TooGoodToGo

[jennyjj01]

From Morrisons (I can't seem to upload photos...)
Cafe was £2.99 (worth £9.00 apparently).
- tray of salmon sandwiches and crisps (hubby's lunch tomorrow, 2 packs children's ham sandwiches(I will make them into toasties tomorrow) and a mixe box of cakes (pudding today).
Groceries £3.09 (worth £10.00l).
- broccoli, dill, 2 packs celery, pack chilli peppers, small loaf of bread, loose apples (6 in total, punnet of raspberries, 3 punnets of blueberries)

I've had worse from Morrsions.

Well, there's something that's changed. Last year, items were 1/4 of initial ticket price and now it seems like 1/3.
The tray of sarnies and crisps would only retail for about 3 quid anyway. To only get one is pants.
Your Morrison's grocery one sounds pretty rubbish
Not actually one meal in that. The cafe one sound's better.

Tip with the berries. Get some campden tablets from amazon or a wine making supplier. One crushed campden tablet in cool water, soak the berries for maybe 30 minutes, and it will kill off moulds before they can get a grip. Extends the shelf life up to a week. It's harmless, odourless and tasteless. Works with salads and bigger fruits, too.

Trying to think what I'd do with those products..... Dehydrator for the celery, apples. Freeze chillis and brocolli?
Bread and butter pudding? or Breadcrumbs? Make wine or compote from the berries and apples? It's all a bit of a stretch.

[steptoe]

From the ones I've had so far, I can see this working well. Target day for the TGTG challenge* is looking like Monday

*To try to survive a week on 3 or 4 TGTG bags

I confess, I didn't do my TGTG challenge. The Chicken thighs got frozen and other stuff went in the fridge.

Nonetheless I picked up another magic bag today. What an eclectic mix......

Tray of 2 pork chops
Tray of 4 veg samosas
half loaf of bread
chilli hot scotch egg
tub of Tuna Mayo sandwich spread
and something I never tried: A jar of marmite peanut butter !!!!!

LOL. good value and I got some meat. The chilli hot scotch egg already eaten.
IMG_20210824_192845.jpg

Ok you thrifty lot how the hell do i get in the game lol

[itsybitsy]

I dare not tell my parents about this, otherwise they will spend their entire time in the UK roaming the streets collecting cheap food.

[jennyjj01]

Ok you thrifty lot how the hell do i get in the game lol

It's an app for a smart phone. Start here
https://toogoodtogo.co.uk/en-gb/consumer

In a nutshell, how it works is that shops like your corner spar shop, late shop, morrisons, Greggs, Pound bakery and the odd Toby carvery, make their yellow label expiring stuff available as 'Lucky Dip magic bags'

Obvious what you'll get with some, such as greggs or Toby, but supermarkets are far more random.
You set the app to scan your local stores and each day, you can reserve your 'magic bag; usually for you to collect next day after about 7pm.
You prepay by card and if you don't collect, tough tittie.
Sometimes stores will not fulfill the order and you get a refund automatically.
Remember, you are getting stuff that is on it's last Best before day.
Typically, you'll get a bunch of stupid stuff, like I once got 6 bags of assorted salad leaves. Or maybe 3 loaves of bread, some hummus and a pizza
Sometimes you get meat, such as a couple of pork chops or a pack of deli meat. They are great bags. Sniff and snarf
Back in 2021, i did 11 of these magic bags, and with a bit of lateral thinking, got at least two meals out of each.
Price is typically £3.09 which gets items of original price of about £12

There's a couple of things I do to get the max out of this....
Only use it for local suppliers. Literally, my corner shop partakes. Sometime, I can have a mooch in there in mid afternoon and get a good idea of what will be coming up. Bread on offer at the tills? Veg, already yellow stickered. Etc.
You have to be prepared to bin some stuff. But I can eat houmous. I can freeze bread, make pesto out of salad leaves. Just got to be a bit nuts. Two vegan scotch eggs and a marmite bap for supper. It's still calories

The toby carvery ones can be great, if you can deal with eating late or next day. It's gut wrenching what they plan to chuck away at the end of the shift.

Back on first covid lockdown, I got gallons of draught beer at £1 a litre. just bring a bottle


If you live near a greggs or pound bakery, you can score big. Unsold doughnuts, sarnies, salads, sausage rolls. What's the worst that can happen.
Some folks do well with veg boxes. £3.09 for a 'banana box of assorted fruit and veg. Learn to eat yams

[PreppingSu]

Costa Coffee: £3.00 (retail £10)
Vegan quorn smoked ham and herself toastie.
Tuna melt panini
Mini munchie ham roll.

Hmm, as I'm now on school holidays, this will do for lunches for the next few days.

Re: morrisons bag. I will use everything in the bag apart from the 2 packs of celery (celery soup came to mind, or chucking it in a stew).

Blueberries: I will be making blueberry muffins with my store cupboard ingredients and donating them to a local Feed The City charitable cafe/warm space.

Broccoli and dill will probably feed the bunnies this week.

It's an OK bag. It just means all my other food will stretch just that bit farther.

Also managed to get a bag reserved with a local bakery for tomorrow so looking forward to that one.

[jennyjj01]

And tonight's bags...... One disappointing. One pleasing.

£1.99 from a local small supermarket. The disappointing one
Meal Deal type Sandwich
Meal Deal type Tuna Salad
Toffee trifle for one
Probable full retail value, about £5
That will be two lunches. Dated today, hopefully good till Wednesday

£3.09 from a local small supermarket. The more pleasing one
Steak Slice (one lunch)
6 Cooked Chicken drumsticks (will make some sandwiches)
Meal Deal type Salad (one supper)
4 Dinky Doughnuts (a bit stale so eaten)
Pack of Deli Chicken slices (will make sandwiches for two lunches)
Garlic Baguette (Into the freezer)

In combination, this will heading past it's best by the time it's eaten by Wednesday/Thursday.

Buying these two magic bags was mostly to determine whether the scheme is still worth the effort and to compare the offerings of two shops. It is worthwhile at something like £1 per lunch/supper But it's a bit marginal. Unfortunate that not much worth freezing.

[GillyBee]

Not worth it for us due to the wheat intolerance thing. I do know how to handle a big bag of fresh chillies if you get them again.
Either chop and freeze in icecubes with about a teaspoonful in each or chop, dump in a jam jar and cover well with vinegar. Keep in fridge. My Curry Club recipe book says that the pickled chillies like this will keep for months. I suppose it is much the same science as pickled onions so that makes sense.
If you are in a hurry you can just dump them in a blender with the vinegar and whizz to make a sort of puree.

[PreppingSu]

Today's haul from a local bakery:
3 white bread rolls (large, almost the size of my hand!)
2 seeded sub rolls
2 large sausage rolls, still warm
1 pasty, still warm
1 jam doughnut.

DD got doughnut as she drove me there.
Rolls into freezer, perfect for filling with leftover turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce.
And tonight's tea will be sausage rolls and pasty, with homemade wedges and salad. Perfect.

All means my stocks of food will last a little longer.

[jennyjj01]

Today's haul from a local bakery:
3 white bread rolls (large, almost the size of my hand!)
2 seeded sub rolls
2 large sausage rolls, still warm
1 pasty, still warm
1 jam doughnut.

DD got doughnut as she drove me there.
Rolls into freezer, perfect for filling with leftover turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce.
And tonight's tea will be sausage rolls and pasty, with homemade wedges and salad. Perfect.

All means my stocks of food will last a little longer.

Was that a £3.09 one?
If so, not great value.

[PreppingSu]

Today's haul from a local bakery:
3 white bread rolls (large, almost the size of my hand!)
2 seeded sub rolls
2 large sausage rolls, still warm
1 pasty, still warm
1 jam doughnut.

DD got doughnut as she drove me there.
Rolls into freezer, perfect for filling with leftover turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce.
And tonight's tea will be sausage rolls and pasty, with homemade wedges and salad. Perfect.

All means my stocks of food will last a little longer.

Was that a £3.09 one?
If so, not great value.

It was a £4.00 one, but from an excellent local bakery. Worth £12.00.
The bread rolls and seeded sub ones are huge. Much better quality than supermarket rolls.
The sausage rolls and pasty were part of 3 adult meals in the evening, adding only homemade potato wedges and salad which needed to be used up, so I think very good value.