Week's food budget for a couple in London?

[zenie]

I dont ever do a weekly shop anymore just get bits as and when probably spend 20 quid a week maximum, unless I have people coming over.

Don't really eat evening meals though, (cooking for one is shit!) so spend about 4/5 quid a day in the sandwich shop or at the pub if I'm working.

Gonna try and not do that and take packed lunches - well maybe

 

[dessiato]

I dont ever do a weekly shop anymore just get bits as and when probably spend 20 quid a week maximum, unless I have people coming over.

Don't really eat evening meals though, (cooking for one is shit!) so spend about 4/5 quid a day in the sandwich shop or at the pub if I'm working.

Gonna try and not do that and take packed lunches - well maybe

((((zenie))) eating on her own

 

[zenie]

((((zenie))) eating on her own

ha I know! poor me!

<violins>etc etc etc

 

[dash_two]

About £20-25 per week on myself. Fruit n veg from Lewisham market (loads cheaper than the supermarket), some stuff from Aldi and also the Italian deli in Lewisham. Making packed lunches for work saves a lot of money too.

 

[Ms T]

I don't really have a budget, but I reckon we probably spend about £100 a week on food for the two of us, and we eat very well. I do have an extensive store cupboard though, as I am an obsessive deli shopper. Don't really do a weekly shop, but do have the occasional Waitrose splurge, supplemented with Lidl/Aldi purchases. Veg is delivered weekly, and meat comes from the butchers. Everything else is either M&S or the various delis in Brixton/Herne Hill.

 

[ScallyWag II]

I just worked it out and I spend more on the cats' food than I do on me But that's excluding wine

About £57 in total for a full weekly shop including a probable over-estimate for cleaning stuff, shampoo and stuff

That doesn't include eating out, say £30 a meal, or takeaways, say £12 for enough food for 2 good meals, which I probably have about once every couple of months

 

[wrysmile]

We do a big shop which gets delivered once a month (today, as it happens - yay!). So that's about £80. Then I spend another £20-£40 a week on eating out, lunch or picking up stuff that's been forgotten in the big shop or is fresh. Kyser buys his lunch daily, I take mine 2-3 times a week. I'd say I spend about £50+ a week on food - but I am a swine though...

 

[bikergrrl]

It depends - I'm not in a couple but I like nice food and I spend about £70 a week. I would probably make more effort in a couple but I don't know whether that would mean buying even nicer stuff or saving money by pooling resources!

We spend £40 on food for a week for the two of us. You must eat like a prince OU! I know if I lived alone I'd probably buy five ready meals for £5 from Asda as my weekly fare.

We don't eat out much though, I love cooking too much!

 

[scifisam]

Fuck, so much money on food!

I've been keeping a closer eye on my spending recently so that I can work out a budget.

I do a 'big shop' once a month, roughly, which includes toilet roll and everything, and that's about £70. We then buy a few bits from the local shops, at about £15 for the week, and eat out or have a takeaway about three times a month, but they cost around £6-7 each. We mostly cook huge meals and freeze them then defrost, so I guess that helps. On top of that, my daughter has school dinners at £8pw. That's £159 per month for two adults and a child, food, snacks, soft drinks and so on, but not including booze. I still need to cut it down by cutting out the cans of coke, though.

(Edited to add - oops, it's less than that, probably by about £20, because I was including non-food goods from the monthly shop).

Course, it helps that both me and my GF are very good cooks and enjoy cooking.

 

[Dissident Junk]

Fuck, so much money on food!

I've been keeping a closer eye on my spending recently so that I can work out a budget.

I do a 'big shop' once a month, roughly, which includes toilet roll and everything, and that's about £70. We then buy a few bits from the local shops, at about £15 for the week, and eat out or have a takeaway about three times a month, but they cost around £6-7 each. We mostly cook huge meals and freeze them then defrost, so I guess that helps. On top of that, my daughter has school dinners at £8pw. That's £159 per month (

I make this £183, scfisam.

I must say I'm kinda intrigued on how you manage to feed two adults on less than £4 a day. What do you eat?

Any road . . .

When living in London, I could feed myself and my partner (taking sandwiches to work) on £200 a month quite nicely -- and that included slightly unnecessary items such as mackerel pate, and yoghurts.

However, I do not buy ready meals, or jars of sauce, curry paste, white sauce or anything like that, I make everything from scratch.

So I reckon you'd be looking at maybe £300 if you want to do takeouts and dine out. But then that £100 would be, say, a pizza for both of you in Ask every Friday night, which might not be what you are thinking of. I dunno.

Best tip is to order online. Then you can plan your meals for a fortnight and keep tabs on what you are spending as you shop. It also stops those compulsive purchases.

 

[Orang Utan]

I must say I'm kinda intrigued on how you manage to feed two adults on less than £4 a day. What do you eat?

I once managed to feed myself for a few months here in London for £6.50 a week

 

[Dissident Junk]

I once managed to feed myself for a few months here in London for £6.50 a week

What did you eat? Packet Noodle soup every day? These days you can't get a loaf for under 70p!

I must admit that I've fed myself and my husband dinners that cost about 80p: but that when I've either bought up all the reduced items in Tesco, or boiled up a cheap hamhock with peas.

 

[Orang Utan]

What did you eat? Packet Noodle soup every day? These days you can't get a loaf for under 70p!

I must admit that I've fed myself and my husband dinners that cost about 80p: but that when I've either bought up all the reduced items in Tesco, or boiled up a cheap hamhock with peas.

Value soup and Value bread for dinner.
Tesco Value Pies, mash and beans for tea.

 

[Dissident Junk]

Value soup and Value bread for dinner.
Tesco Value Pies, mash and beans for tea.

Where's yer veg?!

A couple of months of that, and you'd develop malnutrition! Your hair would fall out!

 

[Orang Utan]

Er, there's veg in soup and potatoes were a vegetable last time I checked. Beans are very good for you too.

 

[Orang Utan]

and the pies had microscopic traces of onions in them

 

[sleaterkinney]

I once managed to feed myself for a few months here in London for £6.50 a week

I once had a budget of about £10 a week for food, even now I don't like soup that much, and those dodgy 50p for 10 burgers - yuck.

 

[Badgers]

Varies...

I reckon we spend about £40 - £60 a week depending on if we eat out or get takeaway.

Do an online shop each month which costs £60 and then top up with fresh stuff, milk, bread etc

 

[dirtyfruit]

I once managed to feed myself for a few months here in London for £6.50 a week

How long ago was that, 1978? HeHe

 

[Orang Utan]

Nah, this was about 4 years ago

 

[scifisam]

I make this £183, scfisam.

I must say I'm kinda intrigued on how you manage to feed two adults on less than £4 a day. What do you eat?

Any road . . .

When living in London, I could feed myself and my partner (taking sandwiches to work) on £200 a month quite nicely -- and that included slightly unnecessary items such as mackerel pate, and yoghurts.

However, I do not buy ready meals, or jars of sauce, curry paste, white sauce or anything like that, I make everything from scratch.

So I reckon you'd be looking at maybe £300 if you want to do takeouts and dine out. But then that £100 would be, say, a pizza for both of you in Ask every Friday night, which might not be what you are thinking of. I dunno.

Best tip is to order online. Then you can plan your meals for a fortnight and keep tabs on what you are spending as you shop. It also stops those compulsive purchases.

I was making guesses in that post, but I've spent this evening doing a full budget (using a spreadhseet from moneysavingexpert.com) using receipts, statements and so on, being careful to guess a fair bit up rather than down if I'm not certain of the costs. According to the spreadsheet, I spend £147pcm (rounded up). My GF spends another £20pw on her own snacks and so on, though, so our monthly combined bill is around £230 for me, her and my daughter, which is only slightly more than your £200.

To be honest, that's not even with being all that careful. Or at least, it doesn't seem that careful to me. There are definitely ways we can cut back - £36pcm of that is in canned drinks, which is just stupid.

We just cook enormous lovely dinners, freeze them and reheat them. I guess they must work out very cheap. We don't eat meat, but we do sometimes eat Quorn and soya, which aren't that cheap. We have all sorts of gadgets, like a breadmaker (partly because I'm coeliac), blender/smoothie maker and a sodastream (for the fizzy drinks we love), and, like you, we make everything from scratch - although that's as much to do with my crap digestive system as anything else.

This is one of the ways in which cooking for two (or three in our case) is cheaper than cooking for one, though, so when working out a budget for a couple you shouldn't just double your single person's expenditure, of course.

 

[Ms T]

Er, there's veg in soup and potatoes were a vegetable last time I checked. Beans are very good for you too.

Potatoes aren't a vegetable, they're classed as a carbohydrate in nutritional terms.

 

[mentalchik]

I reckon i spend about £30-£50 a week for myself, my 22yr old and my 13yr old !