Is food suddenly loads more expensive? Why?

[niketrainersarecomfy]

Ok. Panicking if it continues.
Just been to the local shop for tinned tuna and couldnt get it below 2 pounds. Corned beef 2. 50.
These were once cheap options for sandwiches. Now i see them as protein to be saved for an evening meal, and for sandwiches to be made from paste, marmite, soft cheese etc.
I have noticed my usual bread rolls go from 90p to 1.10.
Milk stayed the same. Squash much more money.
Is it just me? Yes i could have gone to aldi and not the corner shop but even so.
I honestly dont see how places like tesco are going to stay open if this continues, nor how anyone could afford to fill a trolley for the weeks shop.
Is it just me or is food becoming too expensive? Thats before tv license, water, petrol getting dearer each year.
How are we supposed to manage when wages dont rise at the rate of inflation?

Larlaland
Living in shared accommodation or poor accommodation may mean fridge space is shared and severely limited. There may be no working equipment and a stove which may not work properly. Many people may need to walk to shops rather than take public transport to save money and may not have a car. They may not do an online shop as there would be nowhere to store things. They may work shifts and therefore proper cooking making a lot of noise may wake other sharers on different shift patterns. Many people working on their feet all day doing 60 plus hour weeks and are physically exhausted and time poor.
If someone finishes a night shift at 4am there are reasons why they reach for a really cheap meal deal at a garage or fast food place on their way home.
I am surprised at the lack of understanding and the things that are taken for granted by those that have a reasonable income and are fortunate enough to live in decent accommodation.

You assume so much glazedover in that post. You assume I have never been on the bones of my arse, I haven't lived in shared accommodation, I haven't struggled. I have experienced all of those things. I work, I have a disabled DP who has been very, very ill for very long periods of time. I have been exhausted. I have however always tried my best to make sure my dc put decent food into their mouths because that food builds the bodies they will have for the rest of their lives. I am not superwoman and I do not always get it right but I try. Apparently UK children are now fatter than children in the US. We as a nation are getting things very wrong and we not stop all the 'healthy food is boring' shite.

All the slightly smug grow your own veg, buy a trug for £200, we should eat less junk food....ignore the reality of the kind of working life most people have, finances with little or noth8ng spare and that frankly, I like red peppers and tomatoes .... both hard to grow year round in the U.K.

Nobody is saying that we will all be turning into Tom and Barbara from the Good Life. However what we are saying is that it is actually very easy to grow a few things that will supplement what you can buy in the shops (which is likely to be limited in choice if the prices keep going up and the predicted supply issues come to pass). My window ledge in the bathroom is currently home to a plant holding three peppers (I've already had one off it) with lots of flowers still creating more. It cost about 2p. I put the seed in the soil and have done nothing else to it other than give it a bit of water. Clearly it isn't going to keep me alive on its own but the couple of quid I've saved because I haven't had to buy packs of peppers can then be put towards something else.

In times gone by supplementing with home grown would have been the norm. Its about supplementing not about being self sufficient (which I agree is not easy unless you don't work and you have masses of space).

I wouldn't attempt to grow vegetables but I do grow herbs. The big pots you get in the supermarket are split up and repotted. They go much further that way. Excess can be frozen or dried.

Glazedover You can stand by it all you like but I am living proof you are fucking wrong.

That’s not agressive by my usual standards

I thought the lasagna would be cheaper cooked from scratch, given what I'd seen on Eat Well for Less. (£5.49 I seem to remember from a recent episode) But I looked at the Asda website (I've only lived near an Asda once, for about 18 months, so don't know their range as well as the others) and found this groceries.asda.com/product/italian-meals/asda-family-beef-lasagne/1000005037612 1.4kg "family lasanga" for £3.50 - has really bad reviews though! If your kids will eat that and you've not much money it must be a really good deal.

The depressing thing about the Asda lasagne is that it comes as a meal deal with garlic bread, chips or chocolate cake. That is why UK kids are getting so fat.

One thing I think is difficult to develop before living on your own is the willpower to eat something you don't especially feel like at the time because it's what's due to go off soonest, and that helps when dealing with cooking fresh food in general. When you live somewhere with other people, stuff is more likely to be eaten quickly.

Try walking everywhere as you can't afford transport, day after day, it grinds you down. I doubt they'd be whipping up a nice lentil stew but would reach for crisps, pot noodles and chips too.

Varies a lot between people. I know a couple of people who grew up poor who think nothing of walking 5+ miles as transport. It's just the normal way you travel shorter distances as far as they are concerned, and they didn't change when they became a bit better off.
It's the same as the 'no poorer people cook from scratch' idea. It's hard to tell what the percentages are, but people exist who do. About some of them you get arguments that someone isn't really poor / working class because (like Jack Monroe) one of their parents used to have a good job, so they are really a middle class person. But doesn't always apply.

“I wouldn't attempt to grow vegetables but I do grow herbs. The big pots you get in the supermarket are split up and repotted. They go much further that way. “

That’s a very expensive way to grow herbs. Supermarket pots are notoriously expensive and often don’t last long.

That’s a very expensive way to grow herbs. Supermarket pots are notoriously expensive and often don’t last long.

Actually it isn't that expensive. A pot of basil in Lidl is about £1 however each pot will as the PP said be able to be split into about 6 pieces very easily. If you then repot those you will soon have a good supply since each piece will grow quickly to at least the size of the original.

Yes you can grow from a pack of seed for half that cost but the ability to use the herbs instantly is appealing and a really good starting point for those who are new to growing things on the window ledge.

food costs will go up massively in the next few months when the effects of the draught become clearer.

growing your own is nice, but hard work. and to feed an average (2+2) family you need quite a large growing area. a 'full size' allotment is huge

Tesco do tuna for 65p and squash for 42p. Are you buying brands? If so if you are worried about cost I would swap to value.

Tanith The reason why they don’t last long is because the supermarkets cram too many seeds into a pot and grow them under intensive conditions. The pots don’t have enough nutrients to sustain the amount of plants. If you split the plants and report them into separate pots you can make about 10 pots of herbs which last a long time. So not expensive at all actually.

Cross post with Cloudtree

Living in shared accommodation or poor accommodation may mean fridge space is shared and severely limited. There may be no working equipment and a stove which may not work properly.

you are talking about a TINY MINORITY OF PEOPLE! Hardly anyone has zero access to a single saucepan and a single ring burner.

However what we are saying is that it is actually very easy to grow a few things that will supplement what you can buy in the shops (which is likely to be limited in choice if the prices keep going up and the predicted supply issues come to pass). My window ledge in the bathroom is currently home to a plant holding three peppers

You don't have a rampaging three year old, who sees plants as a jungle for his dinosaur empire do you?

I don't have many windowsills as it is. Two are storage for the bathroom and the kitchen as it is. I'm sure other people have less.

Honestly you have to have space to do it. Living in a one or two bedroom flat, you aren't necessarily going to have much of that.

These threads always descent into whataboutery

What about the blind autistic deaf quadriplegic illiterate single mother to 12 children living in a shoe with no shop in a 50 mile radios and no internet connection and and and and and

Hardly anyone has zero access to a single saucepan and a single ring burner.

Actually I would say, having the money to pay for the fuel to power the said ring burner is more the issue.

...and 3 peppers have how many calories?...

The reason why they don’t last long is because the supermarkets cram too many seeds into a pot and grow them under intensive conditions. The pots don’t have enough nutrients to sustain the amount of plants. If you split the plants and report them into separate pots you can make about 10 pots of herbs which last a long time. So not expensive at all actually

Ooooh good tip thanks! I've got supermarket basil, coriander and parsley all doing OK but I will split them :-)

Well them's the rules on here. We have to assume that all poor people:

Cannot cook
Have no pots and pans
Have no cheap shops nearby
Only like poor quality food
Have special needs
Have no time
Are unable or unwilling to do anything constructive to help themselves.

I think it might be because some people get enjoyment from being able to do the handwringing 'it's this awful Government's fault' that they cannot accept that the above applies to hardly anybody.

As someone who's grown up in a large working class family and suffered hardships such as the miners strike and business failure without resorting to living on value pizza I find this attitude quite insulting to be frank.

Funny how people always have the fuel to power an oven to cook pizza and chips but are never able to use a slow cooker or make an omelette.