To think it’s actually hard to live off this for the rest of the month?!

[munnyya]

I have 350 to last me and dd (2) until 29th of august. This is for food and household essentials like washing tablets, dishwater tablets, shampoo etc only. I think this is incredibly difficult to do? Am I going wrong somewhere? I can’t understand how this is meant to last us until then.

Buy some basic plastic Tupperware type boxes from the supermarket
stuff will freeze for ages - months - things like shepherd’s pie.
our normal bowls are freezer proof so I use those and cover with clingfilm.
or put in fridge for up to 3-4 days.

maybe start off with one recipe/suggestion. Does anything suggested above appeal to you?

Note to self: teach my kids to cook.

Also think about what type of learner you are. There are loads of videos and instagrammers etc. Or recipe sites. The information will be out there if you research and use the right key words. Lots of recipes are categorised by time, number of ingredients, cheap etc.

You're best placed to do the research because you know what type of food you like and what will be similar to how you currently eat. But maybe just find one or two recipes that look good and try. You might have to google every stage like how to chop an onion but you'll only have to do it once.

I don't know how to make every thing either. I looked up how to make white sauce. Get on your pc/iPad and youtube it.

OK, so you need to learn to cook. Do you have a friend/relative who can help? If not, look on YouTube etc. Buying ready meals is much more expensive than cooking from scratch.

I've been there, I'm not the world's best cook but when DC were babies/toddlers the ability to make a cheese sauce was a godsend.

You can buy freezer bags, they're cheap and available wherever you do your grocery shop. Just write on them what it is and the date, I try to use them within a month personally but I know you can freeze a lot of things for 3+ months and it's more a case of its not going to taste as good after so long rather than it being dangerous if you forget about something in the back of the freezer

Freeze things in leftover takeaway cartons washed out, or in plastic bowls with a sandwich bag over and sealed if its all you have.

Or order some foil containers with cardboard lids - cheap in bulk off amazon etc

Or tbh you don't even need to freeze meals. Buy the list of stuff i posted, will keep a week in fridge, make meals with shortest date ingredients/green veg earlier in week.

That should be more than enough. We have £200 a month for 2 adults.

I'd start with a decent book to teach yourself to cook. Probably Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food is the best for a new cook. You can buy it cheaply here second hand:

https://www.wob.com/en-gb/books/jamie-oliver/jamie-s-ministry-of-food-anyone-can-learn-to-cook-in-24-hours/9781856132848#GOR002000290

Once you're up and running with that, you'll be able to batch cook and you'll save so much money. And eat better.

They’re non-essential TO YOU. For the OP and for many people they are essential. Telling her they aren’t isn’t constructive or helpful, just patronising. If you don’t have anything supportive or helpful to say don’t post.

Ditch dishwasher tablets for a start. Washing up liquid from Aldi is about 79p. Fruit juice is expensive, can you manage with just squash? Buy a bag of potatoes rather than prepared ones.

The Little Dish meals are great but I keep them in for emergencies, when we’ve got in later than planned and DS absolutely can’t wait for food, or if we’ve had an awful night and I just cba. I wouldn’t make them a regular occurrence, maybe once a week for an easy meal? You can get a three pack for around £7

That's 21 pounds a week just on toddler dinners. If you have a 100 pound budget a week that's not something you can afford.

You could make that Tik Tok pasta that everyone was raving about a year or two ago. Cooked pasta, cherry tomatoes and some feta cheese in the oven.

Omelettes are quick and easy and a complete meal if you add some salad and put cheese/ham/mushrooms/peppers etc in the omelette.

Do you have anyone in real life who can teach you to cook? Are there any facilities locally? My local city market has a unit where people can go and learn to cook.

Or look for online cooking videos, there's literally millions of them.

If you ever get takeaways, the plastic containers are probably about the right size for freezing a 'mum and toddler' sized portion of bolognaise sauce, curry, chilli etc. Or you can buy a few for a pound in Poundland, B&M etc. If you have a proper fridge freezer, they'll be fine for months, if you only have a 'top of the fridge' section, check the star rating, as it might only be a month.

Also washing powder is cheaper than tablets. Sainsburys own brand is good.

Washing up liquid cheaper than dishwasher tabs, can you last 3 weeks?

Get in the habit of having some "store cupboard essentials" in.

Ive got tinned tomatoes, beans, tuna, spam, pasta & rice etc, flour, sugar. If you told me tomorrow i had to live off what i had i could eat pretty well for 3-4 weeks. It would be boring but I'd live

Chinese takeaway dishes are great for freezing (and it's kinda recycling!) If you don't have any you can usually get them cheap in poundshops or even the supermarkets.

You don't need to suddenly cook everything from scratch, it's bound to be daunting but even try buying mince and a jar of bolognaise sauce to start. Lloyd groseman does some decent ones and you can get tubs of dried sauces too - curry, peppercorn, gravy ect. You just add boiling water and stir. It'll still work out cheaper than buying everything pre prepared

I'm sorry you're struggling. Cook loads of veggie food - it's so economical, delicious and satisfying.

This isnt true - it's actually more expensive to wash up by hand if you have a reasonably modern dishwasher.

We run both ours overnight as we have an overnight tariff and it costs a grand total of 14 pence per load.

I was just about to suggest this.

Quick, easy meals that don't break the bank and are suitable for adults and children.

I feel like you're a bit anxious about cooking? You can't go too wrong though.
Boil a kettle and fill a saucepan. Bring to the boil (when it's bubbling loads) add 75g pasta per person and give it a stir. Leave it to do its thing for the time it says on the packet, around 10 minutes. Taste a bit to see if its done. Drain the pasta and mix in a sauce (a jar is 50p at tesco) add some grated cheese. That should boost your confidence, its quick, easy and cheap and you don't have to worry about making a sauce. When you're more confident you could add more to the sauce like veg or meatballs or whatever

Tesco/Sainsbury's are the more expensive supermarkets, along with Morrison's,Co Op, M&S (obviously) & Waitrose. £70 for 3-4 days of food is ridiculous. You need to do a main shop at Aldi or Lidl, then say Asda for what you can't get in there.
I go at supermarket reduced times too. Aldi/Lidl for their 75% off, I get all sorts from there like fresh salmon & duck 75% off for instance last week, along with Asda & Morrisons for evening reduced time is great. You can get bread & donuts for 10p in Asda. Along with ready meals & sandwiches etc for 20p. Sunday's are typically even better for this. Morrison's bbq meat goes down to £1 when originally it was £4.50.
Cut out the little dish meals, you can bulk buy ingredients to make different meals and then freeze, like mince which will do for cottage pie/bolognaise, chilli con carne & bags of potatoes. It's all the convenience stuff which is pricey. Ready made cut up forget about it, bulk buy fresh fruit. I buy luxury food items when they are reduced as I refuse to pay full price.

OK, didn't know that. does that include the tablets? Tesco dishwasher tablets $3.29. Tesco washing up liquid 69p.
Still, the OP is getting some good advice on here. But dishwasher tablets and duck breasts...?

wash, bake, tin of bake beans, bit of grated cheese, done.

When do lidl do the reduced items? I used to work at the co op with a bakery and deli, at the end of the day we reduced everything to 5-10p it was great!

That’s my budget for petrol shopping and any spending money for the month for me and 2 teens.
£40-£50 a week for food and house hold bits £20 a week for petrol.that leaves me with around £70 for a takeaway or something and I try and put some back for savings.
some months I have less than that and have to really budget.