To ask what you can actually cook for 30p/meal?

[Porcupineintherough]

Following on from the comments by MP Lee Anderson I was wondering what I could actually make for 30p/head. I'm a pretty good thrifty cook but all I could come up with were:

beans on toast (budget brands)
tinned tomatoes on toast (budget brands)
tinned mushrooms on toast (budget brands)
egg on toast
cheese on toast (ditto)
some kind of veggie stew/sauces w red lentils (if cooking for more than one) to eat w pasta
stir fry noodles w a few shreds of veg
bowl of basics cereal

I'm not counting things like baked potatoes where the ingredients are cheap but the energy costs to cook them are high.

So what am I missing? What skills and recipes are this food bank teaching? Wild foraging? Poaching? Shop-lifting 101?

No no you silly peasants. You have it all wrong. You get whatever you meal you want from a posh restaurant, put it on expenses then sling the waiter a 30p tip. Job done.

I think the only thing you are missing is that the person who made that remark has had a privileged life and has no idea whatsoever about what he is talking about, be it adequate nutrition, extreme budgeting or energy costs.

If you use those apps, olio, good to go, and trash nothing, you should be able to find bags of food going for cheap in your area that are still good to eat but left overs.

30p a meal!! Are they mad

I an a thrifty cook and I allow £1 a head for evening meals. Recently it's had to rise to £1.25 a head.

Otherwise the options are desperate.

I'm assuming fuel/electricity isn't restricted as cooking nutritious cheap meals requires oven or hob on for an extended time. It really wouldn't be 30p per person even with cheap options.

I agree many people don't have food prep skills or know how to look, buy and cook seasonal food these days but 30p! I do, and I can't comprehend how he thinks this is possible.

Which the op says in her very first sentence.

Following on from the comments by MP Lee Anderson I was wondering what I could actually make for 30p/head.

It’s easier (but not easy) if you’re a vegetarian who likes lentils and has a cupboard full of spices/oils etc, plenty of cooking equipment, a decent sized freezer, knowledge of how to cook and the mental energy to plan, plus the time to actually prepare the meal.

I’d be eating a lot of daal, veg curry, lentil bolognese type meals and soup.

We cook almost everything from scratch, always have done, but the costs of the ingredients are rising. The properly cheap cuts of meat aren't sold in many supermarkets, certainly not in small ones, and many require slow cooking to be edible, which brings energy costs back into it. Try finding lamb neck in a local Co-op. Add in the issue of food deserts, with significant numbers of people unable to access a wide range of fresh unprocessed food, which means their options are limited from the start.

I'm glad the MP works in a food bank. I totally agree that not relying on convenience foods is cheaper and healthier. But it's not a level playing field, the food industry has shifted a million miles in the last fifty years, and it's not realistic to think that changing the way en masse the way people cook is going to solve this crisis.

I forgot that you also need to not live in a food desert and be able to access cheap supermarkets.

I hate that when ‘economical’ meals that some rich bozo has suggested has expensive ingredients but because you’re dividing it up between x amount of meals it’s cheap. There was one once that actually had champagne in the recipe but because you were only using a small amount they calculated that as part of the cheap cost of the meal (eg two tablespoons of champagne).

True but it takes time, it doesn't offer any certainty, and you might not be able to travel to where the food needs to be collected from.

Absolutely this.

I've eaten on a strict budget for years. Lots of cheap carbs.

I was recently diagnosed with various deficiencies and type 2 diabetes.

No of course she will not. That is why it is down to you to make sure that she learns to cook.

I could live on £10 a day for six at a push ( cheapie pasta and rice meals) but 30p isnt sustainable even the odd months we only spend £40 on food is because we have spices and canned / dried food in the cupboards.

Even lidl beans on toast would be more than 30p surely? Eggs are just under £2 for six.

If you live on cereal and watered down long life milk you could do it. But I dont think you could live like that for more than a week?

I'd love to see him live like that and more importantly feed his kids 30p for a month and feel happy they was getting good food.

Utter bs from out of touch twats. Again

Pulses/beans/rice/spuds cook fairly quickly in a pressure cooker/instant pot BUT that pre-supposes that poorer households can afford to buy one.

That said, one of our local foodbank/low waste distributors managed to get a firm to donate a truckload of slowcookers.

If the MP is serious about this, they should come up with the costings and recipes (like Jack Monroe does).

Well plenty of people are needing to do it, or reaching there.

I've found some recipes for under £1.00 but none for 30p

savings4savvymums.co.uk/5-days-5-meals-5-5-ingredient-budget-meals-will-get-working-week/

That is why it is down to you to make sure that she learns to cook.

That’s great if parents have the time, energy and resources to cook. Isn’t it pretty likely that the poorest households won’t?

I wonder what the HOC dining room can rustle up for him, I mean, there is subsidised and then there is subsidised……

“ May I recommend the piece of toast sir? We have a special on day old whole meal served with a scrape of margarine and garnished with a nasturtium leaf.”

30p a meal? I can do better! 20p a meal = budget pasta with some budget butter/ oil 😋 ... and if you raise it back up to 30p well you CAN add a teaspoon to parmesam or frozen peas!
All you need to do is attend the budget cooking course and hope the price for basic foods & energy is steadily falling!

has anyone read the Queen and i by sue Townsend? The bit where the queen (who has been removed and banished to a council state and lives off meagre benefits) tries to make a soup for £1.30 or similar. She has to visit several shops in order to get the cheapest ingredients, by the time she gets home and makes the soup she is tired and hungry. She remembers a politician telling her when she reigned that ‘poor people simply lack the ability to make cheap and nutritious meals’ as she gives up on the unappetising-looking soup and makes a jam sandwich.

Quite. Plus these days with convenience foods being such a large part of the diet of many for years and cheaper foods having been out of favour for a long time, how many parents simply do not have skills to cook economically, or the knowledge to pass on

I wasn’t taught cooking at school, I learnt off cookbooks and the Internet.

If you can’t afford a supermarket shop your hardly going to order a takeaway are you?

the traditional cheap cuts of meat such as lamb neck and belly are now made into sausages and burgers because it is more appealing to consumers and makes more money.

Presumably the MP gave detailed answers to a question about his suggestions for 30p meals and the press omitted that from the articles?

Putting aside feelings about the MP in question, what would be the cost of a portion of pasta, passata and a grate of cheddar. Suspect if purchased from Aldi/Lidl, the marginal cost might be in the ballpark, depending on energy costs. No nutritional balance if repeated though.

So how are they eating, if they never cook? I take it, that is what you mean?

I'm probably in the minority but I think he has a point.

I eat a lot of things that are very cheap. Baked potato with beans or a two egg omelette were my first thoughts. You can buy 20p packs of pasta at my local supermarket...