Shoping, Day 1, A hard start.

Shopping wasn't fun this morning!  I hate going to shops - Arghhh but as I cancelled our veg box scheme for the week I thought I better had,lol.  It took me two hours to spend my money and lots of that was spent adding up things with a calculator, then re-adding as I had to chop and change ingredients to get the most for my money.  Here are the results.

Sorry about the appaling picture quality, I had to use my sons toy camera as mine seems to have gone AWOL for the moment, hopefully it will turn up before tomorrow.

• 2 loaves bread - £1.50 on offer from Lidl
• 1 Large bag potatoes - £1.79 from Tesco
• 24 Frozen sausages - £2.00 from Tesco
• 6 pints milk - £1.85 from Tesco
• 1 large bag carrots - £0.76 from Tesco
• 375g bag soya mince - £1.63 from Tesco
• 1Kg pasta - £0.18 from Tesco
• 4 tins chopped tomatoes £1.32 from Tesco
• 1 large bag frozen peas - ££0.85 from Tesco
• 1 block cheese - £1.48 from Tesco
• 2 packet cereal - £1.98 from Lidl
• 10 apples - £1.20 from Tesco
• 1 large bunch bananas - £1.15 from Tesco
• 4 peppers - £1.25 from Tesco
• 1 Chorizio sausage - £1.92 reduced item from Tesco
• 4 Cornish pasties - £1.16 Reduced items from Tesco.
• 12 tomatoes - £1.50 on offer at Tesco
• 1 large pineapple - £1.00 on offer at Tesco
• 4 tins baked beans - £1.12 at Tesco
• 1 large bag frozen green beans - £0.71 from Tesco
• 1 pack value frozen prawns - £2.00 from Tesco.
• 2 cucumbers - £0.98 on offer at Lidl.
• Cereal bars - £0.99 from Lidl
• 1.5Kg Flour - £0.52 from Tesco

Total amount spent  £30.84 so I managed to come in under budget, but how far that actually goes only time will tell.  I still have £4.16  that I can spend if I need to.
I'm concerned about the lack of fruit we have, my son can polish off a bunch of bananas in two days and Daddy Troll usually only takes fruit to work with him, but I have some spare cash to do so if I need to, I also have 4 mangoes, a handful of pears and half a bag of grapes leftover from last weeks delivery which will get used in something as I certainly won't waste them.
Tomorrow I plan to cook up some pasta for their lunches, but I think I'm going to have to rely on store cupboard ingredients, especially herbs, spices and I didn't buy flour or yeast as I already have loads in the cupboard.I also have a handful of herbs growing in the garden which I shall no doubt use here and there, but nothing else growing yet.

I did check out the price for flour which is £0.52 for 1.5KG in Tesco and have added it to the budget calculations.  Yeast I buy in 125g bags for £0.99 which last FOREVER as we only make a couple of loaves a week.


Day 1 Menu

Breakfast - cereal with milk
Lunches - Cheese sandwiches, a pear, cucumber, cereal bar, water.
Dinner - Cornish pasties, potatoes, carrots, beans.

The pears came from last weeks shopping as did the cheese, but the cheese from last week has all gone now although there are still pears left.

You might also notice that I do not include any drinks in this costing, that is because non of us drink anything other than water or squash so I didn't have to buy any tea or sugar or other drinks which is helpful to the budget.  This week we will make do with just water from the tap.

I will be working this evening so only 4 dinners to make, I have taken out a pre - bought meal from the freezer to take to work with me for my dinner (which cost £1 from Iceland) and as you can see todays menu is very bland, but that is because Daddy Troll will be cooking with no assistance so I have to make sure he has easy things to cook, he has a bad habit of burning anything remotley complicated, actually he burns almost anything.

Join me tomorrow for extreme frugal day 2.