How much are you spending on your food shopping?

[Supernova23]

How are prices STILL going up? I went in for a couple of meals and lunches for the week for just two of us and spent £50. I'll be back there before the end of the week. How on earth are people with big families, teens that eat them out of house and home etc, coping?

Ah, for the PP who was casting doubt by saying "not casting doubt" 🤣

My meal plan for this week is:

1)Beef bolognese and garlic bread
2)Tuna salad jacket potatoes
3)Vegan (Richmond) sausages and mash (with tenderstem broccoli)
4)Homemade pitta pizzas & homemade wedges
5)Omelettes using up stuff in the fridge
6) Vegan chilli with salsa / cheesy nachos
7) Bacon, Broccoli Pesto Pasta

I make all the sauces homemade. We have homemade brownies, coffee cake and flapjacks each week. I make garlic bread too.

The only thing I splurge on is tenderstem broccoli, olives and nice cheese and a bag of sweets for each person.

Breakfast: Wheetabix which I stockpile when on offer, Porridge or homemade fluffy pancakes.

Fruit: Kiwis, bananas, apples and clementines.

😊 I often buy peas, sweetcorn and mixed veg from Aldi or Lidl.

I could definitely trim my shop down by omitting a lot of the fresh stuff and having more processed food (we eat very little).

I agree, we don’t use much in the way of processed food, fresh fruit and veg is seasonal (no concerns about salad shortages here) or frozen and I have a well stocked baking cupboard for sweet treats. If you don’t have the time, energy or know how, or fussy eaters, it’s often much cheaper to buy processed stuff and know it’ll be eaten than make something less predictable and risk it going to waste.

Exactly!

Average £175- £190 a week, for food, detergent, toilet paper. 2a 2c (primary school age). We eat mostly fresh food (lots of veg and salads, 4-5 different fruit packs) but also a few tins (beans, rice pudding, ravioli-which is normally eaten as snack not a meal). Only "treats/highly process food" are multipack of crisps, pack of biscuits for visitors and a pack of pastries. Bill was around £125 in 2021...

I'm on a budget and couldn't afford much processed food. I mostly cook from scratch, staples like veg, rice, and legumes are very cheap

Inflation is always a personal thing, it's about how much the things YOU spend money on have gone up in price. I'm only buying one lot of meat a week (I live on my own) and it's usually mince, so I'll have shepherd's pie, chilli with rice and spag bol twice from that, then a Spanish omelette one night, risotto one night and maybe a vegetable curry (with beans in) one night. For lunch it's usually soup (which I'm increasingly making myself) or a salad, or cheese on toast. I'm glad I'm not the sort of person who feels it's not a meal if you don't have fish or meat in it.

I’m glad it’s not just me being totally incompetent. I am spending a fortune.

Co op hobnobs - which my autistic son adores- they’ve gone up from £1.35 to £2.30 in the space of a week.

We spend about £80/£90 each week, including wine, toiletries and cleaning products. I meal plan obsessively though, and have switched from Morrisons to Lidl. There are three adults in our house, and we are NOT skimpy eaters.

2 adults for a full weeks shop, this week, was €64 in lidl... including deodorant, razors toiletries etc. We dont eat meat though.

About £200 a week, I think. For me, dh, dd2 (adult student still at home), plus dd1's shopping (final yr student). We don't buy shopping for ds as he is on a bursary at uni.

That includes pet food (dog, cat, rabbit, 2 Guinea pigs that eat a lot of veggies). Not much meat but fish a couple of times s week. Lunch is usually leftovers for dh, and dd2 takes sandwiches and homemade soup for lunch on her college days - she also works in a hotel spa 2 days a week and gets fed there. I'll quite often skip lunch or have soup and a sandwich.

We usually get a takeout at the weekend, and dh will buy a bottle of wine on his way home some nights.

Just added up Feb’s groceries and it’s £410 for two adults, two male teens and two cats. That’s everything and seems lower than normal tbh. I don’t really think about overall price as we are lucky to be able to afford some variation but I won’t buy things I think are overpriced which is a lot at the moment!

£200 pw inc cleaning products and some toiletries
18 months ago it was £100/120

Food inflation is at over 17%

I did a shop for the week including toiletries & cleaning products for a family of two adults & 2 teens and it was £180 in ALDI! I have never spent that much in Aldi before. Ever.

I have stopped buying some items now as they are too expensive (used to eat salmon once a week, but salmon fillets are crazy prices now) . We don’t eat meat or fish everyday. We don’t have any crap like biscuits, crisps, snacky stuff etc. No readymeals. All our toiletries are basic stuff.

Its really hard to cut down any further, but we will keep trying.

5 of us here. 2 adults, teen boy, 3yo twins. This week, a combo of Sainsbury's and Lidl came to £144, including maybe £25 of alcohol and all toiletries. I could do it a lot cheaper, but you have to decide where you draw the line at eating cheap and eating tasty and nutritious.

We often get in at various times and eat at separate times, so that's not particularly cost effective either. This week in particular is a bad example of this, usually it's only one or two nights we don't have the same.

We've had jackets with prawns tonight. Cheaper version would be with Tuna mayo, cheese and red onion. Teen had a carbonara ready meal. Twins had ham, cheese, tomato, crackers and a few crisps as a light snack, as they eat dinner at nursery.

Tomorrow we are eating seafood linguine. Teen and Twins eating a slightly different version of seafood pasta. Cheaper version would be everyone on pasta, soft cheese, chopped herbs and crisped pancetta. Or carbonara.

Thurs, DH out. DTwins light tea again. Me, paella ready meal. Teen, pizza.

Fri, DH out, DTwins light tea, Me omelette, Teen, (can't actually remember what's on his meal plan).

Sat, whole family will eat smoked pancetta and mushroom lasagne which I made today and is in the freezer.

Sun, whole family will eat sausage, mushroom and fennel ragu, again cooked today and in the freezer.

Lunches at the weekends tend to be toasties, or we have quite a late very large fry up and that keeps us going til tea.

We also buy our eggs (we go through about 40 a week with my baking and breakfasts) from a local farm for £8, including a box of double yolkers. DH and I have had eggs Benedict twice this week as as brunch. DTwins and DS have scramble or eggy bread probably every other day.

I either make a tonne of toblerone cookies or a Guinness cake, plus a tray of yoghurt topped flapjacks that at about a fiver a go each, are really indulgent and last all week.

I'm lucky as a sahm I have the time to put this much effort in to cost effective meal planning, prepping, and taking a day to cook ahead. Everything is from scratch. I don't know what we'd do if relying on pre-made meals or more convenient foods.

Last year, we could shop for under £100 a week.

The same now is £150, but I do think we eat really really well, have quite a bit of booze and probably 5 nights on average each week, sit down and think to a meal, that we find delicious and doesn't feel like a frugal meal at all.

Used to be about £90-£100 a week for me, DH, two teenagers and a toddler. This week it was £150. That doesn't include top up shops for bread, milk and veg.
I'll also have to start taking food to work as I used to get free food there but chef has had his budget cut so he can't make extra for the staff (or seconds for the children)! All blamed on cost of living, which I'm sure is true. However considering the amount they charge it's shocking they can't make extra food incase the kids want seconds.

I can’t get the shop for two adults under £100 a week. Just can’t. I daresay I probably spend more in total too with top up shops. It’s horrendous

@Urnotthebossofmenow what do you buy /cook for that please

Thanks, that's good stuff! Of course, Mash can be pricey from Waitrose or M&S but a tin from Sainsbury's of peeled potatoes is less than a quid, dunno maybe 40p so I may do that, esp with Richmond sausages as you suggest.

Tuna with bakes potatoes is a good one, I will try that.

Carrots are also dead cheap aren't they. Bananas, yep. Porridge I can only face with blueberries and cream which are fattening/pricey but full fat milk and a banana should make it okay.

The home-made thing, I dunno, takes time.

Tesco do two fillet of salmon for under a fiver, cf with Waitrose where it's about £8. I know that is not cheap anyway, but little tastes better, esp with mash.

How come you do vegan sometimes but not others? Is bacon for the kids? I am leaning towards vegan options but not too passionate about it, I do fish anyway.

£200 for 2 adults and 3 teens. We don't drink either. Awful! It has definitely doubled.

I live on my own but I feed my bf about three times a week. I can't get it under about £75 a week now.

I can afford it but I'm using up vouchers and points to keep it down, plus using the freezer foods and making a lot of lentil daal and soups. I WFH so that includes most of my lunches too. I tend to have porridge for breakfast with oat milk, though I'm going to change to water with just a splash of milk I think.

Porridge I can only face with blueberries and cream which are fattening/pricey but full fat milk and a banana should make it okay.

I make my porridge with oat milk, a bit of cinnamon, blueberries and agave syrup. You could use frozen blueberries, or other berries, which are cheaper. Also, change to water and stir in a spoon of natural yoghurt at the end for creaminess. The cinnamon gives it flavour and the agave is slightly better for you than sugar and you need very little.

Did our food shop today went to 4 different shops cost 200 euro altogether. 3 teens , 2 adults, 1 child and dog . Definitely has gone up I see a large increase in the price of meat