How much do you spend on food a week?

[[FnG]magnolia]

We've started using online delivery for our weekday evening meals. Enjoying it so far and it's good fun serving up menus I wouldn't normally produce. That's probably around 70 or 80 pounds or so for 5 meals. We then have breakfast, lunches and the odd takeaway plus basics (fruit, veg, milk, cheese, booze) so maybe another $200/100-ish pounds a week?

That's two adults and two kids aged 2 - 7 years old.

 

[Glaucus]

• Where do you shop Ocado, Sainsbury, ASDA, Tesco
• How often do you shop - weekly shop at ocado, + extras from other shops
• Do you buy lots of name-brand products, no, but I do try and buy high welfare, unmolested food(cant think of a better word, so no preservatives, sugar or anything else which wouldn't be in a home made version)
• Do you make a list for the week or just browse whatever takes your fancy - have a general idea. But don't have it set per day, as it depends how I feel to what I want to eat.
• Do you cook from scratch, or do you buy a lot of ready meals / processed foods like pre-prepared sauces / instant rice. mainly scratch but I do like Direct mash parsnip and carrot mash, and I like buying butternut noodles from Sainsbury and cauliflower cous cous from Tesco, but they're just cut up rather than processed.
• Do you buy a lot of meat yep and try and keep it high welfare, but can't always
  Does a lot of that spend go on lunch time 'meal deals' and coffee shops
  - nope but about 1.5 takeaways a week, but I keep trying to cut that down as it always sounds amazing and then always disappointed by how rubbish it is,

It's a combination of a takeaway, high quality stuff and actually knowing how much I spend. A lot if these £20 a week are well just deluded, unless they just sit and eat rice every meal.

 

[cheesyboy]

About £90-£110 per week for 2 adults, 2 kids (age 6, 2.5). Excludes eating out.

 

[The IPB]

Same as above, wife 2 kids + dog.

Generally £90, but can creep up higher.

We shop at Tescos online and do it weekly.

 

[McGray]

£30 - £35 for a week for me. Includes veg, meat & fish.

Wife buys her own food as she's veggie.

 

[suenstar]

I probably spend in the region of £40 per week at supermarkets (Tesco, Asda, Iceland).
I don't buy alcohol so that saves me a good chunk of money, things like coffee and sugar are picked up from wholesale stores so I get a large unbranded pack which'll last me 5-6 months.
Things like herbs and some vegetables (tomatoes, onions, peppers & peas) I grow in the garden, so that also cuts down on costs a bit as well.

Every now and then I might get some meat from the butcher, usually if I want lamb for a Sunday roast so that'll add an extra £8 to that week's shopping.

 

[smokedog]

I must spend close to £100 a week. I don't do much food shopping. Most of the expense is due to breakfast/lunch at work, at least £10/day.

 

[thep02]

£70/80 p/w for me and my kids who both eat here frequently though aren't resident.

 

[SPG]

About £25 a week (for one) and every 4th week a little more where I go to a big supermarket for stuff you cant get in Aldi.

Overnight oats 5days a week (oats, blueberries/strawberry, Yoghurt, Almond milk)
Lunch is a nutriblast (spinach/kale, fruit) 6 days a week.

Dinner is a hotch pot of whatever else I bought, jacket spud, Omelette, Butter beans, Fish on a Friday.

 

[dirtychinchilla]

My girlfriend and I spend about £60 on food shopping a week, and then maybe £20 additionally for random stuff. Probably more than we should, but we budget for it.

 

[NotAGolf]

This is what we're having for the week (two people)....

Thanks, that's really helpful. I think lunches are my downfall, they're all homemade but are basically another dinner so aren't particularly cheap. I would love to have soup for lunch but there's no way it would fill me up.

I'm not in the £100 club, but thought I'd comment since you took the time for me...

• Where do you shop.
  Almost exclusively at Tescos
• How often do you shop - once a week / once a day.
  We do a big shop once every 2/3 weeks (we freeze a lot of stuff), and top up with fresh ingredients where needed maybe twice a week.
• Do you buy lots of name-brand products
  Rarely. Nearly always tesco's own brand unless they don't do it. Get the odd thing from the value range, but again this is rare.
• Do you make a list for the week or just browse whatever takes your fancy
  I hate food shopping, and I'm so incredibly sad that I created a program that gives lists all my recipes that we pick from, then will work out all the necessary ingredients which I just paste into the online shopping list. This has the added bonus of a ready made meal plan, and ordering the meals in terms of expected shelf life so things don't go out of date. Very military but it's saved sooooo much time in the long run.
• Do you cook from scratch, or do you buy a lot of ready meals / processed foods like pre-prepared sauces / instant rice
  95% of the time from scratch. We never have ready meals but sometimes use ready made sauces/spice mixes, especially curry pastes.
• Do you buy a lot of meat
  Yes, mainly chicken and beef mince. Don't mind the cheap stuff though (yes I'm a terrible person)
• Does a lot of that spend go on lunch time 'meal deals' and coffee shops
  Nothing. Always home made lunches and I don't drink anything other than water or home made smoothies.

Just doing a bit of research - any input would be really appreciated.

 

[Cleisthenes]

3 adults, £120 a week plus lunches

 

[Amraam]

The girlfriend and I put £25 each into a joint account for food per week. I then spend about the same on food at work as I'm too lazy to make my own bait the night before.

 

[kaptainmarc]

2 adults normally spend £50 a week on shopping and then 1 takeaway/eating out per week

but it does vary quite a lot and we can be very wasteful cooking too much or stuff going out of date. we are trying to plan our meals better lately

 

[yer_averagejoe]

£60/week on the main shop, plus £5/week on bulk chicken we buy roughly every 10 weeks. Then I usually spend an extra £10-ish on lunch extras during the week. We'll also get a cheap pub meal now and then so I'll throw another £10 on top per week to bring the total to:

£85 a week.

Could cut it down, but we've not really got much need to since we take home a decent amount at the end of the day.

Food prices seem to have crept up a lot over the past 5 years, too. We'd be half that 5 years ago, easy.

 

[topgun06]

£30 quid a day, that's booze, fags and food.
It goes to waste in our house, so we don't big shop.

£30 per DAY!

 

[joelk2]

£80 a week on the "big shop" and then bread/milk etc throughout the week. to be honest id like to reduce that.

 

[Mark A]

I would love to have soup for lunch but there's no way it would fill me up.
.

That's what bread is for .

 

[Irish_Tom]

It's a combination of a takeaway, high quality stuff and actually knowing how much I spend. A lot if these £20 a week are well just deluded, unless they just sit and eat rice every meal.

Thanks for filling that out Glaucus. I think paying a bit extra for quality meat, especially if it's farm assured / organic makes a lot of sense. We only really have meat at the weekend so we try to go to the butcher or get the farm assured stuff.

I think it's things like branded tinned tomatoes that can really add up on a food bill, but have no discernible difference to the value stuff.

Thanks, that's really helpful. I think lunches are my downfall, they're all homemade but are basically another dinner so aren't particularly cheap. I would love to have soup for lunch but there's no way it would fill me up.

I'm not in the £100 club, but thought I'd comment since you took the time for me...

Thanks for filling it out as well mpledge - if you're making full-on meals for lunch as well I can imagine that adds to the bill considerably (and the time to cook it all).

I know you say soup won't fill you up but I'd definitely give it a try - you'd be surprised how filling soup can be. In the summer we change to salad which is even less volume, but I guess people have different appetites.

By the sounds of it, you're doing a lot right with the planning and home-cooking, so doubling our food bill seems a bit steep.

 

[clockwork.satan]

I spend between £8-10 per week on lunch food and probably £20-£30 for supplies for dinner/weekend snacks.