Here we are, my final post of my £20 grocery challenge series. Today we’re going to be talking about how I’ve managed this week, how I’m feeling both mentally and physically. Then I’m going to show you what I ate this week and we’ll have a little peek at my nutrient consumption. I have a feeling this isn’t going to be the greatest diet you’ve ever seen.
How I’ve Felt Mentally
A lot of hurdles I’ve had this week have been mental rather than physical. I think the whole I’m eating this way out of choice not necessity has had a massive impact on the way I’ve viewed my food.
Aside from breakfast being repetitive and quite dull, I have eaten different dishes every night as I originally planned. But I’m bored. Whether you put a carrot in a spicy curry or an herby Italian pasta dish, a carrot is still a carrot. And I don’t want to eat another carrot for at least a month. My meals are usually quite colourful and vibrant. This week has consisted of the same few vegetables in a tomato sauce, some added protein and the only variation has been different herbs and spices. Although my taste buds may have been tricked into thinking there was a wide variety in my dishes, my brain knows differently and it’s ready for something new.
I’ve felt very restricted. Not in terms of calories or sheer amount of food, but the limited choice has me feeling down. I’m eating peanut better rather than almond butter and they’re a pound difference in price. I’m eating regular oats (and have looked about 4 months pregnant all week) rather than gluten free ones, out of choice.
How I’m Feeling Physically
Don’t get me wrong, if I had literally had £20 to my name or I was giving myself a serious budget for whatever other reason, this diet is perfectly manageable. I feel fine (gluten excluded). I’m not hungry, I’m not lethargic, I don’t feel physically lacking in anything, I could do this for a few more weeks if I really had to.
Another thing, this is somewhat mental and physical. My appetite has been crazy. You may recall, I said in my planning post, that I have a tiny appetite and was feeling confident about this challenge because I don’t usually eat a huge amount. Well, feeling restricted does funny things to your brain, food was on brain all week. I’ve never had so many cravings in my life. I wanted to eat constantly. As I’ve mentioned, I wasn’t hungry, but I would have eaten just about anything you put in front of me.
Again, I think this is because it was a choice. A choice I made as an experiment, not a choice I made because I had a great desire to eat carrots in a different flavoured sauce all week. I’m certain that if this was my life out of necessity I wouldn’t have had those feelings. I was proud of myself for the fact I managed to pick up a varied selection of food, with options for certain meals, for £16 a person. But it was like telling yourself your going on a strict diet, this week I’m eating low fat and no carbs. The average person wakes up on Monday morning and wants ALL the fat and sugar because you’ve told yourself you can’t have any. I told myself I had to sacrifice things I normally enjoy to complete this challenge, so it was all my body wanted.
What I Ate
The part you’ve all been waiting for, what I managed to eat this week. For breakfast I was either having toast or porridge with peanut butter and chia seeds.
Snacks consisted of my Pulsin’ bars, almonds and my yoghurt.
Lunch. In my first post I said I don’t usually eat lunch, just a couple of small snacks throughout the day. As I suffered from a huge boom in appetite, I did eat lunch a couple of times. One day I had a spare potato, so I baked that, one day I had some leftovers from the night before and one day I caved and had some toast. (I must hate myself, the stomach ache was not cute by the end of the week)
The majority of these pictures were taken at about 8pm with nothing but a slightly yellow toned bulb. I apologise in advance for the quality.
Sunday
My go-to Veggie Burger
Now I know this isn’t the cheapest food, but starting on a weekend, eating plain basis felt like too much of a challenge so I made my ‘indulgent’ meal on the first night. I had to adapt the recipe slightly as I couldn’t afford things like pesto, so it wasn’t as great as usual. However, having something that was a ‘usual meal’ felt like a good thing.
Yes. you’ve seen this picture before. No this wasn’t taken this week. I hadn’t mastered the 8pm photo yet so pretend this doesn’t have greens in and is served in a pitta.
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- Sunday overview
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- Sunday without vitamins
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- Sunday with vitamins
Monday
I was aiming to eat in order of freshness, so my foods get less vitamin rich as the week goes on, but on Monday I had pasta. As unhappy as I was having the pasta, as it’s something I wouldn’t usually eat often, this turned out to be a good shout. It’s an easy dish to throw the most vegetables in. I think this could be the only day I managed to get my full 5 a day. And because I opted for the more pricey lentil pasta, it’s a fairly balanced day in terms of macronutrients too.
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- Monday overview
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- Monday without vitamins
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- Monday with vitamins
Tuesday
Potato nachos. Heavy, filling, not the greatest amount of vegetables but it’s a very cheap and satisfying option. Using only potatoes, black beans, salsa and an onion, it comes in at around a pound a portion so it’s a great choice in terms of budgeting.
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- Tuesday
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- Tuesday without vitamins
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- Tuesday with vitamins
Wednesday
Mexican rice. Very simple. Very cheap. A little dull. Again, this one also comes in at less than a pound a portion. This dish contains rice, kidney beans, tomatoes and an onion. This dish has potential to be really good if it was bulked up with more vegetables for extra texture and flavour, but budget…
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- Wednesday overview
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- Wednesday without
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- Wednesday with
Thursday
Vegetable + chickpea curry with turmeric rice. This is so easy to make on a budget and should have been enjoyable. By Thursday though, I was really started to feel like repetitiveness of the same vegetables over and over again, so it didn’t matter that this dish tasted different. I was over it.
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- Thursday overview
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- Thursday without vitamins
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- Thursday with vitamins
Friday
Roasted sweet potato and chickpeas with kale. This was a pleasant change. It was great not to have a carrot on my plate. The sweet potatoes were a great alternative carb and I managed to get some different nutrients in. I really like this meal; however, I usually make a salad dressing or sauce to go with it. I know I sound like a broken record, but I couldn’t afford that, so it was a little lacklustre. The kale was dry, thankfully though there was enough moisture in the sweet potatoes that the dish overall wasn’t.
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- Friday overview
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- Friday without vitamins
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- Friday with vitamins
Saturday
Was painful. My final day. Also, the day I go food shopping. Buying the food for next week, having a limited amount left, and trying to have the will power not to eat it was challenging. I caved at about 10pm and opened my Pringles. Don’t judge me. I tried. But for my dinner, which I made with a fully stocked fridge of food for the following week, I had a lentil dal. Lentils, water and spices. 0 of my five a day. With a full fridge. I didn’t put my Pringles in my food intake, so that’s accurate for what I would have had with the food I originally bought.
Although the lentils were tasty, it was by far the ugliest meal of the week. Sorry, no photo for today.
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- Saturday
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- Saturday without vitamins
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- Saturday with vitamins
Did I cheat?
We’ve already discussed the Pringles. I wish I’d had the willpower to wait another two hours, but it is what it is. The only other thing I did cheat with was a Nakd bar on Friday. I saw a new flavour, Blueberry Muffin, blueberry is my favourite flavour of muffin and Nakd bars are one of my favourite snacks. I couldn’t resist. It was however only an extra 85p so my total for the week was still within budget. With the Nakd bar added, the weekly shop would have averaged at £16.40 (ish) per person so I still think this was a victory.
How do you think I did?
Nutrition
Below is my weekly in nutrition, based on averages from everything I’ve entered for the last seven days. I do take a vegan multivitamin daily for my B12 etc, so please take into consideration that this would also be added to these figures on an ordinary day. There’s a shot with and without my multivitamin added to highlight the differences. Also, the exact vitamin and mineral levels for things like vegetables are averages; this isn’t an exact science. For things that I’ve added myself, there won’t be a vitamin profile as food labels in the UK don’t include vitamin information as a standard. I won’t be adding my water consumption, please don’t be alarmed when that figure is low for every day.
It’s not great. There’s more amber than I’d like. Although, it is a lot better than I thought it would be. Obviously, not great if I was planning on doing this forever, but I wasn’t expecting to see much green at all. As you can see, most days I ate roughly the number of calories I burned which was surprising for me. You will notice though, a lot of my calories came from the nut butter rather than ‘proper food’ and I have eaten way more fat than usual this week as an easy way to increase energy levels.
Weekly average without added vitamins
Full weekly average with vitamins
Reflecting on this, expect a ‘what I usually eat in a week’ next week so I can compare the differences.
It’s now Sunday as I’m putting the finishing touches to this post, my week officially ended 12 hours ago (maybe 14 if you take the Pringles into account). I’m now off to eat my own bodyweight.
See how I planned this week and what I bought.
Until next time,
Sophie
Your meals all look SO delicious! Especially that veggie burger!
Thanks Hebah! It’s amazing what you can whip up from not a lot! x
Great post! I really enjoy reading this, it made me think about what I eat and most of all how much I spend weekly on food. I think I might give it ago next week actually. Really good read!
Ashlee | ashleemoyo.com
I loved your post. You really gave all the details and charts and I loved your honesty about how it all went down.
Le,a xx
The meal you made looks so tasty! I should give myself budget. Especially now. I have been spending so much lately! xx corinne
This post really made me reflect on my eating habits and the amount of money my family and I spend on groceries. It’s ridiculous how much money we spend on food every week. I’d definitely be willing to apply this sort of idea to my own meals. Great post!
The detail you put into this post is fantastic! And the honesty as well. Such an interesting read and makes me want to try the £20 challenge myself.
Heather xox ||
Thank you! That means a lot, it took a really long time to put it all together so I’m glad you appreciate it. It’s really interesting to see what you deem necessary when you give yourself a strict budget. It’s hard though! x
Sophie
I hate being such a fussy eater! All this food looks amazing but i know that i just wouldn’t be able to eat it!
This is a great post, and is such an amazing idea to save money as well as trying to eat more healthier and actually tracking what you eat! Ayse x
Loved this post, such an interesting challenge and amazing to see the results. Also, that veggie burger looks and sounds amazing! X
That food looks so yummy! I find it so difficult to get inspiration for meals on a budget but this had definitely helped.
I love seeing challenges like this. I loved this post! 🙂 x
Fantastic post have been reading your grocery challenge and great to see the final result . The meals look delicious too
Melanie |www.frasersfunhouse.com
I’m always interested in what others eat. I think these meals look pretty good. I’ve never heard of potato nachos before, actually, but it looks and sounds good.
I’ve been looking forward to this post. I think you did really well meal wise with what you had. This is also an eye-opener to how little you actually have to spend each week to still have enough food. Maybe you won’t be restricting it to as little as £20 every week but spending less than before.
Hi Evie, it’s interesting actually. I did my food shop for this week yesterday and I thought I was going to spend a fortune. No more restrictions, time to give in to all of those cravings… and I didn’t. It was actually slightly less than a usual shop. Only a few pounds but I did buy a few extra things to ‘treat myself’ after this week so it would have cheaper! Thanks for following my little experiment x
Sophie
Aww it’s a shame that you started to get bored by the end but I think all of it looks delicious, especially that pasta! I’ve never heard of a potato nacho dish either, that’s definitely something me and my partner would love as we’re huge fans of potatoes and salsa haha! Well done for completing your challenge, you’re so creative with food!
Alice Xx
I am still in awe that you took on the challenge. And managed without cheating – the blueberry Muffin snack aside. Furthermore, some of the meals you cooked look very good. Well done
I think the key here is to always have staples in your cupboard. My larder is full of spices and herbs, coconut milk, chick peas and tinned tomatoes. I can easily live on £20 per week, some weeks even less. Make sure you have a fully stocked pantry and you can’t go wrong. Well done on the challenge! X
Never in the last 3 years has there been less than 4 cans of chickpeas in my pantry . The whole premise of this challenge is that you’re not allowed to use the stuff you already have. That’s why it’s so hard, you’re meant to start from fresh. I would have had way more options if I was allowed to use my cupboards!
I love the honesty with which you have written the post. This sort of a challenge is hard and kudos to you for doing it
You did so well!! Loved seeing exactly what you ate too as I need as many budget-friendly recipes in my life as possible! ❤️
I’m super nosey, and I love reading what people eat in a week! I’m a super fussy eater, and I love snacking so I know that I would really struggle with this challenge.. I wish I wasn’t so fussy and ate more fruit and veg, but I just can’t bring myself to eat those things! Well done on doing so well with this challenge though..
Well done for completing the challenge Sophie! Your meals looked nice especially the veggie burger. I’m sure if it was me I would have cheated way more than you did . I bet you are excited to go back to your normal diet again he he . Your post is great, so detailed and interesting! <3 xx
Bexa | http://www.hellobexa.com
Girl I commend you for keeping track!!! This is something I’ve always wanted but failed to complete. I’m also trying to eat better on a budget and it is nottttt easyyy!! Thank you for this post! Definitely helps 🙂
This is such a good idea even if it is just to try out a few times because it’s so easy to spend way to much money weekly on your food. Also your meals look lovely, great post pet!
L xo
This was really interesting to read. Your meals all looked tasty to me, especially the potato nachos and chickpea curry. You did well to last until 10pm on your final night, though
This is such an interesting post, I don’t really keep track of how much I spend on food so it’s made me wonder how much I do spend and if I could budget this amount per week as as kind of experiment too! Potato nachos sounds great though!- x
Our usual weekly shop is about £70 including a few cleaning products and the other general stuff you pick up in a supermarket so this was really hard! x
I have so much admiration for you, there’s NO WAY I would even attempt a diet like this. I’m afraid I love my meat too much and I can only tolerate pulses every now and then. Seriously, kudos for doing the challenge, I would never judge you and I hope you thoroughly enjoyed eating your body weight at the end of the challenge. “a carrot is still a carrot” hahaha! X
Lisa | http://www.lisasnotebook.com
I’m happy that you can finally indulge! Ive found this whole experiment very interesting though. It’s amazing what can be done with so little money x
http://www.jesseatsandtravels.com
Well done on completing the challenge! It’s can’t have been easy!
Wow… congrats for completing this! It sounds like you had a pretty good experience and you should be proud of yourself! Your meals look yummy! I would seriously struggle with this xxx
Well done for completing the challenge!! I can imagine it was very mind-numbing at times with such limited ingredients but I’m super impressed at the amount of tasty looking meals you made! This was so interesting to read, I’d attempt this challenge myself but I’m certain I’d struggle so bad Thanks for sharing!
Ps I’d have totally cracked open those pringles too haha!
Milli
This sounds a fun yet daunting challenge! Now I’ve been restricting myself to 1,500 calories a day I have been feeling so much lighter so I think this would be interesting to try. Really cool post!
I think you did a really good job and it’s funny how if your brain thinks you’re even slightly restricted at all, it seems like food is on your mind all the time! I’ve had that happen to me before and it can be all consuming!
Julia // The Sunday Mode
Our cooking styles look quite similar! I love chickpea curries and veggie burgers, especially!
Thank you so much for taking the time to show us the actual nutritional value of your meals! This is so helpful – especially when sticking to low food budgets over longer periods of time. Can’t wait to see the comparison to your usual week!