Grocery shopping....anyone else finding it increasingly expensive? What do you pay weekly?

[whispywhisp]

Anyone got any recommendations on Tesco Value products - are they any good? What foods to avoid that are clearly rubbish?

We are a family of four. I have always tried to buy our groceries economically but have tended to avoid Tesco Value products because I've worried about the quality.

Its now become so expensive to buy food and household products that we've got no choice but to buy the cheaper range.

I don't know what everyone else is spending each week but, on average, I'm paying way over £100 per week on everything - food, cleaning materials, pet food etc etc and we simply can't afford to continue like this.

What does everyone else do? Are we all finding it increasingly expensive to buy groceries? Anyone found some of the Tesco Value stuff should be avoided?

I would grow my own stuff but we don't have the room. I would use a local greengrocer...if we had one. I cook all our meals - we are a family who eat a lot of fruit and veg and its those items that I'm finding have gone up so much. I like my kids to eat well, which they do, I don't want them to eat junk (which they'd love to, I'm sure!). Help!

I've just done an internet shop with Tescos - to be delivered middle of next week. Came to just over £50. Got free delivery too. Bought a lot of their value range which actually I find ok.

My best test is with the kids. I cook the usual type of meals and see what they think without letting on I've used different ingredients - and so far they've said all has been ok...unless they are just being polite and don't want to upset me?!!!

Had a value quiche for tea tonight - heated up in the oven with some value pasta and tin of tomatoes and it was lovely!

So far...so good!

i have also now started doing online shopping at the start of the month, for 2 adults and 2 children (1 in nappies) i am spendnind an average of £180 (then allowing and extra £30 a month for milk, bread and fruit/veg etc. i sort out a months meals, and then buy everything then, i get lots of the colemans/ schwartz packet mixes so we have lots of different varietys.
have been buying tesco value bacon for use in recipies, eg pasta & bacon which goes down well. and have been buying lots of frozen meat.
did anyone see the one show tonight and they were talking about the price difference and quality of buying frozen compared to fresh, quite often its cheaper and in the case of fruit and veg its better quality as its frozen quicker and the fresh items lose their vitamins after a few days. it was quite interesting.

worley...no, I didn't see the One Show re the frozen vs fresh. Wish I had. I always tend to buy fresh veg apart from peas but then we may have a run on salads and the veg goes off in the meantime so should maybe look at buying more frozen veg.

Had a Tesco Value pineapple yesterday. Only 79p. Absolutely gorgeous.

I love Poundland & Farmfoods. 12pk of Mini Chedders for £1! We would love to buy frozen veg but only have a tiny freezer. I always check out the reduced to clear bit in Morrisons and work late enough in Tesco to sometimes get a bargain.

Tesco value bacon is good, even my dad likes it and he is fussy with bacon. We have tried Morrisons non-bio washing powder and I even got a box from Poundland, which was just as good. Own brand cleaning stuff is good. I always try to check if Poundland, Farmfoods, Semi-Chem, Savers etc have the branded stuff in and buy there.

So far...

Tesco value washing detergent - brilliant - bottle is 66p, 3kg box of powder is just £1.41. I did a white wash last night and came out lovely - that included DD1's school t-shirts which are usually grey when they come home. Put on hot wash with TV stuff and lovely and white.

TV conditioner - brilliant
TV furniture polish - fine
TV kitchen cleaner - fine
TV baked beans - ok altho tasted quite sweeet but the kids didn't notice
TV tinned sweetcorn - lovely
TV tinned tomatoes - gorgeous

I'm a converted Tesco Value shopper! I can so absolutely no difference in buying their value stuff as compared to branded stuff other than its a hell of a lot cheaper.

don't have a tesco near us so not sure about the tesco value stuff but lidl and aldi do alot of very good stuff for a fraction of the price.

it helps to buy things like meat on special offer and freeze them for use a week you can't afford to pick up much meat, and always stock up when a family favourite is on special offer.

our weekly shop for 4 is between 120 euros and 200 euros depending on the week. i do have to spend up to 50 euros a week in the health shop though as both kids are cows milk intolerant and dd is wheat intolerant, would be cheaper if i could buy more of the cheaper foods but an astonishing amount of things have wheat added.

i'm thinking of starting to get more frozen veg after seeing the one show and also getting increasingly annoyed for forever fishing some veg (normally spinach) out of the fridge when it's on it's use by date and is already slimy

Just getting this on my threads so I can read it later.

I have just spent about 45 minutes+ reading this thread, and have found it utterly fascinating!! I am unhealthily obsessed with how much I, and others spend on food on a weekly basis. Like everyone else, we are feeling the pinch, and next week for the first time ever I will be shopping at Aldi instead of Tesco!! I give myself a cash budget of £100 a week there are 2 adults and twin 3 year olds plus a food-fussy pusscat (who may have to get over himself!) and I am really looking forward to saving money!! We do grow our own veg, but this year our allotments have performed dreadfully - deer, rabbits and slugs, so are rather limited to our homegrown produce, but I find its fruit more than anything that costs us a small fortune. There rant over!

I agree riven

though have found Ecover on offer in several places recently (and stocked up) (I think that ecover washing up liquid is better and cheaper than fairy)

Im very happy to have bargain but i dont "do" caged EU pork, or battery hens full stop.

I have in the past withdrawn cash each week for grocery shopping - normally around £80. I put the money in a pot and that is it for the week. If I need something else which means going over the money in the pot it has to wait until the following week. I leave my switch card at home when I shop.

Its great discipline cos you end up having to watch absolutely every penny you spend, shop very economically, buy only what you actually need and its great when you have some cash left over by the end of the week.

I did this for a while and it did work. Maybe I should go back to doing this. I always find I get into some bloody awful habits with shopping - I buy whats on offer, I buy bits I don't actually need and I tend to buy bits to replace what we've had in recent meals which can spend weeks in the freezer.

All this makes it sound like I'm rubbish with money, which I'm actually not...we're simply skint and its got to the stage that we've got to make serious cut-backs now otherwise we'll be in trouble soon. We've had too much going out, everything going up and not enough coming in.

All it takes is for the kids to need new school shoes, uniform, school trips (inc residential trips), vets bills, car tax and MOT...and we're flat broke.

kingfix Bit late answering but is always worth switching to washables. I am down to one a day now so have some for sale if interested.

jazzandh My husband's parents had a yogurt maker when he was a child but said they had to put a huge amount of sugar in it to make it edible. This has put me off getting one. How do you find it? My children love yogurt but when I bake I don't always put the full amount of sugar in so I wouldn't say they were overly sweet toothed kids.

We do this, too, whispy and it does work.

We're in the same fix, as I'm sure many of us are.

The fuel bills - gas and electricity - just jumped A LOT within a few months.

We need to run a car out here, too, for DH to get to work and for me to ferry DD1 to SALT and OT, she has dyspraxia.

She's going to an SEN nursery come August where she can have SALT and OT in house so here's hoping that will cut back some, although I'll have to fight with the council to get her transport to and from there.

I think I will work out a figure each week again - withdraw it - stick it in a pot again - and if I have a week where we don't spend it all we save it - that way not only are we buying more economically and more within our means but if we have a good week we can save a bit too.

I need to go and draw up a list of regular outgoings and work out what we can actually afford each week rather than what I'd like to have to spend on shopping, iykwim.

This is the first time that I've had to seriously watch what we spend. I hate living like this. Many years ago, pre-kids and with us both in full-time well paid jobs money wasn't an issue. We'd regularly go out for meals, go shopping for the latest CDs or treat ourselves to a holiday. All that is unheard of now. I don't think we've ever been as skint as we are now.

Well...I've just gone thru our list of DDs - compared it to the balance in our account and once I've paid a couple of credit cards we'll have about £300 left to last us until next payday (25 July) for groceries - so that'll be about £80 per week....family of four, a dog and two cats....possible?!

Not sure if this has been mentioned before, but by far the cheapest (and best) bread you can have at the moment is the one you make yourself.

Tesco is selling 1.5kg of white bread flour at 48 pence these days (ok that's about half the price you get elsewhere but it's been at this price for some time). That makes three decent-sized loaves.

No contest. Plus there's NOTHING better to wake up to than the smell of freshly-baked bread.

I've got a Morphy Richards bread maker but unfortunately I can't use it because I need a new pan for it - the pan the bread cooks in - I've used it so much its broken. I have tried and tried to get a new pan but so far no luck. I wish I could find one because to bake your own bread is apart from delicious it is so much cheaper and fresher.

Adding up as you go round really does help. I've reduced our rather extravagant £120 weekly shop (two adults, one toddler in nappies) to less than £95 by doing that and not impulse buying.

Good thread. I really fancy a breadmaker. Any recommendations?

Oh, no idea if anyone has said this but we stopped buying shower gel and liquid hand soap and just stocked up on soap. Saves a fortune - if you get dry skin Simple or Dove don't dry you out.

Yea...my Morphy Richards if only I could find a pan for it! Makes the most gorgeous cinnamen and sultana loaf and lovely simple white bread. Fantastic for toasting and sarnies. I really miss using it.

Weird...I went to Wilkos only yesterday and bought a load of soap (bars)....the kids seem to wash their hands properly with a bar of soap rather than the gel/liquid which seems to get squirted all over the sink. Such a waste. Bars of soap are so much cheaper too.

we use a Panasonic 253 and it's still rocking and rolling after 4 years.

and we use it about every other day.

expat...what yeast do you use?