Food Spending is ridiculous and I can't seem to reduce this.

[spababe]

Ok so I cut back last month and had to have a big shop on 1st Oct but so far this month I have spent £400 on groceries and have £30 to last me until the end of the month. I also have spent £80 on school lunches.
I vary my shops between Lidl and Tesco online (where I can track what I spend as I order)
I have 2 teenage sons and DH so 4 of us but the milk bill alone is £30 a month as they get through 4 pints a day.
We do not eat meat or much processed food. We live rurally so no takeaways.
I do meal plan.
I do have quite a bit in the freezer to get us through the next week but then we will have to survive on the last £30 through half term - tricky.
It's ridiculous really but I have no idea how to reduce this.

I would love to have the option to consider the farmers and animal welfare. But at the moment it's just about price.

I don't think people should be given a choice over the price. Supermarkets should be forced to pay dairy farmers a fair price and hence if they want to sell it cheap in the shops it should be the shops that lose out financially.
What would you do if milk cost 80p a pint in every shop?

Rethink my meal plan! I know it's not fair.

Rethink a meal plan? How much milk do you cook with? Aside from porridge and rice pudding I can't think of any actual meals that use a significant amount of milk. What do you cook that requires you to use a lot of milk?

And yes, milk PRU ex are not fair to dairy farmers and they are constantly under threat of their prices being further cut by supermarkets who want to lure customers in on the price of cheaper milk than the competitors. How would people feel if their bosses decided to cut their wages so that customers can get a cheaper deal? Their overheads remain the same but their wages do down , along with their quality of living, just so somebody can save a few pence each day.
It's shit, Really shit and I wish there was somewhere that I could buy ethically priced milk from.

Prices, not PRU.

There are five of us. We use four pints a day. So if I paid an extra 55p a pint I would be spending an extra £800 per year.

And in answer to your question, porridge, rice pddung, bowls of cereal, sauces, muffins, cakes.

I reduced food costs as follows :

• porridge with basics oats made up with water not milk.
• I buy remaindered veg and veg packs for soup/veg curries (reduced to 50p stew pack bought today.... 2 litres of soup now!)
• I have a pressure cooker so buy lentils /chickpeas /beans in bulk from ethic section in super market and bulk out most meals with lentils
• small thermos pots so soup/leftovers for packed lunches
• economy/own brand everything
• good housekeeping family meals for £5 book and Jack Monroe book for cheap meals and old veggie 'grub on a grant book' also Rose Elliot's 'cheap and easy'.
• we all veggie so no meat to buy
• have given up weekly shop, mainly shop local with cash for only what I need

Can feed 5 with all of us having packed lunches and shopping including cat food for around £50-70pw. That includes Making things for freezer and a couple of booties of wine.

I wish my food bill was £100 a week for four. It's more like £130! Though we do eat vast amounts of veg and fruit. I think you're doing well! Any other areas you could cut back on?

Lidl sell 4 pints for 96p! I totally agree farmers should be paid a fair price, but I want to feed my family the best I can within a budget we now have to keep to (or even reduce). At the moment I can keep within our max budget of £50 per week for three, and we still have up to five portions of fruit/veg if we want.

£62 in Lidl this week which included 2 lots of fish and a lot of fruit and veg. Yes I do a top up for the milk midweek but try to buy only that. I only have a under the counter fridge. I think everyone is getting hung up on the milk when it's not that expensive. I do use it for cooking eg soups, pancakes and cheese sauces as well as porridge and drinking.

My meal plan for the week is as follows:
M: pasta and mushrooms
T: leek and sweetcorn risotto
W: veg and bean chilli
T: Quorn lasagne
F: salmon and veg
S: toad in the hole
S: veg stew and dumplings

Lunches will be frittata, beans on toast, homemade soup x 2, sandwiches, baked potatoes with houmous

Also have a look at amazon subscribe and save. We buy nappies this way and it jaut turns up at our door but lots of grocery items are on there.

I keep my food budget to £100 a week for 4 of us by doing the following;
Basics shop at aldi.
Top ups at asda and co op.
I shop around for deals...for example, the pizzas my ds1 likes were half price at the co op last week.
Yoghurts were half price too. And porridge.
Dh and ds2 take pack up to work and school (ds1 has hot dinners so that's £40 per month)
We eat a lot of fruit and veg and we have meat/fish everyday in some form (even if it's only fish fingers)
We use UHT milk and have done for ages (I actually prefer it!) it means I can get 6 litres of milk for £3.
We also like treats so we keep chocolate and cakes and biscuits in the cupboard too.
I also bake ....apple crumble is a really cheap pudding!
I buy own brand San pro, generic meds, own brand cleaning stuff and toiletries.
It's a pain having shop around sometimes.
But it does pay off.