To think that Jamie Oliver is a Goady goady mc judgy pants personified!

[LEMisdisappointed]

judgey much?

It reads like a clip from the daily mail - actually, it probably is!

Now there are people, i have a friend who can make an amazing meal out of apparently nothing (she is italian though!) in ten minutes flat - although she has lots of those ingredients that are expensive to buy in the first place but go a long way,i would never know what to do with them!

I am such a boring cook, i have a small repertoire (sp) of meals that i cook - over and over again, the ingredients in my cupboard are basic because i can't afford capers and porcinni mushrooms etc. I rarely fall back on ready meals and feed my family healthily. But its boring really and i can understand why some people use ready meals - time, money - So yeah, making your own pizza will be cheaper than dominos or tesco fineset but it is not going to be cheaper than icelands £1 pizza is it? Not from scratch, not from the start - yes if you divide the amount of pizzas your flour, cheese, tomato sauce and anything else you want to put on it by 20 it might be cheaper but those ingredients have to be bought in the first place.

See, I would welcome cheap and easy ways to make my meals more exciting and thankfully we are not on the breadline this month, but im not going to watch that smug little bastard telling me how i can just knock out some pucker tucker out of a packet of anchovies and dust from the cupboard!

I have always thought him a smug twat - this confirms it!

I think it's a shame he's mentioned Tvs but everything else he's said is true.

Although food is expensive, a generation ago people spent a much larger amount of their income on food. Today everyone (me included) has Tvs, computers, phones, clothes as well as higher energy bills and council tax etc etc etc. so there is LESS to spend on food.

I'm 47, we were quite poor, although I didn't know it. We didn't have holidays, phones, heating, my clothes came form jumble sales, but we did eat very well- lots of cheap cuts of meat, brisket, spare ribs, a chicken which my mum always made at least 2 meals from.

I dont know what im trying to say really, just that life in the UK is sodding hard if you're poor. But i also think a book full of ideas for cheap, healthy meals is a great idea. The problem is he's probably alienated his audience now . He needs to apologise big style. I also think it would be a nice gesture to give away his book, to people in benefits, rather than charge them for it.

I do think there is something to be said for rethinking traditional british cheap food. It just needs to be done with more thought.

For example, tuna pasta bake used to be pretty cheap, but now tuna is nearly £1 a tin where I live. Suddenly not that cheap.

Same with mince, a couple of years ago when we were really poor (and for the love of god, don't go on about lentils, there is a medical explanation why that wouldn't have worked at the time) I could buy 800g of mince for £1.25 which would easily do at least 2 meals. But now that pack in tesco is 750g and costs more like £2.50, so my cheap mince meals are now not so cheap.

That sad truth is that many poor people (but by no means not all) are unedcutated

Glad you added the in brackets comment, I've worked with many people on benefits and approx 70% were educated to degree level - not that intellectual education = common sense or relates to having lots of input re cooking from family.

My family (immediate & wider) plus my friends, have many different diets, none of which, to my knowledge, have any problems cooking with basic ingredients even with some medical or ethical things to take into account.

I do have a 'store cupboard' of ingredients but could easily knock something up with very limited resources - isn't that a basic skill that most parents/grandparents teach their kids? I was at school for using up a whole lesson on how to add Crusha to milk so perhaps HE lessons could be a bit more informative if the government think parents are lacking in basic food skills

Squoosh - thank you for agreeing that its not only the poor who eat crap food. In fact from my experience its more my rich mc friends who rely on ready meals rather than anyone poor

The m&s dine in for a rennet offers here are always sold out. Is he saying that an Iceland ready meal is worse than a marks or waitrose one?

My point is that eating crap runs across all the classes. His mistake is he is only talking to the poor.

oh but starfish, many posters would rather criticize someone who has achieved more to help disadvantaged people than they ever will, rather than see any good in what he says.

Thauma I agree about giving solutions BUT doing them in a way that alienates or offends people will never work will it?

I used to work for HomeStart and whilst a leftie and happy with that, can't pretend that Labour were helpful- we were a charity and my branch went under financially. However, our SureStart made a huge difference- teaching gardening, cooking, hosting healthy lunches and father's days where they cooked with their kids. Now OK I've heard about some appalling SureStarts that achieved sod all, but that shouldn't mean close them all- simple learning from the good ones is far more sensible surely?

And one of the things some of us were campaigning for (oddly and unusually I worked for both) was lunch clubs for kids whose families received free school meals in term time to help them through the long summer hols, that or a benefit increase for that period. Heck food boxes even, anything to help with that necessity!

Am LMAO that I may be patronising the poor, as a council estate raised, low income mother whose only income for herself* is Carer's Allowance. DH earns but MW. I am also I hope not stupid- I have post grad quals if that is evidence?

Most families I worked with had a mix of foods- cheapo pasta, and crappy crisps. Like most people. Many poor families are there temporarily- job loss, illness- and you don't suddenly lose the ability to cook or wish to feed your kids with the P45. So some bloke telling you that you should feed your kids better and not have the TV you bought yourself when in work is pretty damned insulting- and enough to make your switch off, especially when your morale is likely to be at a low ebb. In truth, the people JO speaks of- those who don't care enough to have picked up a cook book at the library or seek out advice- are those that wouldn't watch anyway because there's a rerun of That Pupper Gameshow on at the same time.
^Happy to stereotype people who watch that you notice ;)

*by which I obviously mean school coats. This week anyway. Was art supplies for DS1's BTEC last week. Same as most of the rest of the UK really.

Of course it's a free country , what's that got to do with the price of fish?
I just don't understand criticising someone for pointing out something completely obvious, when in many cases the only reason many families are eating rubbish ready meals etc is because they don't want to cook, or go the extra mile timewise to get whats needed. Iceland, Lidl, they all sell frozen vegetables and cheap frozen fish and meat, but its a shame that many will walk past this to get to the ready meals. When I get home after a long day for a low wage I still know that dinner needs to be made.
There are some sections of society where what he is saying does not apply, but I really don't think those people are who he is talking about. He's saying that there is ome thing fundamentally wrong with the fact that when faced with the choice many people will go for the easy option.

And LMAO at uneducated.

We have two good degrees and most of an MA here, and we are far from unusual amongst those we know.

Indeed I would contend that those who are most likely to be uneducated seem able to knock up decent meals from scratch or budget; it's those like me who had a good income for a while and now find themselves struggling financially, or who have never been low income before, that have to learn it all from scratch. I love it when friends post meal plans on FB and I pick up new ideas, as they always have new things to share and a saved tenner goes a long way. However I don't want some bloke who clearly does think i must be a bit dim and unable making me feel guilty over the mid range TV Dh paid for after working every day of Christmas.

Jamie Oliver is someone who has completely lost sight of how extraordinarily rich he is, and what the grinding long-term reality of poverty is. I wonder if he doesn't accept how far removed his own life is from the norm because the disconnect between that and his salt-of-the-earth self-image/persona would be too uncomfortable.

He's tried to change things, put his rep on the line on telly, they haven't magically changed, he's getting frustrated. That's part of the problem with sleb single issue advocates with no in-depth training and education in the issues or background in activism.

Real life does not fit into a nice story arc for TV. And people who need help can be resistant to change, unwise and annoying. If you can't accept that without getting arsey, the long-term social activism is not for you.

Yes, sorry to state the obvious but the reason why some less affluent people and also those who are trying to save money for other things is because ready meals are cheaper. I'm not being funny but there are loads of ready meals in Iceland that you can buy for £1, so really its a no brainer if money is your main concern. I personally find (although there are exceptions) that recipes are very expensive. However, it is true that simple pasta dishes etc can be made cheaply. Personally think the key to eating cheaply is shopping around, although I appreciate that not everyone has the time or lives in an area with a wide range of shops.

Am loving as well that he cited one family as evidence; if I did that at uni I'd be shown the door!

If he really cared he'd be putting free recipe leaflets in benefits offices and emergency food boxes- not selling books at the cost of a few weekly meals and putting telly programs on at times that tend to compete with the soaps (or maybe the soaps is just my background, but certainly everyone back home seems to watch them every day).

Realism versus cynical marketing.

Of course it's a free country hmm, what's that got to do with the price of fish?

Because, as you say, some people don't want to cook. Some people don't want to do lots of things that might be good for them.

If they have enough money we let them get on with it. Otherwise they'd be well within their rights to tell us to fuck off in well-modulated tones.

Only if they're the cheesy chip-eating, Brighthouse telly-watching classes do we make TV programmes about them and their appalling lifestyles.

peachy - advertisers wont be beating a path to his door after this. this is not marketing. this is all very bad PR.

would you have advised him to take this course of action?

"The way Jamie Oliver talks you'd think Southern Italy was heaven on Earth"

LOL, they do actually have a massive child obesity problem in Italy. Fat little bimbi munching on ice cream and cakes

But there is a huge amount of defeatism on this thread, depressing. stop buying fucking ready meals people!

I am going to sound like a cxxx but last night I made pesto with tomatoes, olive, and basil . blended. it took me literally 2 seconds

i wont mention the expensive Lidl pine nuts I added in

If you want to read somebody who really knows what they are talking about then read this And she has her own opinion on the very smug Jamie who appears to only 'care' about the poor when he has a TV show and a book off the back of it to promote.

Another smug millionaire telling people (women) what to do. Because it is always the Women's fault.

I think it is complicated, ready meals are not just the reserve of the poor, although they seem to be judged for it more.

I think working hours has a lot to do with , in many ways better placed than most to eat healthily. We have our own veg garden, pigs for meat, chickens for eggs, we shop online as well as using local farm produce. However once a week we will have a ready meal or takeout night because DH and I work long hours. I am out of the house from 7am until 6pm and have more work to do when I get back, there are times when I cannot be bothered to cook and I do not want to be made to feel guilty for that.

I also think like everything else , the richer you are the cheaper and healthier life is. We buy bulk meat from a local farmer, because we can afford to buy half a cow in one go, many people can't. I can get up in the morning and put stew on to eat when we get home in the slow cooker because we could afford the £40 to buy one. We have fresh bread every morning because we had the £100 to buy a bread maker. We have a packed store cupboard because we have a house big enough for a larder and I have the disposable income to buy a few store cupboard ingredients every week and build it up. We rarely buy biscuits or cakes because I can make them speedily with my Kenwood Chef and have all the baking trays etc.

I wish he would bugger off to Southern Italy
and I think it's really sad what has happened to sure start

Faster- possibly actually, poor bashing seems to be very in at the moment; seems to be a huge element of 'If I distance myself fast enough it can't happen to me'.

Last night I ate at my Mum's, bet that was cheaper ;) Although the day before I did a lentil quesadilla thingy with a little minced lamb and it was lovely.

And I consider myself blessed to have the knowledge, ability and facillities to do that, and thnk those that can't have far deeper issues than the temptation of (usually revolting) ready meals

Oh and wittering on about feeding people cheaply on a bag of mussels, pasta and tomatoes as they do in Sicily. 1) We're no in the land where Tomatoes grow big and cheap and 2) Is he aware of the poverty in Italy both historically in the South and now all over the country and 3) Try feeding very hungry children on mussels. Hardly filling and very expensive.

Stupid boy.

He was happy to take the Sainsbury's £££££ and sell his own range of pre packaged tat.

Compared to meat, mussels are actually quite cheap. But we don't eat meat that often because it is expensive,

Yes, but fromparis how often can you eat tomatoes, olives and pasta?

And how healthy is it anyway - not much in it really, some carbs and tomato mainly...

I am not trying to knock you down but I think it can sometimes be tricky to produce a nutritious well balanced meal night after night with limited ingredients.

It's tricky. Poverty has so many dimensions/factors that it is almost impossible to talk about from just one angle.

JO is a chef - his focus is food. Supermarkets don't make it easy for people to buy good quality food cheaply. Markets are harder to come by.

Some people (regardless of wealth or class), do not know how to put meals together cheaply. Some are just not that interested in food, others are obsessed.

Celebs....dammed if they do, dammed if they don't.

He won't be damned, he'll be even richer.