Supermarket RANT!!

[Alison]

my dictionary defines it a pleb as a "commoner" originally of ancient Rome, I.E. not one of the ruling elite, therefore I count my self as one.

I didn't know you were Italian PW???????

Seriously though, it's not necessarily the original meaning of a word that can be found offensive, many times it's the way in which it is said. Even the most polite of terms can be said in an offensive and "I'm better than you" kind of demeaning way and that is never on.

[OverWyreGrower]

My 2-pence-worth

Thought I'd put my 2pence in as well....

We try and shop locally (i.e. Knott End for those in the Fylde Area). They have a great butchers (locally produced meat, own bacon and sausages) and bakers and little cheese shop/deli. There are 2 great fruit and veg shops also, which are way cheaper than supermarkets.
We have a Co-op and a Spar. I prefer Co-op, as I like the range of stuff they have and I have always thought they were more "ethical" than most.

The nearest Tesco is in Blackpool. An hour's drive away. They do deliver though.
We tend to walk to the village on a Saturday morning, get our shopping (in my canvas bag!!) and walk back.

However, I do tend to do approx 1 shop a month at Tesco. I tend to buy larger packs of loo-roll etc that work out cheaper.

I think it's not always right that "plebs" (plebians??) can't afford to buy fresh veg etc. I poster a thread a while back about my FIL and SIL and my views on their diet (they eat cr@p)

It's more often that people don't have the time, skill or inclination to cook fresh food.

What's easier? Putting something in the oven/microwave and going to sit down while it cooks, or having to chop all the veg, time the veg and potatoes/pasta and meat right so its all ready at the same time?

What's quicker? Putting a microwave meal in, or preparing a fresh meal from scratch?

If someone has never been brought up with a good knowledge of food/cooking, making a homemade lasagne seems like a nightmare.

When you've got your 3 kids, all of whom are fussy eaters, all screaming for their dinner, its easier to microwave 3 different meals.

Now of course, if all parents encouraged their children to eat everything (e.g. vegetables) and could all cook (and had the inclination to do so) it would all be a lot better, but since you can get 2 frozen pies, a bag of chips and a Vienetta for £5 (or whatever) - what's easier??

Phew! Rant Over!

P.S. When I met Mr OWG, he didn't eat eggs, cheese, baked beans, chicken or most types of veg, as his mother didn't like those foods. Last night he ate a vegetable chilli (carrots, onions, courgettes, tomatoes, kidney beans, peppers, chilli's). 10 years ago he would have only eaten the carrots from that meal...

P.P.S. I watched that poor overweight child the other night on TV. I was alternately terribly upset or wanting to shake his mother hard. He won't starve, he's 14 stone for crying out loud!!!

[Alice]

I see quite a mention here of what we eat and cook being a function of education - and that the message isn't getting across. There may be a reason for that.
Teacher friend of mine was trying to engage some children in conversation about eating fruit and vegetables - but the message coming back from the children was that was for POSH people.
I had some home made soup at work for lunch and a passing colleage commented - home made, VERY POSH.
So there seems to be some perception that vegetables and home cooking is only for what they see as posh people, and not for them. Maybe the message has to be delivered in a different way.
On the other hand, as Piglet also noted, I know some well educated, quite well off people who have no interest in food other than the quickest, easiest, meal they can put in their mouths ,and they never cook. I think they believe they will not be afflicted by the health problems which afflict the poor, and don't see the connection between health and diet as having anything to do with them. That's just for the poor.
Maybe the advertisers /educators have to find a way to get over that the message is for everybody.
And there will be those who are perfectly aware of the message, but choose to ignore it. They have a right to that choice. It's not for anybody to tell them what to eat.

[OverWyreGrower]

I've heard tell of small children who don't believe food grows in one's garden, and think that food comes from the supermarket.

Alice, Mr OWG and I were called "posh" by some of his family, as I'd cooked a meal from a lot of our own produce! There was even the comment made that I obviously had a lot more time on my hands than they realised if I had the time to "cook properly".

What had I made? Spaghetti bolognese (home made sauce from our own tomatoes and veg) and an apple and blackberry crumble (own apples and blackberries).... very posh?!?

[SueA]

I was brought up on 'meat & 2 veg.' by my mum who used to do most of her own cooking & we had very little money. Healthy eating in those days however consisted of 'fattening up ' your children to ward off colds & illness & we used to get 'sugar butties', toast & dripping, & bacon fat poured over the potatoes you were having with it! Needless to say I now have to watch my b.p. & cholesterol due to high incidence of heart disease in the family! I think growing & eating your own veg. etc. is still seen as a 'middle class', 'Tom & Barbara' sort of thing by many people who think it's not for them. I think just a healthy mix of a little whatever you like plus a lot of whatever does you good is the best way to go & if the only place you can get fruit & veg. is from a supermarket then so be it.

[pigletwillie]

We have lost the cooking mentality iin this country and its partly due to the disintergration of the family. If you go to Italy and France especially, dinner is a FAMILY occasion, everybody sits down together as a family and eats and talks and they even manage to drink wine sensibly. the food is cooked fresh and treated with some reverance.

Unfortunately the word "family" is almost a swear word in Britain nowadays and as a result people sit glued to tv's every night eating mechanically recovered sh*t burgers, not communicating and not bonding as a family unit. Food has not meaning other than sustenance.

Being poor is no excuse, as a child, did that, been there. My mum still had a home cooked meal for me at night, alot of these "poor" families manage to run cars, have sky tv and smoke and drink (not all I might add) and spend a fortune on ready meals that are a damn site more expensive than fresh fruit and veg.

As for homemade soup being posh, were not allotments originally for the poor of the parish so they could feed themselves?

Its not posh, its called being bothered and being responsible for yourself and your family and until people do, no matter what people say or do they will feed themselves crap and watch tv and them blame somebody else when they get to 40 stone and say "I didnt know any better".

Yeah right

excuse my mumblings

[Don Vincenzo]

Don V

That's a really interesting comment about Co-op as I always think of them as Fair Trading, Organic etc... Sure there's the price...

In Hull they have 6 stores, and market them vigorously along ethically principled lines - every home recently got a guide to Co-op in Hull.

Where are you? It could be that they are improving things piecemeal and not across the piece.

Hi J.G.
my nearest Co-Op is about 3 miles from me and I am quite sure you are right with your opinion. Now and again I stop at this Co-op for other reasons than shopping but I do buy the occasional item. I find this particular store excessively over priced, items badly stocked, displayed and I cannot see any quality in their perishable produce to justify their price. The staff are very friendly so friendly that they speak to each other still holding a cigarette in their mouth during their short break ( in the car park ). However my previous comment was simple a joke ( maybe a bad one ). Like Pigletwillie I am a plebeian too, perhaps we could have a plebisite about supermarkets to decide which one is the best i.e. Prices, quality, fair trade and competition, staff working condition etc.
My best regards
Don Vincenzo

[OverWyreGrower]

Unfortunately the word "family" is almost a swear word in Britain nowadays and as a result people sit glued to tv's every night eating mechanically recovered sh*t burgers, not communicating and not bonding as a family unit. Food has not meaning other than sustenance.
...
Being poor is no excuse, as a child, did that, been there. My mum still had a home cooked meal for me at night, alot of these "poor" families manage to run cars, have sky tv and smoke and drink (not all I might add) and spend a fortune on ready meals that are a damn site more expensive than fresh fruit and veg.
...
Its not posh, its called being bothered and being responsible for yourself and your family and until people do, no matter what people say or do they will feed themselves crap and watch tv and them blame somebody else when they get to 40 stone and say "I didnt know any better".

You are entirely right PW!

There seems to be some sort of malaise affecting a lot of people. A "can't be bothered" kind of disease.

People have no time, no money, no inclination to help themselves.

God help us when a bowl of homemade soup is posh!!

Maybe places like Iceland should be stopped from selling the rubbish at such cheap prices (and stop that Kerry woman advertising them!)

Maybe Tescos et al should do something radical to promote fruit and veg

But who am I kidding? It'll never happen. We'll just end up with every 8 year old being 14 stone...

[pigletwillie]

Unfortunately Britain is the only country in the world where you can go from cradle to grave without once ever having to be responsible for yourself, and the shameful reality of it is that its accepted almost to the point of being the norm.

[Muddy Sarah]

I am on a very very low income, with barely enough money to get through each month, and I have decided that growing my own is the best chance I have of being able to eat "decent" fruit and veg that hasn't travelled a load of miles and won't cost me an arm and a leg. I just can't afford organic supermarket prices, and object to eating crap all the time (I do enjoy the odd convenience food though!).

I used to live on Plymouth's roughest estate, and I do think there are links between education, income and quality of diet. Certainly my very-skint neighbours seemed to eat a lot of junk food.

I am now trying to cut back on what I spend on food so that I can afford to buy seeds, tools and stuff for my lottie, and hoping very much that I'll start to feel the benefit of the investment when I can eat what I've grown. I'm lucky that I don't have a family to feed, so it's only me that's affected by the belt-tightening.

I'm also lucky that I now have a car. Before that, I was incredibly limited in the number of shops that I could use. Co-ops have been my closest local shop for a number of years, and the two branches I have used are both very very small, with limited stock, no organic range (they said there was no call for it, and at the prices they would have charged, I have to agree with them), and they have always seemed to be quite expensive.

Taxis back from a supermarket were never an option (too pricey), and trying to get a month's shop on a bus is a nightmare! So I used to end up spending a lot more in the long-term for a couple easily-carried bags a week. I can see how easy it is to get into a trap, and am now trying to do something to get out of it.

Like I say, I'm lucky. If I was still living in my previous flat (which is being demolished and redeveloped), I wouldn't have a lottie and wouldn't have been able to choose to find another way of trying to eat healthily. Sometimes circumstances conspire to make it very very hard.

Sarah

[Jan]

Hi all, this is really interesting - can I just put my two penneth in? Firstly it is sad about the young lad who is so dratically overweight but, speaking as a psychologist who works on a daily basis with child abuse, his plight has little to do with food either good or bad, IMHO his problem is that he is the victim of some pretty difficult family dynamics ( can't really expand on this here). However, I have to agree quite a bit with OverWyreGrower about people not having the time, skill, or inclination to prepare their own food as well as what pigletwillie says about food and families.
The problem for many lower income families is the need to find self -esteem and position in todays consumer society. there is a real pressure (to survive sometimes) that means that people are judged by what they can show they have rather than what they do for themselves. This extends via the media to include quite well off people as well unfortunately. Many families I have come accross have a pristine 'range 'cooker and only heat pizzas up in it, why?, because for many in society it is about proving you are an Ok person rather than being content with what you have. During the consumerist 'YUPPIE' years many people spent all their time trying to earn enough to pay for the ever increasing 'must haves', coupled with the dreadful pressure that put on families and the inevitable splits, people didn't have time to spend on preparing fresh meals etc, especially when you can buy a pizza for 99p or better still phone a takeaway or burger and get it delivered. The problem then is that young people never learnt to prepare food, I remember my son coming home from school with a list of ingredients for cookery class that included 1 packet smash, 1 tin mince meat in gravy and 1 pack frozen peas! needless to say I refused to provide them but was told by the teacher (quite appologetically) that that was what today's families wanted to learn.
I'm sorry if this is a bit long winded but it is important to see that there are other sides to this problem, it's not just about people making poor choices it's about people not having the wherewithall to make better ones. It's not the fault of education in schools etc, it's the fault of societal education around 'a quick fix for everything' ( look at the abuse Jamie Oliver came in for) and the media's part in this. It cannot be the responsibility of the govt to 'impose change' (except to VAT additives higher than anything else)but it is the privaledge of enlightened folks like ourselves to share what knowledge we have and to keep plugging away to get people to see. At the end of the day, the occasional burger/pizza does taste quite nice and the pressure on people to 'achieve' makes growing, shopping for, and prepartion of food just one more stress to be dealt with (we each have our own ideas about what is stressful). Some years ago when I was also a struggling very young single parent with 5 children under 10 there was a brilliant programme on Tv by 2 Scottish ladies who demonstrated how to be thrifty and creative - on a very tight budget they 'saved my life' and many things I learnt then I still do today. Maybe more programmes like that (and how to manage on income support etc) would be more beneficial than 'a second home in the country/ renovation' type stuff. When dealing with families I have found that it is not just that people can't be bothered, they just don't know how and don't value food highly enough. Who can blame them when we read so many disheartening stories in the papers including one on just what goes into bottled mineral water! For me, growing and preparing my own food is more about achieving something and, yes, I too, sometimes resent the time it takes to prepare and wash up afterwards, 'specially after a long day at work.
Again, sorry about the essay but some things I do feel quite strongly about (she says sheepishly - sorry no smilie for that emotion)

[greenlung]

I had a similar experience, but with a pint of milk from my corner shop, which was 3 days past curdling when i got home & poured it in my coffee. Thing is, i said nothing, 'cos i like my struggling corner shop & i suppose i was partially negligent for not noticing. (I check like a hawk now)

On the other hand, you should demand better from the £squillion profit making supermarkets, or try harder to avoid them. I try both, but the latter is more rewarding.

[pigletwillie]

Interesting reading both Jan and Muddy Sarah, Its difficult to pin down as a society where we have gone wrong. It appears to affect our country more than others and we do seem to be at the top of the leaderboard in europe for many ills.

Consumer pressures certainly do bear down and there are indeed low income families out there that would benefit from more help but that isnt the be all and end all of the problem. Sarah hits the nail right on the head when she says there is a link between education, income and diet.

People seem to think that only organic food is healthy and as organic is very expensive, out of the reach of the people who probably need it most. I personally would sooner eat a non organic carrot from my local market than an organic one flown in from Spain, mainly cos its cheaper, but then I would also sooner eat the organic one from Spain than a processed one.

We pay considerably less now for food than we did 50 years ago in real terms and can we blame the supermarkets fully when we demand those cheap prices that we get cheap foods? They are after all, very much consumer led and WE are the consumer.

[madderbat]

Well done Sarah, and best of luck with your venture. I'm sure you will enjoy far better meals from your lottie.

Jan, I think your analysis is spot on. It seems that we are all on the right track here. Education per se cannot override the pressures that society, media or peer pressure imposes. Children are being educated to become 'consumers' instead of thinking beings in order to 'keep the economy going'.

I am not convinced that consumers totally lead the way either, as I believe that advertising creates desires which are then met. Seriously, when did the idea of having strawberries at Christmas become a reality?

In my experience young parents have had no education about feeding their families, whether from school or home. My son, now 21, did 'cooking' at school when he was 13. He was asked to take the ingredients for making ................. a sandwich!!!!!!!! He had been making sandwiches for himself since he was two years old and cooked a three course dinner (with a little help) at the age of 8.

I cannot forget a young mother I knew who came to my house one evening when I had some chicken soup on the stove. She had run out of money to feed her two toddlers and I offered them both a bowl of soup. They were dubious and didn't want to eat it. I explained to the girl that one portion of chicken (80p at that time), together with one onion, one potato and one carrot plus a few herbs, could feed four or five adults. she hadn't got a clue.

Some things I absorbed from my mother, who used to make chicken feed four of us for two main meals and sandwiches in the late 1950s. Such frugality stood me in good stead when I lived alone in London and supported myself in the 1970s. The week when I lived on brown rice and sprouts is still memorable!

Even in those days as a trainee teacher I came across children in Central London who sincerely believed that milk came out of a bottle. Their faces when we took them on field trips were incredible. Many of them had never been outside their neighbourhood.

It seems to me that people are losing confidence in themselves and their ability to survive. We are being conditioned to believe that 'other people know best' (ie commercial enterprises) and we are incapable of deciding for ourselves.

[sewer rat]

Even in those days as a trainee teacher I came across children in Central London who sincerely believed that milk came out of a bottle. Their faces when we took them on field trips were incredible. Many of them had never been outside their neighbourhood.

I know what you mean Madderbat - I worked on a farm with pigs and a suckler herd of cattle near Glasgow and we had kids come out to visit from the schemes. I can remember how hard it was to convince these kids that the cows were really cows - they didn't believe me because the only cows they had ever seen had big long horns and wandered across the TV screens in cowboy movies !!