Weekly food shop.. how much?

[babyblueblush]

How much do people spend on a weekly food shop?

Me, ds 16 and dd 13 living in the house plus snacks and breakfast items for 6 childminding children 5 days a week. One big Aldi/Home Bargains shop a month for toiletries, cleaning products, baby items, toilet roll, fruit juices, water and pizzas comes to roughly £65 for the month.
One click and collect from Tesco per week around £26-38 and then £15 on parent pay to cover school lunch for the week.

50-60 for 2 adults and a 13 month old that eats tons. We shop at Sainsburys and I only tend to go over the 60 mark if DH wants more wine.

2 cats but buy them separately - probably works out at £20 per month.

Nappies & wipes are bought in bulk when on sale, maybe £10 a month if that.

We have a cleaner who uses her own products, so don’t have to regularly buy those.

Since having DS, we eat a lot more veggie food, beans and lentils etc which are really cheap. We will eat meat 2-3 times a week, but I will do something like a cottage pie over two nights and a lunch, or chicken thighs rather than breast. Yoghurt & fruit for breakfast, soup for lunch currently now it’s winter.

@nannybeach avocados are less than £1 in Lidl - I buy the medium ones which are 65p, I think the large ones are maybe 85p. But the boxes are definitely good value!

I do believe people spend £50, I just think that’s hard when it’s a family of say 2 adults and 2 teens. If it’s just 2 of you, then that’s similar to families spend £100 ish.

I think food is a lot more expensive where we live as well. We don’t drink alcohol often, not meat daily, grow lots of own produce in summer etc.. but for the three of us I would struggle on £50. One week sure, as we have full pantry at the moment, and can eat simple basics, but out of choice, I wouldn’t want to eat the same thing week week out.

We eat porridge for breakfast too. But oats are staple in this country, so they aren’t really budget option. I like to then give Ds the chance of having fruit or yogurt afterwards or with it. We also try and buy local where possible ie milk direct from farm shop, which probably does push the budget up

£60 for two adults and a 2yo shopping in Aldi

£95 a week on food from a mix of Aldi, Sainsbury's and a weekly fruit & veg box. 2 adults, 1 teen and 2 older primary along with 2 guinea pigs and and 2 gerbils. We are vegetarian and all our dairy and eggs are organic so could bring it down by £10/20 if we really needed to. I budget another £20 a week for toiletries, cleaning products and a once a month take away. I do cook everything from scratch and DC have packed lunch.

@RockAndHardPlace1

£150 family of four. 3 cats. Morrisons.

Morrisons have gotten very expensive lately!

We use Morrisons too and after my delivery saver has run out I'm not renewing it. Ever since they swapped to picking in store and not the warehouse I keep getting subs and short dated items. Plus the prices keep going up.

£50 for just myself but this includes toiletries, kitchen roll, sponges etc and the delivery fee of an online shop.

2 adults and 3 teens, around £100-130 a week. They get FSM though, it goes up in the holidays!

YooCoo, am fascinated, give me a rundown of what you buy. That was more than my take home salary, before I retired 5 years ago.

@nannybeach. I did list some of the groceries that we buy upthread - but it felt kind of crass to bang on about how much we spend when the general tone here seems to be to spend as little as possible, be thrifty, feel guilty about spending “more than one should” or be constrained with a strict £ budget.

Like I said we buy almost all organic and DH does the order - he buys things like 1 serving of Daylesford soup that costs £9 and has Able & Coke 7 seeded organic sourdough bread, and a few bites of some Organic cheese with the soup. So that’s one lunch for one person that costs about £10.

I recently asked him to order some peppercorns and he ordered Daylesford organic peppercorns - I wouldn’t buy organic peppercorns (they are really nice though, I have to admit.)

Also, the eggs alone cost about £15 per week. (we eat about 2 1/2 dozen a week). Cawston Press Ginger beer is £8+ a week for 8. And DS eats the organic avocados (£1 to £2 each) and organic fruit. For example, He will eat one small punnet of organic blueberries (£3)for a snack.

About 160-180 a week here, plus top up of about £20 on milk and bread and bits over the week, for a family of five.
That's all food including lunches and snacks, booze, toiletries, cleaning products.
I meal plan but don't consciously shop for bargains.
The kids (teens) get through astonishing amounts of crisps and cereal bars and noodles...

Thanks YooCoo,I cannot imagine£9 for soup. I make my own, batches of usually 4,at a time
I did say I grow a lot of my own fruit and veg, its organic,I don't use pesticides. My diet is mainly plant based. I was completely veggie for about 30 years,I do occasionally eat fish or chicken. DH love's meat. Have got him eating more veggies,he thought a vegetarian diet comprises lettuce/cucumber/tomatoes!!

It's fruit that eats up a lot of our budget too. Sure veg are cheaper but DS won't eat it and I'd still like him to eat healthily. Bananas are cheap but it's generally £2/£2.50 for 4 apples, if the 3 of us has an apple a day then that's £11ish a week, same for pears and if you add in some soft fruits which never seem to be cheaper even when in season and then add in veg and tomatoes etc then I'm generally up to £40 plus just in that.

I've already done a Costco shop recently so I have plenty of mince/chicken in the freezer so will mostly be using that up so this weeks shopping was mainly ingredients to make the meals with, fruit, milk, yoghurt, cold meat/lunch stuff, fruit juice, bread etc and I was still £120 plus. Meals this week are salad using up some of the cold meat/cheese and some prawns/salmon from the freezer. I'd do some spicy wedges with it. Lamb tomorrow from the freezer with accompaniments, I'll do a curry with chicken from the freezer, chili with mince from the freezer, fish cakes using fish from the freezer, we'll have a pasta night and no idea what else. We have a couple of days off so might have a lunch or dinner out and I'll also make some soup for lunches. I did buy a tray of drumsticks which i'll cook up for using for lunches too.

I did say I grow a lot of my own fruit and veg, its organic,I don't use pesticides. My diet is mainly plant based. I was completely veggie for about 30 years

I do envy you growing your own organic fruit & veg but I just wouldn’t ever be able to do that. I am vegetarian with no meat or fish at all.

it's generally £2/£2.50 for 4 apples

Where on earth do you shop?!

We buy Lidls giant bags of red apples which are £2.29 for about 16...and it's a nice apple. Not Pink Lady nice (my fave) but certainly nice enough.

We go through a ridiculous amount of apples - probably about 45 a week for 5 of us. I'd never spend £2.50 on 4 even if it came with your own personal servant to feed it to you 😂

Where on earth do you shop?!

Sainsburys usually. I used to only buy organic apples but can't do that anymore, plus normally I end up having to bin some because they are rotten. We usually buy pink ladies as sometimes anything else has no flavour or is very tart. Sometimes buy gala but they have tended to be flavourless or rotten lately so it's a false economy if you have to chuck them away.

I know I could buy elsewhere cheaper but then I'd have to go to more shops and places that aren't doing click and collect or delivery and I don't have the inclination or time.

I really don't like wasting food so I'd rather pay for stuff that gets eaten.

Even a decent tin of fruit in juice is a pound and has 2 portions in it.

£60-£80 a week for 6 of us. We plan every meal (breakfast, lunch, packed lunch, dinner, fruit for snakes) only have meat twice a week and if it's not on the list it doesn't go in the trolley. This has been a bit of an eye opener as I thought we were spending to much.

You seriously thought that £10-£15 a week per person was too much? Pull the other one.

I wasn't really looking at it per person and more of a crikey if I don't get this down will we be able to afford petrol to get them to school.

About £160 a week. Family of 5 (4 of us adult sized). I cook everything from scratch pretty much.

We're usually around £150 a week for 2 adults, 1 teen, 2 kids. No pets and that includes all food, toiletries and cleaning stuff.

We eat veggie or vegan at least twice a week and bulk out a lot with lentils and beans which is good for the waistline and the pocket.

£60 pw inc cleaning products and most toiletries. We also get a takeaway or eat out once a week.

YooCoo,we always enjoyed gardening
My plan was to be self sufficient once I retired. We downsized, property but 8,th of an acre of garden
We inherited 3,apple trees (one died) big cherry,(planted 2 more) plum,2 pears
Have planted gooseberries, blue berries, raspberries, strawberries
Blackberry, blackcurrant,kiwi. Asparagus bed,rhubarb. Then annually whatever we fancy. We have 4 lemons, calamondins, mandarin. Used to have chicken, hubby doesn't want anymore because of the cleaning out. They used to call me Mrs Good life at work!

@Oldmotherhubbardlivesinashoe
You wrote: This has been a bit of an eye opener as I thought we were spending to much.
That implies that this thread has changed your views on your spending (hence it would not be unreasonable to assume that you could spend more than you currently do) not that you must spend less than £2 per day per person for food in your household so that you can afford petrol for schooling.

Your first post was misleading.