More of the waste not campaign, the sugar tax and the environment.....
A bit of a rant.
I have been spurred into finishing this post, by a fantastic piece in today's Observer by Eva Wiseman and all the publicity about the huge amount of sugar in the oversized, mucked about with coffee and chocolate drinks served up by the well known coffee shop chains.
When I was a teenager, we were all urged to lose weight by swapping to saccharine tablets in our drinks which, quite frankly, were vile. They left a nasty chemical aftertaste and persuaded me that tea and coffee drunk without sugar was the way to go.
But swapping to unadulterated hot drinks - I also like my coffee black - did not remove my sweet tooth entirely and a nice shortbread (made with sugar AND butter AND gluten laden flour) is always welcome.
Things have progressed and the new sweeteners taste far better than those of the 70s.
BUT, sugar is entirely natural, unlike the chemical cocktails of the alternatives. And as far as I am aware, the side effects of sensible consumption of sugar are significantly less scary than those attributed to aspartame.
My concern about taxing sugary drinks is that it does not really address the heart of the problem, which is that our tastes and our eating habits have changed and this is what we need to be looking at.
It's no good imposing a tax on fizzy pop, if the choice is a sugar free drink and a giant sized chocolate bar.
And what about sweets, cake, all the savoury foods which contain sugar - baked beans- biscuits, ice cream, breakfast cereal...... Need I go on?
Unless we re-educate kids', and even adults', palates then there is little to be gained in taxing fizzy drinks.
My children didn't even know that sugary cereals existed til they went to their first Cub camp. They started on Weetabix and got used to so called adult cereal.
I'd rather they had squash with sugar and cleaned their teeth than risked panic attacks with aspartame laced versions.
And while I am on my soapbox, can I bring up portion sizes? Being overweight is as much to do with how much you eat as what you eat.
Portion sizes have grown and grown - last week my teenage daughter and I indulged in fish and chips from the local chippie. We had one portion of cod and chips between us and couldn't eat all of it.
The so called "scandal" of the over sugared coffee drinks need to be put into perspective too - the statistics that were quoted related to the large drinks - who needs a PINT of coffee anyway?
All of this adds to the growing issue of food waste. We choose larger portions, we are served larger portions and quite often we scoff the lot, but sometimes our eyes are bigger than our stomachs and what seemed like a good idea suddenly feels like a mountain to climb and a pile of food goes untouched.
There are, of course other issues associated with food waste and page upon page has been written about this.
In my opinion, whilst laudable, it's not enough to tell people not to throw away their food when they have no idea where it comes from and what to do with it.
We really need to find a way to get back to basics with our food education.
Trust your senses...does it look ok? Does it smell ok?
Buy fresh from the market, local specialist or farm shop. Ask the retailer or producer about their produce, don't rely on a printed label.
What's wrong with a little mould on the rind of a cheese when we are happy to eat Stilton? Cut it off, grate the remainder and put it in a cheese sauce.
I am not advocating risking salmonella, but I do feel that we should be teaching all generations more about their food, so they can make informed choices about what they eat and how they eat.
We have Scouts who won't touch raw food, don't recognise basic fruit and vegetables and certainly can distinguish between beef and lamb.
I recently taught them how to make baked beans and they...and our scout leader... genuinely didn't realise you could make them at home.
We lead increasingly busy lives, but that's no excuse not to appreciate good food, to shop sensibly and eat wisely and well.
Can we get rid of the notion of "good and bad" food.
Sure we cannot live on cakes and chips, but food should be a delight, not a chore. Moderation and exercise can compensate for the occasional chocolate mousse and glass of red wine.
I am worried about the concept of clean eating and guilty pleasures, which can so easily distort our view of eating and enjoyment and result in eating disorders and obsessions.
It's a long way back to where we used to be in our relationship with food, but we need to look forward to find a way to reconnect and to truly relish and enjoy our food. Maybe the current interest in paleo diets and bone broth, aka stock, will trigger more interest.
An understanding and appreciation of food and a knowledge of where it comes from , how to cook it and what it does for us is surely the starting point in the approach to tackling food poverty, malnourishment, obesity and anorexia.
Remember the Sophia Loren quote.......Everything you see I owe to spaghetti.
But it's not just about the food we eat, it's how we cook it and what we cook it in.
We seem to have become a notion fascinated by TV chefs, clamouring for the latest celebrity cookery series or the competitiveness of GBBO and Masterchef.
But truth be told, once in the kitchen, we become assemblers, with the addition of a jar of pre-cooked sauce to a pan of pasta being regarded as cooking and therefore not dishing up convenience food.
Just how many people read what goes into this sauces - often too much salt and sugar and a great many fillers.
So many of them can be made better and cheaper and just as quickly from scratch.
So if we can educate people to cook better and learn about where their food has come from and what goes into it, then the next step is to look at the cookware we use.
This is a very long and worrying article, from the NY Times and it may make you think twice before buying another non stick pan.
And don't forget, the first time that you used a chemically coated pan, is the best it will ever be, as continued use will degrade and erode the coating and, as it cannot be restored, the only solution is to buy a new pan.
Ours are naturally coated with Sussex grown flax oil ....
....and if I'm being totally honest, the first time you use is the worst it will be, but the patina and non stick properties will get better and better over time and in the event of a culinary disaster, they can be scrubbed back and restored.
If you look at them in terms of pence per use over the lifetime of the pan, you will realise what good value they are.
© Netherton Foundry Shropshire 2016
