Olio and TGTG - share your finds and meal plans

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Anyone else use Olio and Too good to go?

Those that do I thought it may be interesting to share our finds and what we are doing with it. For those who don't know these are discount food apps where you can collect near date food to save it going to landfill.

Yesterday I collected
Beef Kofta's
Egg noodles x 2
some pork and egg ham
some spring onions
2 pint milk

The plan
freeze the egg noodles for a later stirfry meal
going to use the beef kofta's as meatballs and have with pasta. Will put some spring onions as well as other veg in it
use the milk to make yoghurt which I have for breakfast every morning
The pork and egg ham will be used for lunches.

Anyone else use these apps and what have you been picking up?

Today.

Used

Breakfast- yoghurt made from the milk

Lunch - chicken and veg soup and a bread roll from an earlier olio collection (had frozen the soup)

Dinner tonight- we are having burgers and chips. The burger buns came from an olio collection and have been frozen.

Collected today - 4 stir fry sauce mixes (two terriaki and two chow mein). I have two egg noodles in the freezer from yesterday plus quite a lot of frozen veg from an earlier olio collection so looks like one of the sauces will be used for stir fry tomorrow and the other 3 can go into the freezer for another day.

I've kept meaning to try these apps. Thanks for the reminder!

I have been using it for 2 months. My mortgage went up quite a lot in feb and so using this to bring down the grocery spend to balance out the monthly budget. I also hate food waste so win win as far as I am concerned.

So far have been able to turn weekly shops into fortnightly with a small top up and using olio to bridge the gap. According to my app I have saved £450 so far.

I like inventing in the kitchen so can be a bit flexible with ingredients (made mango sorbet a couple of days ago with two mangoes I picked up) and it's become a bit of a game to see what I can get and how I can use it. It helps not to be overly bothered by best before and to have a freezer for the use by stuff which can be frozen.

Today I picked up

3 loaves of bread. 1 for the side, 2 for the freezer
2 cucumbers
1 bag of shallots
1 pack of naan bread

Dinner tonight- stir-fry using olio noodles, olio Chinese sauce, chicken and various veg.

Do you find the stuff you get is fairly 'mainstream' on the whole, or is some of it a bit 'out there' so to speak?

You only ask for what you want. Sometimes some more interesting stuff comes up- it can be a good way to try stuff you wouldn't normally buy.

As an olio wfh. Keep it up.

From my pick ups locally dinners would be harder but I only go to a few shops. Snacks and puddings would definitely be covered. The amount of bakery goods is unreal. Fruit and salad in abundance too.

How are you finding your areas times for listing? I do mainly evening pick ups so I have people collecting till near midnight.

TGTG is variable and random from our local shop and every bag is a “surprise” but must consist of a protein, fruit/veg and a carb. We’ve had nice chicken, veg, and cake. If the very young assistant packs the bag it’s not quite there for a full meal. We once received 2 packs of mini pork pies, 2 large bottles of OJ, and a cabbage. Struggled with that one.

Most things get listed around 8:30pm. I struggle to do evening pick ups so tend to go for the best before rather than use by and pick up next day

Today- lunch all from olio collections (sandwiches and wraps plus some bakery goods)

Dinner curry featuring olio spinach and yesterday's naan bread.

No pick ups yet today but will see what gets listed later

That’s the issue for some isn’t it. One of my pick ups isn’t untill 9:45pm so any use by has to go that night which is certainly a mad dash.

We got an abundance of flowers from a sugar market last week was still trying to get rid of the good ones days later.

Did a rare evening pick up tonight and got
A beef stroganoff
Mashed potato
Some sushi
Couple of salad bags
Spinach
Pack of ham
Sourdough bread

Finished off Some mushrooms from an earlier pick up in dinner tonight. Pudding was Some choc chip muffins from a previous pick up. Lunch was a wrap from yesterday's pick up.

picked up
baguette
a pepper, a chilli and some basil
a pasta sauce jar
a load of closed cup and portobello mushrooms
potatoes
pack of crumpets, pack of english muffins
tin of beans

tonights tea
kids - sausage, chips and beans (will chip some of the potatoes for this)
me and hubby - stirfry using another bag of olio noodles (I froze them) olio stirfry sauce and veg

Last night collected
A spaghetti bolognaise
A shepherd's pie
Some apple pies
Two wraps
Two pasta bowls

Running out of freezer space

Where do you collect olio stuff from

You download the app

There are food waste heroes who collect stuff from supermarkets and upload it to the apps

You the request items you want (nicely) and if you are allocated it then you go and collect from their houses.

We have 5 fwh's within a mile of us so stuff is uploaded daily.

Partly doing this to show people what can be picked up from the app to encourage those who need it to register and see what is available in their local area

Forgot the back of Sausages I also collected last night. Last night was a good one

Do you live in a city, OP? You are lucky to have so many options where you are.

I used to use TGTG but it’s mostly been disappointing recently including waiting around in an area of London for a bag from Pret that was going to be for our tea only for them to cancel it in front of us when we arrived to collect as they were sending the stock to another store.

We had an OLIO collector in our village for a while and that was good but couldn’t have helped reduced the burden and cost making meals as it was mostly baked goods and occasional boxes of bananas which I loved for smoothies/banana bread. Now there’s no OLIO options near me which is a shame.

I live in a town. About 100,000 population.

We have tesco, Iceland, booker, boots who are partnered so stuff comes from those shops

How are you getting on with Olio op.

the shares are in for a treat locally here. Lots of meats gone up/going up tonight and of course the first Sainsbury’s collections start today 🥳

Tonight I picked up
Ham and egg roll
Two chicken and stuffing roll
2 packs of ham and cheese bites
pack of Kebab Sausages
Spinach
Pitta breads
3 peppers
2 chicken and bacon pasta
2 aubergines
Little gem lettuce

A very good evening here.

Counted up my supermarket spends last month. Came to around £250 for a family of 4

Very good. I’ve had 8 people collect and 135 items listed. It’s a long night.

we have had bread😅 avocados, cakes, bbq chicken, roast chicken, yoghurts, salad, Humous, fruit boxes, ham, pork stuffing rolls, vegan meats,bbq bites, chicken poppers, choc au pans, cinnamon swirls and other bits that my brain cannot keep up with.

Defiantly getting to know the regulars. blocked a few people after pick ups due to poor behaviour… kicking animals, smoking in my front door! Non collections and out and out rudeness because I wouldn’t give someone 20 loafs of Bread 😂

Wow. Considering how much of a favour you are going people you would think they would behave.

A couple of the olio collectors just put items in boxes

Two of them I have lovely chats with. Both ladies do this as a way to meet people locally as a social thing so it's nice to have a conversation.

Good manners cost nothing

I’ve met a few interesting people. If I have extras I’ll offer. A lovely lady tonight asked for one single pasta pot, when she got here I was like are you genuinely sure that’s all you would like as I have (lists items) if she wants anything else.

You do get to know the cheeky ones though, I have people show me pictures of their pets and all sorts.

One women, the one who older child kicked my cat after pulling its tail infront of her, asked exactly what I had in my fridge and wanted more and more cheeky. If I’d of realised that she watched her kid do before she left I’d of pulled of her up, it’s only dh who clocked it and then showed me on the cameras.

Only half an hours before I’m done with collections for the evening. I think about 80% of items picked up accounted for giving wise.

I have an excellent Tgtg near us. It's a petrol station with a morrisons so has lots of food that most customers don't buy, we've had bread, milk, fruit and veg and lots of meat, chicken breasts, sausages, mince. We freeze as much as we can. The kids love it when we have donuts, DH loves when we get pasties.

I've tried all different shops but this one is defo the best.

Having a freezer is key