Slimming World for students

Hi All,

This is my first post so apologies if I do anything wrong!! ;)

I've been attempting to follow SW since November but I'm really struggling to keep up with the financial side of things. I'm a Postgrad student and I currently have no funding so i'm living off savings at present. I have approximately £1500 to last me until August and that's to cover the cost of living too. So as you can imagine i'm really struggling to keep up with the food bills that are coming to about £30 a week. :cry:

Can anyone suggest how I can carry on food optimising on extra easy without breaking the bank? It's so much cheaper to buy chips and pizza and live off those but I'm determined to lose some weight!!
 
I used to buy a job lot of pasta and chopped tomatoes many moons ago when I was a student. We have stopped getting our fruit and beg from supermarkets as it doesn't seem to last long we've started shopping at grocers or market which works out cheaper and we have less waste. I know near my work there is a fruit and veg stall and they will try and sell stuff off cheap towards the end of the week.
My brother tells me that Aldi do a bag of frozen chicken breast for under a fiver? Think you get 6 or 8?
xx
 
I tend to buy things in bulk, make meals in batches & freeze them as its much cheaper. I buy supermarkets own label stuff the majority of the time but buy veg from the greengrocers as its much cheaper. Being a student sucks sometimes lol

Ps - green days are much cheaper than red lol
 
I but frozen veg and fruit sometimes too, most supermarkets do value versions at a fraction of fresh fruit and veg costs, and there is no waste as whatever you do not need when cooking just goes back into freezer ready for next time. Value ranges is the way forward i think, baked beans, pasta, rice, tomatoes, stock cubes etc, many of these items are still free foods so just do some research to check out which value ones are included. Aldi and lidl also do cheap fresh fruit and veg if you have one near and it seems to last well from my experience.
 
I lived off pasta and tinned tomatoes too when I was a student, which at least fits in with Slimming World. I think I saw on someone's post that Morrison's were doing 30p bags of fruit and vegetables. Chicken thighs and drumsticks are fairly cheap too.

I must admit though that my shopping bill has gone up since starting Slimming World, but I am getting to the point where I have so much food left over I don't need to buy so much this week. Luckily, little has gone out of date.
 
I'm currently a student and at target - lost all my weight whilst attending University - so know exactly what you're going through with regards to budgeting and such.

Everyone is right - green days generally tend to be cheaper, maybe try doing a mix of EE and green? That way you can bulk more on pasta and sauces and rice-based dishes which tend to be cheaper and more filling :)

Also, shop around! I tend to do 3 mini-shops a week in different places. One is at the local fruit market (makes fruits and veggies all the more affordable!) one is at Lidl and one is at Asda. I spend less than ten pounds at each, and the weekly total is usually around £20.

Also, frozen fruits are good, if yu're a berry fiend like me. Best deal I've found is Sainsburys, where you get 3 fairly hefty bags of frozen berries for £5. Sounds pricey, but they last forever.

Also, if you're making bolognaise-type or chilli dishes, you can bulk them up using lentils. That, and I seriously advise batch cooking - makes everything so much cheaper so long as you have the available fridge/freezer space. I know what a nightmare that can be!

Tinned veggies are also fab - a tin of mushrooms can be as little as around 30p, as can things like mixed bean salad, which are both good meal-bulkers.

Hope this helps, and best of luck!
 
Try using quorn or soya mince in bolognese and chilli so much cheaper than lean meat is. Spices really help make boring cheap essentials into tasty meals.

Bulk out dishes with lentils or grated carrot, makes things go further.

As others say try frozen veg & fruit much cheaper and no waste, plus no chopping or peeling required! :)

Dried beans are a bit more hassle (need soaked overnight) but cost much less than the tinned varieties.

Try cheaper brands of yoghurt. Instead of pasta n sauce, mugshots, supernoodles etc you can make similar things yourself for much cheaper and better for you as less processed rubbish in them.

For cheap breakfast I recommend Asda Smartprice bran flakes 77p a box and I like them better than Kelloggs. A fraction of the price of cereal bars.

Plan out your meals, do batch cooking, means you only buy what you need. With a little planning and effort eating healthily doesn't have to be expensive :)

Of course you still need some little treats too but you can often find these cheaper in Poundland. They do 5 packs of curlywurlys, multipacks of Velvet Crunch, ww crisps (most of them are pretty low in syns) etc. Buy the packs of sugar free jelly that you make up yourself you get 2 sachets for around the same price as one of the readymade tubs and I get 6 portions out of that.

Hope some of these ideas help :) X
 
i use aldi for the bulk of my fruit and veg and i tend to base my week around the super 6.

for example the super 6 at the moment is all 39p...swede,carrots,cabbage,4 pk baking pots,parsnips,onions.
so this week we have had,veg soup,stew,jacket pots for lunches,had sausages with mash,carrots and swede etc....the main bulk of the meal being from the super 6.

planning is also vital to me for both keeping costs down and sticking to plan.
 
Thanks for the advice everyone... especially in regards to the planning. I think that's what i'm lacking at the moment. I'm really struggling to stay on plan because I tend to go to the fridge to get nibbles and not find anything healthy there so I go for the cheese instead. If I learn to plan a bit more it'll kill two birds with one stone in terms of staying on plan and saving money! I think I will have a batch cooking session when I return from my break in Edinburgh :)
 
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