Yesterday, I managed to spend enough time in the front garden, cutting back and tidying up, to fill my usual 3 trug's full! By limiting myself to 3, it prevents me straining my back etc and also ensures I don't get too cold. As the weather is due to be a huge 2C warmer than last week, I might actually be able to almost finish it!
Our snowdrops are about 1.5" tall at the moment. When we went to the hygienist's this morning, someone had daffodils in full bloom in their garden. Mine are no-where to be seen.
I have menu planned now, to the end of the month, allowing for an away day here and there. Herewith menu:
Sausage meal x 2
Indian mushrooms with beans
Creamy curried mushrooms
Pork and bean cottage pie
toast x3
Mushroom risotto
Fish & chips x 3
Vegetable chilli
Gammon and chicken pie x 2
Courgette pasta
Bacon and bean risotto
Bratwurst meal
Although we will be finishing the second and final week of our food challenge (£20 per week for 2 people, all meals and snacks), we have enough meals made and frozen or enough in the freezers and cupboards to see us through until then.
We have been out this morning shopping for fresh and pantry staples and spare cupboard top ups. In total, it all came to £40 which means for a full month of food plus toiletries, we have spent just £80, half of what we normally spend so that is a great saving.
Mind you, to get to the end of February, other than the odd bit of fresh fruit and vegetables, no more than £10 - £15 should need to be spent. A few more things will disappear from stores which have been catered for. All in all, a huge saving. It must be Aldi and Lidl prices as this morning we did £20 in each and there was far more in the Lidl bag than Morrison's!
Can't say I would be able to do such tight shopping indefinitely but it just goes to show, menu planning, cooking from scratch making more than one nights worth of food at a time and freezing some, as well as judicial shopping and still being able to keep my store full, makes all the difference.
Well done. Great achievement. I have been very frugal with the food budget this month. The £5 voucher off at ALDI helped, along with the Tesco clubcard vouchers. I buy HUGE bags of pasta at Tesco for £3. Last weekend I drained the sauce from a tin of baked beans to make a veggie pasta sauce. Also got some marked down broccoli at Tesco which have supplemented our meals nicely this week. There are 3 of us, so pro rata I should try £30 challenge! Will work towards it! Sunny at the moment here in South Norfolk......am hoping for slightly warmer temperatures next week. Sue
ReplyDeleteWell done. I think the more there are of you, the easier it should be providing you don't have to cook different meals for everyone. Wouldn't like to try this as a one person family.
DeleteWell done! We must have been thinking along similar lines this morning as we have both blogged along similar lines! You are managing well on a tighter budget than mine though! I'm impressed.
ReplyDeleteMeals are not my problem as always cook from scratch. But having a 17 year old son who eats little but very often and needs snacks for the college day costs a fortune.....Given up this month. Will try again next payday.
ReplyDeleteRosezeeta.
Yes, that is a problem, at least you keep trying.
Deleteit's good when you can see the savings. I am trying to have a low spend month also. I am under $100 so far this month and that includes food, cleaning supplies and personal hygiene.
ReplyDeleteAlways good to actually see it, especially left at the end of the month when it can be transferred into our savings account.
Delete