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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: shopping
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Chief of sinners
Shipmate
# 8794
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Posted
Am I normal what do people spend on shopping? My wife and I thought Ed was about right, we spend about £130 every two weeks and top up small items so Ed's estimate of about £80 was right for us. If we run out of washing powder or dishwasher tablets it is higher other times it is lower but on average we thought Ed was right
We have a grown up daughter at home and one or two foster children (it changes but our average shopping bill remains about £130 a fortnight)
[ 24. May 2014, 07:34: Message edited by: Chief of sinners ]
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If Jesus was half the revolutionary you claim, how come he is now represented by one of the most conservative, status-quo institutions on the planet?
Posts: 155 | From: UK | Registered: Nov 2004
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
I'm pretty frugal but you sound like a world-beater.
But then I also think that if you tot up the small top-up items you and your wife pick up apart from the main shop you'd be surprised at how much the total is. And are you including the cost of school lunch in that figure?
As for Mr Miliband: I suspect he's lying through his teeth. For a start, the artisan loaf which he and his family buy comes in at nearly £3 per loaf. For a household of 5 (Ed, Justine, 2 children and a nanny) £70 per week is unrealistic in London - and certainly can't include the cost of meals out which I suspect he has more often than not Monday to Friday.
In any case, what on earth is the point of politicians trying to beat each other to be 'most normal'? Fact of the matter is, they ALL earn more than double the national average wage, cabinet ministers and party grandees a lot more.
As Leader of the Opposition Mr Miliband earns £139,000 - that's only £3,500 less than the Prime Minister and £4,500 more than Mr Clegg.
(Incidentally, Gordon Brown gets £115,000 in addition to his MP's salary as a former PM as a piblic duties allowance and claims nearly all of it while his voting record (effectively attendance record) in the House is only 12.6%.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
Well, £80 per week seems very low to me, in London. There are just two of us now and we probably spend double that. And we don't live on caviar and champagne.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Amanda B. Reckondwythe
Dressed for Church
# 5521
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Posted
I'm a retiree on a fixed income, and live alone. I budget $60.00 per week for groceries. Most weeks I am on budget -- some weeks under, some weeks over.
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"I take prayer too seriously to use it as an excuse for avoiding work and responsibility." -- The Revd Martin Luther King Jr.
Posts: 10542 | From: The Great Southwest | Registered: Feb 2004
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que sais-je
Shipmate
# 17185
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Posted
It depends what you include but food + household stuff like cleaning materials. When money was very tight a few years ago I did a spread sheet for keeping track of what we spend on what. Nerdily, I still fill it in, so, at the press of a button, here's what two people spent/week for Jan to April this year.
Clothes £17
Education £36 (we like talks/courses etc)
Entertainment £55 (mostly taking out aged parents)
Holidays £106 (our luxury - an early week in Mallorca - so the average over the year will be much less)
Food £75
Home £50 (mostly council tax)
Transport £64 (diesel+mot+car insurance etc)
Utilities £55 (gas/electric/water/phones/TV license)
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"controversies, disputes, and argumentations, both in philosophy and in divinity, if they meet with discreet and peaceable natures, do not infringe the laws of charity" (Thomas Browne)
Posts: 794 | From: here or there | Registered: Jun 2012
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
Up here in the North East, my weekly shop at t'Co-op comes to around £100-120 per week, for 5, including 2 teenagers. You can add another £15-20 for fresh fruit and veg I get from the local greengrocers.
None of that is extravagant. I make everything from scratch (including the bread) from fresh basic ingredients. £25-£30 per head is reasonable. If I take out cleaning products and toiletries (we seem to eat the bloody toilet rolls rather than using them for more regular purposes), I can usually bang out the evening meal for around £1-2 a head.
School lunches for the Torlets works out at a shade over £10 for each of them.
So, yes. £70 is low, but not impossible. If he'd said £140, I'd have accepted it without a blink.
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Heavenly Anarchist
Shipmate
# 13313
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Posted
I spend £120 most weeks to feed a family of 4, two of which includes weekday lunch. This is at Waitrose (my local) and I often buy organic and free range. I cook from scratch and do my own baking.
I can't see why people would expect any politician to know the weekly shopping bill, I doubt if many do the food shopping. I just asked my husband what I spent and he overestimated by 25%.
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'I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.' Douglas Adams
Dog Activity Monitor
My shop
Posts: 2831 | From: Trumpington | Registered: Jan 2008
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
You maybe forgetting the amount of freebies too. Just how many working lunches and working dinners do you think the Millibands go to. Plus their kids are both under five, not folk with teenage appetites.
The house of commons sits till at least 6pm and till 10:30 several times a week - there is a good chance that he eats at work many nights too.
[ 24. May 2014, 12:27: Message edited by: Doublethink ]
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
I ordinarily wouldn't expect Milliband to have a clue how much he spends on groceries. Not because"I bet he doesn't do the shopping", although I do, but because he has a large income, his wife also has a large income, and so it's absurd to imagine that they have to worry about how much they spend.
It would be entirely reasonable for them to just buy whatever they wanted, and not pay attention to the cost - unless they're filling bathtubs with caviar, no grocery choices are going to make a difference to their financial bottom line.
The difference, of course, is that Milliband was running a political campaign, talking about the finances of normal people, and should have prepared better. This question always comes up.
The thing that shows him to be a piece of lying amoral pond scum with no character is the way that he continuously and reflexively lied about it. "Oh, I was thinking about basic groceries." My arse, he was!
Compare also the language that was reported when he was unable to identify Jim Grant, Labour leader on Swindon council, whilst campaigning in Swindon.
Milliband first admits that he doesn't know who Jim Grant is, then says "Well he is doing a good job as leader of the council – Jim is. And I think that is the case." Then he's told that Jim Grant isn't council leader at all, he leads the minority Labour group, and we get "Well, I think he is doing a good job for Labour on the council."
Milliband doesn't know who the man is. There is no way that he can reasonably have an opinion of whether Mr. Grant is doing a good job or not, given that he doesn't even know who the man is.
I know - maybe it's a bit much expecting a politician to have a shred of honesty - but Milliband can't even fake it.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Fineline
Shipmate
# 12143
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Posted
If you mean on food, I spend about £20 a week (for just myself - I live alone). I can spend less than that if I'm being extra frugal, or more if I feel like treating myself. I'm always frugal in general, having always worked very low pay jobs. I generally shop in Asda and make good use of the shelves of reduced food which has reached it's sell-by date. Obviously not everyone can do that - there wouldn't be enough reduced food for everyone, and it depends what time you're able to go shopping, as the biggest reductions happen in the evenings.
Posts: 2375 | From: England | Registered: Dec 2006
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chief of sinners:
Am I normal what do people spend on shopping?
Like Mr. Milliband, I don't have much of a clue how much we spend on the weekly shop, but unlike Mr. Milliband, I am happy to admit it. (If we did a single weekly shop in one supermarket for all of it, I might know, but we routinely get our weekly food purchases from five different shops, so it's a bit confusing.)
However, every year my credit card sends me a helpful summary of my spending, and it tells me that last year, I spent $6,300 in grocery stores. That doesn't count Costco though - Costco don't take credit cards. We spend about $250 a month in Costco.
So apparently we spend $180 a week. That's food, cleaning supplies, nappies and the like for two adults and three children. That converts to GBP 107 at current exchange rates.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Augustine the Aleut
Shipmate
# 1472
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Posted
I budget about $200 a week for food, which would include a meal out every few weeks and, aside from bread, I cook everything and use no prepared meals. I tend to buy at specialty shops and farmers' markets so my food bill is higher than it need be. My costs did not change that much when I retired, as I normally brought my lunches to work and evening meals were at home.
To be fair to the politicians, their timetables (disclosure-- I worked in a ministerial office many years ago and saw this up close) are so totally insane with 70-90 hour work weeks, that I think few ministers ever go shopping.
While I wouldn't know Mr Millband from a hole-in-the-wall (further disclosure- very recently I was introduced to a provincial party leader whom I had only seen on televsion and did not recognize them, so he needn't feel singled out), I would not fault him on this. Recently decluttering, I found a parcel of ministerial schedules from the 1980s (off to the National Archives!!) and, in one week, my old boss had 5 working breakfasts -- 2 in restaurants, one in the parliamentary restaurant, and 2 cabinet committee), 6 working lunches, and 5 working dinners. He had 2 private meals with friends that week, one in someone's house, and the other in a restaurant. I remember his flat and noticing that he had nothing in the fridge aside from some cheese, fruit and yogourt.
Posts: 6236 | From: Ottawa, Canada | Registered: Oct 2001
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Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
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Posted
As a single person, I'd expect to spend around £20 a week on food, £15 if being frugal, £10 if really broke. Costs are a bit higher at the moment thanks to a pretty bad depressive spell.
£70 does seem quite low for a household of five in London, but the children are only small so won't eat much - and it would be doable, if rather tight. I'd imagine that they eat out (Commons canteen as well as restaurants etc, and eating at friends') a fair bit which would cut down on actual shopping costs.
I think 'amoral lying pond scum' is a bit much.
[ 24. May 2014, 16:23: Message edited by: Jade Constable ]
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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marzipan
Shipmate
# 9442
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Posted
I think we spend about €40 to €50 per week in the supermarket, but we regularly run out of eg milk or bread midweek and run down to the shop, so we actually spend more than that on food. There are two of us and we both take packed lunches to work (except on days when I don't get around to making lunch!)
We aren't particularly frugal but we try not to overspend, I don't know how average we are (the main limit to our food shopping is "is it too heavy to carry home?")
[ 24. May 2014, 16:23: Message edited by: cheesymarzipan ]
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formerly cheesymarzipan.
Now containing 50% less cheese
Posts: 917 | From: nowhere in particular | Registered: May 2005
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justlooking
Shipmate
# 12079
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Posted
I order most of my shopping online, usually every ten days, and get it delivered so I don't have to carry heavy loads. This is usually £50-£60 and then I probably spend £15-£20 in between orders for more milk, bread, fresh veg etc. So about £40 a week on average. This is just for me. It's mostly healthy stuff and includes a bottle of wine, sometimes two every ten days.
Posts: 2319 | From: thither and yon | Registered: Nov 2006
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Pulsator Organorum Ineptus
Shipmate
# 2515
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Posted
I spend in the region of £100 a week on food and booze just for myself. I have a full time job and a very time-consuming hobby running a steam railway, so I get a lot of convenience foods of one sort or another.
I'm well enough paid not to have to worry about the cost of food. I was healthier when I did. Mind you, I'm talking about 40 years ago!
Posts: 695 | From: Bronteland | Registered: Mar 2002
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Chief of sinners
Shipmate
# 8794
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Posted
The question he was asked was on grocery shopping, I guess this discussion shows that is a loose definition. In addition to the fortnightly shop we spend £10 a week for each child on school meals and have a take out or meal out on Fridays between £20-£30. If you include those then I go above the average.
If Red Ed had done so the interviewers would have said, "Look at the posh git he eats better than the rest of us." This is why we don't get straight answers from politicians, interviewers don't ask straight questions. Next time this question is asked the politician should ask for a series of definitions, such as, "Do you mean all food consumed?" "Do you mean 'what do I spend at the supermarket?' Does this include drinks which I buy at the same time as my weekly grocery?"
If asked how much does milk cost, another favourite, the politician will say, "It depends where I buy it, it costs more at my local shop, more still at a farm shop but it may be special offer at the supermarket, so whatever price I say you find out that the cost is different somewhere else."
In answer to my angst it seems that I am average and not straving my kids, thanks for your help folks!
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If Jesus was half the revolutionary you claim, how come he is now represented by one of the most conservative, status-quo institutions on the planet?
Posts: 155 | From: UK | Registered: Nov 2004
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North East Quine
Curious beastie
# 13049
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Posted
Our weekly organic veg/fruit/eggs box is £23 a week. When both kids were at home school dinners were £10 per week per child, so £20. We spend £15 to £20 a week in the butcher. About £15 per week in the local shop on bread / milk / juice etc.
Supermarket shop is about £80 once a month - toilet rolls / dishwasher tablets/ tinned stuff / rice / pasta / noodles / tea etc.
Six-weekly refill of ecover products / herb jars etc £20.
Monthly farmers market £25.
More than £80 per week anyway. That includes having friends round for dinner on average once a week, which reduces our "going out" expenditure.
Posts: 6414 | From: North East Scotland | Registered: Oct 2007
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
I have no idea what we spend - Mr Boogs does all the shopping and cooking ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
But we never have ready meals or take-aways, all is made from fresh meat and veg.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
I've got no idea what I spend either. I find it quite hard to keep track of money. Food does seem quite expensive. I can get twenty euros from the cash machine, buy a few bits and bobs for the day and only have a few coins left.
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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justlooking
Shipmate
# 12079
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Posted
Looking at my last online order which cost just over £55 and the receipt for the 'in-between' shop of £17 I spent £72 for 10 days, however just under £6 was cleaning products and £11 was for two bottles of wine. Food therefore was £55; approximately £20 went on meat,fish,eggs,cheese, £20 on vegetables and fruit and the rest on milk, bread, cereals,coffee, olive oil, and a few jars and tins. No sweets, cakes, biscuits or crisps, just a pack of mixed nuts. So £35-£40 a week for what I think is a reasonably healthy diet.
If I had to keep to just £20 a week I think it would be a struggle but doable. Cheaper protein foods, basic fruits and vegetables and more meals with pasta or rice.
Posts: 2319 | From: thither and yon | Registered: Nov 2006
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moonlitdoor
Shipmate
# 11707
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Posted
quote:
posted by chief of sinners
the interviewers would have said, "Look at the posh git he eats better than the rest of us."
I don't understand why interviewers or the public should get exercised about this. I am not a fan of Mr Miliband and I'm not keen to see him become Prime Minister, but he can spend whatever he likes on food as far as I am concerned.
He earns several times what I do so clearly he can afford to eat better, or have better clothes, or a better house, better car, better holidays etc. Probably several or all of those things. But which he chooses is entirely up to him, I don't see it as any of my business.
As for politicians wanting to appear like normal people, I think that buying better stuff if you earn more is extremely normal. That's exactly what most people would do if they got a big pay rise.
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We've evolved to being strange monkeys, but in the next life he'll help us be something more worthwhile - Gwai
Posts: 2210 | From: london | Registered: Aug 2006
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justlooking
Shipmate
# 12079
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by moonlitdoor:
.....As for politicians wanting to appear like normal people, I think that buying better stuff if you earn more is extremely normal. That's exactly what most people would do if they got a big pay rise. [/QB]
The way I see it politicians represent a lot of poorer people and influence the policies which affect poorer people. Therefore they need to know what food costs and how most people feed themselves and their families - especially those politicians who claim there's no need for food banks.
[ 25. May 2014, 14:23: Message edited by: justlooking ]
Posts: 2319 | From: thither and yon | Registered: Nov 2006
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Jay-Emm
Shipmate
# 11411
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
especially those politicians who claim there's no need for food banks.
On that line I'd be curious to see how the numbers given now differ from the similar descriptions when (for example) talking about foodbanks.
I know (as vaguely leftist) I'm finding myself trimming to the tightest definition of groceries whereas on the other thread I was well aware of anything that made things easier for me.
(about 3 years ago for one person it used to be £30/week including collection and 'lunch' money. But not sure how many 'exceptions' there were).
Posts: 1643 | Registered: May 2006
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
Recently returned from a month in England and Ireland. Summary of shopping costs - we had a kitchen in an apartment in London, what you would call in UK I think a self catering flat. Rough summary of shopping costs: 1£ costs Can$1.8. About 1 £ buys what 1 $ buys here. So not quite double. But close. Your beer and wine costs are very high, and exceed that, whether store or pub/restaurant.
Your gasoline/petrol/diesel costs are very high. About 2.5 times what it costs here.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Chief of sinners
Shipmate
# 8794
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Posted
quote:
1£ costs Can$1.8. About 1 £ buys what 1 $ buys here. So not quite double. But close. Your beer and wine costs are very high, and exceed that, whether store or pub/restaurant.
I once turned down the chance to move to Fredricton New Brunswick, in view of above that seems a blunder now
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If Jesus was half the revolutionary you claim, how come he is now represented by one of the most conservative, status-quo institutions on the planet?
Posts: 155 | From: UK | Registered: Nov 2004
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chief of sinners:
quote:
1£ costs Can$1.8. About 1 £ buys what 1 $ buys here. So not quite double. But close. Your beer and wine costs are very high, and exceed that, whether store or pub/restaurant.
I once turned down the chance to move to Fredricton New Brunswick, in view of above that seems a blunder now
Just did a quick look. Average cost to buy a house in New Brunswick is $150,000. Not exactly daily shopping are houses, but most Canadians own a house. Houses are close to 2½ times that in the Canadian west.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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North East Quine
Curious beastie
# 13049
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Posted
Do his kids spend their days at home with a nanny, or are they eating at school / after school?
He was speaking about "groceries" - I wouldn't include £20 per week on school dinners as part of my "groceries." If most of the family meals are eaten outwith the home, at the House of Commons, or wherever his wife works, or at school, then the family "groceries" might well be £70 or £80 per week.
They might only be buying milk / coffee / cornflakes / bananas.
Posts: 6414 | From: North East Scotland | Registered: Oct 2007
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Mrs Shrew
Ship's Mother
# 8635
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Posted
Our groceries are probably about £50-60 per week for the two of us. However, that includes a few beers most weeks, and also cooking dinner for six friends every Sunday night. I most often do a roast for that so it does get expensive. I feel like my groceries bill should be smaller than it is but I am chronically disorganised with planning meals.
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"The goal of life is not to make other people in your own image, it is to understand that they, too, are in God's image" (Orfeo)
Was "mummyfrances".
Posts: 703 | From: York, England | Registered: Oct 2004
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justlooking
Shipmate
# 12079
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Posted
Economies of scale operate with food shopping. Even when it's just a couple they seem to spend less than a single person x 2. Where there are children their ages make a difference but in general the larger the family the cheaper the 'per head' food bill.
As a single pensioner I'm OK with spending £6 on a 400gm pack of organic lamb which will do for two meals but a family of four could also get enough meat for two meals for the same money. They'd just buy cheaper meat.
Food choices differ with circumstances too. E.g. for my lunch today I'm having a 170 gm pack of prawns, with a dollop of low-fat mayo and a crusty bread roll plus a salad of cherry tomatoes, cucumber and yellow pepper, followed by a box of 8 fresh apricots. I think a couple would share the prawns and the apricots, double the salad and perhaps have more bread. I doubt if a family with several children would have such a meal.
I'd like to see MPs seriously engage with the realities of what it costs to ensure an adequate diet for the poorest in the UK.
Posts: 2319 | From: thither and yon | Registered: Nov 2006
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ecumaniac
Ship's whipping girl
# 376
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Posted
When I decided to eat properly/healthily, my food costs almost doubled.
I had been previously eating workday lunches at work (school dinners) which were "free" but actually not that healthy compared to what I prepare at home.
I share an under-bench fridge with 2 other adults so don't have a lot of fridge space to store leftovers or to cook/buy in bulk.
My current monthly budget for food (including all groceries and eating out) is £150, and towards the end of the month I find I usually dip into other budget categories, go searching for stray Tesco vouchers or eat more lunches at work which I don't have to pay for with money. I have a good pantry of staples so I won't ever actually go hungry, but it's been an eye opener for how much more money I had to spend to eat healthily. It's the meat/protein that seems to cost the most, and the food at work is stingy on the amount and quality of protein.
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it's a secret club for people with a knitting addiction, hiding under the cloak of BDSM - Catrine
Posts: 2901 | From: Cambridge | Registered: Jun 2001
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
Most of the meals I cook are based around stretching the meat out so it looks like more. Yes, I could buy more meat, but that's obviously and necessarily the most expensive ingredient. So we have lots of casseroles, curries, tegines, stir-fries and the like. Very rarely do we ever have an actual slab of identifiable meat on a plate - normally when I've located a decently-priced joint. There are still a lot of veggies on the plate too.
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
(double post)
The obvious question is to ask why not eat more vegetarian meals? The obvious answer is that my MiL, who lives with us, doesn't consider it dinner.
Tried it a couple of times, decided I didn't have the emotional strength to do it again.
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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ecumaniac
Ship's whipping girl
# 376
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Posted
I used to only eat meat at work, and not at home, and that did not really go very well for my energy levels.
There's only so much effort, willpower and time to go around. So far I've chosen to spend more money on straightforward meals that are quick and easy to prepare, but that involve buying moderately pricey meat.
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it's a secret club for people with a knitting addiction, hiding under the cloak of BDSM - Catrine
Posts: 2901 | From: Cambridge | Registered: Jun 2001
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Talitha
Shipmate
# 5085
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Posted
Seems reasonable to me. Our weekly online grocery shop is £70-80 for 2 adults, a small child and a baby. That includes nappies, toiletries, cat food, and things like washing powder. I top up with bread and milk from the local shop but that's single digits.
We're not especially frugal; we tend to buy and eat what we want. Although what we want happens not to include much meat or much alcohol.
Posts: 554 | From: Cambridge, UK | Registered: Oct 2003
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
I gather, as expected that for many people and places meat is the most expensive item. Here, it is often quite cheap compared to vegetables and fruit. :jealous:
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
I gather, as expected that for many people and places meat is the most expensive item. Here, it is often quite cheap compared to vegetables and fruit. :jealous:
I did notice (I mean this was over 20 years ago now) when I was travelling through Western Australia, the meat was dirt cheap compared to the limited amount of veggies. Whether this was due to the high cost of growing and transporting them, or whether it was simply due to low demand, I'm not sure. Aus seemed a very meat-oriented culture.
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
Meat would have been both reared and then probably slaughtered locally. Only a small amount of land in Western Australia is of a suitable for growing vegetables on a commercial scale* with an adequate and dependable rainfall to allow that to happen. As a result, many people in rural areas grow many of their own vegetables and the remainder are shipped in at considerable cost. Much the same applies in most of Australia between the Dividing range just inland from the eastern coast and the bottom south-west corner of the continent.
* I can't quickly find any source material, but recall reading that the average topsoil depth across Australia is well under 20 cm.
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008
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comet
Snowball in Hell
# 10353
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Posted
I spend between us$3-400 a month on food, for two adults and one pre-teen boy who eats everything that doesn't bite back.
most of our animal protein comes from wild sources, so the meat part of the budget is relatively small - which is good, a small whole chicken is over $10 here, and beef and pork are higher.
I'd say the majority of my budget goes towards freshies - i.e. produce. in the summer it's not quite so much, as I can grow and gather a lot, and get pretty good prices at the farmer's market. We eat a LOT of fruit and veg.
my kitchen rule is scratch - which is possible as I work in spurts (contract work) and in between I'm home a lot. so all bread and yogurt is from scratch, and about 1/4 of our cheese is homemade. I'd do more but I'm frankly lazy where cheese is concerned.
We eat out about once a month, less in winter, a little more in summer.
the only things that come in packages are flour and other related baking staples, and a few canned goods - olives and green chile, for instance, that I just can't access fresh. coffee comes from the roastery. I try and locally source as much as I can.
When I was working full time+, had two boys at home with just me as an adult, my monthly grocery bill was over $600/month.
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Evil Dragon Lady, Breaker of Men's Constitutions
"It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.” -Calvin
Posts: 17024 | From: halfway between Seduction and Peril | Registered: Sep 2005
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Tubbs
Miss Congeniality
# 440
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Posted
I'm still not sure quite how Ed Milliband managed to break the UK section of the Internet with his comment that they spend about £80 a week on food. If they travel outside Primrose Hill for the weekly shop and whoever does it knows what they're doing, it is within the realms of possiblty.
If you fancy a laugh, have a read of this article from the Daily Mail. Rose Prince claims is Milliband being out of touch whilst sneering at value ranges, not appearing to know how to meal plan or stick to a budget. She admits to spending about £200 a week on food. That's a week! Pots and kettles.
Tubbs
[ 28. May 2014, 12:31: Message edited by: Tubbs ]
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"It's better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than open it up and remove all doubt" - Dennis Thatcher. My blog. Decide for yourself which I am
Posts: 12701 | From: Someplace strange | Registered: Jun 2001
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Tubbs:
I'm still not sure quite how Ed Milliband managed to break the UK section of the Internet with his comment that they spend about £80 a week on food. If they travel outside Primrose Hill for the weekly shop and whoever does it knows what they're doing, it is within the realms of possiblty.
The number may well even be correct, but Milliband doesn't know it. He lied, and made up a number that he thought would sound good. When he was then told "that's not much - most people spend more than that" then he wriggled, and tried to claim that he was thinking about fruit and veg.
I don't care whether Milliband knows how much he spends on groceries. He makes a lot of money, and his wife makes a lot of money, so they can spend anything they like on groceries and not have to worry.
I care that he's a dishonest lying toerag who will say whatever he thinks people want to hear.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Tubbs
Miss Congeniality
# 440
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
quote:
Originally posted by Tubbs:
I'm still not sure quite how Ed Milliband managed to break the UK section of the Internet with his comment that they spend about £80 a week on food. If they travel outside Primrose Hill for the weekly shop and whoever does it knows what they're doing, it is within the realms of possiblty.
The number may well even be correct, but Milliband doesn't know it. He lied, and made up a number that he thought would sound good. When he was then told "that's not much - most people spend more than that" then he wriggled, and tried to claim that he was thinking about fruit and veg.
I don't care whether Milliband knows how much he spends on groceries. He makes a lot of money, and his wife makes a lot of money, so they can spend anything they like on groceries and not have to worry.
I care that he's a dishonest lying toerag who will say whatever he thinks people want to hear.
He may be, but I'd put good money on the fact that none of the UK's political leaders know how much they spend on food each week. Or have seen the inside of a supermarket in recent memory.
Tubbs
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"It's better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than open it up and remove all doubt" - Dennis Thatcher. My blog. Decide for yourself which I am
Posts: 12701 | From: Someplace strange | Registered: Jun 2001
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Tubbs:
He may be, but I'd put good money on the fact that none of the UK's political leaders know how much they spend on food each week. Or have seen the inside of a supermarket in recent memory.
Yes, I'd agree with you - and there's no particular reason why they should know how much they spend on food. They all have a lot of money, and don't have to worry about budgeting for food - they can just buy whatever they want. And probably none of them do the shopping, either.
"I don't know how much we spend - we are well off and don't have to worry about budgeting for food" would be an honest answer. Although if you're campaigning on the subject of rising everyday costs for ordinary people, it would seem sensible for you to have some figures for ordinary people's everyday costs in your head.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
Our budget (2 adults, no kids) for the weekly visit to Sainsburys is exactly £80 - that includes all the extra toiletries, cleaning products, washing-up liquids and suchlike that generally have to be bought every other month or so. Most weeks we spend less than that.
It doesn't include little extras bought during the week, or eating out (about once or twice a month), or alcohol other than maybe an occasional bottle of wine to go with a roast.
And as far as that Daily Mail article goes, anyone who considers courgettes to be a basic staple of the average diet hasn't got a bloody clue about what any of those words mean.
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
Daily Mail hasn't got a bloody clue .
FTFY.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
Our budget (2 adults, no kids) for the weekly visit to Sainsburys is exactly £80 - that includes all the extra toiletries, cleaning products, washing-up liquids and suchlike that generally have to be bought every other month or so. Most weeks we spend less than that.
It doesn't include little extras bought during the week, or eating out (about once or twice a month), or alcohol other than maybe an occasional bottle of wine to go with a roast.
And as far as that Daily Mail article goes, anyone who considers courgettes to be a basic staple of the average diet hasn't got a bloody clue about what any of those words mean.
Actual Poor Person here, and I would consider courgettes to be a basic sort of vegetable, especially in season when they're incredibly cheap. When I was really really poor and living off £10 a week, couscous with a tin of value sweetcorn and a chopped courgette fried with a garlic clove was a favourite, especially as I could have leftovers cold for lunch.
Don't be so patronising and assume that poor people don't know anything about food.
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
quote:
Originally posted by Tubbs:
I'm still not sure quite how Ed Milliband managed to break the UK section of the Internet with his comment that they spend about £80 a week on food. If they travel outside Primrose Hill for the weekly shop and whoever does it knows what they're doing, it is within the realms of possiblty.
The number may well even be correct, but Milliband doesn't know it. He lied, and made up a number that he thought would sound good. When he was then told "that's not much - most people spend more than that" then he wriggled, and tried to claim that he was thinking about fruit and veg.
I don't care whether Milliband knows how much he spends on groceries. He makes a lot of money, and his wife makes a lot of money, so they can spend anything they like on groceries and not have to worry.
I care that he's a dishonest lying toerag who will say whatever he thinks people want to hear.
But how do you know it's a lie? This is what baffles me. You don't live in the UK, you don't know what food costs here, you have no right to make assumptions when it's perfectly doable. Many of us have lived off much less, are we all liars too?
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
But how do you know it's a lie? This is what baffles me. You don't live in the UK, you don't know what food costs here, you have no right to make assumptions when it's perfectly doable. Many of us have lived off much less, are we all liars too?
I know that it is perfectly possible for two adults and two small children to feed themselves for 70-80 quid a week. I have no idea what the Miliband household actually spends on food. It is completely irrelevant.
The point is that Ed Miliband was asked how much he spends on groceries, and he said "70-80 quid". Then he was told that average for a family of his size would be more than 100 quid, and he says "Right. Well, it's more than 100 quid". Later on, he claimed that the 70-80 quid was for "the basics".
This is why he's lying. He's not internally consistent - he's just grabbing at numbers and building an off-the-cuff story around them.
I suggest that what actually happened was that he was asked what his grocery bill was, didn't have an answer ready, and so guessed. Then he's told that his number is lower than average, and he realizes that that is silly - he lives in London, he and his wife both make lots of money, and they don't go round Tesco looking for the blue stripy packets. So he revises his number. Later still, he invents a story to explain why his number changed.
It's all fiction. An honest man would say that he didn't know.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
But how do you know it's a lie? This is what baffles me. You don't live in the UK, you don't know what food costs here, you have no right to make assumptions when it's perfectly doable. Many of us have lived off much less, are we all liars too?
I know that it is perfectly possible for two adults and two small children to feed themselves for 70-80 quid a week. I have no idea what the Miliband household actually spends on food. It is completely irrelevant.
The point is that Ed Miliband was asked how much he spends on groceries, and he said "70-80 quid". Then he was told that average for a family of his size would be more than 100 quid, and he says "Right. Well, it's more than 100 quid". Later on, he claimed that the 70-80 quid was for "the basics".
This is why he's lying. He's not internally consistent - he's just grabbing at numbers and building an off-the-cuff story around them.
I suggest that what actually happened was that he was asked what his grocery bill was, didn't have an answer ready, and so guessed. Then he's told that his number is lower than average, and he realizes that that is silly - he lives in London, he and his wife both make lots of money, and they don't go round Tesco looking for the blue stripy packets. So he revises his number. Later still, he invents a story to explain why his number changed.
It's all fiction. An honest man would say that he didn't know.
I don't think that's really lying though, it's guessing. I would say this regardless what party the person belonged to.
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
It's lying when they don't admit it's a guess and pretend they were saying the same thing all along.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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