How do I reduce how much I'm spending on a food shop!

[weescottish31]

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong but I seem to spend over 50 pound almost every week on food etc for only myself and my 6yo son! I buy for school lunches for my son for school but I don't even eat lunch myself.
What things can I do to reduce how much I'm spending almost every week. I'm a single parent and most of my money seems to be going on the shopping and I'm not left with much after it.
Any advice would be appreciated!

Have you switched to a cheaper supermarket?

£50 sounds about right? Less than £4 each a day.

I shop mostly at Asda

My best tip would be to buy ingredients rather than ready made items. Also buy the cheapest version of what you want, unless its something you particularly like to be the best. For example, I don't buy cheap tea but I always buy the very cheapest tinned tomatoes.

What items do you find you are spending most on?

Do you have a lot of waste as it's harder to buy for just 2?

To keep within budget I always aim for mostly cheap meals with one or two meals more expensive. So a cheap meal would be pasta, a mince dish, jacket potatoes, omelettes, a roast dinner (leftovers can be good for omelettes or sandwiches) for example.

You may already do this but look at what is on offer in terms of meat and fruit/veg. Then base meals around this where possible.

Do you meal plan to reduce waste?

Swapping to Lidls or Aldis would help. Buying less meat or batch cooking for evening meals and freeze in takeaway containers. 500g of minced beef would probably do two or maybe three evening meals if you bulk it out with carrots, lentils, kidney beans or baked beans. A small/medium roast chicken can do 3 meals for an adult and child and some sliced meat for sandwiches/salads. Buy the unbranded foods and decide which foods you will compromise on. Cut down on treat/snack foods and buy seasonal fruit/veg. Bulk buy on things you use a lot like toilet rolls, washing powder.

Buy the bigger trays of meat and break it down into portions then freeze.

I tend to find that with things like mince or pork steaks it will be able £2.50 for a portion for 2 or £3.00 for a pack for 4 people.

If you have one of those butchers near you that do 3 trays for £10.00 you can make a big saving.

Buy frozen veg too, you dont waste any, its quick to cook and tastes fresh.

Eat veggie several times a week. Replace meat with pulses. Pad out mince with lentils.

Shop online if you can. It’s saved me a fortune as I’m not wandering round the shop thinking ‘ooh, that looks nice...’

Combine that with meal planning and making one thing last two meals (eg roast chicken into chicken pie the next day) and you should be able to save.

Is that just food or does it include toiletries etc? Keep in mind that the average for 2 adults and 2 kids is around £84 per week on food alone.

Meal planning, using leftovers, bulking out dishes with lentils/carrots and the like. Also look at tumbledown recipes that you prep all at once and then change up over the coming days. The obvious one that comes to mind is a mince mix that you can turn into chilli, spaghetti, cottage pie etc.

Do you find that you've got a lot of waste?

Do you buy things like “Lunchables” for your Ds’s lunch? Expensive breakfast cereals? Cereal bars? This sort of thing can really add up.

Many basics are good at Lidl: jam, their own deodorant, shower gel, laundry detergent etc are MUCH cheaper.

😮 I spend £60 on a food shop for 3 adults and a toddler!

Meal plan. It really helps me to avoid picking up things we don't need
Always look for the roll back prices and deals.
We buy a lot of Asda own-brand stuff
Frozen veg is cheaper than fresh and lasts longer

Aldi or Lidl.

Drop meat and fish - you don’t need it. Protein is found in so many other foods.

Plan meals around things that are on special offer.

Stock up on special offer items and freeze them.

Find out what time the reduced items get put out and pounce!

If you buy packs of nuts/dried fruit, buy the bigger bakery packs and portion them up.

Meal plan - make a list and stick to it - no compulsive shopping.

Don’t buy ready sauces and ready meals. Make everything fresh from scratch and in large quantities and freeze it.

Nothing wrong with Aldi’s cheapest pasta, rice and spaghetti. Cheap tinned tomatoes also good.

Nothing wrong with simpler, cheaper meals like baked potato with cheese and salad or beans on toast a couple of times a week.

If you have a garden, start growing your own veg next summer. Start with the easy things like lettuce, tomatoes and radishes. Runner beans are the best home grown.

I swapped from ASDA to Lidl and found we got a lot more for our money

What is a typical meal plan? Dh and I have 2 kids. We spend 50 in Aldi per week. Thats evening meals for us two for five days. Evebing meals for four of us for two days. My work lunches (dh gets fed at work). Breakfast for the week for all of us. Weekend lunches for four. It also includes toiletries and cleaning products as needed. If we add alcohol its nearer 60.

We meal plan; use some freezer stuff (pre chopped onions, chips, always get a frozen pizza for one night).

So you would need evening meals for 2 x7 nights, lunch x5 for you weekdays, lunch x2 for both, breakfast for both x7.

Could you do a chilli or bolognaise for four people (fiver?) Assuming 6yo would eat a half portion thats two for him for two nights, two for you same night, plus a spare to have one lunch. Similarly a sausage stew split the same way.

If, like me, Aldi and Lidl and far, far away and not realistically an option - I find that looking at the bottom shelf of the supermarket really does have the cheapest stuff. eg pasta at half the price of the shelf above.

Its easy to forget simple suppers like beans on toast, omelette, soup and crust bread if you get stuck on the idea that it must be meat and two veg for a proper meal.

I find frozen food useful as it doesn't go off if I'm too tired to cook, or something comes up. We have peas, sweetcorn, stir-fry veg, med veg, fish, quorn bits and stewing beef sort regularly.

make sure you use your leftovers.

Oh some fab tips here. I am going to try them out.
I am spending about £500 a month on 2 adults and a small child! This does include cat food, loo roll and dishwasher tablets etc, but it’s out of control and I use Aldi as well and virtually no waste. And we are all quite thin!! I don’t even ever buy fizzy drinks, or posh coffee just tea, or we drink water. I must be doing something wrong or we are very greedy!

Aldi all the way!!

I use Sainsbury's/Tesco for the branded items that we like to have - Robinson's squash, McCains chips etc but I also use an app called MySupermarket to find out where there are deals to be had and do my shopping in whichever one has he most deals available/works out cheapest. There is also an app called GreenJinn which will give you cash back on certain items - I'm a sucker for Appletiser but it's expensive so I find out where it's on offer and see if there is Cashback available. I believe ClickSnap works in a similar way but have never used that one.

There are also a couple of apps that will award you points for taking photo's of receipts, I'm building mine up for Amazon Vouchers towards the December festivities (I just can't bring myself to say it in September!)

Good Luck!

We average £70-80 for 2 adults and 2 teens, it's a struggle to keep to that. I don't think £50 for 1 adult and one child is a lot

Batch cook!

I make meals in the slow cooker just for me as I'm WF and ds is autistic and eats certain things!

I pay £5 for 5 meals worth.

I buy meat in reduces section - batch cook and freeze or delegate into sandwich bags, date and freeze.

Make a load of veg up and freeze cooked.
Buy separate fruit/veg rather than packaged so only why what's needed for 2.

£50 is probably about right for 2 people a week on today's prices of that includes toiletries, cleaning stuff and loo roll etc.

Just popped into new Lidl its not much cheaper than the regular supermarkets

Thanks for all your replies. I agree with OP about Lidl not being much cheaper here either.
We don't waste much food at all, I do but toiletries every 2nd shop I do but they always seem to be similar in price.
I eat almost anything, my son is a picky eater so what I would make for myself he most likely won't eat so bulk making and freezing can be tricky sometimes unless I want to live on lasagne or burgers

Great thread. Our finances have had a sudden downturn in our finances so have to cut our bills by £500 a month. Last week I started to do an online shop with Morrison's and just did this weeks shop for next week.

2 adults, 2 kids (9&10), kids have school dinners (that's stopping to save us money soon) so breakfast, lunch for me and sometimes DH and Evening meals for all. Next week I managed to get for £56 including 1 bottle of wine, laundry detergent, hand soap etc plus all food. I was pleased with that.

We are doing very cheap meals at least 3 nights a week - beans/spaghetti on toast, cheap tomato soup and roles, home made tomato sauce and pasta, jacket potatoes with beans and cheese. We are just being strict on meal planning but I think longer term we might get board with the food so will need to think of more ideas.