April Austerity - Last Leg

I still had quite a few bits and pieces left yesterday, so they all went in the slow cooker: mince turkey, a pepper, a courgette, ¾ of a red onion, the tin of red kidney beans, the jar of Everyday Value pasta sauce and some vegetable stock and mixed herbs.  I made four portions and I think it  was about 90p a portion.  With the free pasta from the Orchard Programme and left over broccoli, this was a pretty tasty dish, with plenty left over!

I needed bread and found this in Tosca.  Several days later, it's still fine in the kitchen - absolutely fine!  It does make you wonder why one loaf lasts and lasts and then another one is green and gross within a couple of days.

Anyway, tomorrow I can come off the 'diet'.  Will I?  Well, yes and no.  I am certainly going to keep my shopping costs down, but I am looking forward to having some 'nicer' extras backin my  diet.  And then there is the small matter of the Food Bank shop.  I've saved approximately £60 this month and Tosca have oblidged by sending me a £10 voucher, for a £70 spend.  Ahhhh, they must have been missing me ;p

So you know what I am going to do...I'll put my shop in full price at £70, wait for it to drop half price, add £1 delivery and then deduct the £10 voucher.  £70 for £26.  I think that will make quite a nice donation :D

April Austerity - Tales of Tosca!

Oh Tosca, you are so inept!  I'll get back to that in a minute, but a quick update that this weeks austerity shop actually only came to £7.61 as they didn't bring the bread that I wanted, so I still have enough for some milk next week - but I won't need to buy any more of that because Tosca are total twits...

My shop this week - including stuff for next month's cupboard and the freezer - should have cost me £27.95.  It came to £21.95, because of my wombled voucher, plus a few other coupons that I had.  The delivery was 15 minutes late, so I rang and moaned - £3.50 refund.  Result.  Then just as I was unpacking the delivery driver pitched up again with some of my shopping - I didn't think anything of it, until I got everything out:

Two legs of lamb (free range - on deal + coupon:  I always get some lamb when going to see mum, as it's her favourite: that's the next two trips sorted then!)

Two pots of plain yogurt

Two lots of pate

Two lots of lettuce

Four pots of houmous 

Four lots of Philidelphia Cheese

Yes - they'd doubled up my order.  I rang them; I keep the stuff and I haven't been charged. That's £14.73 worth of free food.  Now I am waiting for my £5 vouher for spending over £20 and to see if I have any money back on their Price Promise.

So um...yes, in terms of this month, I have a truck load of milk and lettuce, two tubs of houmous and philly... I can't get anything else in my freezer and I'll be spending next to nothing next month too.  It's a shame they didn't double up on the tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, courgettes :D

My doubles - the others were already packed away.

I love Tosca!

April Austerity - Chocolate Chomping Cheat

Ok, so Sunday 13th looms on the horizon and I am almost at the half way point of this little experiment, so I thought I'd try and sum up the progress so far and work out 'where I am' - yes, at home on the sofa, with a cup of tea and the cat.

You're probably wondering about the chocolate chomping.  Well, I haven't and that is an odd thing.  As far as I was concerned, chocolate was one of my five a day and this had been the case for most of my life.  When I was recovering from heart failure as an infant, the first thing anyone could get me to eat was a plain chocolate digestive.  At this point the medical team and my mum were less concerned about what I was eating, they were just relieved I was eating!  The dye was cast and plain chocolate has been my default setting ever since.  But on the 1st April it all changed; I haven't had any chocolate this month and the really odd thing is, I haven't missed it.  If you'd told me to give up chocolate for Lent, charity, a week, 24 hours, I'd probably have laughed at you and told you were to go and how to get there.  I have chocolate tucked away in Narnia (large cupboard under the stairs).  I have been into the cupboard, seen it and not touched it.  It's not bothered me.  What does that say about cravings for sweets/mind over matter/addiction/want vs need?

So, no, I haven't cheated on the chocolate front, but I am going to cheat the next time I go shopping.  It's back to the Wombles again.  On my way back to my car, outside Tosca in Egham I saw this on the ground --->

  

Considering I am down to just over £6 for the rest of the month, this may well save my bacon.  I drove home dreaming of knocked down apples and avocado.  So, is this 'cheating'? If I was genuinely this broke, I could still have picked up this receipt.  You'd be surprised how often people abandon these on the car park floor!  If I found a fiver, I'd pick it up; I'd be mad not to.  

Feeling like I've won the lottery tonight...

April Austerity - Food Forecast

What's on the Menu?

So this is what it boils down to; can someone live (not just scrape by) on £1.50 of food in a day?

Breakfast!

Porridge - made with the following:
40g oats (serving is 50g) 3p
25g sultanas  - 4p
100mls water                  
100mls milk - 4p
Total - 11p

Calories: 279
Fat:         4.4g
Sugar:     23.2g
Salt:        Trace




Based on this, I think I'll be increasing the oats to 50g and reducing the sultanas to 20g!


Lunch!

Mission Herb Wrap: - 6.25p
Tosca Everyday Mayo: -1p
Lettuce: - 4p
Cucumber: -5p
Carrot: -4p
apple: -31p
Total: -51p


Calories: 313
Fat: 8.7g
Sugar: 20.2g
Salt: 1.2g



I haven't worked out the calorie content etc. of the veggies as they would be negligible!  The wraps are now off deal and I haven't found any more coupons to replace them - clearly, I'm now hunting for vouchers for next month!

Dinner!

I had this last night and owing to not wanting to waste anything, it looks like tonight's dinner and tomorrow's lunch as well :S

Panebello Pizza - Free - I won it!
(whole costs £2.50 - ⅓ = 83p)
Lettuce: - 4p
Cucumber: - 5p
Carrot: -4p
Onion: -1p
Tosca Everyday Mayo: - 1p
Total: - 15p


Calories: 347
Fat: 13.7g
Sugar: 3.5g
Salt: 1.62g

This would have cost me 98p, had I had to buy the pizza.  Half a pizza is a portion; this was divided into three.  The cost would increase again. 

Teabags and Milk allowance - 15p

My Daily Food Spend 
- with the free pizza  - 77p 
- 'paying' for ⅓ pizza - £1.60
- 'paying' for serving of ½ a pizza  - £1.87

Daily Consumption:

Calories:  939
Fat:          26.8g
Sugar:     26.9g
Salt:        2.82g

I'll probably have a couple of those ginger nuts this evening, but which ever way you cut it, there is not enough food on the plate to sustain most adults, on the available £1.50.  I won't do this mathematical working out every day; it's taken too long and it's tedious to read, but I will once a week, on a random day work it all out. 

My weight was 46.4kg this morning.  Harefield likes me to be 45kg and they advocate a lowER calorie, lowER fat, lowER sugar, lowER salt diet.  This selection ticks that box, even if the sugar percentage is high.  I sense this weight coming off fairly quickly.  If it drops too low, then I may have to abandon the fruit/veg in favour of keeping my weight stable - just as the government FINALLY catches onto the idea that the English really, really don't eat enough of the healthy stuff!!

April Austerity - Wimbledon Wombling

Ok, so I don't live in Wimbledon, but surely you remember the philosophy of those chaps?  They picked up rubbish other people left behind; this afternoon, I picked up a Tosca Price Promise.  There it was, all £1.42 of it.  It was left in the floor.  Someone's 'chucked away' very valuable money! It paid (almost) for 1.3kg of frozen veg and a huge courgette.  I contributed 12p.  I'm quite prepared to stoop to cheap tricks to come in under £45 - although Freeganism may be one step too far!

I've priced up the remaining odds and ends in the fridge - 3 apples, ½ a cucumber, ⅓ of a lettuce, 3 eggs, ⅓ jar pesto, and a large carrot.  I also grabbed milk (95p), 13g of mixed herbs (49p) and 4 garlic bulbs (59p).  So the total spend now stands at £29.54, leaving me with about £5 a week!  eep!!  That probably doesn't sound a lot, but if you scroll back over the last ten days, then you'll see a lot of stuff has already been squirrelled away.  

I said before I think I *could do this, but it has been nearly two weeks in planning - and it could still go wrong.  I can't imagine having to think like this ALL the time, just to survive.

April Austerity - Preparation Problems

Whose daft idea was this anyway?  £45 is a miserly amount of money for a month's worth of food, even though I am a scratch under 5ft and weigh 7st 4.   

After spending forever on price comparison sites, it has become abundantly clear that being broke means being canny, organised and it's a full time job sourcing food at a reasonable price.   I've become obsessed with the changing prices between Asbo and Tosca.  I am annoyed that Aldee doesn't put all it's prices online.  Why don't Moccasins run a nationwide delivery service?  But, be careful; their cheap range bread is a lot more expensive than Aldee and Tosca!  Well, it was when I checked last night...

I haven't even started the month and I am very much aware that to eat this cheap, you really should be growing your own vegetables.  I have neither the strength, nor the health to do this.  So, what can I do to make sure I am not starving by day 19?  I'm organising my cupboard, fridge and freezer.  I've decided that I'll allow myself salt and pepper as 'freebies'; I have enough to last a lifetime and if I lost all my money/income overnight, I'd still have that in the cupboard.  

I'm lucky, I have three other freebies at my disposal - ½ a pack of Manchego cheese and ¾ of a pack of pasta (I belong to Tosca's 'Orchard' Scheme and get sent vouchers to try and review products); I also won a pizza in a competition.  If you are having to be more than thrifty, you can still enter competitions and go to the library to take part in reviews online.  You can also take advantage of reward schemes and use their appropriate vouchers that come in the post - thank you Tosca Clubcard.  Is this cheating?  No, this is being a savvy shopper - collecting coupons and then using them against a deal.  Two packs of Mission Wraps (£2.00 each = £4.00, but they were on offer - 2 for £2.00) may have been out of my price range for April, but Tosca obliged and sent me two 50p coupons - 16 wraps for £1.00, is acceptable (better than the original start price of £4.00!!)

I've priced up some of the odds and ends in my cupboard and fridge freezer that can contribute.  If it's less than a packet, I have worked out the price based on the percentage.    Living with very careful account balancing, you don't throw everything away at the end of the month and start again with £45 - you use up everything.   If I run out of something and need to replace it, then the cost has to come out of the money that remains.  I hope this seems fair; it's more in line with normal living.  After all, we all have some daily, weekly, fortnightly, monthly costs in a rolling fashion.

These are the items hanging about at home at the moment that can go towards April - the cost of the goods will be deducted from the monthly sum of £45.  TEV stands for Tosca Everyday Value.

£0.89 - Tosca Coffee (I weighed my morning coffee: 2g.  200g jar - £2.98: 2.98/200x60=89.4p

£0.99 - TEV Honey

£0.75 - TEV Oats 1kg

£0.18 - TEV Self Raising Flour (600g out of 1.5kg, 45p bag)

£0.60 - TEV Sultanas (355g from 500g, 84p)

£0.24 - TEV Baked Beans 

£0.30 - TEV Kidney Beans

£0.68 - 2x TEV Tinned Tomatoes    

£0.35 - TEV Peaches in juice 

£0.63 - 5 flatbreads out of pack 6 (reduced - 75p)

£1.00 - 2x8 pack Mission Herb Wraps (buy 2 for £2 + £1 coupon!) 

£0.49 - 620g Tate & Lyle Sugar from 5kg £3.99 bag

£0.31 - TEV 1kg Long Grain Rice 770g out of 1kg, 40p bag

£1.37 - New Potatoes

£0.88 - 125g Seriously Strong Cheddar Ctr (50p coupon - in freezer)

£0.75 - TE Salad Cheese (in Freezer)

£1.49 - Mince Turkey (in freezer)

£0.20 - TEV ½ jar Mayonnaise

£0.34 - 26g of Boullion Vegetable Stock, from 150g at £2.00

£0.33 - 56g Chicken Bisto from 500g tub at £2.99

£0.00 - Pizza won in comp (Free)

£0.00 - 80g Manchego Cheese (Free Coupon)

£0.00 - Tosca Finest Pasta (Free Coupon)

£12.97 - Total Spend

£32.03 - Remaining (eep)