Would anyone like to join me in this?

[swiperfox]

Having just watched Supermarket Secrets again and feeling absolutely sick at what they do to us, I am going to try, from this weekend coming, to buy as little as i possibly can from the supermarket from now on.

Who wants to join me?? I would like to do an 'experiment' and post exactly what i buy, what is available and the prices so that any of you interested can see the differences. I want to find out exactly how much we are being conned by being led to believe that it is cheaper to go the supermarket than the local butcher/baker/grocer and market. I also want to see if it makes a difference to dd (3.7)(behaviour/concentration etc) It would be good if a load of us could do it and post what we have bought, prices, what meals we made etc so that we can all give each other ideas for things to buy and meals to make. I would also like to try organic ranges as well and post the differences.

Anyone fancy it?

I'm planning on trying organic boxes from Abel & Cole. I'm fed up with there not being decent fruit and veg at supermarkets and don't like the idea of non-organic meat either. There are recipes on the site too:

See here for box details

Not sure this is quite what you meant, but it's a resource for what you meant (I think!)!

I'd love to - but can't afford to buy organic at the moment (unless someone can tell me where to buy organic milk (for example) for less the £1.11 for 4 pints

I shall certainly watch with interest as as soon as we've got an income and are slightly more financialy stable I WILL be going organic.

I'd love to do this but can't atm, I will read with interest though! Please do post and let us know how you get on.

QOQ - i've kept my last few supermarket receipts so i can post the differences in prices. My biggest thing about ever buying organic before is prices but hopefully between us we can find a solution!!

Hunker

Just keep an eye on the quality, I have had a few friends, who have had poorly packed boxes, ergo bruised veg boxes.

These boxes sound great hunker i think i will get a small mixed box delivered every month, we dont eat alot of vg but loads of fruit, we also have a farm shop minutes from us so i may do some shopping there.

Thanks for the link hunkermunker , they deliver in our area, all be it a limited range. the first supplier I have found who will deliver to me.

I will join in with this.

I think Riverford is cheaper than Able & Cole but not sure how extensive their delivery area is.

What exactly do you want me to do? A bit confused

as soon as we move in sept and have a decent sized fridge and freezer i will be forgoing the supermarket as much as possible.

also if you eat meat, i think the ideal way to buy would be for eg. a half lamb, from a farmer, butchered and frozen. becuase what they do to meat (inc organic, well, chicken at least) is unspeakable. i'm reading 'not on the label' at the moment, can you tell??

I will join in too!

swiperfox
i couldnt watch it all as i was sickened by the whole thing too
and decided to make a concious effort to avoid mass prouced stuff,

QoQ, in my local sainsburys the organic produce is marked down close to the due date, but its ok still to eat, thats how i usually like to pay for it,

I bought most of my organic veg in sainsburys today as it was marked down for being close to sell by date, made it affordable as we are on a budget.

Organic chicken was $4.99 for two breast fillets, as we only eat meat once a week I thought that was ok.

our local Saisbury is cr*p and we usualy shop online as the local Tesco is too far for me to walk - so I get all my weekly groceries in one go - which means I miss out on all the deals [frown]

Our sainsbury isn't that great as it is a local one so isn't very big but it is right next to the bus stop and only a ten minute walk from home which makes it handy.

I used to go to tescos but used to end up spending a fortune as it sells everything under the sun. I also found that the fruit and veg goes off quickly.

If I start tonight we had for tea "sushi" made with smoked salmon as I couldn't get the sheets.

Smoked salmon was BOGOF £3.99 - had about 4 sheets of salmon in each pack about 150grams I think.

INside was small white cabbage 39p
wholemeal rice which was in my cupboard.
Pickled ginger -£2.29 for 50g pack
1 red pepper 65p
carrots in my cupboard
cucumber 58p

For pudding we had rice pudding made with

1litre rice milk £1.69
cinamon stick £1.09 for three
lemon organic unwaxed 19p
pudding rice from my cupboard.

Also bought some fruit

1 medium pineapple £1.29
pack of strawberries 250g £1.69
500g grapes £1.24
fair trade bananas £1.36 about 6 I think
2 avacodos reduced at 99p each

Other vegetables

200g fine beans £1.09
organic cherry tomatoes little punnet 69p
pack of asparagus organic reduced to £1.99 about dozen spears

Is this what you want us to do?

Thanks TSAP - that's the idea. I think in the past I hava always assumed that it's just too expensive to go organic/fresh/local etc but I think if we all show what we can get where for what prices it will help encourage the likes of me to switch!

I've got til Friday to get rid of all our Tesco/Morrisons/Sainsburys crap then i'm doing the weekend shop organic/fresh so i'll try to use last weeks receipts to do a comparison if i can find them!!

Last night dd and ds had fresh tuna steak and spaghetti hoops for dinner and tonight me and dd made homemade burgers, which they both loved. It was more time consuming but i bet it was a hell of a lot better for them than frozen processed ones they might have normally had!

We started this a couple of months ago after reading some of the books mentioned on the Dispatches programme (Not on the Label; Shopped; etc). I would never go back to supermarkets again. Here are a few tips for those of you setting out to do this, including money saving ones.

If you can, shop at a local farmer's market. This is not to be confused with a local regular market. Farmer's markets can only sell things which the farmer's have produced directly themselves. You do not have to buy organic as you can talk to the farmer, find out the methods they use and be sure you are happy with what you are buying. For instance, when strawberiies were plentiful, I spoke to one of the farmers at my local market and found out that although he was not organic(cost too much to become certified), he did not use any pesticides on his strawberries. I bought his as they were cheaper than the organic ones.

For meat, start to think about cheaper cuts. We are so used to only seeing prime cuts of beef, etc in supermarkets, that we have forgotton about other cuts and how to cook them. I have bought some lovely brisket beef recently that was 7 ish pounds per kilo instead of the 14 or 15 for good cuts and slow cooked it. It was lovely and tender and delicious. Again, organic is not essential if you speak to the farmer and know the conditions their meat is raised in. Remember about things like off cuts. My dh has bacon everyday for breakfast. To buy organic would have cost us a fortune. But our local pork supplier in the market does off cuts of bacon for a fraction of the price. Tastes just as nice.

Hope some of this helps!

We buy as much organic/ethically produced food as possible and our weekly shopping bill for 6 of us is lower than average - read recently that weekly average, presumably for family of

Thanks for this information. We are on a tight budget at the moment so am keeping accounts of all our spending which will enable me to see how much it costs us to eat ethically.

For tea tonight we had warm chicken salad using

two organic chicken breasts £4.11
Organic cherry tomatoes 69p
Organic asparagus £1.99
Green beans £1.09

for desert we had a fruit salad using some of the fruit bought on my earlier psot.

For lunch we had minted pea soup made with bag of frozen peas, creme freche and mint all from freezer/ fridge / garden.

With rolls made from stuff from my storecupboard.

I bought a hand blender yesterday and made dd and ds banana and strawberry smoothies. Does anyone have any good smoothie recipes?

I've just been up to the shops to have a snoop around the local grocer etc. I went into Sainsbury's to get some organic yoghurt for smoothies. That cost me 1.79 for a 1kg pot. I bought 1 litre organic milk as well which was actuall only 1p dearer than normal sainsbury's milk. In Morrisons, their organic milk was 10p dearer than their normal milk!! Also in morrisons it cost me 69p for 5 organic carrots - so will be getting them from the grocer in future.
I bought some honey but ended up not getting organic because it was over 2.50 so i'd rather get that from a farmers market.
I had a look in the village butchers - which is actually a Dewhurst, not a local butcher, but even so their cuts of meat looked a hundred times better.
Then to the fruit&veg shop. A big celery was 69p, half cucumber was less than 50p. I also got a couple of handfuls of monkey nuts for the rats - which usually cost around 1.50 - they cost me 9p!!!!

I'd like to do loads more research into the differences in the supermarkets 'organic' ranges. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the same stuff in a different box!!

Well, I've been scouring the web for info to help us in our quest. A few links:

interesting blog

bigbarn excellent website with lots of good links and searches for local food in your area

soil association

I'll come back and post when I've made my first purchases - I'm busy clearing out all the cr*p first!

hi thanks a lot flashingnose just looked up bigbarn i will be useing it starting at the weekend.