help me to cut our average weekly food bill of £200 to 120, please!!!!

[mrsStubborn]

family of 4 plus a large dog.

Where are you shopping currently?? I would suggest not buying brands for a start and trying aldi or similar for food. I did a 70 shop at end of.last month and other than bread and milk it should keep us going for two weeks,we are two adults and children aged 5, 3 and 11weeks

Drop a brand in everything. Batch cook and freeze. Try aldi. Meal plan and don't deviate from it at all. Cut down snacks dramatically. With your budget you can afford a few but once they're gone they're gone!

Try to avoid just putting things in the basket at top up shops. Make sure if you do need to do a milk or bread run that's all you come out with.

Again, depends where you are shopping. This week I went back to Lidl - it is a 15 minute drive each way, so not the most convenient. I spent £47 and when I came home, I entered the details into the Ocado website which has become my default for shopping. It came to £77!!!
No contest, and I am looking forward to saving that every week now.

Meal plan
Make a list and stick to it
Put all your shopping on to mysupermarket.co.UK, it will tell you where your shopping will be cheapest from, also it will suggest items you can swap to save money.

I do my main shop at Aldi and top up bread,milk and yogurts in the week. My weekly bill is around £66-£80 total.

cook more frugally. Think about what you are buying.
Try veggie, ie. lentils

• plan what you are going to eat each week
• try down-sizing a brand . Is. If you always eat Mcvities penguins,mother try tesco equivalent
• limit amount of alcohol purchased
• Take advantage of the 3-for10 offers and batch cook
• save takeaways for special treats

It may help if you tell us what you routinely buy, like to eat wrc. £200 is a lot of money. I spend approx £75-100 on main shop, plus £10-20 on top up.
( family of four, no pets)

Drop a brand. Weetabix is weetabix regardless of the box.

Stop buying expensive out of season fruit and veg. Bananas, satsumas/clementines and apples are all cheap. Frozen berries are cheap to add to porridge.

Meal plan based on deals ie 3 for £10 meat buys us sausages, a chicken, some pork, so 3/4 dinners' worth of neat for £10!

Add lentils or veg to bulk out stews and spag bol.

Reduce meat.

Don't buy dessert - bananas in custard/icecream are cheap. Yoghurts are cheaper.

Only buy what you actually need, regardless of how good a deal it is.

We are a family of 4, 2 adults, 1 hungry teen and 1 hungry toddler and we spend about £50 a week and eat well.

Meal plan
Don't waste food - if you've got it, use it up.
Eat seasonally - so no strawberries in Feb
Drop a brand (so premium to own brand - if you really notice the difference - eg for tea or something, then you can go back to your usual. But most things you won't notice).
Eat some vegetarian meals (pulses for protein rather than meat)

Oh, and try frozen foods sometimes rather than always fresh - usually much cheaper (say, £1 per kilo rather than £2).

Agree with not buying pudding.

i find online shopping quite economical. I dont do top ups.
look at what you have in the cupboard though. I have ended up with 11 onions and 8 tins of toms!

We do around £100 for 3 adults and two younger. Buy local - huge amounts of fruit and veg from your independent grocer.

Cook veggie 3 or more times a week

Make biscuits and cakes

We eat well on this, tons of fruit, great meals but all is cooked from scratch

I can share what worked for us:

1. getting vegetables and fruit from the market - sometimes this works out as much as three times cheaper than a supermarket.
2. finding a good local butcher - much cheaper, you can get unusual cuts of meat and cheaper cuts, not to mention superior quality of meat
3. shopping at Aldi/Lidl for everything other than fruit, veg and meat
4. doing on online shop for things not available at Aldi/Lidl - this way you do not run a risk of impulse buying

I also found that what helps is batch-cooking and always having that emergency meal in the freezer. This saves us a £20 takeaway bill when you are just too tired to cook at the end of a long day at work. Home-cooked food is loads cheaper and you get a bigger meal than a ready-made serving.

Baking your own bread (and having a few loaves in the freezer) certainly helps to cut out that trip to the shops. Milk can also be bought in bulk and frozen - for the same reasons.

Having healthy snacks/fruit at home helps to cut down on expensive supermarket biscuits and chocolates, not mentioning the wider health benefits.

I've managed to cut ours by meal planning and online shopping by about 50-70 quid a week.

only getting milk and bread in midweek top up, not those and other bits which always ends up at £40.

though dog costs £50 a month on dog food on top of our shop.

What are you buying now. What do you buy each week and throw away.

lidl and aldi are shite. I have tried many times to go there but I don't get the appeal.

I need to get my bill down. Spent 140 since Saturday on food and will have to go again Saturday.

The 3 for 10 meat aren't large portions.
I bought three packs of lamb chops. That will do tonights dinner and lunch.

I could repeat the answers that are mentioned above.
Have you watched eat well for less on bbc1 tomorrow , 1st show was last week or look up economy gastronomy. It was shown a few years back.
They both show all the tips in practice. I always enjoy watching the results.
Some mnters did think it was teaching your granny to suck eggs but interesting.

You need to look at how you are managing to spend that much.

Do you buy most expensive brands ?
Do you end up throwing food away ?
Do you buy lots of 'unnecessary' stuff ?
Do you check 'BBE' dates ?

er

not sure what else - I can't envisage spending 200

But then it will be easier to see which of above suggestions will be a good place to start.

Cut down on meat

Buy yellow sticker food that can go in the freezer

Try to get to a point where your big purchases are staggered eg don't buy huge bag of dog food the same week as a load of cleaning stuff

How old are DCs?

Does this include packed lunches?

Do you eat meat everyday? Cutting out meat 1/2 days will save a lot.

Change supermarket.
Meal plan, write a list and only take the cash you need for what's on the list. Don't shop when hungry.
Downgrade brands.
Make as much from scratch as possible.

Vixx - lamb is an expensive meat. Often twice as much as pork by weight. You do have do choose wisely.

We are family of 4 (two large teen boys) and a cat - I've managed to spend only £130 on main shop this week. We both work, dont have time to shop about so it was one trip to Sainsburys. This is roughly what I bought:

4 boxes of cereal
bag of raisins
14 pints of milk (we'll need more by weekend though)
2 loaves of bread and 2 lots of rolls for freezer
Bag of Krisprolls
2 packs of cold meat
2 blocks of cheese
Large jar of peanut butter
Jar of Jam
Tub of mini sausage rolls and tub of egg bites (to add into pack lunches)
2 bottles of Squash
2 bottles of Coke (my indulgence)
packet of sandwich bags
Large tub of spread
two large packs of chicken drumsticks (1 meal plus extras for lunch)
pack of mince (will make spag bol and will do 2 meals for 4)
4 steaks (bargain bin)
fish cakes
large chicken
tray of roast tatties (bargain bin)
bag of normal tatties
brocolli
cabbage
Carrots
carton of tomatoes
jar of pasta sauce
2 packs of spaghetti
tub of mushrooms (bargain bin)
2 packs of grapes
pack of nectarines
bunch of bananas
Bag of pears
3 bags of apples
large bag of salad
2 packs of tomatoes
chocolate bars and cereal bars for lunchboxs and snacking
large bag of crisps
bag of cashew nuts
tins of soup
toothpaste
Large bag of Cat food plus some sachets
noodles
frozen mash
frozen peas
potato waffles

Think that was roughly it.

Use muscle foods for their meat bundles - it's lovely.
Meal plan.
Go shopping later in the evening and buy reduced stuff and freeze things.
I spend a quarter of what I used to by thinking ahead and buying meat and other bits in bulk. I only shop once a week too (Friday evening) and when its gone that's it- crisps, luxuries etc.
There are four of us (three teenage boys included)