Has the price of food made you eat healthier or the reverse?

[RudsyFarmer]

I was thinking about this today. I’m genuinely so shocked at the price of food it’s made me restrict my own food massively. I have the money to pay the prices but I just keep walking out of shops kind of she’ll shocked. Tonight I had a bag of crisps for dinner.

I understand for many it’s had the opposite effect. Lots of cooking from scratch with beans and lentils etc. I wish I could be that person
but I absolutely loathe cooking which is unhelpful.

We’re growing food to offset the increasing cost of vegetables.

We cut out roast dinners quite a while back due to the cost, even a chicken which would do us 2 or 3 meals with leftovers for lunch sandwiches are expensive. I am now feeding my Dad four times a week, two meals at ours and two to take home and unfortunately he will not eat chilli, curry, spag bol or anything which he is not used to. I did try to expand his palate a little with a nice mushroom risotto which ended up in the bin so we are back to roast dinners every weekend and something like gammon or cottage pie. I avoid making him something like fish and chips as he can manage to cook that for himself on the three nights I don't feed him. Plus he likes a pudding, as does my husband so crumbles, fruit pies stewed fruit and custard. We grow some of our own fruit which helps a little. It has made our shopping much more expensive now. The roast lamb bone with the little meat left on was made into a Scotch broth which he will eat and which is full of veg and healthy but it is taking it's toll on the costs of our shopping.

We have an allotment which was always just a relaxing hobby and I enjoyed making it pretty as well as growing fruit and veg. Since food prices have rocketed we have been growing more efficiently and growing fewer flowers. We’ve looked up how to store things better and have filled the freezer rather than let things go over. We picked bagfuls of blackberries in August for the freezer. We try to buy according to the veg we have and I’ve had a go at making soup as we seem to have gone overboard on leeks and potatoes.
We don’t eat meat, and have cheaper fish or try and make one portion go between two of us. We also buy reduced items and freeze them. I think we’re probably eating more healthily now.

Hmm, it's a bit swings and roundabouts for me.

I eat much less fruit because of the increased cost so I just generally buy enough for the kids now and I don't have any of things like berries or exotic fruits that cost a lot.

On the other hand I also eat less chocolate and cake type rubbish and also sugary yoghurts, because I buy a lot less of it now with the price increases.

Main meals haven't changed at all really just got more expensive. If we didn't have kids I would cut costs down by eating a lot more tinned food based dishes to save money but they won't reliably eat pulses so I can't.

Much healthier because the price of takeaways have gone up so I cut down on them and I now if I try one (which I don’t) I feel very ill. I used to have about five a month.
Same with the coffee shop prices, I don’t buy them now.

So less takeaways and take out coffee. But we're eating more carbs. Used to have salmon and seabass every week but it's a treat now when I find it's reduced.

I cook from scratch for me and ds. We haven't resorted to crisps for tea!

The main changes are substitutions - for example I buy trout rather than salmon. I buy seasonal veg. I buy venison rather than beef (plenty of it round here).

I've stopped buying alcohol. And I buy fewer biscuits and ice cream. I home make more cakes. I eat porridge with fruit rather than other cereals.

So on the whole I think we eat slightly healthier - lower cholesterol, fresher veg, less alcohol, less sugar.

Great recipe, will try.
I have found myself buying less snacks as the price of crisps and chocolates etc keeps rising. it's hard as I have teen dc who love thes things. once a fortnight i go to lidl to buy snacks for dc, but not every week.

have found myself eating more store cupboard processed foods such as beans on toast instead of proper healthy meals to try and save on cooking.

Also trying to eat one meal a day to lose weight/lower cooking costs

Agreed. I rarely buy fruit these days

I'm mostly just spending more tbh, except for sal on - I will not pay what they are asking now. So more eggs instead.

Salmon, not sal on.

Less healthy(ish), filling up on cheap carbs like rice and potatoes. Less fruit. Pretty much the only fish we have now is fish balls because they're cheap but they're probably mostly filler so not exactly healthy. Thankfully me and the children all get a decent healthy lunch at school (I take a massive plateful, with lots of salad and vegetables, to make the most of it. Its free thankfully.)

I'm eating much worse. I used to buy and eat a lot much fresh food than I currently do. I do have a healthy breakfast (muesli, Greek yoghurt and an apple) but I eat packet noodles for lunch, as they're only 65p. When DD is at her Dad's house I eat pate on toast, beans on toast, egg on toast for dinner - sometimes with mushrooms. Used buy to lentil chips for healthy snacks, now buy own brand crisps as they're less than half the price. Used to cook stews, fajitas, casseroles, lamb steak, rump steak, roast dinners, fish etc. Now we eat a lot of freezer food, sausages, pasta, lower quality mince dishes. I'm so grateful that DD gets a free cooked lunch at school.

We're eating well and more British in season which is better for the environment too!

I get a box delivered by a local greengrocer and it's much cheaper than the equivalent in the supermarket. Right now it's cabbage and cauliflower and root veg mostly, but we like them so we aren't missing much, though I'm buying peppers and tomatoes additionally!
So that nothing goes to waste I make sure that the meals for the week are based around the veg, rather than adding in veg as an extra, so in order to save money we've really increased the amount of fresh veg we're eating.