampoo, shower gel, loo and kitchen roll etc plus loads of fruit and veg. We eat a few veggie meals a week.

@Babyroobs I love our Co-Op. Great for reduced smoked salmon. I buy it and freeze it. Nice reduced often bread too.

Why do you hate aldi?
Eggs are eggs
Cheese is cheese
Beggars cant be choosers you will get used to it

It's costing you approx £2,800 a year to hate Aldi and not shop there.

@Snog @Advicewouldbeappreciated rtft

Sorry OP
Crack on

I find Sainsbury’s so expensive! My you gear used to do explore learning there and I started doing my weeks shop.. it was outrageous!

I think that is a LOT to spend on food. We're a family of four, all with big appetites, DC are teenage boys, and we spend about a third/half of that. We do eat meat/chicken/fish but less than half our meals (for health and environmental reasons). Shopping in Aldi or Lidl on staples like tins, pasta, etc is a no brainer as they are SO much cheaper and the quality is just as good. When I first tried Aldi after shopping in Sainsburys for years I felt like such a mug! We also shop at local butchers to support them but not for everything. We ARE ruthless about food waste - it just doesn't happen - and I've become good at improvising to make dinners out of random selections if things about to go past their best or leftovers need using up. Slow cookers are great - pasta sauces, chillis etc (mostly veggie) throw any leftover veg in even if its past its best its fine and pulses, tinned sweet corn to pad them out - healthy and filling and cheap. Make two dinners from one dinner, eg I'll make a big veggie chilli, one night is with rice another night later in week is same mix in tortilla wraps with sour cream, jalepinos and salad. Also hearty salads with pulses like bulghar wheat, pearl barley, sphelt. Really tasty and healthy. get yourself a vegan cookbook for some inspiration! Good luck.

The key thing for me is that when I shop I'm thinking of the number of meals I'm buying.

Also I keep in pasta, dry and pouch rice, potatoes, pasta and noodles, as well as things like bulgar, couscous and pearl barley. And lots of tins of staples like pulses and tomatoes. Also dried herbs, garlic, fresh ginger, onions, Freezer stocked eg with fish, chicken breasts, etc, and frozen veg. Plus ready made dinners for when I'm busy (make 2, freeze one). A spare cake,a pudding, frozen cheese and bread.

That way, I can always put a meal together, whether I've shopped or not.

I also keep a cupboard in the utility room for spares.

Not relating to food but something to investigate for new baby that will save you a fortune in nappies (and loads of other benefits too and easier than nappies once you get the hang of it) is 'natural pottying/elimination communication' (rubbish name I know) . I've met parents who have done this successfully so we tried with DC 2 and it was a revelation! Shame nobody promotes it to parents (but it doesn't make money compared to nappy companies of course...!)

www.eric.org.uk/blog/blogbabypottying

I think this is one of the most shocking threads I’ve ever read on MN. And it’s very sad that people are grossly unaware of how indulgent they are when millions of people are having to use food banks. £800 a month on food. Wow. And PP are saying that’s their norm... bloody hell.

You should go down to your local food bank OP and see what it’s like in the other side.

We have five people in our house. Three adults and two primary kids both of packed lunches and that comes in at around £550 a month. Asda/Aldi or the butchers.

You sound like my friend - my kids go to the same private school and she too despised Aldi. Said it was scruffy. Her DH is a pilot for a huge airline and was laid off at the start of COVID. Guess who’s shopping at Aldi now and crowing about the Prosciutto and wine..

.

Things like sausage pasta, spaghetti bolognese, stir fry (the frozen raw king prawns in aldi are really good), prawn and spinach risotto or mushroom risotto with dry and fresh mushrooms, toad in the hole, macaroni cheese with bacon etc are all inexpensive and filling. Have these with a big salad and you have proper home cooked meals. You can buy a proper shop in aldi (bar dried mushrooms and risotto rice, maybe a couple of extras,) so change the ways you shop. Your shopping isntcexpendve for 5 adults really but you need to reduce the amount of meat and change snacks for things like appkes and oranges have squash as drinks and dont have alcohol if upu usually do. Just buy simple biscuits in aldi for snacks when they're gone, they're gone. No topping up. Everyone gets used to it.

@Codexdivinchi yes for 5 adult appetites, you're not far behind me. You have no idea what my circumstances are and have no right to judge anyone.
I am fully aware of poverty in this country and have direct experience of food banks. I am not going to explain to some judgy stranger on the internet though.

@GlamGiraffe I love the sound of mushroom risotto! Going to try that on next weeks menu!
I explained further down the thread I've done a big Aldi shop with a full weeks menu and bar a few bits got most things I needed.

@Codexdivinchi your mind will be blown when you find out that food is just one thing that families spend different amounts of money on. Like housing, education, clothes, cars and holidays.

I spend less than op but can easily see how with rushing in and out of your nearest supermarket, with young people asking for certain things that suit them but unaware of prices and noone particularly looking at the bill until one day someone does day's "wow!" and posts a thread asking for sa few pointers.

Some posters lack any sort of imagination!

That should read "someone does and says"

My circuits were clearly blown by a previous poster's hypocritical lack of empathy and judgement.

@Codexdivinchi

I think this is one of the most shocking threads I’ve ever read on MN. And it’s very sad that people are grossly unaware of how indulgent they are when millions of people are having to use food banks. £800 a month on food. Wow. And PP are saying that’s their norm... bloody hell.

You should go down to your local food bank OP and see what it’s like in the other side.

We have five people in our house. Three adults and two primary kids both of packed lunches and that comes in at around £550 a month. Asda/Aldi or the butchers.

You sound like my friend - my kids go to the same private school and she too despised Aldi. Said it was scruffy. Her DH is a pilot for a huge airline and was laid off at the start of COVID. Guess who’s shopping at Aldi now and crowing about the Prosciutto and wine..

.

You sound almost pleased your 'friend' is now slumming it. 550 is also disgustingly high if you shop at Aldi. Shocking when people are using food banks don't you know.

@Codexdivinchi

I think this is one of the most shocking threads I’ve ever read on MN. And it’s very sad that people are grossly unaware of how indulgent they are when millions of people are having to use food banks. £800 a month on food. Wow. And PP are saying that’s their norm... bloody hell.

You should go down to your local food bank OP and see what it’s like in the other side.

We have five people in our house. Three adults and two primary kids both of packed lunches and that comes in at around £550 a month. Asda/Aldi or the butchers.

You sound like my friend - my kids go to the same private school and she too despised Aldi. Said it was scruffy. Her DH is a pilot for a huge airline and was laid off at the start of COVID. Guess who’s shopping at Aldi now and crowing about the Prosciutto and wine..

.

I literally do not know where to begin with this post.

So I think I will just leave it

Don’t make chicken curry with breast meat! Thighs are tastier and much cheaper and a good curry needs some slow cooking, expensive breasts are wasted in a curry.

I am ‘time poor’ so shopping in Aldi : Lidl annoys me as, as you say, you can’t get everything.

So once a month I do a Lidl shop for all the things that are so much cheaper there: their version of HobNobs (chocolate Oaties, 41p), their premium jam, marmalade. Olives in jars, ready to wok noodles, cous cous, bags of sugar, Grand Padano, halloumi, big tubs of Greek yogurt, frozen petit pois etc etc. Check what they have at a good price.

Then get other things in Tesco / Sainsbury’s.