£800 pm on groceries for a family

[popsickle555]

recently had a conversation with my DM (lighthearted) but I explained our weekly shop is now around £200 for a family of 2 adults and two teenage children during summer school holidays. She said she thought me ‘overspending’.

Anyway here’s what we spend:

£150 ish weekly shop (has to be weekly during the holidays as they eat so much)
£50 on top up shops fruit and veg and occasional extras eg wash powder and such things. This also includes cat food (1 cat on cheap food).

this includes lunches for me and DH (wfh) and also packed lunch stuff for DC’s who have been on a drama camp.

AIBU to think it’s actually quite hard to eat reasonably well (I do cook most days and I am buying decent ish ingredients but also plenty of ‘basic’ range options) for less than this sort of price now for 4 full portion people eating 3 meals a day? We hardly ever eat out unless on holiday.

For reference my DM hardly eats a lot now she’s older and when she does it’s really simple and generally quite boring stuff eg omelette, jacket potato etc. My DH and DCs needs more protein than that as are all very active.

I just came away feeling like I’m wasting money but genuinely can’t see how I can do it for much less without really scrimping on ingredients and protein.

We are two adults one dog and a toddler who is currently only eating cheese, pasta and sweetcorn, and ours is about £600

Agree it is normal. Frustrating though. We have a couple of home cooked low cost vege meals in the mix to keep around this level. Way too easy for it to creep up. Growing fruit at home helps, though we are rural and further south than the UK, so easy to say this,

DH has a CF friend who turns up, eats huge amounts and then comments how little they spend on groceries. FFing annoying. Very wealthy and eat out a lot, plus a complete CF. This then sets DH off about grocery costs.

I think it's fine. We spend about £120-130 a week, including a bottle of wine, for 2 adults and a prolimary-aged child (who eats like an adult most days). That, plus about a tenner on the milkman. Quality food is one of the last things I'll negotiate

Eating out? Hilarious. Not happening.
Put lentils in your mince, cower under a blanket in winter, hate a refugee.

I am on my own and spend about £200 - £230 a month which covers three meals a day and the occasional snack but I am not a real snacker. I cook most nights but I do get fed up with it I menu plan and use my slow cooker to batch cook and I freeze loads of stuff. The cost of food is horrendous and apparently things are going to up again, especially veg due to the hot summer and lack of rain. I do use Ocado but try to rationalise this because the quality is so good. I live near an Asda but it is not very good, you really have to watch the dates . Get cleaning stuff and the occasional bottle of wine from Aldi. My main meals are based round chicken, fish and veggie stuff.

Lidl and Aldi do a good selection on frozen berries for quite a good price

I spend less than most of the people on this thread.

I think I eat well but who knows

Duck legs are £2.40 for 2 in Tesco this week. They often do a loss leader, half price meat or fish. I always buy it. I did duck confit with dauphinoise potatoes broccoli and honey roast carrots.

Leftover cream was added to 3 egg yolks and some bacon with spaghetti the next day for a British carbonara. Egg whites whipped up for meringues, treats for the week. Garlic bread.

Tonight is an aubergine bake thing with red peppers and tomatoes and mozzarella.

I've got sausages, prawns and more bacon, a fridge full of veg and a bowl of fruit.

I bought batch rolls that have been used for lunches and sides, there's 4 left in the freezer for the rest of the week. Usually have leftovers or soup or a sandwich for lunch. There's always salad. I always have flour too, to make my own bread products if I run out.

Breakfast is porridge or toast or whatever is on offer that week. And fruit. Fruit is cheap. A melon, bananas and whatever is on offer.

Anything leftover is repurposed or frozen.

Good cheap meals my kids liked were the ubiquitous spag bol, anything mexicany with wraps, crispy shredded beef, ham egg and chips (Spanish style with patatas bravas and own brand prosciutto was a surprise hit).
Fake KFC was also surprisingly cheap and a massive hit. A roast chicken once a week, leftovers the next day and soup the third. Chicken noodle, egg drop, ramen. Sausage and mash is easy and cheap. Get the veg in with mushrooms and tomatoes and onions or green veg.

I get the impression that a lot of people have meat or fish with bits. I've always done 100g of meat per person per meal, then loads of veggie sides. I know my neighbour spends twice as much as me but she only ever eats beans on toast so I'm at a loss as to what she buys!

I buy milk butter eggs cheese and creme fraiche every week.

I spend £50-60 odd in tesco every week for 2 adults, a delivery, no top ups. Everything is included.
I buy wine and cigarettes too but I've excluded those from my total. My total includes cat food.

I would be interested to know what the people who spend more eat. Is it just protein? Both my kids are around the 6ft mark so having less meat was really not detrimental at all.

Yup, I agree with you OP. Food, especially good quality food, is extortionate. We spend about the same.

I spend £320ish on the monthly food shop for a family of 4 (kids are primary school) so about £80 per week. After I have paid bills from my account I have £400 left for the month and probably 50% of that goes on food of some sort be it school dinners, cafes, extra bread/milk/fruit within the week, one take away. So all in all probably £5-600 goes on food and groceries. I think we would be better to bulk buy and spend £100 a week on the big shop and that way we could cut down on school dinners, take aways ect.
Edited to say we have just spend two weeks travelling around Europe and the supermarkets were much more expensive...im talking Aldi and Lidl too so directly comparable to our shops.

This absolutely. Husband and I eat less these days, now retired. Our metabolism has slowed down I guess. When our son and girlfriend come to visit for the weekend. We fill the fridge with extra foods. It's always empty when they leave 😂

I live alone and spend between £80 and £100 a week on my main shop. Then a few top ups from M&S for lunches etc. That’s probably an extra £30 a week.

this includes meat, fresh fruit and veg, a bottle of wine, and toiletries and cleaning/laundry products as needed.

I could get a a bit lower if I wanted of course, I get fresh fish - like salmon - a steak and some convenience foods.

2 adults, 2 teens and a preteen I try to gap the weekly shop at £100ish and no more than 20-30 on top ups. We eat well BUT it takes effort and isn’t easy to plan! It’s a time-consuming must

We spend just over half for two adults and three tweens/teens and a dog, but we’re vegetarian. I recently had to cater for a extended family holiday and was shocked how much meat added to the cost of a food shop.

Food isn’t cheaper in France though. Greece very expensive for food too.

We used to spend that and more in waitrose and sainsburys, I think we were doing 1000 a month. But we had a look at our spending and started buying online. we do a big monthly meat order direct from the butchers, veg boxes online and bulk order washing powder, wasing up liquid, toiletries etc. Lidl for tinned stuff, crisps and carton apple and orange juices twice a month. I buy yellow sticker stuff too if I see it Then just a few nice bits like hams and things from waitrose and marks now and then, but I put that in our eating out and takaway budget as class as a luxury now. Rather than it was our usual shop.

Op refers to 'but I explained our weekly shop is now around £200 for a family of 2 adults and two teenage children during summer school holidays.'
Family of 4.

We are two adults and one 11 year old who is currently eating me out of house and home (for context, he is 5ft 7in tall, skinny but constantly on the go, playing out, swimming club etc so he needs a lot of food!).

I probably spend around £120 a week so I would say you are about right.

That does breakfast and eve meals for us all (plus snacks) and lunch for me and DH as DS has school lunches.

We are extremely fortunate that we grow veg plus have access to free eggs from neighbours chickens and get pork/lamb from another family we are friends with who keep pigs/sheep. So, some of our food comes free, which is obviously a luxury that many don't have.

I also don't eat very much.

Food is so expensive now - I certainly notice it when I go in the supermarket 🤯

Yes Ops is around 200 for 4 people and yours would be 160 for 4 people? My point being it's really not steep at just £10 per week a person more in comparison to yours?

In Spain too. Very expensive compared to the UK

I currently budget £200 a week for food and petrol and think im likely not budgeting enough and thats for 3 of us. So can definitely see £800pm for 4 not being excessive.

Without getting political, as I voted remain and indeed live in France for half the year, one can’t argue with the fact that the lower paid in the UK are better off than they were before BREXIT. The national living wage has gone up hugely, and still employers have to pay more than that, though not as much as they did a few years ago. That’s a direct result of a shortage of labour. Now, at a macro level the UK economy hasn’t done brilliantly post BREXIT, though arguably many EU economies have done worse. But it’s easy to see that the traditionally lower paid, less skilled workers in the UK got exactly what they wanted from BREXIT, and that was an exodus of foreign workers and higher paid jobs. Inconvenient for those of us who benefited hugely from the EU, but the main issue was that many less well off didn’t see how it benefited them, because on a day to day basis it didn’t.

Back on topic, here in France food shopping is more expensive than the UK and yet eating out is a little cheaper. Despite France having tougher labour laws, though a much lower minimum wage. We also have much higher unemployment in France, so not all is rosy. Warm weather, cheaper housing and good wine certainly helps though :)

I just done a top up shop for myself, one adult.
Just milk, bread, some household cleaning items, sardines, cupboard stuff, fruit.
Nothing extravagant and no meat.
£50.

It's about what I'd pay for that household. It is possible to eat more cheaply and of course many people have to, but it's not extravagant.