To have found this blog about childhood obesity intensely smug and annoying?

[MalenkyRusskyDrakonchik]

agirlcalledjack.com/2013/06/13/dont-blame-poverty-for-your-childs-obesity/

Is it just me ... what kind of la la land does she live in, where everyone who is struggling for money lives in a nice house with a cooker and has plenty of time from not working two jobs to bake bread?

What she is describing is the sort of sensible cost-cutting I would expect most people who're struggling for money but not absolutely on the bones of their arses could do. I get what she's saying, I do, but the smug tone coupled with the failure to realize that quite a lot of very poor people don't actually have good enough cooking facilities to do what she describes is getting me down.

Am I being mean?

Plus the 'chicken to feed a family for a week' makes me slightly suspect her of embroidered truth.

[squeakytoy]

there is no mention of fresh veg in her blog at all..

or the cost of bread or milk either..

2 people can not live healthily on a tenner a week

[Elderflowergranita]

Well, I think she does make a reasonable point. Baking bread takes very little time, and surely most people own a cooker?

Are you seriously suggesting that people don't have hobs and ovens? Leaving the bread baking aside, lots can be cooked on a stove top, including flat breads on a dry frying pan.

It's a mindset that can hold people back, not cooking facilities.

[MalenkyRusskyDrakonchik]

I didn't even notice the lack of fresh veg ... true, there's not much. Tomato in the bread, I think.

[MrsHuxtable]

If you look at her recipes, you'll see she uses plenty of vegetables. Veggie soups for lunch, curries etc for dinner.

Can't comment on poor people not having cookers though.

[MrsHuxtable]

And as for milk, she uses soya milk.

[squeakytoy]

I didnt look at her recipes, but if that is the case, then she is lying about her shopping bill only costing a tenner a week.

[MalenkyRusskyDrakonchik]

elder - but she's aiming the blog at people who are really poor, I think?

Lots of people don't have a cooker. I am seriously suggesting that. If you're in a hostel or a B&B because you're waiting to be housed, you won't necessarily have cooking facilities. You could end up in a council house and not have a working cooker, it's not exactly unheard of.

I do think it's naive to assume that everyone has this stuff, has the outlay to buy all the pans and so on ... I mean, when do you do that?

If you're me, you pick up pots and pans gradually, and your mum buys you some at 18, and it's all pretty easy to acquire without thinking about it. But they do cost something.

I wouldn't mind at all if she were addressing a general audience of people who're not brilliantly well off, but she is specifically mentioning poverty.

[Corkyandviolet]

I love how she makes casseroles, hotspots, gratins etc from scratch - and it takes her just fifteen minutes each evening! She could be serious competition for Jamie Oliver!

[coppertop]

The confusing thing for me is that the blogger makes it sound (in the linked post) as though spending only £10 a week on food is something to aspire to. Yet if you look elsewhere on the same blog there is a link to this article:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22715458

This one describes the effects of spending just £10 per week in a very different light.

[squeakytoy]

and having just looked at her shopping list... can someone point me in the direction of pitta breads at 22p, or tinned potatoes at 15p???

[MalenkyRusskyDrakonchik]

squeaky - maybe if you drive to Aldi at the edge of town? Easy with your magic free-petrol car.

[Elderflowergranita]

Ok, if she is indeed aiming her blog at the very poor, then I take your point.

It must be horrendously difficult to cook healthy food under the circumstances you mention.

I do agree that the £10 budget sounds far fetched.

[cantspel]

tins of potatoes and tined carrots is hardly cooking from scratch

[expatinscotland]

I lived with only a kettle and a microwave to cook with for months. Still didn't gain a bunch of weight and eat healthily.

[LadyBeagleEyes]

She sounds unutterably smug.

[MalenkyRusskyDrakonchik]

elder - I read it that that's who she was aiming it at. I could be wrong, it was just how I read it.

I think her message is valuable, it's just the way she puts it across seems counter-productive because it is just so smug.

[chickensaladagain]

Friend of mine has an oven but can't afford the gas to use it

[5Foot5]

I love how she makes casseroles, hotspots, gratins etc from scratch - and it takes her just fifteen minutes each evening! She could be serious competition for Jamie Oliver!

Yes I noticed that too! I cook most of our meals from scratch and have been doing so for years so I have had lots of practice and think I am pretty good at it, but there are not many main meals I can do in under 15 minutes.

[BellaTalbert]

Very smug and totally living in La La Land. I don't believe it for a minute about £10 a week.

[coppertop]

The linked BBC article is apparently about the blogger herself, and how she needed help from the food bank because £10 per week on food just wasn't enough:

"She spent £10 a week on food, which brought her a can of kidney beans, a tin of tomatoes, pasta, rice, a loaf of bread, a few loose vegetables, pulses and occasionally a pot of herbs or spice as a "treat". She very rarely had any meat or fish."

"While she and her son were attending a support group where single mothers could socialise while their children were in a creche, one of the workers noticed the pair were regularly going back for seconds and thirds of the free meal provided.

She asked Ms Monroe if she was ok and Ms Monroe eventually accepted the referral to a local food bank.

The food bank provided her with nappies and five items of food a week. She described it as "such a godsend", adding: "I don't know what I would have done without food banks."

[MalenkyRusskyDrakonchik]

Well, I'm confused, then.

She sounds totally different from that (and is claiming to feed herself quite differently).

[coppertop]

I found the link on this page of the blog:

agirlcalledjack.com/category/life-food/

It's the food bank story in the right-hand column.

[MalenkyRusskyDrakonchik]

Thank you.

(I feel mean now if I've misjudged her, but honestly, that article did make me rage a bit.)

[coppertop]

I'm not defending the smuggery at all!

I'm just genuinely confused as to how she can be smugly telling everyone about how well she eats on £10 per week, yet is quoted elsewhere as saying how she relied on food banks because it wasn't enough.

It makes no sense to me.

[BlackeyedSusan]

I feed a family for a week on a chicken. protein is supplemented with beans and pulses.

she also uses the value stuff from supermarkets. things a year ago were that price. I think they may have gone up a bit since, can't sy i have looked recently.