Sick to death of grocery costs (1k/ month)

[Icannotbudget]

Our grocery bill has slowly increased and is now around 1k per month. This is for two adults, two very active teenage boys, and two dogs. This includes everything you would get from a supermarket eg personal care and laundry/ cleaning stuff.
Both kids are neurodivergent one in particular is very fussy and would rather go hungry than eat ‘cheap’ food. The older one just seems to need constant protein.
I am vege and pretty unfussy but don’t like freezer food. No alcohol and i shop at Aldi as much as poss but do use other supermarkets too.
DH works long hours and Ive just gone back full time and really struggling its impossible to cook from scratch every night.
Not sure if I want sympathy or strategies to be honest, its crippling me and im feeling really down.

Family of 3 and two dogs I spent £50 a week but I refuse to shop in Tesco - Aldi and freeze so much and pad everything out with cans of tomatoes etc

I live alone and my food bill is £60pw, some weeks cheaper, some more expensive depending what I need but it averages out at £60 not including cat food

Times that by 4, add dog food and there you go

Interesting what people say about ND/SEN kids.

My NDN/friend has 2 DC, when they were younger one was vegetarian and the other was a normal teenage boy (but on the spectrum) and tall but he ate bad choices so ended up piling on the weight and got called names for it.

He was never really into exercise, bar walking, but one day changed his diet from fatty, carb laden foods to more healthy choices including more salads, fruit and vegetables and less carbs and fat and slimmed down massively, not too slim but just right. But it was his call.

His DM used to give him pocket money and when he made his own way back from school on trains before this he’d buy cheaper food in Morrisons and also Kennedy’s. This changed when he went on a diet but it was a healthy lifestyle choice.

So you can eat healthier as a teenager but still eat enough, even if you’re ND.

Super curious about this! £50 including all the non-food bits, no top-up shops,
and you don't order takeaways etc? What sort of stuff do you cook?

No. I think there's plenty to be cut from the budget and cheaper dog food available.

I want to echo a poster upthread who said that it’s a scandal that ordinary families cannot afford to eat well. At the same time, supermarkets are often paying farmers below the cost of production whilst making big profits for themselves. We should be asking a lot more of our politicians.

ND aside I think for many " fussy" children the issues with food are a symptom of MH issues in the child or parent ( yes you read that correctly)
My DH was the world's fussiest eater, his mother totally overbearing and controlling.
When we got together he started trying more and more foods to the point he has a couple of things he won't eat but that's normal.
She hated it which was very telling.

Just back from Aldi. Was £86 and that included 3 big sacks of bark for garden and bottle of Malbec on offer. No dog food or laundry stuff needed this week.

@fieldsofbutterflies yeah let's just keep expecting women to overcompensate and spend more time, energy and resource on trying to keep things ticking over rather than even attempting to make even the smallest of changes. Women's needs are negligible after all-let's just keep pushing and pushing and pushing.

Yes I do. Also have carried on 'hiding' veg in some dishes.

Clearly it's a risk. If he rubbles then we would be back to square 1 but we can't afford the current position so need to try something.

To answer some of those who say 'well how to do they know about lurpack' or whatever - our answer is because pre COVID we could enjoy some brands. I still think Heinz tomato soup is the nicest. Aldi though is fine so it does. My son can't process it the same

You could send them down the shop to buy butter and a loaf of bread and only give them enough money to get their preferred brand. Tell them they can keep the change to spend on sweets and see what they come back with.

@pelotonaddiction it’s not x 4 though is it? You don’t need to spend £60 pw per person. Economies of scale come into play.
That £86 will feed us 3 adults very well for the week. DH is 6ft 4 and very sporty. Granted the 3rd adult is a DD but she likes her salmon and avocado etc . We eat well.

@Borntrippy @ColBoulter I have seen so many threads from posters on here about how their husbands/partners will only eat certain foods but will take absolutely no responsibility for any of the shopping or cooking. So the women are bending over backwards trying to please these men because guess what? They were raised to expect a woman to bend over backwards for them.

And the vast majority of posters responses are that the man needs to take responsibility and be a better husband/partner/father etc. And some of those men are also ND.

This has nothing to do with neurodiversity and everything to do with raising adults that can take responsibility for their own needs and understand how consequences work.

These are teenagers, not children. They may very well be husbands and fathers in around a decade. What happens then?

And just to add another tip - we eat well for about the same budget by avoiding supermarkets as much as possible. They are designed to make you impulse spend. How many times have you gone in for milk and ended up with a basket full?

We order meat online every so often - it arrives frozen and we fill the freezer. Sacks of rice and dry food like flour, lentils, etc come from an ethnic wholesaler. We have to travel for that but only need to go every six months or so, and we make a day of it. Yes you would need the storage space for sacks and it really needs to be inside the house to avoid rodents. Fruit and veg, we use a box scheme - it works out a similar price to supermarket produce overall, but is fresher when it arrives so we throw less away. Loo roll gets delivered. The milkman is my little luxury - it costs more but they supply all dairy and so it removes the temptation of ‘just popping in for milk’ and leaving with a load of shopping you don’t really need.

As a child there were foods that made me feel ill, including meat. My parents would make me sit with cold food long after my brothers had finished and gone off to play. I didn’t eat the food and sat there, miserable, until they took it away. They didn’t replace it with other food. I still don’t eat those foods. Children will just not eat if they don’t like what is in front of them. I won’t eat a meal I found disgusting or even unpalatable and I don’t suppose many people on this thread would. I don’t think creating a fuss over meals for children, neurodiverse or not, is ever worth it. You want your children to be fed and happy.

Can you do a 2-week plan and double cook? So a double Bolognese, a double chilli, double chicken wrap? So the next week you have 3 meals ready done (as you don’t eat a potion, do some single portions too for your ND son to have on other nights). Can you do a batch of vege stuff for you? Get the dog who can’t have grains. I’ve had one. Did tolerate a lower priced one but lost weight.

😂
So you think a child that has a disability really is just fussy.

Would you say a wheelchair user should have some decency and walk. Do you think someone with anorexia should have some decency and just eat.

Please educate yourself and research ASC and other ND. A child with issues around food did not ask to have to issues.

I am with those who are outraged that families are struggling to buy decent quality food. The way food prices have shot up without incomes doing the same is outrageous

I actually didn't say that it should be OP that does those things. My responses were about what they (as in, the whole family) could do to save money.

It's just exhausting. I've never like cooking but having to think what to buy within budget, then cooking it and I begrudge the cost of it all.

Everything is going up all the time. I don't think my age helps. I'm at the point in my life where I'm cross I have to think like this.

Its what we spend per week. It is ridiculous that prices have gone up so much.

It works out at 3.80 per person per meal and that includes all toileteries and cleaning products. Not bad really.

@ThisOldThang , Lurpak isn't butter. I love butter but I don't need it.

I think people can underestimate how much hungry teen boys can eat- it's way more than the average female adult.

I think part of the issue is that you're working full time and therefore you're spending more than you might do in order to cut down on the time you spend in the kitchen.

Meal plan, batch cook and freeze so you don't have to cook every evening. Get your teens involved in the shopping and budgeting. You could do a click and collect from Aldi and tell them you are not spending more than £200. See what their opinions are on making cut backs - in a fun way, not "oh no we can afford the food we want".

Ultimately though, people are having to make cut backs elsewhere to pay for groceries.

I said ND aside.
Not sure why you are arguing when when I've said mostly it's not ND?

Who knows?
Quite frankly I don't care much
As I said to my DH, I'm cooking this
Eat what you like

I'm autistic and I was the same. I have a vivid memory of being forced to eat spinach and it made me gag to the extent that I promptly vomited my dinner all over the table. My dad (who is also autistic but not sensitive to texture) said that was the day he suddenly realised I was probably autistic too. He never forced me to eat anything again!