Great British Budget Menu

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

Anyone else watching?

Joanna does look malnourished bless her.

I assume the sweet tea drinking is habit more than need.

Out comes the porridge!

I think the sugar is killing her appetite.

I honestly think that the lovely people on this programme just have lost their way a bit, and need help to reeducate their way back, its just that elderly man needs more help than the rest xx

It's very sad. Even the chefs with plenty of research couldn't do a meal in the budget. If you have kids and work how do you find time to shop around not to mention the lack of education in healthy eating.

This programme is breaking my heart. It's not always about the money is it though, some people are just not aware of how to feed themselves on a really really tight budget.

It is true about bargain hunting being time consuming. I used to spend ages doing my food shopping when I had to watch every penny. I've struggled to continue that now I'm working full time so my food bill has gone up substantially. Also it is really depressing having to shop and live like that.

It's interesting to see the working poor on TV, often overlooked.
I think it is possible to eat reasonably well on a low budget but you often need an initial outlay to bulk buy staple good that then reduce the cost of each meal.

Joanna makes me feel really sad.

What these people have in common is they haven't always had to live like this, which I'm sure makes it harder.

I'm sure you're right bico, it's almost like they've been caught out in a situation and haven't really been able to reassess.

Angela is the perfect person to help Joanna.

I think part of it is that inability to get together enough money to buy those staples in bulk.

They need to bring back household management in schools. Not just learning how to cook but how to cook good food cheaply.
Sadly food technology has been dropped for year 7 at our local secondary due to budget pressures.

This is a really well done program so far isn't it? Lots of compassion.

chickens only lay eggs in spring and summer, so feeding the chickens during the winter with nothing to show for it is another cost!

Why is it they all have branded products? value products would make their money spread further and often contains less salt etc than their branded equivalents.

I think it should be part of the national curriculum. Even when it's not about budgeting, people should know and understand food and diet and how it all works.

Angela seems a bit more grounded and empathetic

Totally agree we need home economics taught in schools again.
It's where I learnt to cook cakes, savouries etc.

I agree intarsia, we need to teach kids now how to feed themselves properly.
my cousin is like the people on the programme, she will by the kids happy meals because it's a dinner for 2 quid, she has no idea about batch cooking, or having a chicken 1 day and using all of it to make other dinners over the week.

Being vegetarian helps...

Richard is getting bargains because he is well known and confident enough to ask. I can't see Joanna doing that.

Food technology or food and nutrition is compulsory from sept 2014 from ks 1-3. Supposedly cooking mostly savoury products and looking at nurtrition and budgets etc. New national curriculum turnaround.

It's part cooking, part maths because it's not about cost per meal, but cost over the week. A £4 chicken might be a lot of a lay out for one meal, but it can last almost a week with careful planning.