Our food bill is beginning to feel a lot like Christmas

There are good reasons why it’s better for everyone in Woods Towers if my husband and I take turns with the supermarket run. For a start, we don’t have to endure the following conversation.

Him, tossing a large pack of granola into the trolley: “Oooh let’s get that!” Me, removing it: “No!”

Him: “But you absolutely love it.” Me: “Exactly. Which is why we’re not getting it. I can’t possibly be in the same house as delectable golden clusters drizzled with honey and blended with plum raisins and almonds. I need a safe space.” Him: “I’ll never understand women.” The kids can tell when he’s been, because the fridge is groaning with fancy “not from concentrate” orange juice and shop-bought apple pie, which I consider to be an insulting affront to my womanhood, even though I never make it myself. Me, I’m all about the generic butter and wonky peppers smuggled into the veg drawer.

But prices aren’t so much creeping as catapulting upwards. Inflation is even having an impact on my Because-i’mworth-it spouse, with his insistence on Medjool dates (on a school night?), gourmet hummus and the closest Sainsbury’s get to Wagyu beef.

“I can’t believe how much that came to,” he frowned as he surveyed the metre-long receipt for his haul last weekend. “That was like Christmas. But without any seasonal treats. I blame the Cherry Brandy.”

I did, too. So we agreed to register our withering opprobrium by drinking a generous snifter of the stuff while vowing to pull our purse strings tighter.

Then a couple of days ago, I popped into a nearby greengrocer’s for a top-up. I emerged with a head of broccoli, a red onion and a single conference pear which, in my defence, was surprisingly weighty – and barely a handful of change from a fiver. Next thing you know, I’ll be wheelbarrowing all of our debit cards to Londis for two litres of semi-skimmed.

The festive season is coming, and I fear unless we shop smarter, Christmas is really going to cost...