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How much is the weekly food shop?!

104 replies

Keenbean22 · 24/02/2026 12:24

I understand it’s variable for everyone depending on number of people etc but my food shop keeps going up and up! Is this normal these days?!

family of 5 ( 2 adults, 2 children. 1 baby). Tend to cook 90% from scratch with the odd pizza thrown in. I do cook dinner for my grandmother 3 nights a week. Kids eat the same meals we do. All have breakfast at home, one DD has school dinner so the rest of us need lunch too. No pets. need nappies but no formula.

we seek to be averaging £150-£200 a week. Am I going wrong somewhere?!

OP posts:
GreatAuntytobe · 25/02/2026 13:33

£180 - £200 per week for me, dh and ds (26). That includes absolutely everything, food, cleaning products, personal care products (shampoo, shower gel etc), all drinks (including one bottle of nice wine for weekend). I could probably cut back but we don't buy takeaways or go out for any meals or holidays (due to severely disabled dh), so we like to have nice things to eat at home as its our only pleasure in life.

whattheysay · 25/02/2026 14:38

We are 5 adults in the house atm, breakfast, dinner and stuff lunch occasionally like bread, ham, eggs etc. it’s about £250 per week maybe more but I don’t count anymore because it is what it is. not even saving money by having Ds at uni because we give him money to buy food
I cook from scratch everyday except Saturday we get a takeaway. Sometimes dh and I go out for dinner then the kids sort themselves out
Dogs eat butternut so that’s separate.

CostadiMar · 26/02/2026 09:54

2 adults, 2 kids, no pets, no alcohol.
Main food shop is ca. £125 per week +£20 total top-ups. That includes cleaning stuff, cosmetics & toiletries.

MikeRafone · 26/02/2026 13:37

meal planning to within an inch of my life and getting it to £150-160 per month for 2 adults

but Ive found that shopping once per month is my best option, cook for the entire month on a meal plan and freeze everything. Then every 2/3 days take meals out of the freezer ready to eat, even the mash potato and rice is frozen.

It saves time, cook once, cook double of treble freeze 3/4 times, cook for 7 evening in the first week and then no cooking for 3 weeks, limited washing up and the added bonus no weekly trips t the supermarket, just pop to the Saturday market to the fruit stand.

I buy milk to last the month and make flat bread and pitta and freeze, make our own bread and also sweet snacks

we eat well, and by meal planning we have a lot more variety of meals, with only one or two repeated

some recipes state they are for 4 portions, but find they are ample for 5 or 6 without being stingy. So extra 2 or 3 portions get frozen as we are cooking double or treble.

This has meant this month, Februarys meal plan will last into March, which has reduced the cost

I think before the extra portions were just being eaten up, either at that meal or the next lunch time etc and so 6 potions became 4 portions

not doing top up shops has saved much more than anything else

EmbracingUncertainty · 26/02/2026 20:10

Trying to keep our grocery budget to £500 a month and so far seems doable, that’s 2 adults and 2 young kids, no pets. That includes cleaning stuff and toiletries, occasional beers but no wine. We meal plan, also defrosted the freezer this week with the aim of doing more batch cooking for march.

MrsLizzieDarcy · 26/02/2026 20:18

2 adults and a lot of visitors most weekends (kids and grandkids) so we spend around £200 to £230 a week (i had 9 for lunch last saturday). No cleaning products as our cleaner supplies those and we bulk buy washing powder/dishwasher tablets/dog food so none of those either. We eat well though - DH likes steak, we have salmon weekly, a Charlie Bigham ready meal or 2 and we eat a lot of fruit/veg. I've got 2 large veg drawers in the fridge that are always full. No alcohol or treats other than the odd bag of sharing crisps.

simpledeer · 26/02/2026 20:50

No, I think you are doing really well. It’s just the cost of living has rocketed and wages haven’t 😞

Meadowfinch · 26/02/2026 21:12

One adult, one hollow legged 17yo boy, £60 a week, including basic toiletries.

I cook from scratch, order flour by the sack and bake all our bread. Idon't drink alcohol and we waste almost nothing.

For that we get chicken, eggs, pork, fish, some beef and duck.and a good range of fruit & veg.

Titsywoo · 26/02/2026 21:26

3 adults and probably about £130 a week but none of us eat breakfast, DS eats lunch at work so pays for that and DH and I eat something small so the cost is just dinners and we eat fairly simply and from scratch now so cost isn't too high. We also eat a lot less meat than we used to and a lot of the rising prices were for meat and fish I found.

Flingotheflamingo · 26/02/2026 21:45

We spent £140 a week: 2ad, 2ch, 2 cats and 1 dog.

Lots of slow cooker meals. Daily pancakes and milk. No one goes hungry or complains. Always, always meal plan.

Marmite27 · 27/02/2026 17:09

I said £115 per week, this week was £112.87. The only things missing off the list are some yeo valley yoghurt for me (£2) which takes us to almost bang on budget.

The kids want some chocolate rice cakes for snacks, I’m happy to chuck in the £2.50 for them as they last more than a week usually.

Marmite27 · 27/02/2026 17:24

Here are my receipts from today and meal plan. We have an extensive store cupboard so the herbs and spices/recipe mixes/stock/stuffing are already in the house.

Breakfast - DH has overnight oats and I have yoghurt and granola with fruit or a thin bagel with soft cheese (half a pack left from last week) spinach and ham. The DC are currently obsessed with beans on toast for breakfast - hence 6 tins of beans.

We’re still eating last year’s Easter chocolate, Halloween treats and Christmas selection boxes so no sweet treats required!

Lunches are usually left overs, DC have school dinners. Weekends they have soup/toasties/left overs.

For some reason we ended up with double the usual amount of apples last week, so no need to buy any this week. Same for potatoes, I thought we were nearly out and bought a bag, but we had just under half of the Albert Bartletts left. There’s still a couple in that bag, plus the new one I bought last week. Plus there’s a pack of baking potatoes and 2/3 of a bag of baby potatoes.

Next week will see us need fusilli and easy cook rice as they’re getting low this week.

We don’t use a full bag of lots of things one week, so they roll over to the next. The chilli was batch cooked a few weeks ago and we got 3x3 portions out of it (DC have half an adult portion) and we already have tortilla chips in to go with it.

How much is the weekly food shop?!
How much is the weekly food shop?!
popcornandpotatoes · 27/02/2026 18:39

I also think you're doing really well. I spend about £100 at Tesco's a week but I also pop in to m&s on Saturdays for a nice dinner, separate shop for dog food and a takeaway once every few weeks so probably at least £150 a week for two adults, one primary aged child and a dog

Hassell · 24/05/2026 14:56

goz · 24/02/2026 14:27

I honestly don’t believe a family of 4 eat their meals for the week with £30 unless they’re literally eating unbalanced poverty rations.

I agree

SeeYouThroughACameraFlash · 24/05/2026 15:05

We spend between £200-£250 per week for 3 adults, 1 teen and 2 dogs. Kids friends are here often so that adds to the cost. We eat out a couple of times per week.

intrepidpanda · 24/05/2026 16:23

I am £100 a week for 2 adults. You are not going wrong. Nice ingredients are expensive. People that say cooking from scratch is cheaper are obviously cooking different things to me.

herbetta · 25/05/2026 06:40

hamsterchump · 24/02/2026 13:57

We spend £50 a week at Lidl for 2 omnivore adults (I'm 5'9 and DH 6'2 so we are not tiny eaters) and a cat for all food/household/toiletries/cat food/litter/everything really etc. That includes a bottle of gin (£12) and tonic every two weeks and a bottle of wine (£4.50 - £5) most weeks. I am very frugal though and focussed on getting the most for our money. We shop once a week, no top ups.

I do pick up some stuff on Olio sometimes if I can but it's only about once every two weeks and is usually just bread and maybe a bit of veg.

We usually eat Lidl weetabix (DH) or porridge with golden syrup (me) for breakfast. I usually have something like a sandwich or egg/beans on toast or leftovers for lunch and my OH has a cold meat and mixed bean salad (he does weight lifting so this is his choice, something to do with protein).

For staple dinners we have things like roast chicken (I always buy the heaviest "medium" chicken in Lidl for £4.25 as they vary in weight by about 500g) then cut the raw bird in half and roast half at a time. We have the half a roast chicken as one meal with veg & homemade gravy or salad and then I strip the rest of the meat for something like a curry/thai curry/casserole/sweet & sour chicken/chicken fajitas/chicken pie. So I get 4 good dinners out of one chicken for example.

Or we have things like spaghetti bolognese, pasta bake, burritos, chilli, smash burgers (I buy the cheapest 25% fat Lidl mince for £3.10 for 500g and generally use a quarter at a time for a meal for two people).

I also buy the Lidl cooking bacon at £1.99 for 1kg (if you pick through the packs there is usually one with good slices rather than big chunks in, sometimes it is just all streaky slices which is great, but sometimes it's gammon so if you wanted that it's a good way of buying it. I split that in to quarters and a quarter is enough for either a pasta dish like a carbonara or for our bacon sandwiches at the weekend.

We don't buy much branded stuff I suppose generally because it's more expensive and we find Lidl's own is so good. We use lard instead of oil for roasting/frying which is very cheap at 50p for 250g. We only use butter (no spread). I only buy whole milk (3 x 2L bottles a week). I buy coffee beans (we have a grinder and espresso machine at home) from lidl at £10 for 1.2kg). We always have some chocolate (I like Dairy milk so try to get as close to £1 per 100g as I can, I currently have some chocolate coins from Christmas that I bought reduced) and sweets (DH likes jelly sweets so I get Lidl's own) in the house. I buy the 24 pack of toilet rolls for £5.99 from Lidl because it works out the cheapest.

I try never to throw anything away, we either eat leftovers or repurpose them. For example I made a big cauliflower cheese to go with our roast chicken last night, that will either get saved to go with the next roast or blended down into a soup we'll have with homemade bread (I have a breadmaker which makes bread for pennies, I buy yeast sachets in Lidl and regular plain flour as I found it works just as well as strong flour and is half the price). I still buy some sliced bread for bacon sandwiches, why does it have to be sliced bread for these? It's just not the same without.

We also do Lidl plus and when we get a free item I try to get one of the more expensive items in that class. So for the free veg item, the best value thing you can buy is a 7.5kg sack of potatoes for example. I have had free razor blade refills/car screenwash/etc in the past which have saved £4 each instead of perhaps 40p if you bought the cheapest item the voucher would count against.

If I see a good reduction on a non perishable item then I'll buy it in bulk so I currently have 3 x 40 wash boxes of Daz powder (more than a year's supply for us) in the cupboard because I noticed them half price. I colour my roots every two weeks because I hate seeing the grey at home. I use Derma V10 colour which is £1.10 a box and I buy the whole year's supply of 26 boxes at once from Wilko so then I don't have to think about it restocking very often.

We probably have a takeaway every two weeks ish, usually Dominos or fish and chips on which we spend £20-£25. Even then, the Dominos we usually get a large pizza, a garlic bread and a chicken side (use vouchers to get at least 40% off) and that will often provide two dinners, the second one with salad and maybe chips added. At the fish and chip shop we share a fish and a large chips and 2 jumbo battered sausages. If we have chippy chips leftover I always freeze and reheat them later.

@hamsterchumpI could have written your post almost word for word Smile very similar mindset & way of doing / planning things.

CeciliaMars · 25/05/2026 06:58

Family of 5, we spend around £150 a week in Aldi with a bread/milk/fruit top up mid week.

Citygirlrurallife · 25/05/2026 07:45

Ours is easily £200/week 2 adults, 2 teens, 2 cats and a big dog, all meals covered for everyone (WFH and DC take packed lunch). Meal plan and cook almost everything from scratch, never buy branded, shop at Lidl and Tesco. We could probably bring it down a bit but I already feel like I watch it closely and it’s much more than I feel it should be considering what I buy. For that much money I feel like I should be getting everything organic and not having to pay much attention to what goes in the basket!

so depressing

Kitestring · 25/05/2026 07:56

2 adults, one big shop a week, non alcohol drinkers - we do buy a bottle of non alcoholic gin a month and a few non alcoholic beers. Eat healthily. All in, including household stuff, £100 a weeks. We shop in Sainsbury’s and Waitrose. Chicken from M & S. I do use Trolley app and if the gin is cheaper in an Asda or a Tesco I will go there. We do noticed the prices increasing rapidly. I no longer buy my workday lunch out because of the expense so my weekly shop also includes my lunch for the week. I no longer impulse buy. Use a list, rarely deviate.

Larrythecatforpm · 25/05/2026 08:08

£150 for 2 adults, 1 teen and 1 preteen whose diabetic so needs “extras” for it. 4 cats too but most of the time I bulk buy their food so it’s just 2 bags of litter a week in the shopping. Neither of us drink and we cook from scratch.

PersephoneParlormaid · 25/05/2026 08:11

One of my kids moved out and I expected my weekly food bill to go down, but it hasn’t, and I assume it’s because prices have gone up.

pambeesleyhalpert · 25/05/2026 08:15

Around £200 ish- prob more. 2 adults, one cat, 2 kids 2 and 4… we eat a ton of protein and fruit/ veg

Mumofyellows · 25/05/2026 08:23

About £120 a week for 2 adults and 2 large dogs, both DH and I WFH mostly so that also includes breakfast and lunch for us both. DD 23 lives here too and sometimes it will include her depending what she’s doing, she often cooks her own food as she’s veggie.
creeping up constantly, I have recently switched to Sainsbury’s as I get deliveries and it’s actually seeing cheaper than Tesco was, I get 2 deliveries a week to make sure we always have fresh salad, bread etc.

confusedlots · 25/05/2026 17:13

I have started paying more attention to how much we are paying on the food shop for the past few months after I realised we were spending around £600 per month for 2 adults and 2 children. Been trying hard to get it down to £500 but haven’t managed it yet. I have started using Everup to get the cash back which is great. I basically buy supermarket gift cards at the start of the month and see how long they can last. And then use the cashback earned for a ‘free’ supermarket shop.

Prices are mad though, I spent £60 today for 2 evening meals and a few other bits like bread, milk, fruit.

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