Last week, I spent £3.75 on food. I spent 32p on parsnips, 45p on bread, 75p on potatoes, 69p on double cream (my luxury item of the week), 45p on swede, 50p on chopped tomatoes, 35p on lime (to put slices in hot water to make it taste better). 24p reduced price grapes.  That made me some pretty great root vegetable soup which tasted a lot less good on day five. I also cooked a massive pasta bake using the aubergine I’d saved from last week, chopped tomatoes, 24p pasta, breadcrumbs and cheese. It was good food and nice enough that I got to have people over for dinner and feed them the pasta, too.

(Less good on day six. A lot, lot less good on day six)

This week, I had a massive £8.40 for food. I’ve never gone through the supermarket with a calculator before this challenge and this week I spent half the time doing the maths in my head. That’s a special kind of luxury. Just, knowing you have a buffer is pretty wonderful. Even in my fake pseudo-experiment where I actually have what might be a months’ worth of food in the next cupboard, I felt so insecure last week. I just knew that if anything came up I wouldn’t have money in the budget to pay for it. Things are looking up.

Also, I got to buy some amazing food this week. I bought a culinary pumpkin for a semi-extortionate £1.50. I bought quorn mince. I bought feta cheese (okay, well, “greek style” cheese). I bought eggs! I can afford protein! Protein! I’ve got root vegetable, bean and quorn mince chilli cooking in the slow cooker and I managed to get the train to see my sister this weekend and I have never appreciated these things so much before.

It’s actually okay.

I JUST REMEMBERED I BOUGHT TEA BAGS THIS WEEK. I HAD A CUP OF TEA IT WAS SO WONDERFUL.

It’s made me appreciate a lot of things I don’t usually think about. It’s made me realise how much I miss certain things. I’ve really missed tea. I miss sugar and sugary foods. Bread that doesn’t make me want to throw up. Coke. I really, really miss coke. Wine. I really love wine and beer. I have a bottle of beer in the fridge that I really want to drink. Good coffee! In my flat I currently have a coffee grinder and fresh coffee beans and I have been drinking Nescafe instant and I did not know I was such a coffee snob (I did not pay actual money for this myself; it’s on loan from my sister. I’ve so far used it twice before this thing came up). I miss realising I want to read a book and instantly downloading it on my kindle and reading it. I miss being able to go places. Being able to plan for the weekend without worrying whether I’m going to run out of washing up liquid, or milk, or tights, or just anything that costs more than £1.50.

It’s not so bad but that’s only because I can see an end point.

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