Is it possible to live only off reduced food for a week?

There’s over a month to go before the next glorious instalment of our student loans and it can’t come quick enough. After recklessly spending all of my last loan (a week in Morocco isn’t exactly what the government expects you to spend it on) I am poor.

I have no job, no money and it’s got to the point where pasta (and I literally mean just pasta) is an acceptable meal.

So, I had the idea to try living solely off reduced foods for a week. I partly wanted to do it to see how much money I could save (if any) and partly because I’m addicted to a bargain. Admittedly some of my meals used things already in my cupboard but I would have to buy everything new from the reduced aisle.

Bargains

Monday

The week didn’t get off to a great start. For breakfast, I had dry toast and butter. I’d ran out of tea bags too so breakfast was pretty much the most depressing meal. Things could only get better.

The loaf of bread did only cost me 20p though, one of the many perks of living near Morrisons. Each night all the bread gets reduced down to ridiculous prices like 21p for five bagels. I rarely pay more than 20p for a loaf and while it’s not the best and you do need about four slices to fill you up, it’s edible and it turns into toast. Amazing.

Luckily, the rest of the day was a lot more successful and after prowling all of the supermarkets surrounding harbourside I’d gathered the ingredients for a simple sausage casserole.

It was delicious and healthy! I served it with rice but couscous or even some crusty rolls would’ve made a perfect accompaniment. The whole meal cost less than £3 and made 4 portions which I then was able to have for lunch all week!

I also bought a Chinese takeaway meal for two that came with egg fried rice, Chinese chicken curry ,sweet and sour chicken, and spring rolls down from £5 to £2.99. Perfect for two quick and easy meals later in the week.

Tuesday

Morrisons yet again saved the day (or should I say saved me from going hungry). I managed to pick up two pork loins and a box of vegetable stir fry for the grand sum of £2.38. I’m one of these people who will always have sachets of things in my cupboard and at times like this, I’m so grateful.

At this point, I have a confession to make. I ended up making two different stir fry dishes, splitting the ingredients and using yellow bean and cashew nut sauce in the second. The thought of living solely off black bean stir fry for the next week wasn’t pleasant.

Wednesday

The middle of the week proved to be my biggest fail. I woke up and couldn’t resist the urge for a caramel latte. For the cost of £2.80, I broke the rules, indulged myself, and felt awful about it after. I’ve been making meals to serve four people for less than that.

It didn’t get any better as the day progressed either. My sister was visiting from Plymouth so we ended up indulging yet again but this time in cocktails and chicken at Turtle Bay (she did pay though, love you Soph).

Cheers sis, owe you one

On the way home I managed a quick dash to Tesco for a late night snack and managed to get my hands on Pepperoni Pizza Pockets – basically cocktail pasties with pizza on the inside.

I’d already had 4 cocktails by this point and a few beers so my memory was not at its best and I forgot about the food completely and left it in the oven. By the time I rescued them, they were slightly black and definitely way crunchier then they should’ve been but still edible and with a little less cooking time, I think they could’ve even been enjoyable.

Thursday

Thursday turned out just about as well as Wednesday. I spent the day doing girly shit with my sister and went to Racks in Clifton for lunch. I do have a tastecard though and we did get 50 per cent off our food, so that kinda counts, doesn’t it?

After a hectic day of shopping and eating, I had no energy to trawl the shops for the best of the bargains. I was still full from lunch so ended up having the Chinese chicken curry with egg fried rice from the freezer which probably cost me less than £1.50 and probably contained zero chicken.

Friday

After four straight days of eating reduced toast with butter for breakfast, I decided to shake things up and have porridge for a change. I love porridge and a huge bag of oats from Asda costs less than a pound and it’ll seriously last forever. You can’t go wrong.

Friday was a good day for reduced food. I managed to pick up some cooking apples, a punnet of strawberries, two chicken and bacon Ginsters pasties, a pack of three onions and a pot of potato salad. It felt like I was in reduced rood heaven.

Having had a very savoury week, it was time for something sweet and a home-made crumble is my absolute favourite. I made two crumbles, apple and toffee, and strawberry. I already had plain flour, brown sugar, cinnamon and butter so I guess this is cheating a bit, but the main ingredient I bought was reduced at least.

I really enjoyed living off reduced this week but it can be stressful if and when you can’t find anything to eat, though thankfully this didn’t happen too often.

I realised pretty quickly you need to make sure you go to the shops at the right time. Morrisons and Tesco were by far the best shops for reducing foods to the lowest prices whilst Sainsburys and Co-Op were the culprits of reducing things by as little as 3p. Generally late evening is the best time to get the best reduced bits but sometimes if you go even later everything is reduced again for a quick sale. 7p potato salad anyone?

All that being said, I won’t be spending the rest of my life hunting for that ultimate bargain meal. Because let’s be honest, if we really want to save money we’ve just got to say no to that oh-so-desirable caramel latte.