I have cut my food bill by over half!

[joanneg]

I have been spending a fortune on shopping (I reckon between £75 - 100 a week). There are three of us, me, dh and ds.

Anyway we are really hard up at the moment so I have really cut down. I have started shopping at Asda and planning meals. For instance if I decide that we will have a beef stew - I only put the veggies to go with that meal in. - I plan each dinner time like that. I also have started using their own brands - even their nappies which I have found quite good. I write a list and am really strict on what I buy.

On average now I am spending between £35 - £40 a week. I am so pleased. It is amazing the difference it can make in just going to a cheaper supermarket and watching what you buy can do. (also I make dh use a calculator as we go around poor bugger!!)

gosh carla, i thought i was bad. how many are you feeding?

God carla!!! How the other half live!! I spend about £5 a day - granted there's only me and dd to feed.

I shop monthly now at kwiq save for the fridge about (60.00 - includes the washing powder etc..) Iceland for my freezer a full load of it (45.00 complete incl some 'dry' foods) Lidl for Juice (10.00 for the month incl bucuits), and (30.00) morrisions for fresh veggies (15.00 per month for dog food as well) that feeds two aduls and two dogs. (normally have loads still left thou. (also 10.00 in the house for essentials during the month ie bread and milk) its cheaper for us to shop monthly, and less agro! (170 per month)

We used to shop at Tesco, and since Aldi opened here we have cut our grocery bill by half. We can also afford to buy wine, not just as a treat. Since Aldi and Lidl opened Tesco have started offering their full value range here (Ireland) which they hadn't done before.

However the quality of the Tesco value range is nowhere near as good as the quality of the stuff at Aldi. There are 7 of us, and a weekly shop, including beer, wine, and meat for at least one meal, is about 130EURO or about £100.

And the nappies at Lidl are as good as Pampers or Huggies, if not better.

have been thinking about this type of thread for a couple of days, as just had our credit card bill in, and all the Tesco food( not incl. petrol) entries for the month come to £495 for 4 of us, including nappies for twins, and 12 bottles of wine from the wine warehouse. Dh thinks my shopping is extravagent, but wants the kids to eat organic, won't eat pasta as it tastes"plastic", won't eat pulses or couscous, and wants meat every night. Am i being unreasonable?

I shop carefully and have become an asda convert. I think we make most savings by cutting down the amount we spend on toilteries and cleaning stuff. I can save a fortune by buying asda's own brand toiletries - 2 toothbrushes for 20p, etc

I also buy cheap washing up liquid - 13p for a bottle. I never use any washing up liquid sparingly, so if I buy a normal price one, I use it up quite quickly. A cheap one last ages and I can wash up just as well with it. Netto's washing powder costs £1.99 for a huge box that lasts us six weeks easiily (and that's one wash a day).

I semi plan meals for a week, do lots of home cooking and freezing. If I see meat or fish near the sell buy date very much reduced, I buy as much as possible and freeze it.

I estimate that many of our family meals (enough for 4 people) cost us £2.00 in total, and we eat meat or fish most nights.

zaphod, I agree with you about Aldi. I find the quality of a lot of their stuff is much better than the mainstream supermarket. As soon as the babies are bigger, I will be using their nappies (I use Asda at the moment). Have you checked out Weetbisk, their equivalent to Weetabix. Weetbisk cost about 75p for 24 as oppose to Weetabix that cost about £1.20 for the same about. Guess what, they taste the same to me.

I feed a family of 8, so am always really keen to find the bargains without losing quality.

For lots of things, I shop at Costco. I like it because everything is good quality but a great prices. I go roughly every 6 weeks and spend about £350 a trip - it's the same regardless of how much meat, wine and other expensive items that I buy.

I use Sainsbury's for everything else, and spend less than £100 a week, unless I'm entertaining.

I find it really hard to make lists for Sainsbury's as they have so many deals once you get there. It would be mad for me to plan out a meal in advance, only to have to pay the full price for the main ingredient, when they have BOGOF on something else. I do stock up on the BOGOFs, though. The deals don't seem to make it to their website, so it makes their online shopping less attractive.

I've tried Tesco and Asda, but they just aren't worth the extra journey for me. I do pop into M&S and Waitrose when I'm in town though, but just for that night's meal. I don't "get" the quality that other people see in Aldi and Lidl. I go there very occasionally if I see something in their weekly offers that I'd like (non-food), and will, of course, fill my trolley - but am invariably disappointed. There is no way that I'd buy their nappies or toiletries.

We have a market twice a week, so I will often go there for fruit & veg - getting buggy-tipping quantities for about £8.

I spend about £40 a week on wine - a great opportunity for cutting back on the budget.

Its very difficult to keep costs down when everyone suggests organic food for babies/evian water etc. Organic food costs a blinking fortune - next summer I'm going to have a veg/salad garden to do my own stuff.

Have decided to spend £50 on this week's food shop. Will let you know if it works or not. It'll be for food only (no cleaning products, toiletries,wine or anything else, just food stuff) and have already made a menu plan for the week.
Still doesn't seem enough £50 but I'm not taking my card with me, just cash so it'll have to work!

And I'm not going near another supermaket for a whole week.

Unfortunatly we don't have any of the cheaper supermakets around here, just Tesco, sainsbury, waitrose and M&S so I'm a bit sceptical about the success rate I'll achieve...

I'm reading this with great interest, being as horrendously skint as we are. I menu-plan, and manage to keep the food bill low(ish), but what does everyone keep the non-food bill under control? I seem to spend as much again each week on Drynites, Persil/own brand, dishwasher tablets etc etc. Help!

Own brand stuff works fine for me, couldn't bear to spend on the marketed stuff now (just call me Po faced.. ). I shop in Coop mainly and use their own brand washing stuff etc which is much cheaper and not tested on animals. I also buy tons of stuff when it's bogof offers, and so I end up with stuff stacked under the sink (you do have to remember it's there though!)

Boots do a Basic range of nappies which are DIRT CHEAP!! It's £2 a pack and I know they're ecologically wretched but it's just I can't help myself in the face of the cost difference...

(Excuse me, but this is for JJ who I don't seem to be able to mail - apologies for the interruption)

Yep, I cook everything fully first, and then freeze in those tin trays with lids (I bet someone can tell me it's terribly unhygienic but it works for me!)

You can then sling those, still frozen, in the oven for 45 mins or thereabout on a medium setting. This is fantastic when used in conjunction with the oven's timer - home-cooked food ready and waiting - yum!

I've put cooked mince with cooked mash straight into the container and frozen that when it's cooled and it's been fine. All you've got to do then is dig out frozen peas and boil a kettle! I'm reet classy me!

The pizza I wrap in foil and freeze, and then put in the oven, frozen for about 15 mins. Seems pretty reasonable quality to me, not as nice as fresh but ok at a push.

I saw it getting a slagging on another thread a few weeks ago but Aldi Almat washing tablets are really good, I used to always buy Ariel but have replaced it with Almat at half the price, haven't noticed any difference except in my purse.

wow peskykids you are really organised with teh cooking too. may ask, what trays are you exactly refering to? where could I buy them from? and how do they look like? TIA

If I spend more than £100 a week on supermarket shop (which includes toiletries, cleaning products, occasionally a small item of clothing, stationery, etc and is for 2 adults and 4 children) I make myself spend less the next week. So, in other words, I average £100 a week. I find the best way to keep the bill down is not to buy any ready meals or convenience foods. If you have time to make it all yourself, that is the cheapest way to go.

I cut my bills by about 95% by going to live in the former Soviet union where there was bugger all to buy (apart from vodka that is!)

That combined with having no car (so we only bought what we could carry) made a massive difference.

Trouble was by the time we left, dh (who is 'careful' at the best of times!) was used to me spending about £3 a week on tram travel to work and lunch in the canteen 5 days a week. He nearly had a coronary when we came back and I started going shopping again!

Paolosgirl - on the subject of how to keep the non-food bill low... See this site for lots of info on how to use White Vinegar, Soda Crystals, soap flakes and Bicarbonate of Soda instead of bathroom cleaner, kitchen cleaner, window cleaner, descaler, rinse aid, conditioner, laundry powder, drain cleaner ... I also get dishwasher powder instead of tablets so I can use half the amount.

& this might keep the liquor bill down too...

www.ohmygoditburns.com/wordpress/index.php?p=4

It has previously been recommended on Mumsnet that dishwasher/washing tabs are cut in half. Have done this successfully with the dishwasher tablets.

At the moment I'm spending about £60 a week for four of us - this includes wine, toiletries/cleaning nappies, and formula (although DD is only on two bottles a day). Once she she is on family food I'm hoping it will reduce a bit.

Hi,
The metal trays are the sort that you buy your take away in - thus adding to the 'luxury'(!) of a homemade ready meal. You can get long ones, (curry size) or square-ish ones (rice size).

I have bought them in Asda, Safeway, and Co-op - they're not cheap - about £1 for 6, with cardboard lids. I keep meaning to go to my local cookshop or cash and carry, to see if they do them in bulk (someone must do - if you know of anywhere now's the time to shout!)

It would be more ecologically sound, and probably cheaper in the long run to buy those pyrex ones but I can never bring myself to cough up the cash!

It is much cheaper, and healthier, to bulk cook and freeze down in these than buy a takeway and providing you've enough selection in your freezer you don't feel so cheated!

I've started collecting the foil trays that M&S meals come in - they're sturdier than the takeaway containers although you do have to put up with the hardship of eating all that M&S food thereby defeating the whole object of this thread

I'll get me coat

Cackling madly in the office Spacemonkey! Thank goodness everyone else is out at spendthrift-y lunch!!

pesky kids where do you get those silver trays you mentioned, Im guessing they are like the ones takeaways come in. Ive tried in my local John Lewis and I have a huge sainsburys up the road but they dont do them.

pepsi - I've looked for the ones peskykids mentioned and saw them in safeways the other day. as she says they're about £1/6trays. I haven't bought them yet.
I was wondering though, what would you cover them with as they don't have a lid. Clingfilm??

matalan is usually good for cheap tupperware etc.