help with budget tips

[MyL&S]

Just reading some of the recently post about money and how much everyone spends on there weekly/ fortnightly food bill and id thought id ask if there are any tips or ideas on how to keep to a budget? I spend $200 a fortnight on food for 3 people, i really want to cut this down, i mostly shop at woolies.. any suggestions

[BJelly]

Wow $200 a fortnight is pretty good - we spend $120 - $170 a week on groceries.

I think you could teach me a thing or two. Do you eat out much? We probably eat out or get take away once a week on top of what we spend on groceries.

[MyL&S]

Maybe once a fortnight i get take away, once a week we have a big cook up and i cook cakes and snack for us but really think 200 is too much for 3 people whan my hubby is at work most of the time..

[Rell]

We spend about $350 - $400 a month on groceries (excluding nappies)
Here are some of my tips
Buy no name products
Make your own sauces, biskets, cakes etc
Work out a weekly menu and stick to it (saves buying extra food )
Find a good butcher - most times they are cheaper than the supermarkets
Buy fruit and veg from a green grocer (again cheaper)
Plan meals around what is on special that week

[Chickadee]

Yep, we're up in the $120 to $150 per week range for groceries too for 2 adults and 1 toddler. That includes formula & diapers but we will often buy lunches separately :(

I do know that my bill goes up whenever I purchase a lot of pre-prepared foods. Tomato sauce is more expensive than a tin of tomatoes and fresh veg to add to it. Chicken thighs and breadcrumbs are cheaper than a box of frozen chicken fingers. I try to cook from scratch whenever possible and use my own seasonings instead of flavour packets or rice/noodle flavoured packages. Alot of those packets are mostly salt anyways.

I try to buy in bulk when I see a sale of things we usually use, and keep a stocked pantry that way. I may buy $60 of coffee in one go and have it in the pantry for months, but if it's $5 off each one it's worth it. Bread on sale because it's near the best before date can be put in the fridge or freezer to extend it's life. Same with packages of meat which may be reduced for quick sale near the end of the day.

[jamb]

Can't help either, we are $150-$170 a week for food, nappies extra. I figure if you want to eat healthy and fresh then thats just what it costs. I've tried all differnt combo's- just woolies, as well as butcher, grocer and supermarket- it doesnt seem to make much difference :o

[Briannabear]

We spend the same - about $150-180 per week on groceries. We are wheat intolerant so it makes everything very expensive. We cant buy most no name brand products. :p
Because of the wheat it makes it hard to get take-away so I guess we save money there. :o

[wattle]

I have found a really good fruit and vegie place that's quite a bit cheaper than the supermarket, and heaps better quality, so I go there once a week. I go to the supermarket every 10 days or so, and I go to the butchers for meat.

It's a bit of extra running around but I reckon it saves us about $50 a week at least.

We eat quite a few more cheaper cuts of meat now that I'm home more, and have more time to cook them (lamb shanks etc..... yum) and hubby loves pasta so that's economical.

I find dairy foods expensive though - milk, yoghurt, cheese. ds has just started on yoghurt and is in heaven! I think I might have to buy a yoghurt machine.

Anyway I'm not sure what I spend each week on groceries - maybe $120 for 3 of us. :confused:

[MyL&S]

i was going to but a yogurt machine from k-mart the other day i think it costs $20 but wasn't sure to buy it, maybe my boy wouldn't like it!
i spends around $10 on custards and yogurts for him a fortnight.. Has anyone try the machine out?

[Refresh]

Heehee, yep we spend at least $150 per week as well!

So it seems like you , Aliciamaree are already the thriftiest shopper around! I think you should be teaching the rest of us a thing or 2! :D

[shanz]

where possible buy in bulk, you will save heaps.Its just me and DP for now and we spend around $400 a month on groceries,meat and vege. and we eat very good. Rump and scotch eye fillet,we buy these whole in bulk,around $50 for a rump and we will get about 25 meals out of it. we pay around $5.50 per kilo where as if you buy it pre packaged you will pay $10-$12 a kilo. It really is amazing. And you can slice it the way you want. We get a huge 15kg washing powder from k mart when they have 15% off and the one i am using now was started at the beginning of april and i would say that doing an average of 3-4 loads per week it may run out by this time next year. So that will be $35 for 18 months worth of washing powder!!!thats all for now.

[Rell]

Yes I have an "Easy Yo" yogurt maker and I find it great. You will save about $1 a kilo with it so if you eat yogurt a lot it is worth it. I also like that I never run out of yogurt as there is always some in our pantry.
One more thing it is a lot better as it contains No colours or flavours( if you by the plain), you can just add what ever fresh fruit you like or eat it plain.

[mumof2girls]

We usually stock up on things when they are on sale and work our budget around that, we also shop late on a sat/sun as everything is marked down and hardly anyone around. We also have a green grocer that is really cheap, we pay $4.00 for 10 kg of potatoes (which we can't eat so we share them around with my mum and friends etc so it is quite cheap to do it this way as well. We also do a bake on sat/sun with biscuits, cakes etc enough for the week so we don't have to buy these things. Hope this helps :)

[MyL&S]

thanks for the tips :)

[ThomasMum]

We used to get our groceries from Coles, and lately we go to Woollies instead we reckon Wollies prices are cheaper than Coles...no flyerbuyer points tho...

[Baby Girl]

We only spend about $150 a fortnight on groceries (not including nappies for both girls and formula) for 2 adults and a toddler but we always have an extra 1 or 2 people almost every night for dinner.

We basically have a pretty set menu most weeks with the occasional variation.

We buy our fruit, veg and seafood from the markets (DP works there). We spend about $20/fortnight (included in my $150).

I don't do little trips to the shop to get one or two things between shops (except fresh milk). You seem to spend $50 without even trying!!

I cook a lot of cakes, biscuits, muffins and things like that but if you make them from scratch rather than buy packet mixes you do save money.

I also try not to buy things like washing powder, dishwashing detergent, shampoo, toothpaste, deodorant etc all in the same shop, it blows the weekly budget.

Other than that i don't look for things on special or buy no name or home brand unless that is what I have always used, I am pretty brand loyal. And we very rarely eat take away. DP can cook Asian food and I can cook Italian and if all else fails we have a BBQ and that way we both cook!!