This is fascinating. I have for the last year been part of a project attempting to find the cheapest diet in the UK from a major UK supermarkey which fulfills all the correct RDAs or vitamins minerals and so on. The best I can do at the moment is 80p per person per day (assuming a typical family of 4) this is cheaper if all parties are adults. I will be very interested to read if your results are similar to ours. I’m not sure if I am welcome to post links to what we’ve found?

All the best in your interesting quest!

Louise

I noticed that you discussed the film Food Inc. on your blog and I wanted to let you know about a film called Our Daily Bread which I think you would find fascinating. It’s similar to Food Inc. in how it illuminates the horrific reality of industrial agriculture, however; Our Daily Bread is not an advocacy film in the traditional sense. The film communicates its messages using provocative images of places where food is produced by going deep inside the world of high-tech agriculture. Our Daily Bread touches on animal husbandry, labor issues, and the shocking reality of food production with a very distinctive style.

I appreciate you taking the time to read this. We are an independent company with limited resources, so if our film interests you, I would appreciate it if you could mention it in an upcoming post. If you have any questions about Our Daily Bread or Icarus Films, please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Maybe you have something similar in your area?

I don’t know about you, but I don’t care nearly so much about how baked beans or pasta are treated as chickens…anything more than the most basic where those are concerned is luxury. The most “basic” chicken is simply beyond the pale as far as I am concerned.

What’s notable about the fact that you run marathons is that 2 of the people whom I cook for on a regular basis (but shan’t include in the ‘meals for 4′ calculation) are keen tri-athletes and eat somewhere between 5,500 to 8,500 calories per day, depending on the state of their training or competitions. They will quite happily eat half of a bread pudding that I had intended to portion into 6 servings and consider it a snack.

I can easily see how to fill people up on carbohydrates – and understand how refined flours/cereals can add quite a lot to people’s nutritional intake but it is awkward to supply 7-9 fruit and vegetables in a way that is affordable and filling. Eg, my local Tesco had some ripe plums that were so fragrant that I smelled them as soon as I walked through the door. They were 50p each – if I’d wanted to buy 2 or 3 for each person (2 medium plums is a recommended serving for 5-A-Day and these were small-to-medium), then that would have been far more money than was appropriate to spend on a budget.

It seems a shame to pass up the seasonal treats such as fresh, wonderfully ripe plums, but those were too costly. I should mention that I needed to visit somewhere yesterday that I knew to have an Aldi store (I don’t have one locally). Aldi currently has a 50p promotion on several fruit and vegetables including a punnet of plums, so I bought one. Nowhere near as fragrant or perfect but still decent plums and far from the cricket balls that are available elsewhere.

For the purposes of this project, I’m not going to resort to ‘stickies’ or very unusual bargains that are unlikely to be available more widely as that doesn’t feel entirely fair. However, it seems sensible to take advantage of various promotions that are widely available such as the above, when I can.

I live with four young adults, we are all either students or on JSA (~£50/week for under-25s). £10-15 on buying food per person per week here, often less if it’s been a good week for skipping ['dumpster diving']. I don’t find this massively difficult to do, & it keeps me healthy enough to run marathons.

Communal cooking is usually vegetarian & often vegan, we’ve basic but mostly-adequate kitchen equipment, and three of us are good confident cooks. We used to get a veg-box delivered (£4 / person / week, enough for making veggie dinner each day & more potatoes than we could eat) but that stopped, have market & large supermarket within a bicycle ride. Tend to live on lentils & flapjack unless particularly inspired.

Is it just me or does it seem that the people who issue this guidance have an image of low-income, f/t working people coming back home, ordering a takeaway and shoving their feet up in front of the much-caricatured plasma TV rather than the reality of seeing to homework, serving dinner, checking lunches, sorting schedules/appointments for everyone?

One restriction at a time – I’m going for the budget for now.