Aibu to be annoyed the food shop disappears so quickly

[toadstool32]

It drives me insane. Food shop arrives and within a day most cupboard snacks / fruit has been eaten. I’ve spoken to everyone on numerous occasions about making things last. Family of 5 plus a dog, spending anywhere between £100-£130 a week. How do you make things last?! (Obviously not fresh stuff with dates but the constant snacking).

edited to add: school lunches and snacks are all provided by school. I get lunch at work too. So this is just home food.

I have a tiered wicker basket stand for fruit and veg, the kind you’d find in a ye olde greengrocers. You really want stuff out of plastic, my house is made of stone and the utility is always cool so stuff will keep for ages although we normally get through it pretty fast. I have four dc between 10-15 and my answer to I’m hungry is always have a banana. At the weekend DC will easily get through two bunches of bananas, bag of apples and a bag of oranges a day. I love fruit too though and if I find lots of yellow sticker berries we’d each have a punnet (or two) for pudding.

Love rice and Dahl perfectly acceptable dinner.

I spend about £150 a week

breakfasts - cereal (weetabix / porridge / shredded wheat) or toast and fruit
lunch - two lunch boxes, cucumber, grapes, cheese, yoghurt, sandwich, juice or smoothie. Once a week packet or crisps, once a week penguin type bar.
dinners
s- roast chicken and veg and apple crumble (apples foraged)
m - spicy chicken flatbreads with tzatziki (leftover chicken)
t - pie and chips and variety of veg
w - jacket potatoes and home made chilli (with 5 different beans)
t - pasta, jarred sauce or cheese - garlic bread - salad
f - freezer night - breaded fish / goujons / oven chips and peas and sweetcorn
s - toad in the hole (2 sausages each) mash, broccoli, carrots, green beans

snacks
6 pack of crisps
proper corn pop corn
apples
bananas
grapes
oranges
iced gems
dried fruit
nuts

We always overbuy on bananas - it's good to have a few going brown for cakes and pancakes.

Oh it can definitely be more expensive, especially cakes (but they taste so much better).
But it's equally possible to cook much much cheaper from scratch if you choose carefully.

Couldn't agree more. We are mostly veggie too, I also filled people up on apple dahl and rice, grain stuffed peppers, eggs, and mac cheese with leeks in and tomatoes on top. There's a lemon cake to cut at, and some apples and bananas and yoghurt, packets of crumpets and nobody will be going to bed hungry.

Grated mozzarella is a rip off, and I say that as someone who used to run their own pizza business. The 125g balls in liquid are cheaper and better, and you just have to chop them roughly, or even rip them into bits with your hands.

And best is good enough, stop beating yourself up

Ill admit Ive not RTWF , just your posts

How old are the ones who are eating you out of House and home? Because if over 6, time to get them on board to make the snacks

No cook tray bakes - 15s, rocky roads, rice crispy/ cornflake cakes - no cooking - micro wave the cheapest chocolate, stir in the rest of the ingredient - press into a tray - set - cut

If they like fruit cake or soreen, they will love bread pudding - that just so easy , filling and decidedly yummy and because you are using the ends of loaves, crusts etc - its pennies and can be cooked in an air fryer

When I was a child, around the time Jesus was born, money was extremely tight for the working classes, there was no money for snacks - unheard of, but as kids are kids we would come in from school starving and back then cakes, biscuits were homemade My mum worked as well so it was simple things made, put in the tin and we knew when they were gone, they were gone, so we did learn to eke them out . No fizz, it was half a gallon of squash bought on a Saturday - had to get three of us through the week

And I know that was then and this is now and children have high expectations of what they can eat , when they want , no idea of costs and what a struggle parents are having

Involving them in making cheap snacks will engage them and will help as well with teaching them about weights and measure, costing everything out , knowing how many each batch will make, how to make things that wee bit smaller so they "get more for their money "

Me and wee sister - by the age of 8 knew how to make toffee popcorn by ourselves with no supervision - possibly burned a few saucepans and if smoke alarms had been a thing would have set them off as well

Other home from school snacks was cheese and crackers , cheese crackers and jam if there had been any made ,

I think its already been advised - scrap the berries, they arent snacks, they are up there on the luxury end nowadays- unless they are out blackberrying ( which we did end of the summer holidays every year else no jam. Apples , pears and bananas and plums this time of year. Melon can still be got reasonably

I feel for parents now. 2 generations have worked so bloody hard, had kids late, mortgaged to the hilt, and now back where we were but with a 21st century lifestyle to fund

You as a mother are doing your best, dont ever forget that and ease off yourself a bit . Its bloody shite at the moment and I think its going to get a lot worse , so look at the wee tiny changes you can make now to get you through the harder times ahead

We have a back up (fully sealed) box in the garage so I unload half the snacks into that then drip them into the house

But just a smidge over one banana per person a week isn’t exactly a generous starting allowance

I don't understand what people spend so much on. We spend about £350 per month for 3 adults, £400 when the 4th is home from uni. Includes all household stuff like washing powder, loo roll. Includes a bit of booze. Includes everything including midweek milk, bread etc. Always feels like we have plenty. Maybe it's that we eat completely veggie/vegan, but does meat really make all that much difference? Genuinely asking as I'm flummoxed.

I think it's pretty normal with large house hold, I just shop same time every week and put up with the moaning that we don't have anything to eat in between...

Yes meat and fish costs

reading all the replies from veggies /vegans their cost is much less

Meat will add a lot to the total, especially if it's pricier cuts, though even mince and basic gammon are getting more expensive these days.

You being vegan/ veggie will have a lot to do with it

Im old school ( as you can tell from my posts previously ) I learned to cook, I'm the sort that will open an empty fridge and pantry - and make something , because Im from the generation that had fuck all growing up and we ate what we were given - no choices - well two - eat or go hungry

You are probably the first generation ( maybe second ) in your family who are vegan?veggie - you had to learn to cook with vegetables and I bet most of your meals are pure plant based, not processed tofu and "meat replacements"

As I said previouslyy, we didn't have the snacks because most hand been invented and those that had been were beyond our price point

Veggie kids are growing up on processed meat replacements - not a friggling clue on how to cook real food

Thing is we have had 30 years of cheap fppd because of our Standing within the EU mostly , but also pretty much steady weather patterns

The past 10 years, the weather has be becoming more extreme, we flood, other countries burn, we left the buying power from the EU, Trump decided to add more fuel to the powder keg

You have to be earning big bucks to be able to shop with impunity at the moment

Glad I'm not the only one!

I dont understand this obsession with snacks!

I would provide more filling meals - including more protein in form of lentils and pulses and more veg, and extra courses if needed (see below).

Work out when the kids are hungry.

If they are hoovering up snacks when they get home from school, for example, try bringing dinner/tea forward or provide something like own-brand cereal and milk, toast (preferably wholemeal)with jam/peanut butter, oatcakes and cheese, or something home-baked. Home-made pancakes are easy and cheap as well as being lower in sugar (plus no added preservatives etc) and you can bake a batch and put them in the freezer then defrost in a minute ot two. Same goes for home-made cereal bars, muffins etc.

If they are hungry aftee the evening meal start giving a pudding if you don"t already - could be yoghurt and fruit, (maybe frozen fruit), fruit crumble (again, cheap and quick to make and you can use cheaper fruit like apples or frozen fruit to keep cost down). Consider serving soup as a first course.before what you would normally serve as main course. Substitute in things like wholegrain rice, pasta etc which are more filling (and healthier) than white varieties.

If they are still hungry after evening meal, give them own-brand cereal and milk, maybe with fruit like banana or apple added in, or a mug of hot chocolate.

If you are on a tight budget, don't feel that you need to buy lots of soft fruit - most of their five-a-day can come from vegetables, pulses etc in meals. Fruit can be cheaper fruit like apples and bananas and can be part of meal rather than snacks to make them go further. Frozen fruit or fruit tinned in fruit juice are just as good nutritionally as fresh. Consider growing some soft fruit in your garden if you have space. Most soft fruit is very easy to grow and after the initial outlay the fruit works out very cheap. Rhubarb, blackcurrants and raspberries are all pretty reliable and easy to grow to eat fresh or to make into puddings/muffins etc. If there are places nearby to pick wild fruit such as brambles/blackberries, raspberries etc, these are great fresh and also good for freezing and for making things like crumble and muffins.

The odd snack/treat is fine. I buy one sweet treat a week for each of my DC - one likes Oreos and one likes Mentos. If they eat them all on the day of the shopping, that means they have to wait a week for more! I sometimes also buy a pack of nice biscuits (whatever is on special offer) and we have ice cream as a pudding on Friday. However, the focus in our house is on healthy, filling meals at mealtimes.

Please dont feel.judged. Food is so expensive but there are ways of changing what you buy to make your budget go further.

Don’t dentists recommend not finishing meals with sugar / sweet foods as it’s awful for teeth? I just offer seconds or cheese and biscuits after meals for that reason. Hot pudding on a Sunday usually but otherwise it just isn’t something we do. Maybe an ice lolly in summer but then worry and give a bit of cheese 😆

I’ve never worried about it. My kids often had something sweet as a snack during the day or after dinner. They brush their teeth morning and night and none have ever needed any fillings.

I’ve been told that apparently raisins are awful because they stick to the teeth. Crisps too as they cling, whereas chocolate will melt at body temperature and is more short lived. Generally though fruit is better than juice.

Aldi and Lidl are cheaper, if you want to buy more food for the same amount of money.

Stop buying branded junk food and it brings the costs down too.

Spend less on cleaning products.

There's no cleaning product in my weekly shop.

Good advice. Baking your own snacks such as muffins, brownies, fruit loafs is a cheaper way to provide treats/snacks.

Once you get into the swing of it, it doesn't take too much time. The kids can do it themselves too.

Family of 4 & I spend at least £150 on food. Most things bought come in packs of 4,5 or 6. To be fair to your family even if they had 1 item each that snack pack is gone in a day.

We have 3 dc and definitely focus our main fruit buying on apples, mandarines, bananas and oranges, and toast is a legitimate snack. I keep the individually wrapped stuff for ‘on the go’ between activities as the kids do a lot of sport. I am working full time but I do try hard to bake some snacks. You can freeze raw choc chip cookies and bake from frozen so I make a triple batch when I do those. The kids help so it’s family time :)

130£ is $242 here in Canada. I spend more like $250-$350 per week/10 days if I can stretch it. It's 2 adults and 2 kids under 4 in my home.

No washing up liquid? No laundry products? No soap? No window cleaners? No shower gel or shampoo?

These are what I would call cleaning products.