What do you think?

[Mr_Sheen]

Muesli & banana + orange juice for breakfast, ham and tomato sarnie, bag of cheese & onion + 2 black tea (no sugar) for lunch, spag bol on a plate the size of Belgium in half an hour then a pot of tea and half a hundredweight of jaffa cakes while I slob on the sofa tonight. But I've walked 6 miles today so that kind of cancels stuff out. Probably.

[Eagle]

I like sultanas.

Over 73 posts in 1 day. Is that a record for one subject. Well done Annie.

[Annie.]

Haha, I could easily eat the Jaffa cakes, that's why I don't buy them! And cheese and onion mcCoys soI don't buy them either! See how disciplined I am. :0)

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[Annie.]

I never noticed Eagle, do I get a reward? ;0))

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[Rachael]

Instead of sugar. Hubby has sultanas on his breakfast.
Not burger and chips I gather Eagle?

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Sultanas (and raisins) are full of sugar. Just because it's called frustose, doesn't mean it isn't sugar. Low-sugar diets exclude dried fruit and quite a lot of fresh fruit too (such as grapes).

As for Jaffa Cakes - I can never, ever eat one. It's nothing or the whole pack. So I try not to buy them.

[Annie.]

I know.
However they are good for the digestive system.

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[Nigel]

What a well balanced and rounded discussion.
I would add only two things :
Firstly - I think there should not be such a thing as bad food - if you can't afford loads of meat then have small amounts of good meat supplemented with vegetables - whether simple stews with loads of carrot potatoes or pulses . Ergo no need or justification for twizzlers , turkey or otherwise . Totally reject the argument that people on low incomes need cheap food - there is no such thing only bad food. Plenty of good inexpensive ingredients though ...

Secondly moderation - if not taken to extremes means we can enjoy a pork pie occasionally without feeling bad . Most of the dietary horrors we are suffering are because we don't apply moderation or variety . I have no particular affection for the French but to use them as an example they seem to use cream, goosefat , wine and fatty sausage in a lot of their cooking but somehow do not seem to be particularly tubby . A little of what you fancy , if I may be a tad music hall.

Finally re JO I think we might ALL be right - he is a bit of t**t at times but 100% correct on school meals .

A very good evening
Nigel

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[Bunty]

Sadly many schools have dropped home economics, cooking etc from the timetable. Sydenham high is having kitchens put in this summer. The convenience shopper is habitual and lazy. Sad as it is it's what society has become. The healthier options, I.e. marks and spencer, waitrose etc are too pricey for many. There have been some really insightful programs on recently about the rubbish which goes in processed foods and how to eat healthily on a budget but I expect the target audience did not tune in. It's about breaking the cycle and changing the behaviours of today's children.

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[Annie.]

I'm surprised that it is only now that Sydenham High is putting in kitchens?
I thought home economics would have been on the curriculum already.

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[CaptainCarCrash]

His heart is definitely in the right place though.

Poor people can watch me on a huge flat screen TV cook a banquet???? because he's in the business of selling crap cooking books and demanding his agent gets him a prime time TV spot and makes a lot of noise about junk food doesn't make him a good bloke?

You can get a big plasma for next to nothing and on the never never and has nothing to do with eating crappy take away food. He's jumped on the Daily Fail bandwagon and should be slapped round the mush with a rotten quarter pounder or sumink It really annoys me when people make these types of statements without checking all of the facts or circumstances. Flat TV's and the undeserving poor? Nope, I'm not having any of it.

Humiliate the poor in to doing the right thing

It's about ignorance and not knowing and has nothing to do with priorities.

A space age jack and the beanstalk,

I've sold the cow and bought us a 50" plama

[CaptainCarCrash]

It's about ignorance and not knowing and has nothing to do with priorities.

Yes ignorant about priorities. What would you do, Mike, to arrest this ignorance? Any kind of interference would, I assume, count as meddling, wouldn't it?

I'm not against meddling per say, we're living in a world where people are making really bad choices about food, in a first world country where there is too much of everything. I suppose ultimately the problem lies in how can you change the attitudes of the unreachable? the only way is to target the people who push the junk.

[Tim Lund]

Sadly many schools have dropped home economics, cooking etc from the timetable. Sydenham high is having kitchens put in this summer. The convenience shopper is habitual and lazy. Sad as it is it's what society has become. The healthier options, I.e. marks and spencer, waitrose etc are too pricey for many. There have been some really insightful programs on recently about the rubbish which goes in processed foods and how to eat healthily on a budget but I expect the target audience did not tune in. It's about breaking the cycle and changing the behaviours of today's children.

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In the spirit of helping this thread reach the highest number of posts in a single day, I thought I'd just add that my Mum used to teach home economics ...

[Tim Lund]

And that if anyone wants to do an MA in Food Policy - which means mainly the sociology - here's your man at City University. This one can run and run.

[Nigel]

Blimey mikecg!
Not only do you attribute someone else's words to me , you then use words I didn't say as a launch pad for more liberal invective .
Whatever JO might be like in person , his approach to poor eating habits was pragmatic and sincere .
The middle class practice of describing any kind of guidance as "humiliating the poor" is wide of the mark.
His approach to the children , teachers , dinner ladies and parents on the programme was well intentioned and respectful .
If you take your stereotyping away "dailly fail" etc, I would have to assume that you do not agree that
A , healthy eating is crucial to children's learning and B, that some people lack the information or experience or skills to impart this .
It is shameful that we have allowed the eating habits of children to become so bad and I don't hear anyone other than JO saying that so effectively .
Good evening
Nigel

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[Annie.]

I see there is an uproar about Hospital food on the news today,
Surely as important as School food.
It's terrible that two of the most vulnerable groups of our society are having to rely on substandard food.

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[Eagle]

Annie

I spent a number of weeks in Lewisham Hospital last year and the food in the most cases was very good. Not sure if that is still the case as some say they have new caterers .

I often wonder what is actually in some of these cheap junk pies that people consume by the ton.

[Annie.]

All the nasty bits I suspect Eagle.

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[mosy]

Going back to fresh vs ready meals, a comment on TV, by a caller with experience at grass root level, said that some adults/children were too squeamish about handling raw meat. I can relate to that absolutely - I have to exert a serious mind over matter discipline, i.e. psyche myself up for a couple of hours and then find a peg for my nose. It's not something I'd thought of until it was said.

Another cogent comment was the lack of pans/wok/griddles, knives and of course no processor, blender, chopper etc which most TV chefs use, which put even simple meals shown on TV beyond their perceived reach (in her experience). I wonder if Jamie will start his programme with a basic equipment list to buy - on a budget of course, rather than his overpriced cookware lol.

Shouldn't this discussion be in the Town Cafe now? Just a thought.

[Eagle]

Mosy

I appreciate all your comments about expensive equipment etc , but my grandmothers both made lovely meals without the help of most of these.

Let us go back to basics. Cottage Pie, Sheppard's Pie, Hotpot and Stew.
All with plenty of fresh veg.

[marymck]

I genuinely don't understand why there are labels on so many things nowadays telling you not to reheat them. Even fresh chickens (the wrapped ones from supermarkets) often have labels saying once cooked do not reheat. I can't see the problem myself, if it's reheated properly. A roast chicken lasts me several days, usually ending with the last bits in a pie, bulked out with a tin of Campbell's condensed soup, I think those kind of labels account for a lot of waste.

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