Stretching the Food You have 'til it Fits Your Budget

Last week I challenged Cheapskaters, in the weekly newsletter, to trim 10 per cent from their grocery budget.

This week's challenge is to trim another 10 per cent from your grocery budget, but you're probably thinking there's no way you can do that without causing a riot.

Well there is, and it's simple: stretch food the food you have; and I don't mean by pulling!

Think about the food you have on your shopping list, and the food you have on hand. Now think about how you can stretch those foods, and still eat well, and enough.

I always start wiht meat. Meat is the most expensive component of most meals, so to me it's the obvious place to start with the stretching.

Then think about vegetables and fruit. Do you use all the fruit and veg you have? Or do you find, come garbage day, that you're dumping fuzzy or slimy or stinky or hairy fruit and veg? Because if you're buying it, and then dumping it, you may as well just put the money straight into the bin!

 Some simple ways to stretch food to produce more serves are:

1. Add an equal quantity of TVP, rolled oats or cooked rice to mince when making rissoles and meatballs. You'll get double the quantity, giving you and extra meal for less than half the price.

2. Stretch mince based pasta sauces and taco fillings by whizzing a tin of baked beans per 500g mince in the food processor until the crumbs are the same size as the mince crumbs, and add to the dish. You're adding bulk, and fibre, and doubling the recipe for a fraction of the cost of the same quantity of mince . When the baked beans are whizzed, they can't be detected in the pasta sauce or taco filling. Mince is $7/kg (the cheapest around here right now), while baked beans are around $2/kg. The saving is obvious isn't it?

3. Add a tablespoon (or two) of milk to mayonnaise jars and bottles when they are getting low. Shake well to combine and no one will know the difference.

4. Add a little water or stock to pasta sauce jars, swish and pour into pasta sauces. You'll get every drop of sauce from the bottle and stretch it at the same time.

5. Use a silicone spatula to scrape out margarine containers, peanut butter, jam, honey, cream and Vegemite jars. You'll be shocked at just how much is left in the jar if you use just a knife to scrape it - easily two or three sandwiches worth, and that's money you'd be putting in the bin if you don't scrape. I bought a set of 3 silicone spatulas from Big W for uder $5 about 10 years ago and they're still going strong and have saved many times their cost.

6. Instead of serving whole chicken fillets, dice them into 2cm cubes. Two medium chicken breast fillets will then easily serve four (or five in our case!). The diced chicken can be used in casseroles, enchiladas, apricot chicken, sweet'n'sour etc. 

7. Don't pound meat to make it thin. Slice chicken fillets and steaks in half through the middle, creating two full fillets or steaks from each one. Cut larger steaks down so they're about the size of the palm of your hand - that's all that's required for a serve, anymore and you're just overeating and over-spending.

8. Always take the tenderloins off chicken breast fillets and use them for a separate meal. Save them in the freezer until you have enough to make crumbed chicken wraps or dice them use them in curries and stews.

9. When mashing potato use some of the water it was steamed or boiled in instead of milk. The potato will be lovely and fluffy, no added fat and no extra cost.

10. Always make stock from roast bones. Chicken carcasses and lamb bones make lovely stock which can then be used to make soup, gravies and risottos and cook rice or pasta.

These are just some ways I've managed to keep our food bill down over the years. It was a learniing curve, and  I'm still on it.  I'lm always looking for ways to trim the grocery budget, without compromising nutrition and taste.

If I can do it, you can too!

My Grocery Budget for 2018

The last three days have seen me going over our spending plan, closing off 2017 and setting up 2018 (we run our household budget on the calendar year).

Not much has changed, although I've been able to increase the grocery budget back up to $320 a month. That's more than three times what we lived on in 2016 and about double what the grocery budget was for 2017.

I feel rich, although it's just gone back to what it was three years ago.

As the pantry is pretty well stocked with 12 months of most things, this budget will be used to replace what we use, fill the freezers and build the slush fund to top-up next year's budget.

This year will see me (again) shopping from the stockpile first, and then looking to see if there is an ingredient I can substitute or MOO, then shopping around for anything we don't have on hand to ensure its bought at the cheapest possible price.

The garden will be supplying as much fresh vegetables and fruits as I can possibly grow. It's had a slow start this season, with most of the veggies just starting to produce (I was late planting for summer), but succession planting will keep the salad veggies coming.

My garden journal will be used to plan the autumn and winter gardens, and the autumn garden is almost planned. The hiccup is our trip in May/June, when we'll be away for six weeks. I know the kids will eat from the garden, but they won't do as much preserving as I'd do, so it’s the quantities I'm rethinking. Once I can get my head around quantities and planting schedules, it will be done.

Because the garden will be slow, I'll be on the look-out for cheap tomatoes, onions, zucchini, cauliflower and cabbage to make sauce, pickles and freezer meals. If I can get onions for under 40c/kg, and tomatoes $5 a box (or hopefully under) towards the end of the month, then I'll be busy and happy.

As the stockpile pantry is full, most shopping will be for dairy, fresh fruit and veg and meat top-ups, so I've calculated that the fortnightly cash withdrawal from the grocery budget will be $40.  That covers $18 for milk, cheese, cream, eggs and bread (if any/all are needed), $10 for fruit and veg top-ups and $12 to buy meat if needed. The balance will stay in the grocery budget, ready to buy meat each quarter and top-up the stockpile at the end of the year.

You may have noticed that I've been slipping in a few extra meatless meals (Cream Cheese Patties, Hot Potato Salad, even Taco Pie can be meatless with the addition of extra beans). The meal plan is done for the year and there are plenty of vegetarian meals listed, with about another third that can easily be converted to meatless/vegetarian without too much change to taste and texture (always a good thing for my meat-loving family).

Cream Cheese Patties

Here's where my grocery dollars will be going in 2018:

Aldi - for the bulk of basic groceries to replace stockpile items, and for dairy.

Coles/Woolworths - for stockpile top-ups that I can't get at Aldi, if they are on half-price sale.

Pellegrino's - fresh fruit and vegetables as needed, eggs

Farmer Joe's - meat and chicken on sale

Australian Butcher Store - Meat and chicken on sale

Thankfully I don’t' need to consider any food allergies or even extreme food dislikes, always a good thing for a grocery budget. We do have some intolerances, but they are easily worked around so they don't have a financial impact.

And of course as always I'll be doing as much as possible from scratch, although I do have some bottled pizza sauce and three jars of alfredo pasta sauce in the pantry as emergency back-ups.

Where I Shop

Where I shop

Jilly emailed and asked me if I stuck to the same supermarkets for my shopping or if I divided it up between others, and she asked if I shopped around for groceries like I do for other things.

The short answer is I am not supermarket (or brand) loyal, I shop where I'll get the best value for my dollars, and yes, I do shop around between supermarkets, butchers, greengrocers, wholesale outlets and even suburbs.

If I have to go out of my suburb for shopping, I combine the trip with other errands to make it money, time and energy friendly. Often just going to a supermarket a couple of suburbs away can save money on grocery items.

Where we live we are blessed with all the major supermarkets within just a few minutes. We have Coles, Woolworths, IGA, Aldi and Foodworks within a 10 minute drive, so shopping around the supermarkets for the best specials is easy.

We also have four excellent greengrocers and two fantastic butchers close by.

If I choose to travel about 15 minutes I have another excellent butcher and a great market.

Travel 20 minutes and I have Dandenong Market on a Tuesday, Friday and Saturday, where the fruit and veg are excellent quality and price. The market is great too for clothing and household items.

But for a normal month, here's where I shop:

For groceries (in order):

Aldi
Coles
Woolworths
Food Factory Sales (SPC Outlet), Bayswater
Reject Shop

Specialty Herbs & Spices in bulk:

Hindustan Imports, Dandenong

For Meat:

Australian Butcher, Boronia
Farmer Joe's Boronia
Tasman, Mt. Waverley

For fruit and veg:

Pellegrino's, Wantirna South
Farmer Joe's, Boronia

For bulk wholefoods:

The Full Pantry, Croydon

For toiletries:

Aldi
then Coles, Woolworths, Priceline or Chemist Warehouse depending on what is on sale and the best price

For bulk cleaning supplies:

Aurora Cleaning Supplies, Dandenong South
Coles
Woolworths
Bunnings
FGB Natural Products (Bosisto's)

These are the places most likely to get my shopping dollars. Of course it all depends on what I need and what price it is when I need it. Occasionally there will be exceptional prices at a store/outlet I wouldn't normally shop at, but I do for super special prices.

I tend to shop around, and I do travel out of our local area for great specials, but they need to be cheap enough to make it worthwhile (cover the cost of petrol and extra time as well as being cheaper).

I also try to combine as many errands as possible into each trip to save money, time and energy.

More on Making Meals Cheaper - the Sunday Roast

The price of meat has been going up, and up, and up, and up and up. Actually let me clarify: the cost of what was once cheaper cuts of meat has been going up. The more expensive cuts have increased slightly, but not nearly as much as plain old mince or sausages or gravy beef.

And the increasing price of meat has had an impact on my grocery budget. I still do a big meat shop once a quarter, but I find myself looking every week for really good specials on mince, chicken fillets, whole chickens, legs of lamb and roasting beef.

With those prices in mind, here's how we can afford to have a roast dinner every Sunday (without fail, my family almost cry if there's no roast for some reason).

If you follow my meal plan, you'll see that I I alternate between chicken/beef/chicken/lamb/chicken/beef/chicken/lamb and repeat.

When we have roast lamb or beef I make sure I cut the meat so that we get at least two dinners from the one roast. I serve one for dinner that night and put the extra meat into a Tupperware container, cover it with gravy and freeze. It is then ready for the next time that particular roast is on the menu.

This saves money and makes roast lamb or beef affordable. It keeps the electricity bill or gas for the barbecue bill down as the meal just has to be thawed and then warmed in the microwave, again making the meal cheaper. And if there are bones then those bones are used to make stock for soup or gravy, or to cook rice or pasta - making the meal cheaper still.

Here are some of the ways I get more meals from one roast:

*Cut the slices thinly - this is easier if you let the roast sit for about 10 minutes before carving.
*Make sure all the meat is off the bone, even the tiniest shreds.
*Portion control - the boys get three slices of lamb or beef, Hannah and I have two. I do spread them around the plate so they can be seen. It isn't mean folks, it's commonsense - we don't need kilos of meat with every meal. 180g per person is the recommended, that's what I aim for.

*Cook the meat in an oven bag. This helps with shrinking, keeps the meat moist and contains the juices that I use to make gravy

Meat is expensive. I aim to keep it at $5 per meal, even with the rising cost of meat. To do this I need to have cheaper cuts and stretch them, add some meatless meals into our meal plan and keep an eye out for the cheapest possible prices - then go crazy and fill the freezers.

Just recently chicken fillets were very, very cheap - just $3.69/kg. You can be sure I stocked up! Over the course of three weeks I bought 40 kilos (enough for at least 80 meals), brought them home, skinned them, pulled the tenderloins off and vacuum sealed them.

At that price ($3.69/kg) the cost per meal for chicken is just $1.85! Or if you prefer, just 31 cents per serve! That means I could afford to pay a little more per meal for the steak I bought on special at the same time.

Swings and roundabouts; as long as my average cost for the meat component of each meal is between $4 - $6 (rising prices are affecting my budget) I am happy, we eat well and most importantly my family is happy.    

The Rule of Half

This week's Tip of the Week in the newsletter is all about stretching a half measure to do a full measure job and it's a great idea.

I dilute just about everything! Why? Because most things can be diluted up to half and still give the same excellent results.

Case in point dishwashing detergent. I buy the Tandil Ultra Dishwashing Detergent from Aldi. I buy six bottles a year and dilute each bottle 50:50 with cool water, giving me twelve bottles for the price of six - enough to last a year. I also add 500 grams of bicarb soda to the dishwashing powder to stretch it. That 1.5 kilos of powder then does 60 washes (two level teaspoons per load, and yes I measure it, there is a spoon in the detergent container).  I only need to buy six boxes of dishwasher powder a year, saving $7.20 (I buy Savings brand dishwasher powder from Coles).

Shampoo and conditioner are diluted 50:50 with water and then dispensed with a pump - one pump for short hair, two pumps for long hair.

I also “dilute” groceries: I use half the quantity of mince in a recipe and bulk it out with either rolled oats, TVP, rice or grated vegetables; I add stock to dilute soup; I add milk to salad dressing and mayonnaise; I add breadcrumbs to grated cheese in a recipe; there are so many ways you can stretch your groceries when you get creative.

Baking is diluted too. Biscuits are no more than two teaspoons of dough, rolled and flattened. I use the smaller cutter to make scones. When I make a slice, it is cut into 3cm squares; that gives me 15 pieces from one slice tray, three more serves than most recipes give.

Diluting groceries saves a lot of money, and no, it's not being mean. It is frowned upon by manufacturers and grocers (I've been told in person that they don't like me sharing the Rule of Half) - that's fine, they're not living on my grocery budget. If they were they'd be diluting too - and loving it just as much as I do.

If I dilute something and it isn't just as good then I don't bother again. But I always try because I just love getting double the groceries for half the cost.

Pay for Rain Check Bargains and Never Miss Out

Rain checks are wonderful things, designed to let you buy things after a sale at the sale price. I always ask for a rain check when I can't get something on sale that I especially want. But sometimes when it comes time to redeem the rain check, you just don't have the money before it expires.

I don't like missing out on a great bargain, and I really don't like wasting a rain check so I pay for my rain check items when I get the rain check.

Last week Coles had 12 packs of Mission tortillas on half-price sale, $1.99 a pack. I like to make our tortillas, but at that price making them actually costs more in dollars and time. I went to three different Coles supermarkets during the week and couldn't find them anywhere. The last store had an empty spot for them. So, off to the service desk I went to get a rain check.

Which you'd think would be simple but it was quite a procedure. And then I had to beg to get rain checks for 12 packets (and then only after I'd explained I would have bought every packet on the shelf if they'd actually been on the shelf). In the end I was given two rain checks for six, with a two month expiry.

As soon as I walked in the door at home, I went straight to the kitchen, took out my slush fund envelope and put the $24 for the tortillas in it. Then I wrote the date, the amount and what it was for on the envelope and put the rain checks into the pocket in my purse so I have them on me when I'm shopping.

Now, when I'm in Coles and find the tortillas I can buy them with the rain check, knowing they are already paid for. After I buy them I'll reimburse my grocery budget with the money in the envelope.

It's simple really. You have the money to buy the item when it is on sale, so put that money away when you get the rain check - you are paying for your rain check items when you get the rain check. When you redeem the rain check you'll have the cash ready and waiting to pay for your bargains, your grocery budget will be safe and you won't have missed that great bargain.

Free Meals from the Freezer

Even a small stash of freezer meals can reduce the grocery budget. Single serves of spag bol, chicken soup, lasagne, fried rice, moussaka all in my small freezer, waiting to be used.

Freezer meals, put together from leftovers are free food - it's already paid for. I love freezer meals, and not just because they're free food, but because they give me a night off from cooking, or save buying takeaway when my day gets beyond crazy and dinner is the last thing on my mind. I love them because they can be self-serve too. The meals are already cooked, they just need to be thawed and heated and that can be done in the microwave in just a few minutes.

You may be wondering how you build a stash of freezer meals so that they are free. It's simple really - portion control. We're a family of five, so most of my recipes make at least six serves. I dish up five when the meal is cooked, and as I'm dishing up I put the extra serve straight into a container and put it into the fridge to cool. Then after tea I put the lid on it and pop it into the freezer. One free meal added to the freezer meal stash. If the recipe makes more than six serves, I have more than one free meal to put into the freezer.

Hint:  Use some masking tape and a marker to label the containers. Strangely enough chicken soup looks a lot like vegetable soup when it's frozen, as does bolognaise sauce and vegetable pasta sauce. Labelling the containers also stops everyone from pulling them all out, opening them to see what's in them then putting them back in the freezer.

Sometimes there are no leftovers or extra serves. That's OK. But when there are I take full advantage of them. I think it's far better to put a single serve into the freezer for a freezer meal than stash it at the back of the fridge until garbage night then toss it out - that really is just putting money in the bin.

Take a look at your recipes. Are there any you could perhaps stretch to an extra serve or two? If so, those extra serves could become freezer meals. I have a couple of recipes that serve four. I add a few extra ingredients (grated veggies or rolled oats or rice or even water or stock) to stretch them to make six serves. Then they feed us all and give me at least one freezer meal.

There are a couple of tricks to using free meals from the freezer though:
1. you must pay for them and
2. you must use them.

I budget $5 a dinner. When we have freezer meals I take $5 from my grocery budget and put it straight into the grocery slush fund (you could add it to your Emergency Fund or pay it off a bill or similar) because the meal is already paid for. That $5 is a lot easier to find than the $30+ that takeaway costs too - think about freezer meals next time you're tempted to dial for pizza!

Not everything freezes so plan your freezer meals around dinners that will freeze. Things that freeze well are pasta dishes, rissoles, stews, casseroles, soups, pies, pasties, sausage rolls, fried rice, cooked sausages (great for a quick curry) and quiche.

Then write "freezer meals" into your meal plan at least once a month. We usually have them on a Saturday night. I always plan a meal for Saturday night, just in case we don't have any freezer meals, but usually it's a GYO night. Sometimes we're all home for tea, sometimes there is only Wayne and I, sometimes it's just me.

It doesn't matter, if there are freezer meals then Saturday night in our house is simple - go to the freezer, choose a dinner and enjoy it because who doesn't enjoy a free meal.

How we are going to Live on a (Really) Tight Budget

Morning and afternoon tea is always something homebaked, like this Fruit Salad cake

A few weeks ago Joy posted some statistics in the forum pertaining to how much money is needed to live in retirement.

The following was taken from the ASICS moneysmart website.

"The table below will give you a rough idea of how much money you need to support a modest or comfortable retirement. It applies for people retiring at age 65 who will live to an average life expectancy of about 85."

Those figures stunned me, and not in a bad way!

We live on a tight budget. We don't carry any debt. If we want something we pay cash for it. If we don't have the cash we save up until we do, then we buy it.

Our lifestyle isn't extravagant but it's not stingy either. We don't go without anything we need. We mostly don't go without anything we want either. We do think about our purchases and our spending, and rarely have any spontaneous spending. That is mostly because there's not much we need or want that we don't already have.

Our clothing budget stays low because we take care of our clothes, making simple repairs immediately so clothes don't sit in a pile until they're thrown out.

We eat well. I cook from scratch (real scratch, not packet scratch). I grow a lot of the vegetables and some of the fruit we eat. I have a strict budget for meat and poultry and shop once a quarter for those foods, timing the shop around the best sale prices.

Chicken pot pie from scratch, a delicious and frugal family dinner

I am a bit of a power warden, reminding the family to turn lights, appliances and power points off (if they're not powering something essential like the fridge or freezer).

We catch water in buckets in the showers and I have a tub I use to catch water from the kitchen sink. This water is either tipped into the washing machine, used to water the pot plants, wash veggies or for cleaning. It doesn't go to waste.

So why was I happily stunned with those figures?

Well because as a family we're living well under them. We have started living on our 2016 budget (yes, it's kicked in a couple of months early) and according to those figures we are living on the Single Modest retirement income of $454 a week!

I love flowers in the house, but they're expensive. Just a few blooms from the garden in a vase makes me happy and saves $12! These Daphne sprgs smelled divine and scented the whole house, and they cost nothing.

Our weekly budget is $454.81! And that covers everything we need to survive and a few non-essentials too. Now bear in mind there are five adults living in our house. I am feeding five adults, there are five computers, three TVs, five people showering every day. And yet we can manage on less than a single modest retirement income and we are not going without and we don't feel deprived at all.

Here is our current Spending Plan:

As we are and will be living off our stockpile, the grocery budget has shrunk considerably.
There is wiggle room in this budget. I've factored in haircuts for both of us, pin money and a craft allowance. These are all flexible and non-essential. I can cut Wayne's hair and if push comes to shove I can either stretch my monthly trip to the hairdressers to every second month or just let my hair grow (or act as a model for Hannah so she can practise cutting!).

Making soap is another way I keep costs down. It makes a lovely gift too.

I've included an entertainment allowance. We rarely (maybe once a year) eat out so it's covered if we do, but the main purpose of this category is to give us time out when we need it. We tend to go camping (usually free camping) or on day trips and this amount will pay for petrol and camp fees so we can have at least a few days away during the year.  Entertainment also covers expenses birthday celebrations, anniversaries and any other fun things we do during the year.

There is a separate Holiday category. We are saving up for another big trip so steady, regular saving will help us get there in 2017. It's flexible, again if for some reason I've miscalculated our expenses I can shift  this money to another category.

Camping is our favourite type of holiday - find a pretty spot, set up the tent and then kick back and relax. Once you have all your gear your holidays are virtually free!

The one thing that isn't flexible, that is set in cement, is our Emergency Fund category. An emergency fund is essential and even on a tight budget we will continue to build ours. I've been asked if we'll be dipping into our emergency fund next year to cover any shortfall in our income. The short answer is no.

Our budget has been re-worked, we've gone over the figures and double checked them and unless there is a major emergency i.e. the washing machine blows up and there's not enough in Household Maintenance to cover replacing it, then we won't be touching it.

We will thrive on our current budget because we don't live extravagantly. We live a modest lifestyle and we are happy.  The bills will be paid, we have food to eat, clothes to wear, a roof over our heads. The present box is bulging with gifts for 2015, 2016, 2017 and I've started on 2018 (we have a couple of weddings in 2018 and the presents are ready and waiting).  There are veggies growing in the garden.

So yes, those figures for a retirement budget have made me very happy. I know we'll manage next year and I'm reassured that when we're ready to retire we'll be able to manage on a "retirement" income too.

How to Find your Ideal Grocery Budget

I'm often asked about grocery budgets, how much they should be and how they should be spent.

Here's a breakdown of how your food budget should spent for optimum value and health:

• 60% on fruit, vegetables, cereals, breads, grains, etc.
• 30% on dairy, fish and meats (middle of the pyramid)
• 10% on fats and sugars

But how do you find your ideal grocery budget?

It's easy really, but it may take you a few weeks. Start next time you go shopping. Write your list as you usually do and buy your groceries, this will give you a figure to work off.

Next time you go shopping, write your list but deduct 10% from the total you spent last time.

If you can do your shopping and feed your family on that amount without any complaints, cut your grocery money by 10% the next time you go shopping.

Keep going in this way until you find you can't buy the groceries you need or your family starts to complain about missing out.

Then simply up the grocery budget by 10% and you've found your ideal grocery budget.

We won't all have the same ideal grocery budget, that's OK, we are all different. We all eat different foods and shop at different stores. We all buy different brands, some of us stick to plain labels, others will only buy particular brands. Some of us shop around, others don't.

Our grocery budgets are personal and the only person your grocery budget has to suit is you. Follow the steps to find your ideal grocery budget and then relax, happy in the knowledge that you are getting the best value for your grocery money.

Menu Planning Breaks the Grocery Spending Habit and Saves $60 a Week

Cheapskater Julie is saving $40 - $60 a week by doing something we all know saves money, time and energy: meal planning.

"After reading the hints and tips for menu planning and shopping our family made a monthly menu plan with meals we all like and eat. I then made four weekly grocery lists to go with the planner. This took less than an hour. The lists contain all that is needed to make each meal for that week. I costed out our shopping using the Aldi site so I know what the weeks shop will cost approximately. Now each week all I need is to get my list and shop. Wanting to save money I decided to shop at home the night before I went to the supermarket. Most weeks we can cross off a 1/3 of our list by shopping in our pantry, saving anywhere from $40 - $60 a week. Our grocery bill is now down to about $90 a week for 5 people including extras for lunch and brekkie. We started at $150 and as I had a $150 that was always what I spent out of habit."

Julie used the Aldi Smarter Shopping site to cost out her shopping lists. Unfortunately Aldi recently took the site down which is a shame as it was a very handy tool.

You don't need a website to make your shopping list and price it though. Use your price book or check prices with either the Coles or Woolworths online shopping sites. You'll get an approximation of how much your grocery shopping is going to cost regardless of where you shop.

A Real Australian Christmas

I was asked recently (and the story aired tonight on A Current Affair) to comment on the number of Aussie Christmas staples that aren't really Australian.

When Allison first called me I was literally putting the last of my December/Christmas/New Year/January groceries away, I had to call her back. I shopped for December and January, including the celebration days last Friday so now I don't need to set foot in a supermarket or a butcher until February (yay, doing a very happy dance!).

For this family pretty much everything we'll be eating and drinking over Christmas and the New Year will be Australian grown or made.

Nibblies will be MOO pita chips with MOO dips, veggie sticks, homemade popping candy Santas and of course the obligatory chocolate almonds and sultanas. The almonds and sultanas aren't Australian, nor I think is the popping candy - I've thrown the packet out so I don't have one here to confirm.

All our salad veggies will be from our garden: tomatoes, capsicum, cucumber, lettuce, basil, mint, spring onions, red onions, garlic, cabbage and cauliflower.

Our chicken is Australian grown and processed (and bought for $7.44 from Aldi, marked down from $11.44 and put in the freezer).

The Christmas pudding and cake have been made from a family recipe using Australian fruit, butter, flour and sugar. Sadly the spices aren't Australian.

I will make the pavlova and sponge for the trifle from scratch. I'll use the egg yolks from the pav to make the sponge for the trifle - nothing goes to waste. The strawberries for the pav are from our very own strawberry patch in the backyard. I'll make the custard for the trifle from scratch using Australian cornflour, eggs, sugar, milk and vanilla (although the vodka  I used to make the vanilla extract isn't Australian).

The shortbread we eat for afternoon tea on Christmas Day will be made from Australian flour, sugar and butter, using my mother's recipe (it's in the Recipe File, called "Grandma's Shortbread"). The mince pies are Australian, with pastry made from scratch using Australian flour and butter and my Slow Cooker Fruit Mince as the filling.

Drinks on Christmas Day will depend on what's ready. There should be ginger beer and rhubarb champagne, they've both been made and bottled. There will definitely be orange and lemon cordial.

Our tea on Christmas night will be Australian too - leftovers! We're a traditional kind of family and Christmas Dinner leftovers are traditionally tea in our family.

Is it hard to have an Australian grown Christmas? No!

Is it more expensive to have an Australian grown Christmas? No!

Is it better to have an Australian grown Christmas? YES!

We Aussies are losing not only industry but farms and food producers too. And when those farms and food producers are gone, they are gone for good. We will never get them back. We will lose jobs. We will lose money. We will lose food quality. We will be stuck, or rather held to ransom, by whatever imports we can get.

When you do your grocery shopping for this Christmas try to see where your food is actually coming from, and if you can, buy Australian grown, made and owned. And have a very merry, Aussie Christmas.

5 Simple Ways We Save on Groceries

Today, being the first Friday of the month, is my OAMS day (once a month shopping). I've already done the groceries, I didn't have a lot to buy as you can see from the picture above. I included a few stockpile items this month too, in preparation for the Christmas/New Year craziness.

Since Disaster Struck I've watched our grocery spending like a hawk. We have a very strict grocery budget and I try very hard to not go over it. I need to tell you what is included in our grocery budget, just so you know what's covered by my $320 a month.

For my family groceries include:
1. Food
2. Meat
3. Whatever fruits and vegetables we don't grow or get via bartering
4. Cleaning products
5. Basic toiletries and hygeine products.

I shop for my family of five adults. Yes, our kids are all grown up but still studying and living (and eating!) at home. I buy meat once every three months, so to be sure I have the "meat money" I put $60 a month aside to use. This is usually more than enough (thanks to Tasman Meats great prices and some good specials at our local butcher).

Today I spent $215 at Aldi. For the first time in ages I was able to get everything on the list, including as I mentioned earlier, some stockpile items. The meat money has been put aside and I have $45 left to buy milk (the only grocery item we will actually need) for the next four weeks.

So how do I keep the grocery bill low?

1.  Menu planning

I typically plan our monthly menu a few days before shopping day. I shop for a month so I meal plan for a month. Cheapskates Club members can see what we are eating in the Member's Centre. By doing this, I buy what exactly what we need for the month. Meal planning is a great way to stop "random" shopping, which really causes chaos with a grocery budget. Meal planning also stops the takeaway temptation. Knowing you have something planned for dinner is half the struggle of getting tea on the table. I'm not saying we don't ever have takeaway or eat out but the temptation to do so isn't there if we know we have something delicious already planned.    

2.  Planning my shopping trips

I shop with a list, a very comprehensive list. It has the item, size, quantity and the last price I paid on it. I write my shopping list in order of stores and I try to write each stores list according to the layout. My shopping list keeps me focussed on the task at hand: getting the groceries. I do one big shop on the first Friday of each month, then buy milk and cream and any fruit and veg top-ups once a week. That's it. I stay away from supermarkets until shopping day.

3.  Shop the sales

When I'm writing my shopping list, I always do it with the Coles, Woolworths and Aldi websites open.  This is probably the biggest way we save on groceries; having the online catalogues open lets me compare prices between the supermarkets quickly and easily.  This means I can jot items down under the supermarket they are cheapest.

4.  Build a stockpile

I practice the buy-ahead principle as much as possible, in order to create a stockpile and build up our pantry with items we will use later.  I aim to have a twelve week supply of our basic grocery items at all times.  I don't have stuff stashed everywhere and I don't stockpile things we rarely use. I do use the grocery slush fund to stockpile things we use a lot of when they are on a super great sale, especially if they are the pricier items like shampoo, conditioner, dried fruit, meat and so on. When I'm creating our meal plan I shop the pantry, fridge and freezer and use the groceries we have on hand. This way I always pay the lowest possible price for groceries.

5.  Ditch brand loyalties

I am not a brand snob. Flour is flour, sugar is sugar. Most basic grocery items available in Australia are excellent quality regardless of the price. I try to buy Australian owned, then Australian made when they fit within my grocery budget. There are times I'll have something on my shopping list that isn't on sale. When that happens I buy the best value brand I can find. If the cheapest brand is the store brand, then that's what we buy.

I could write a lot more about how I keep the grocery bill low, but for today these five points give you the general idea.  Everyone is different, every family's needs and wants are different and that is fine. You may live hours from supermarkets or you may be catering to special dietary needs. Your grocery budget doesn't have to be the same as anyone else's, you determine what meets your needs. If you're struggling with cutting the cost of groceries, implement these five simple steps.

I guarantee you will save money and if nothing else, you'll have your grocery spending under control. You can work on getting it as low as you want it to be then.

Don't Make this Mistake!

Changing your shopping habits and becoming a Super Shopper is exciting and fun, but don't make the mistake of going in all gung-ho and slashing your grocery budget by half (or more!) straight away. That simply won't work because you are starting from scratch. You haven't developed all your Super Shopper skills yet and you won't have Cheapskates style stockpile of your staples to fall back on. Keep buying the groceries you need right now and start building your stockpile with items you can buy on sale, ready to use for future meals.

Don't be surprised if the first month you actually see your grocery bill go up, that's normal. You will be buying for now and the future. Start to incorporate your stockpile items into your meal plan and keep just buying on sale and that bill will start to not just drop but plummet. You'll be able to feed your family and stock-up on your staples and stay within your budget.

Don't let unexpected mouths to feed bust your budget

It doesn't matter what your grocery budget is, for most people visitors for dinner means extra spending, especially if those visitors are unexpected, like ours were last night.

Wayne called me during the afternoon to say friends were in unexpectedly town (they live in country Victoria) and wanted to know if it was alright to pop in for a cuppa. Of course it was!

That had me scrambling though, to find something for afternoon tea. There's been no baking for a couple of weeks and while I was out doing Mum's shopping yesterday, and I  did look at the biscuits, I didn't buy any.

I did have flour, sugar, butter and a little cream. I thought about scones but didn't have lemonade and rubbing in butter seemed too hard (and messy - I had visitors coming!). Instead I cheated and made cinnamon scrolls, using the flour and cream to make the dough, spreading it with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon and baking them in a round tin. A drizzle with coffee icing when they were done and oh my but they were good.

As it turned out Wayne was home from work before our visitors arrived. Cups of tea and scrolls all round while we chatted away for a good hour. Thursday night is MOO Pizza Night in our house as per my meal plan, an easy dinner that we all enjoy.

It was getting late so D and K were invited to share our MOO pizzas with us. It was then I remembered there would be seven of us and only four small pizzas. It was too late to make another batch of dough, those four would have to do.

K helped put the toppings on them. We had pizza sauce (of course), salami, ham, diced onion, pineapple pieces, mushrooms, olives, jalapenos, capsicum and grated cheese. We made all the pizzas with different toppings, popped them in the oven at 160 degrees for 20 minutes and waited.

Going through the fridge I found tomatoes, feta, cucumber, red onion, celery, grated carrot and some Kalamata olives, the toppings for a Greek salad. Lettuce straight from the garden was the base. There was more than enough fresh vegetables to make a nice big salad.

A jug of iced water and sliced lemon and a bottle of rhubarb champagne were delicious, cool drinks to have with our dinner and already chilling in the fridge.

When the pizzas were done I cut them into slightly smaller than usual slices, and together with the salad everyone had more than enough to eat and four small pizzas fed seven hungry people, all without having to buy extra ingredients or resort to buying takeaway or eating out.

It would have been easy to jump in the car and run to the corner shop for a packet of exorbitantly priced biscuits for afternoon tea. It would have been easy to rush out to buy more pizza bases or even order pizzas and have them delivered. It would have been easy to suggest eating out too. Instead a little creative thinking and using up what was already in the house stretched a meal for five to feed seven, with a couple of slices of leftover pizza for the boys' lunch today.

Unexpected mouths to feed don't have to bust your budget. Think creatively, don't try to dish up a dinner to impress and use what you have. That old saying about adding more water to the soup is true - you really can stretch your meals when you try.