A Sydney mother has caught the attention of the internet after sharing her grocery haul for her family of nine.
The mother spent under $250 on her shop from Woolworths and Aldi.
She claims it will provide a total of 12 dinners and “a bunch” of snacks for school over the next fortnight.
She mentioned that a year ago the same grocery shop would have cost significantly less as the cost of living crisis continues to soar.
“So we are a family of nine, two adults, two teenage girls (19 and 13) four boys (11, nine, six and four) and a nearly four month old who will be starting on puree food next week,” she said.
“Only a year ago this would have been around $175. This will make 12 dinners and a bunch of school snacks.
“Normally I also buy around three to four packs of winter vegetables from Aldi, but they have sold out. I also normally go to Hunter and Gather to buy all our fresh fruit and vegetables. We buy milk when needed.
“We buy bulk items like toilet rolls and laundry powder at Costco twice a year, which a 60pk of toilet paper would last around five months and the laundry powder around seven months.”
The mother is currently on maternity leave, which in turn has her feeling the pinch even more, and she aims to keep her family’s “bellies fuller for longer”.
“We try to keep to foods that are healthy and will keep our bellies fuller for longer. If I can hide veggies in it, it’s a bonus.”
She plans to use the ingredients to make meals that will last a fortnight such as devilled sausages, supergreen spaghetti, Irish stew and flaxseed chicken wraps.
The kids’ school lunches include ham, cheese and a wrap with hummus. Lunchbox snacks vary from oat brownies to apple sauce muffins and lemon and almond meal cake, with fruit also.
“The school snacks are a deal breaker. oats are so cheap and you can make so much with them and they are a real hunger tamer. I’ve always been a huge fan of baking because of my mum, so I make all my kids snacks.”
The online community praised her price-cutting hacks, with one user labelling her the “budget queen”.
A second commented, “Wow, wow, wow, I spend well over that a week for a family of four”.
And a third said, “I’m taking note! We have two adults, two children under five and a dog and I spend $220 a week. I’m so impressed!”
“That’s a well planned shop” another said. “Good on you for making it work at that price for that many people. Sadly in my house we are 2x dairy allergy and 2x lactose intolerant so I can only dream of that budget.”
Image credit: Facebook
This article first appeared on Over60.