My food budget and diet assessment: Focusing on variation vs costs!

Recently I have seen our weekly food bill double (if not more) and it didn’t feel like we had more food in the house. I know with the economy at the moment people have complained about the prices of food and household items going up but because I bought a lot of fresh, un packaged goods such as loose fruit and vegetables I thought I had escaped! I also put this increase in our food costs down to the fact that, due to reading so many health blogs, I have become very aware of the quality of food I was buying. Sure I can spend £25 a week on a food shop and we’ll live off  basics tomato soup, pastas and casseroles but was I making everything nutritionally balanced? Was the cheapest product on the shelf, for example bread, actually full of sugar/ salt etc where as the loaf that is 50p more is much better for you.

So I’ve gone from being a cost scruteniser to a label reader and it may be costing us more but I feel like I am making a difference. I read a quote by Martin Lewis (Money Supermarket Expert) who said “Don’t ask “What’s the cheapest way to get all the goodies I want?”. Instead ask “On my £XYZ budget, what’s the best value I can get with it?”“. I really agree and I realised that when doing my food shop I have been buying some organic produce or better quality where it is important but now I need to assess if there is anything I am buying which I don’t need OR do I need to re-adjust my budget to make sure we are eating the best foods for our bodies.

I’ve also recently been very keen to add more variety to our diet and to take in as many different fruits and vegetables each day as possible. I’ve always had a good balanced lunch of salads or soups made from vegetables and grains etc so I haven’t changed this. For evening meals I have just been making sure to vary the dishes each day and use as many different coloured vegetables as I can each meal. It sounds strange but I used to be very anti variation, I felt it was a waste of time adding extra fruits to things like cereal when I could just chop up a banana which only cost me 10p. I thought an apple and a banana every day would do the trick, but the more I learn and the better I feel I think it’s safe to say that I now want as many fruits as I can afford chopped up on that cereal!

Saying that, breakfast was my weakest meal of the day (even though it was my favourite) so here is how I have been trying to change it -

Breakfast:
Before – Porridge made with water and a handful of dried cranberries mixed in – cheap as chips but bland and not much variety, fibre from the oats though!
Now – Overnight porridge oats made with soya milk, bananas, strawberries, flax seeds and cinnamon – calcium, potassium, vitamin c, magnesium and more.

Before – Fruit Juice – vitamins (depending on the juice)
Now – Smoothie with coconut water, greens and berries – Iron, fiber, vitamins, calcium, riboflavin etc

Before – Fried Egg Sandwich with butter and ketchup
Now – Fried Egg wrap with mushrooms, tomatoes and spinach or scrambled eggs with various toppings

Even Scott has been changing his breakfasts as we both started to feel better for our healthier start to the day. Instead of having a few slices of toast and butter Scott now has a smoothie before work, then he has muesli with yoghurt later on in the morning.

It may physically be more food than we were eating before but it is better quality meals which are more exciting than before. Also I have noticed a big difference in my day from having a better breakfast, I’m not hungry untill much later in the day and I have more energy!

So now to look again at my food budget, I do not want to stop buying all of these lovely fruit and vegetables which are enhancing our diet so instead I have started shopping at the market on a weekly basis. I take along £5- £10 and see what I can get for my money. This is much cheaper than buying at the supermarket, also you get bigger quantities of the produce at the market so often what I buy will last us the whole week.

I have increased the amount I allow myself to spend at the super market on other items but I try to balance buying cheap items such as porridge oats with more expensive items like organic bread. That way your food shop is more under control and will not be too expensive. My weekly budget has gone from £25 to £40 and I have adjusted my “takeaway/ pub” budget accordingly! I know my priorities

If you want to see more tips on cooking within a budget then why not check out the guest post I did over at Foodies 100 – “A Round up of 5 brilliant budget cooking blogs”.

Unicorn- Manchester’s Vegan/ Organic grocery store

I went to visit friends up in Manchester at the weekend and they took me to a Vegetarian supermarket (they know me so well!!). I found the whole shop inspiring and I hope to find something like this back home! I wanted to share some of the lovely things about this shop and the message they are spreading to their customers Now I’m not saying everyone should fly over and visit this shop but I think if everyone thought more about where their food comes from, what fresh produce are available and of course how to cook them, then issues such as obesity and money management would be helped a little bit!

My big purchase of the day was a pack of plain firm tofu (I can only get the silken “fall apart as soon as you touch it” type in my local supermarket) and also some basil flavoured tofu! They’re in the freezer for now but I’m excited as these ingredients are going to kick-start a new weekly feature I plan to do in the new year! I shall reveal more nearer the time!

The first thing that caught my eye was this map on the wall – it showed where all the vegetables in the store had come from that week! A really lovely idea and although I think the prices were a little bit more than in your normal supermarket it was really interesting to understand where farms are and where the produce comes from around the country. support for local farmers is always a welcome idea  

I think this next photo is an idea that most people are coming around too and is becoming more popular – recycling! Not just putting things in your recycling bin ready for collection but actually keeping things and re-using them around your home. I was really happy to see this idea and I think it could easily be transferred to other deli’s/ grocery shops.

The next thing I saw which inspired me was the “ready meal” section! I’m a sucker for a good pie and I loved the fact that all of theirs were gluten free, organic and vegetarian! Nice looking flavours too! New years resolution – learn to make gluten free pastry (any tips welcome please!)

Ok so the next photo I took was of their Policies board, a good clear message to the customers about what the store represents and why everyone should feel good about shopping there! These are ideas I have found quite a few companies following now (off the top of my head the last company I felt followed these principles also was Rubies in the Rubble- chutney makers)

Here are a few more photos from my visit:

 

Do you have a local supermarket/ Grocery store which is trying to make a difference?

Why waste when you can taste?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2062078/Householders-throw-20-cent-food-buy-costing-12-billion.html

Every now and then I see an article or a story that simply insists I voice an opinion on it and post a non recipe blog post! Well ta da here is a fine example of such time! The government have guessed we are throwing away too much food and I think they are probably very accurate! I am guilty of throwing away food because I wasn’t sure if it was ok to eat or I wasn’t sure if I’d use it but I haven’t done this in recent times. I’ve been very conscious of only buying what I need (see my earlier post about creating a shopping list of exact ingredients and also buying loose fruit and veg so that you buy the correct quantities -http://veghotpot.wordpress.com/2011/10/21/surviving-the-supermarket/), using everything I buy, freezing leftovers and being creative with scraps!

I read this blog http://throughafternoontea.wordpress.com/2011/11/13/waste-not-want-not/ and It inspired me to be much less wasteful and to think about some advice and ideas we can all follow to waste less food. So here are a few pointers which I will be trying to follow and it may inspire some other people to do the same

• Do you really need to peel your veg? I don’t think I’ve peeled a potato, carrot, parsnip for months unless it had been in the fridge too long and the skin really was just too tough! Give your vegetables a good scrub under the tap and then keep all that goodness intact. I even leave the skin on for my mash now and I haven’t had any complaints.

 

• Has your bread gone stale? Don’t like crusts? Why not keep all the ends of the loaf, slightly stale slices, crusts and pop it in a blender then in a freezer bag and freeze until you next need fresh breadcrumbs! Great for burgers, topping on a bake etc.

 

•  Has your fruit gone a bit brown? Pop it in a pan with a splash of water and some sugar and stew it. Let it cool down then freeze it! Great for stirring into porridge/ eating with ice cream or using in a recipe later on.

 

• Never going to finish that slab of cheese? Ok I may be over doing the freezer advice here but I only recently learnt that you can freeze cheese! Grate it, slice it and stick it in a tub in the freezer.

 

• Got a few leftover vegetables which you’re not sure what to do with? Make bubble and squeak…make a pasta sauce by chopping them up and adding tomatoes…make a stew with some dumplings. Get a little inventive and think of a meal each week which can use up leftovers.

 

• Not sure if your eggs are fresh? Fill a jug with water, place in your eggs. If your eggs lay flat on the bottom they are fresh and good to use. If your eggs stand on end on the bottom, they are not quite as fresh but still good to use. If your eggs float, they are bad and should not be used. (egg advice taken from the brilliant website www.lovefoodhatewaste.com)

These are a few tips I use regularly and will try to carry on using for the future

Warning: I’m having a rant!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2032404/Scientists-produce-worlds-test-tube-burger-replace-real-meat.html

“Scientists produce world’s first test tube burger that could replace real meat”

Now as a vegetarian I think I am supposed to find this latest news report exciting, beneficial and progress in the world of food…but I find it disturbing, unnatural and suspicious.
Humans don’t actually need meat to live healthy lifestyles as millions of people have proven so why try and recreate it in a science lab? I have no problem with people eating meat if they want to, I cook it for my partner and one day I will most certainly cook it for my children but what I do take problem with is it being mass produced (over produced) to have water pumped into it and then sold at cut price in the supermarkets. Replacing the cheap tasteless meat in a supermarket with expectedly expensive fake meat will not help anything.  It will not give farm animals a better life, it will not give the farmers better profit, it will not stop the supermarkets selling budget meat with no concern for the consumer and it will certainly not provide nutrition for families.

Has anyone questioned the actual process of harvesting cells from an animal and what chemicals are added to the “meat” during the production of it? Are we willing to switch animal slaughter for animal labs? I have a feeling it is not just swabbing the tongue for some cells – just as bone marrow harvesting and stem cell harvesting is traumatic for humans this will be traumatic for animals.

No I didn’t become a vegetarian because of animal cruelty, if we were living wild we would be hunting them ourselves still, but I just can’t make myself agree with this!

If you’re a meat eater then go and buy some good quality meat and cook it with fresh ingredients and enjoy it! If you can’t afford to buy it all the time then don’t. No one needs to eat it every day and no one certainly needs the nutritionally void cut price meat they sell in the supermarkets.