How can we get our food bill down

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We have a 50 gbp a week food budget
Female - 38 & pregnant
Male - 35

We shopped at asda 1 week
And lidl the next..

Yet this week hasnt ended yet - & food budget has been spent so eating from what we have

And would ideally like to get it down to 40 gbp a week

We are having pasta 4 tea.
My partner with sausages 4 protein..
I will most likely have fish fingers. .

Thurs i can have soup for lunch, and sardines on toast 4 tea and snack on carrot / strawberries / blue berries / satsumas

I do like / need my 5 a day etc. .

Fri we will use some eggs we have already, we have cheese , cereal etc

Just even shopping in lidl - it soon adds up

We bought lidl own brand choc moose - not dairy milk

Do any of you spend more like 40 gbp a week
And if so - how please

Thank you

Thank you

Yes we have lidl app - got the free veg & free bakery treat & a cheese discount

We also have nectar

( & asda rewards )

Thanks

Ok so why are you pandering to his request for you to limit your food budget to £50 a week when you’re finding it hard to do so and you’re pregnant, let alone with health issues?

You need good, nutritious food to combat exhaustion and the physical strain of pregnancy. It’s madness that you think him requesting a £50 budget for food for two adults, one of whom is pregnant and medically vulnerable, is reasonable if it isn’t completely necessary.

Put your child first and spend a reasonable, sensible amount on nutritious food rather than pandering to his tightness about it.

He did mention we could try growing veg in future
Thats also a fun & educational thing to do with child

( obviously stilll buy some but yea)

But why is this his decision? That’s what I don’t understand. Just say I need to spend more I can’t manage in £50 reducing down to £40 per week for two adults. I live alone e and spend more than that.

Yeah..
Weve spent more than 50 in previous weeks..
He does spend it etc ..

He wants to pay his cc off ( its 500 quid ) so hes also conscious of that i guess .

Hes told me before that he checks bank bal online every day & always,has done

Ive said - surely thats not neeeded / not ideal for mental health but yeah .

We can do £50 a week for 2 adult 3 children two dogs two cats. What helps is having a second chest freezer. And growing our own fruit and veg. Plus a stocked up pantry. Appreciate its not viable for everyone. But if its possible it really makes a difference.

If you can do overtime or save from other places in your budget things like mobile contracts we have sim only £8 I think labaru(sp?) Is even cheaper at around £3
Then do a bulk buy of your staples ,tins seasonings ect then it's easier to stick to a lower budget weekly going forward. The slow cooker is good for cheap meals I can get about 4 meals out of one chicken.

We stick with tescos as we found the vouchers and the club card challenges really good. We only get deliveries and don't go in store. We would end up spending more in aldi and lidl.

Definitely see if your local area has fruit going free. It's been a bumper year this year. I've got so much I can't store it all so happily giving away fruit.

Liver is your friend. High in iron for you. Replaces sausages for him. Cheap as well. And tasty.

It's recommended pregnant women avoid liver though isn't it? Too much vitamin A or something.

Olio is free. Probably a lot of bread but you can choose what you want.

• Swap your berries for banana and apples, much cheaper.

• Your freezer is your friend, get as much frozen as you can fit in, it’s always cheaper than fresh, and is usually frozen at source.

• would be careful of the sausages, cheap ones have very little protein in them, and they are an UPF. Plenty of better sources of protein - lean pork medallions, frozen mince, etc.

if you’re looking for budget inspiration then definitely have a look at ‘the budget years’ on TikTok, she posts videos about eating nutrious food on around £25 a week 😊 I’ll post a link to her profile she’s definitely worth gaining tips from!
https://www.tiktok.com/@thebudgetyears?_t=ZN-901n3o7KsA2&_r=1

We have an allotment. We got this while I was on mat leave. To have a good allotment that produces veg and fruit etc is mega work. It is 100% a labour of love. We have grown loads of things and in good quantity but to be clear whilst it tastes great and is fun. I don’t think it saves us much in terms of money. Everything is always ready at once, we had a disaster with bean canes falling over in a storm this year and I ended up picking, blanching and freezing 5kg of green beans one night plus gave loads away to family and neighbours etc. yes we will be able to have green beans with many meals until we are sick of them but it doesn’t save money. Not really.

For what it’s worth my top tips are to eat seasonal (apples right now) as the fruit and veg are cheaper, bulk everything out with lentils especially mince and batch cook. I’ve made 2 large cottage pies which is 4 evening meals for our family plus 3 small ones and a portion of mince tonight (I ran out of potatoes) from 750g mince, red lentils, 1.5kg bag of wonky carrots, some wilting celery, stock cube, gravy granules, some allotment leeks, onions and potatoes. Probably 8 evening meals from one lot of cooking. Takes the stress out of future meals but also really didn’t cost a whole amount. I recognise we are privileged to have a chest freezer for this purpose (and all the home grown produce).

Congratulations and good luck with the pregnancy and your money saving endeavours.

Think the figure your partner suggested is unreasonable, especially as you do not need to be so careful. I'd resent this. He should do the shopping alone and see how realistic his figure is.

I think you are in for a shock.

You can’t get it to £40 and it be healthy for two adults tbh. No chance. And that’s well before berries and puddings.

To answer your question:

• Avoid buying anything pre-made it will cost more and be less nutritious.Cook as much as you can.
• I know a lot of people think that they cannot cook, but trust me, cooking is supper easy, and supper fun.
• Buy plain yogourt or make yogourt at home (very easy)-healthier and cheaper
• Bake your own bread (also supper easy and so much better than what you get in stores)
• Make soups and stews-very easy to make-very versatile-can last a whole week
• Use lentils, beans, chick peas-dry is cheaper then canned- lots of protein and very versatile
• Cheaper fruit, apples, oranges, pears, bananas
• Cheaper veg, cabbage, potatoes, carrots, onion (lots of it), cauliflower
• Cheaper meat, pork chops, ground beef, chicken legs, use chicken harts and gizzards for soups, extra yummy (liver may not be good for pregnancy). I love fish and shrimp, but very expensive if good, I eat it sometimes.
• Eat lots of eggs. Eggs are a supper food and relatively inexpensive. Easy to make

Sorry, I could go on and on. This is my favourite topic; cooking, not budgeting 😩. Even though I cook all the time and from the scratch, still spend tons on money on food.

Having said all of this, OP, please take care of yourself and keep an eye on your DH. What you told us reminded me a lot of my exh. We spent 25 years together and his stingiest drove me absolutely nuts. No matter how much money we had he was always acting like we were poor, we “never had enough money” for anything, and I can tell you this is a very sad and frustrating way to live. Please, please be vigilant and observe his behaviour. Chances are it will get worse when baby comes. Hugs!

Yes, there’s a lot of he does this/he does that/he says this/he says that in your posts, OP.

Are his credit cards on an interest free account? Then he can pay £100 off less a month and you can eat more generously in pregnancy. It doesn’t matter if he lives on rice and veg and spices or whatever, he is not pregnant and regardless, surely you don’t want to have to eat like that. You said he is neurodiverse with sensitivities to texture so maybe he prefers a bland diet, but it’s not very nutritious. This is surely not the life you want? He is basically controlling what you eat. It might not feel like it, but he is.

🤣 sorry op but In you OP I thought for about a minute you were eating your partner with sausages for protein for dinner!
On a serious note things like lentil Shepard's pie and peas etc would be cheap and healthy. You need to have beans and pulses as well as veg and a small amount of meat. Try alot of homemade dishes.

We do this (roughly, we shop once per fortnight and its around £80-100 per fortnight for the two of us.)
Obviously it may not all work for your own needs/goals but for us what works is-

• Make heavy use of the reduced section. Find out what time the last/biggest reductions are done and try to be there for them. They do reduce less earlier in the day if later isn’t viable for you. Make sure to only choose things you know you can make use of - chicken, mince, etc. Plan meals from what you get.

• Be prepared to eat some boring meals such as soup, beans on toast, jacket potatoes etc; low cost and easy to make.

• Try to keep breakfasts simple and repetitive but with different toppings etc to avoid buying too many different things you won't use all of.

• Try to buy in bulk. Big bags of rice, potatoes etc often work out cheaper than several smaller bags. Learn how to make good use of pasta, rice, lentils in different ways.

• Compromise on big brands for everything you can stand. For us, we use supermarket own brands for almost everything except a very small selection. It cuts off a few pence which does add up.

• Learn to make big batches of soup, bolognese, etc and freeze them for later. Home made potato, tomato, or mushroom soup works out cheaper than repeatedly getting cans. Learn to bake bread if you are able.

Buy frozen berries in Lidl you get loads in a bag for a couple of quid and either defrost or make smoothies.

Dump the berries and eat apple is much cheaper, also you’ve got to embrace lentils and pulses really cheap and really good for you. There’s a lot you can do with lentils onion and a few spices. Also huge bag surprise are cheap from Indian or Asian shop.

Meant rice, huge bag of!!!!

He sounds quite controlling! And obsessive too if he’s checking the bank balance everyday. I’d expect the pattern to continue once there is another mouth to feed. Children are expensive!

This is quite unusual behaviour for an IVF pregnancy, parents are usually very very aware of how lucky they are it’s worked and very careful about things like nutrition. Now is not the time to skimp.

Please eat properly. That doesn’t mean you need to have expensive things like berries or
individual yoghurts but nutrition should be your main focus when shopping.

Yes but she doesn’t need to, he’s just fucking tight.