Shelf raiding road trip - £70 worth of food for £15!

Laden with seven bags of shelf delights! 

Shelf raiding road trips are the new going out! Well, it was for me and my friend Zoyla this week!

Zoyla had told me she was spending too much on food shopping (£300 a month for her, her fella and his two little ones' visits) and needed teaching in the #SOS way of life! So I suggested a catch up over a shelf raiding road trip to show Zoyla where to get the best bargains!

We set off at 7.30pm and took in five supermarkets on a five-mile round trip to see what we could find. Tesco Express was the first stop and we got the timing just right as the final reductions were just being made as we walked in - they went straight from the shelf to our basket!


Our first bags of shopping included oranges, jacket potatoes, carrots, parsnips, rolls, pasta salad, a loaf of bread and a bunch of roses - for £1.59... Zoyla was already getting into the #SOS swing of things!

Next stop was the local Co-op with a poor show - just a pack of roast chicken but it did have a great reduction of £3.09 to 79p.

We jumped in the car, buoyed by the Tesco purchases, and hot-footed it to a deserted Morrisons which had lots of delights on offer including half price rotisseries chickens - one each please!

8.15pm and Waitrose was the next stop which had lots of fruit on offer including blueberries down from £3.99 to 59p and raspberries down from £2.87 to 59p. By this point Zoyla was already getting addicted to shelf raiding and realising just how much food you can buy for next to nothing if you put in the hard work! OK so you wouldn't normally go to five supermarkets in one night but it meant we got to catch up and save money at the same time!

ASDA was the last stop where we picked up lots of cut-price bakery goods for the freezer and had a giggle finding a deserted aisle where I posed for a photo!

Home by 9pm, laden with seven bags of shelf delights and Mr Kate greeted us at the door to see what we had hunter gathered.

And the results were quite outstanding...

The haul included:

2 x rotisserie chickens - £5.28 to £2.59 
Seeded oat rolls - 83p to 12p
Warburtons loaf - 70p to 11p
Pitta breads - 22p to 5p
Pesto potato salad - £1.50 to 23p
Cheese and onion bagels - £1 to 10p
Tiger baguette - 40p to 5p
Carrots - 68p to 10p
Lemon tarts - £2.80 to 31p
Breadcrumbs - £1.19 to 22p
Scotch pancakes - £2.57 to 22p
Blueberries - £3.99 to 59p
Halloween muffins - £2.29 to 45p
Red Thai chicken noodle soup - £3 to 49p
Milk - 37p to 29p
Fresh lemonade - £1.10 to 20p
Eggs - £1.95 to 45p
Cream - £1.04 to 16p
Melon medley - £2 to 26p
Honey and mustard chicken pasta - £2 to 30p
Raspberries - £2.87 to 59p
Roast chicken slices - £3.09 to 79p
Packets of jacket potatoes - 85p to 13p
Parsnips - £1 to 15p
Baguette - 70p to 10p
Hovis loaf - £1.30 to 19p
Celery - 90p to 29p
Radishes - 99p to 22p
Activia yoghurts - £1.84 to 25p
Sweet potato and tomato crisp melts - £3 to 75p
Munch bunch yoghurts - £1.58 to 19p
Oranges - 35p to 5p
Roses - £3 to 43p

We bought a few of several items as the deals were so good and it all came to a grand total of £14.89 for the lot!

And how much should it have cost? Drum roll please...

£69.42!

Wowzers! So basically £70 worth of food for £15 (80% savings!) and the cost of a five-mile round trip in petrol. Can't say fairer than that!

Zoyla and I don't see enough of each other so regular shelf raiding road trips are now on the cards and we'll take it in turns for driving duties!

Thai green vegetable rice with chicken - £1 for four portions!

I've already blogged about my vegetable egg fried rice recipe I often cook to use up leftover veg and meat - this is a twist on that recipe using curry paste instead of egg which basically employs the same principle of using up whatever you have languishing in the fridge!

I had some leftover rotisserie chicken and a big haul of free courgettes and runner beans from Mr Kate's Uncle Gerald's veg patch to use so thought this was a quick and easy way to clear the fridge!

1) Boil some rice according to the instructions - I like to use Thai Jasmine rice and buy in big 5kg bags to keep the cost down.

2) 2-3 minutes before the rice is cooked add in a handful of frozen peas and/or sweetcorn. 
3) Drain the rice and peas/sweetcorn and leave to one side.
4) Chop into cubes whatever veg you need to use up - for mine tonight I used green and yellow courgettes, runner beans, spring onions, a shallot, red chilli and broccoli

5) Heat some oil in a wok or large frying pan, add a spoon or two of thai green curry paste (I used a little too much tonight - scorchio!) and stir fry the chopped veg for a few minutes.
6) Throw in the shredded leftover chicken and heat through.

7) Add the rice and peas/sweetcorn to the pan and give it all a good mix.
8) Squeeze in the juice of half a lime or lemon.

9) Serve with some chopped fresh coriander sprinkled on top.

Less than a pound for four portions - two for tonight's dinner and two for tomorrow's lunchboxes. And space cleared in the fridge for the next shelf raid!

£12.53 worth of food for £4.10!

£12.53 worth of food for £4.10!

A tidy little shelfing haul today resulted in £12.53 worth of food for £4.10!

Six mini french sticks down from 75p to 9p, Innocent smoothie down from £2.81 to 95p, fancy-pants bacon down from £2.84 to £1.99, houmous down from £1.15 to 49p and two packs of blinis down from £2.49 to 29p.

I'm going to freeze the blinis and keep them to make some tasty canapes when we have visitors!

Rotisserie chicken for £2.49!

I was a little naughty the other evening - I'd had a very long day at work and Mr Kate was out for the night. Cooking just wasn't an option so I popped along to Morrisons and got the timing just right (7.30pm fact fans!) as they were reducing the fresh rotisserie chickens just as I arrived!

I hovered as the yellow stickers were printed off (you have to be brazen to get the best deals!) and secured a whole roast chicken (£5.28 down to £2.49) and two chicken breasts (£3.84 to £1.49). Luckily the bakery goods were already reduced and I bought bagels (£1.45 to 49p), raisin and walnut flute (£1 to 25p) and a bag of half a dozen mixed rolls (75p to 35p).

Warm chicken rolls for dinner (naughty I know, but it was lovely!), lunch sorted for the next few days and we still have some leftover chicken to use up which I may well throw in to a rice dish for tomorrow's dinner!

Hover at the rotisserie section near closing time and you may well bag yourself a bargain - they can't keep them until the next day so have to reduce them is it's been a slow day!