It’s increasingly unaffordable to eat 5 a day

[HappySnake]

Is anyone else struggling with this currently? I know some veg is not too expensive, but I just find with fruit it’s so expensive now. My kids particularly like blueberries and strawberries - I’m spending about a fiver a day. I feel like others who are less well off financially must be finding it even more difficult.

Any tips on affordable fruit etc and how you ensure you get 5 a day would be welcome!

If you like certain fruits and veg and have space to grow at home, then do that. You can cut up a shop bought strawberry or take the seeds from tomatoes, courgettes, squash, apples, pears and plant them in a little pot. Put in a sunny spot, water often, and watch the magic happen. Obviously apples and pears are a longer commitment!

Some foods are not for everyday OP, unless you're growing them or have an unlimited budget.

I like salmon but can't afford to have it often, so I get cheaper fish instead.

Goes for everything.

Pink lady apples are expensive, but Gala are less so and Tesco do the family bag of apples fpr a good price.

I buy frozen bags of strawberries, blueberries and cherrys and add them to natural greek yogurt the night before however they defrost very quickly. Just a dollop of Greek yogurt on top and they are lovely and so much cheaper.

For those who are getting the heebie jeebies picking berries

Pick away you won't find those flavours from supermarket fruits

Take your haul home, fill the sink with cold water and salt - a couple of tablespoons - look at the size of sink, water and fruit, there's no exact measures. Soak fruit in the salt water over night - washes off all pee and kills the worms , flys and god knows what else

Final rinse , leave to dry, freeze or eat or turn into jam

Real food has no sell by's or BB dates.

@suki1964 I don't bother with the salt though my mum always did. Anyway, swallowing the odd tiny critter is preferable to eating a load of insecticide or whatever they've sprayed on their crops.

Late to the party but single mum, low income …. Too good to go app! You have to be “on the ball” with it but I get the veg boxes from the local green grocer and cut and freeze any that are close to perishing. Also get the meat and fish ones from the supermarket and stock up the freezer. Not great if you’re a fussy eater or allergies etc but great if not. And if I’m honest, I never bore of the surprise element of what I am going to get 🤣🥳
Also Aldi have days where fruit and veg is pence to buy - I stock up x

Get a blue berry bush and some strawberry plants. We have had ours years and both fruit well each year. They are an expense initially but pay for themselves in the long term

Community Fridges are the way forward here. Free for all, not means tested and a way of solving the issue of surplus food which would otherwise be thrown away.
Food (typically fruit, veg and bread) is collected from supermarkets; items with yellow stickers that haven't sold the previous day but still good to eat, and redistributed to the local community.
Our local organisation alone collects 4 tonnes of food every week.

Our one is great!

No, you can't forage for blackberries in May, but why the fuck would you eat blackberries in May anyway? Fruit, especially soft fruit, is seasonal and part of the joy is eating it at the right time. Honestly people's brains are broken.

@Banmooo , I'm sure there are places in the Scottish Highlands with brambles. As @Ginmonkeyagain pp, soft fruit is seasonal.
There are many foods that you can forage, and if you grow your own, you can use different storage or preserving methods to have food for the winter months.
I could have sworn that in an earlier post you said you aren't in the UK, yet you say you are in the SE.

Check out your nearest market. I popped into ours yesterday which has one fruit stall and bought two punnets of blueberries, two large punnets of raspberries and two punnets of grapes for £7.50. This will last me a week and I add the berries to Greek yoghurt with honey for a snack, as well as to pancakes etc (and of course feed DC for a snack!)

@UpMyself exactly. Freezers exist. I tend to stash my blackberry hoard in the freezer and add some to pies and crumbles throughout the winter. I have no real desire to eat blackberris now, just as stawberries don't really float my boat in deepest December.

On the growing things front, for anyone that has a garden I recommend a rhubarb plant, ours has been going for years and years, I ignore it every winter, do no maintenance, and every year it comes back enormous. Stewed rhubarb for breakfast, crumbles galore, and I make jam from it too.

I'm not in the UK. I never said I'm in the SE (se of what anyway?)

Btw, growing your own involves having the space, land, time and money to do so. Your privilege is showing....

I grow my own rhubarb, tomatoes and cucumbers in pots on the balcony of a 2 bed flat in London. Your ignorance is showing.

Seeds are pretyy cheap and you can even germinate seedlings from the fruit themselves.

@Banmooo , what privilege? That I have the wherewithal to go and forage and grow a few things in pots? Or that I live in the UK?

It is asrl78 who is in the SE. She replied to a question I addressed to you.

Agree.

I used to live in a flat with a balcony and had a set of shelves with pots of various herbs, a big tub growing new potatoes and tomatoes in grow bags. I also grew chillies in a pot on my living room windowsill.

I get a little tired of this "won't someone think of the poor people in flats" handwringing. We have ways of engaging with outdoor space and growing things. Sometimes more than people who live in sterile car depedent suburbs whose gardens are all car ports and artificial grass.

Now I am off to my local wood to collect some elderflower heads to make elderflower fizz.

What makes you think I'm not talking about the people with the car ports and artificial grass? I never mentioned flats, you did.

We buy bags of frozen fruit and make smoothies. I do agree though, fruit like strawberries and blueberries is ridiculous and we’ve noticed they don’t last long before they start to turn. The quality isn’t there to justify the price.

I usually get the wonky fruit too, tastes fine. Just picked up some raspberries and strawberries, both wonky and the strawberries are British ones from aldi
6 British apples for under £2 as well

just give them cheaper fruit , OP @HappySnake

Problem solved

I buy frozen fruit from Aldi, give them a quick zap in the microwave & add them to cereal

None of it was expensive. Actually £1.49 for the apples