Re-think eating habits

Ginny

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Hi all,
Maybe like me you do your big shop once a week and maybe buy more milk or bread during the week when you run out. I noticed that sometimes I throw food away because it goes off and it's been driving me crazy (mainly veggies). The two options I found are good for me are to either freeze what wont be used in the next 3 days. For example if I don't want to use the whole pack of carrots in one go, I chop the rest and freeze it. Or you can also consider going out shopping twice a week. You might also re-think your eating habits (how often do you have a take-away ?), instead you could cook a big family meal and have enough left-over for the next day. You'll probably find you'll be saving money plus it'll be healthier ; )
 

Jon

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Hi all,
Maybe like me you do your big shop once a week and maybe buy more milk or bread during the week when you run out. I noticed that sometimes I throw food away because it goes off and it's been driving me crazy (mainly veggies). The two options I found are good for me are to either freeze what wont be used in the next 3 days. For example if I don't want to use the whole pack of carrots in one go, I chop the rest and freeze it. Or you can also consider going out shopping twice a week. You might also re-think your eating habits (how often do you have a take-away ?), instead you could cook a big family meal and have enough left-over for the next day. You'll probably find you'll be saving money plus it'll be healthier ; )

Fantastic post this!

I've wrote about it elsewhere but we've recently joined Costco and it's changed our shopping and eating habits dramatically.

We now do 1 monthly shop for meats + household goods and then do a very very very tesco online shop each week for the basics.

The household goods from costco tend to last us 2 months at a time and the meats last the whole month

It's saving us a fortune!

But to facilitate this we also have an American sized fridge freezer, we could have never stored as much frozen meat in our old fridge freezer.
 
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Ginny

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Thanks for the tip.
Other than eating habits I think that anyone could take a moment and look at their habits in general and re-think a lot of things.
Does your phone plan suit your needs ? Or could you be paying less ?
Do you spend money at the gym but don't go as often as you could ? In that case maybe going running is best for you ? Plus it's free !!!
You can also ask some friends to borrow kids clothes or toys they don't use anymore since you'll only need them for a few months afterall.
If there are things I would like to buy for myself or my son I sometimes think well there's a birthday coming up, maybe i could put that on a list and ask my parents to get it. They'll probably even ask you for ideas anyway.
A lot of options are available to you and you can still enjoy life it's just a matter of organising and planning really.
 

Jon

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Thanks for the tip.
Other than eating habits I think that anyone could take a moment and look at their habits in general and re-think a lot of things.
Does your phone plan suit your needs ? Or could you be paying less ?
Do you spend money at the gym but don't go as often as you could ? In that case maybe going running is best for you ? Plus it's free !!!
You can also ask some friends to borrow kids clothes or toys they don't use anymore since you'll only need them for a few months afterall.
If there are things I would like to buy for myself or my son I sometimes think well there's a birthday coming up, maybe i could put that on a list and ask my parents to get it. They'll probably even ask you for ideas anyway.
A lot of options are available to you and you can still enjoy life it's just a matter of organising and planning really.
I agree

I think there are always areas of your life you can look at and see where you can make improvements.

I've just negotiated my gym membership down to £41 a month from £47 and I always play the usual 'playing them off against each other' when it comes to renewing home / car insurance...
 

Deborah Walker

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When I became a student in 2014 our financial situation changed dramatically. I had gone from a decent part-time wage to a really shocking bursary. I had been given what I thought was some great financial advice regarding tax credits and what I was entitled to. It turned out it was all a load of crock and eventually we found ourselves in a financial mess.

It taught me how to be more savvy with our money and basically to live off of my husbands wage.

Our shopping habits now are about £200 a month for 2 adults and a child. That's food and household products.
I buy all my meat from musclefood which usually works out about £80 that's the budget but sometimes good deals make it less then we do a weekly shop of £20 at aldi to pick up fresh fruit, oh lunches for work and what's left usually gets laundry products, toiletries etc.

I've found shopping in home bargains an absolute god send I can pick up bold washing liquid about 80 odd washes for £8 and fabric softner for £4 and that will last us the month or slightly longer.
 
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Kitch

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I'm newly married and newly cooking for my husband who will eat a portion for 5 people. So I've found Lidl really handy to buy meat and veg etc. They're super cheap for the majority of things. Most importantly, I plan what to cook each day and write it down (and our lunches) so I know I have the right ingredients and don't buy over and above what we need.

When we first started out, it was a little expensive buying core ingredients, but now that we're settled - I can make a meal with pretty much everything already in stock, minus the meat or whatever.
 
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I also hate throwing food away. We've invested in a second freezer which we keep in the garage. It means we've got tons of space to store any leftovers.

I also agree with freezing veggies, we'll often bulk buy when things are on offer, then chop and freeze for later use.

Using leftovers for lunches the next day is a great way to stop my husband from eating junk at work! Ay least I know he's getting something healthy. ;-)
 
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MamaMidwife

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Great post! We do 1 weekly big shop which suits us. When I'm on shifts we need to be a bit more flexible with when we do our shopping etc
I think it really is a lifestyle thing, our income dropped hugely when I became a student, so as a result we learnt to drop our outgoings and look for deals on things, rather than accepting things out of convenience. Like my phone contract. I was paying £40 a month for iPhone 6, that ran out in December last year so rather than upgrade I scouted around. I didn't need an iPhone 6 so switched for an iPhone 5 with EE £20/month + NHS discount which took it down to £17 a month... significantly reduced from 40!

It's like you get a savings bug (or at least I have!) and want to find the best deals you then can on everything!
 
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Ridefeather

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I'm newly married and newly cooking for my husband who will eat a portion for 5 people. So I've found Lidl really handy to buy meat and veg etc. They're super cheap for the majority of things. Most importantly, I plan what to cook each day and write it down (and our lunches) so I know I have the right ingredients and don't buy over and above what we need.

When we first started out, it was a little expensive buying core ingredients, but now that we're settled - I can make a meal with pretty much everything already in stock, minus the meat or whatever.
Lidl is always one for us, couldn't go without it! You can get 224 rolls of toilet paper for £15 of amazon! Worth looking into buying toiletries in bulk
 
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I'm lucky that I live across the road from Sainsbury's so I pretty much shop every day. I buy what we need and hardly ever waste anything.
 

HeatherP96

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Buying meat in bulk is a great idea. We tend to go to the market where they do fantastic deals on a whole array of meats. They have special offers for Christmas and Easter so you can feed a family of 6 for about £40 with plenty of leftovers which will last you a while. In general, we do a big bulk buy of meat, freeze it, then we're sorted for the month. Far cheaper than the packets of meat you get in the supermarket and of course you can have a go at haggling the price down ;)

http://www.burymarket.com/
 

homie

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Lidl and Aldi aren't always cheaper for everything. Don't assume you are saving money just because something has a blue and yellow logo on it.

It's really penny pinchy but when I was out of work earlier in the year I made a list of what was cheaper in Lidl and what was cheaper in Tesco and it was about 50/50. One thing I have noticed in recent months though is Tesco are cutting back their value range. They've lost a few sales to Lidle from me due to that. Always found Sainsbury to be quite expensive and only use them when they send me vouchers.

Local farm shops are often cheaper for season stuff they grow themselves. (But not anything they have to buy in)
 

homie

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btw, anyone ever thought about keeping animals for eggs/meat/dairy? Or is that a bit too Good Life?
 

RickyRaj

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I have a mini freezer (due to lack of space) in addition to my main freezer which I use to store leftovers or discounted ready meals from the reduced section in supermarkets. To use up veg , meat or seafood I sometimes make one pot dishes such as omelettes, biryani's, pastas, curries, pilaf's, stews, soups and more. Once cooked again they can be frozen (not frozen an omelette yet) or kept in the fridge (which is good for 2 days in my experience if cooked from fresh).

When time permits I try and make things in bulk and again freeze what I can't use immediately.
 

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