What does your weekly grocery shop cost?

[RabbitLuvr]

My family were very strict on eating what was made for you, or not eating. (My mom allowed me to cook for myself if I didn't like what she made, so I learned to use the stove at a young age and survived for several years on little else than plain cooked pasta, instant mashed potato, and instant Stove Top stuffing. I was shocked recently when a coworker said she didn't allow her twelve-year old to use the microwave unattended. I was using the stovetop and oven at seven!)

I still keep the same standards at home. If I cook, Husband can eat what I make or feed himself. If he wants to alter something I've made, I'm fine with that- as long as he does it himself and isn't in my way doing it.

If he was sick I would probably take requests, but as long as he is physically capable of feeding himself, I will not make separate meals.

 

[RabbitLuvr]

An I wish I could food shop online here.

 

[AeryFairy]

Wow, your mum must be exhausted.

She'd do this after coming home from work, and all meals were proper from scratch home cooking (except for my brother's meal, because he would only eat slabs of meat and frozen chips). I'd offer to help out, but she was determined to do it all herself. She has her faults and our relationship isn't great, but she was something of a superwoman when it came to that kind of thing. Also, she is a fantastic cook (even if she does rely heavily on meat and dairy).

I don't have anywhere near that resolve. When I get in from work, I am making exactly one meal, and if boyfriend doesn't want it he can get his own (but he always wants whatever I'm making)

 

[ledboots]

It really isn't, but since I've been caring for my mom in her own home and not mine, it's not always easy to haul over all the stuff I need to fix two different meals. Basically I cook her what she will eat, and bring along something for myself (like an Amy's vegan pizza) that I can just pop into the oven.

You must be really tired, Digger. ((Hugs))

An I wish I could food shop online here.

Me too!!! Why do we not have this?

 

[KLS52]

We have Peapod here in NY...it's from the Stop n Shop grocery chain. I've never ordered from there...they never seem to have exactly what I want/need. But some of my friends have ordered online and they really like the convenience.

 

[Lord Snot]

I like it because I spend less money, as I said. You can see your total as it goes up and it really makes you think about what you're spending, whereas it's easy to put item after item in your trolley/cart and not think about how much it will be at the checkout. You can also search for items like a google search, much easier than trailing from aisle to aisle wondering whether dried fruit is in home baking, condiments or with the fruit (for example).

The drawbacks are that you pay for delivery, usually around £3, the delivery slots are 1 or 2 hours so you have to wait in without knowing exactly when it will be there, if something is out of stock they substitute it for something similar that you may not want (e.g. they sometimes sub my vegan meats with Quorn, which has egg) and even though you can refuse the subs, you still end up without an ingredient you wanted, and if you forget something you either have to do without or go out to a real shop again anyway.

It's become incredibly popular here, I see at least one grocery delivery a day in my road, which has about 30 houses. In the US it is probably much more difficult because one store might serve a much larger area, I bet even rural parts of the UK cannot get delivery.

Sorry I have gone a little off topic, I hope not too much since we're still talking about shopping costs

 

[cornsail]

Hard to say, because most of the food I buy lasts a lot longer than a week. Also it depends what I feel like buying at the time. I probably average out to less than 10$ per week most of the time for just me. Sometimes I spend a lot more than that on a whim or if there's some specific food I want to make or try. I'm not sure how much I spend on my two rabbits, but I would guess about $10 dollars per week on average for hay and food.

 

[Kitties]

I'm probably in the 32 to 48 U.S. dollar range. Probably more in the middle. This too includes all my food as I very rarely eat out and I bring my lunch to work. I do think I spend too much on food. I'm trying to cut back on chips and other junk and I've noticed that has decreased my bill a bit.

I try to bargain hunt. Last week I scored Soy & Co yogurt at the food outlet 3/$1.00!

 

[Moll Flanders]

I have managed to reduce our shopping bill to about £70-80 a week instead of £120. It means I have a lot less fresh fruit and veg which I'm not ecstatic about but hopefully it means less wasted food and money. I need to go online to get some new and interesting soup recipes as I am going to batch cook and freeze portions as I could eat soup and bread as a meal everyday!

 

[shyvas]

I have managed to reduce our shopping bill to about £70-80 a week instead of £120. It means I have a lot less fresh fruit and veg which I'm not ecstatic about but hopefully it means less wasted food and money. I need to go online to get some new and interesting soup recipes as I am going to batch cook and freeze portions as I could eat soup and bread as a meal everyday!

That is certainly a huge difference. What is the before and after list ?
You can still buy fruit and veg which are in season without overspending. Many frozen vegetable cost less than fresh ones and come in handy for making soups and last minute meals.
I'm also on to a soup crusade and just make recipes up using vegetables that are in season including pulses and grains.
What kind of soups do you like to eat ?

 

[Moll Flanders]

I just swapped down to the cheaper brands. I bought a big bag of frozen veg and then bought the basic/value range for the other fruit and veg. Next week I still have fresh bananas, onions, mushrooms, potatoes and carrots to be delivered. I always used to buy anything that was on offer 3 for the price of 2 even if we didn't really need that many items. I had a habit of going to the overpriced local shop every other day "just to buy one thing" and then I ended up with a whole bag full of stuff so I've stopped doing that.

I was looking for recipes online and I remembered there was a thread on here about soup. I fancy something a bit different like maybe a Thai coconut type soup but it seems like you have to buy a lot of weird ingredients that I probably won't use again.

 

[shyvas]

You certainly are on the right track when buying basics and 2 for 3. You can get some great deals at Sainsbury's with their basic's range. Well done ! The drinks are on Moll.

What recipe did you have in mind concerning Thai style soups ? What where the weird ingredients ? Lemon grass, ginger and chili ?

 

[Moll Flanders]

I cannot stand lemongrass. I just found a recipe here on the BBC that doesn't look like it has a lot of complicated ingredients. Thai Coconut Vegetable Soup Recipe - Vegan Thai Coconut Soup Recipe - Easy Vegetarian Thai Soup Recipe I should go and look through my Appetite for Reduction too, I'm sure there were soup recipes in there. Now I am really craving soup.

 

[shyvas]

I cannot stand lemongrass. I just found a recipe here on the BBC that doesn't look like it has a lot of complicated ingredients. Thai Coconut Vegetable Soup Recipe - Vegan Thai Coconut Soup Recipe - Easy Vegetarian Thai Soup Recipe I should go and look through my Appetite for Reduction too, I'm sure there were soup recipes in there. Now I am really craving soup.

I have checked the first soup which indeed has tons of ingredients. What are the ingredients that you like and
dislike ? We can work around these and come up with a recipe that wil appeal to you.
If you don't like lemongrass you can always subsitute it with other ingredients according to the recipe.

 

[SummerRain]

I like it because I spend less money, as I said. You can see your total as it goes up and it really makes you think about what you're spending, whereas it's easy to put item after item in your trolley/cart and not think about how much it will be at the checkout. You can also search for items like a google search, much easier than trailing from aisle to aisle wondering whether dried fruit is in home baking, condiments or with the fruit (for example).

The drawbacks are that you pay for delivery, usually around £3, the delivery slots are 1 or 2 hours so you have to wait in without knowing exactly when it will be there, if something is out of stock they substitute it for something similar that you may not want (e.g. they sometimes sub my vegan meats with Quorn, which has egg) and even though you can refuse the subs, you still end up without an ingredient you wanted, and if you forget something you either have to do without or go out to a real shop again anyway.

It's become incredibly popular here, I see at least one grocery delivery a day in my road, which has about 30 houses. In the US it is probably much more difficult because one store might serve a much larger area, I bet even rural parts of the UK cannot get delivery.

Sorry I have gone a little off topic, I hope not too much since we're still talking about shopping costs

I totally agree with this. I love shopping online because I spend £15-20 less each week for two of us, because I think "I'll spend £60" and if it goes over I just take off things we don't really need or could go without for a week until it gets there. I don't mind paying for delivery - it still works out cheaper - but substitutions are annoying.

Some supermarkets substitute much more than others, for example Sainsburys (for me) can substitute 5 or 6 things in a single week! Whereas Tesco have never substituted more than 2, and often substitute nothing, and Ocado rarely substitute and if they do it's always been for very very similar items. I usually check no substitutions for anything that could be subbed with a non-vegan item when I want a vegan one. Usually these aren't "must have" items for meals, just for lunch or snacking, so it's not much bother for me and I just go without, but if I used them for main meals it would be more of a pain.

At the moment we shop half in the local co-op because the food is quiet, it's very local, cheap and has more ethical alternatives (especially fair trade and vegan toiletries) but it's much smaller than a big supermarket so there's less choice - most of the time it's not important because who needs several choices of carrots? But half the time we also shop online to get more specialist things (vegan faux meats, vegan chocolate, etc) and a bit more variety.

 

[Alex76]

it usually cost me and my husband 30 pound ( my pound sign dont work ) per week to get everything we need that including food for the cats

 

[lucky_charm]

I'm not sure... I spend between £7 and £9 a week in lidl buying bread, fruit and veg and a one or two junky items (like garlic bread, chips, crisps, popcorn or veggie sausages), and various cupboard staples but these take a long time to run out so I'm usually just getting one in any one week: pb, jam, soy sauce, BBQ sauce, pasta, rice. Every 3 weeks or so my boyfriend visits me and we go to Tesco where ill spend about £15 on various things, the same as above but often also beans, soya and almond milk, lloyds grossman pasta sauces, and sometimes vegan ice cream, chocolate sauce, rice milk chocolate, smoothies or some other treat- I usually go there instead of lidl rather than as well as.

Once in a while I go to holland and Barrett in Glasgow and pick up one or two frozen items (like chick'n burgers, quiches, pizza) but I usually get a good discount either using my vouchers, through someone I know who works there, or during the boghp sale.

I said under £10 but its probably nearer to £10-£20 when I add the occasional Tesco and H&B splurges

 

[shyvas]

I'm not sure... I spend between £7 and £9 a week in lidl buying bread, fruit and veg and a one or two junky items (like garlic bread, chips, crisps, popcorn or veggie sausages), and various cupboard staples but these take a long time to run out so I'm usually just getting one in any one week: pb, jam, soy sauce, BBQ sauce, pasta, rice. Every 3 weeks or so my boyfriend visits me and we go to Tesco where ill spend about £15 on various things, the same as above but often also beans, soya and almond milk, lloyds grossman pasta sauces, and sometimes vegan ice cream, chocolate sauce, rice milk chocolate, smoothies or some other treat- I usually go there instead of lidl rather than as well as.

Once in a while I go to holland and Barrett in Glasgow and pick up one or two frozen items (like chick'n burgers, quiches, pizza) but I usually get a good discount either using my vouchers, through someone I know who works there, or during the boghp sale.

I said under £10 but its probably nearer to £10-£20 when I add the occasional Tesco and H&B splurges

That is amazing that your Lidl's stock vegetarian food. I have quite a few stores in my area and they only
stock omnis stuff. They don't even have soya milk or cream !

 

[Danielle]

$100-$200, depends o_o;; We eat a lot of vegan alternatives, plus we need fresh veggies for the animals.