Can you be OS with costly principles?

sunflower76

We used to spend around £80 per week on groceries. We ate tinned stuff, frozen stuff and lots of packets and jars. Deep down I knew that this wasn't good for us and I taught myself how to cook 'real' food.

I like to think that if I can't use an ingredient of a jar or packet in regular day to day cooking, then we don't eat it, but I know that we sometimes fall off the wagon and eat takeaways or go out for a meal where they probably use E numbers and additives and who knows what; but on the whole we eat mainly good stuff. I do find it difficult when MrS demands a ready made pasty or pie or some other concoction as he cares less about what we eat as long as it tastes good!

Personally, I'd rather go for locally produced produce than organic, although our local veg box is organic so we get the best of both worlds. I spend around £23 a week on the fruit, veg and salad and 4 pints of organic milk. Although this may seem a lot it saves me from popping to the local shops and supermarkets to top up my groceries. It also means that the fruit and veg we eat are seasonal - I can now do 501 things with a squash or pumpkin! I do have an allotment but this isn't terribly productive at the moment.

I then spend around £15 a week on meat, eggs and cheese from the butchers; this isn't organic but is good quality and isn't intensively reared. My eggs are free range. I'm not keen on pork from anywhere that I've bought it so I'm looking to try a local pork farm in the next few weeks to see if it is a better flavour and quality. I suspect this will push up my food costs slightly.

The rest of my groceries come once a month from Asda, some are organic and some aren't; it depends on how important I feel that it is to the product and whether the costs for the organic version are excessive. And there's the tatse factor - MrS will only eat regular Heinz beans for example and it isn't worth an arguement! On the whole the products I buy are ingredients rather than meals so I can be more selective about what we eat. Our bread is home made so I can be sure of what's in it.

I tend not to talk about what we eat and why as I find that out in the real world I am shouted down for being holier than thou and I've even been called stuck up for the things we eat. At the end of the day it's a personal choice that we make and we all try to do the best for our family.

I'm lucky that I don't have a budget as such for groceries but I think my numbers above show that I now spend slightly less for much better quality of food. If you compare this with the time I now have to spend cooking I guess it works out a lot more expensive but I do enjoy it and love that I can open the fridge and create something from what appears to be nothing!

For what it's worth I find that we seldom get ill, rarely have tummy upsets and can maintain a healthy weight (despite liking our :beer: ) and I think that it is in part to the diet that we have.

maltesers_2

The danger with gm is even if its limited to few feilds it can contaminate surrounding areas and seep into ground and water supply.

The danger with gm food is that thanks to the USA it is now in up to 75% of processed foods and meat in the UK. The soy and corn/maize products are endlessly incorporated into food and all intensely reared meat are fed on them.

Here is one list of suspect products
http://www.seedsofdeception.com/Public/BuyingNon-GMO/index.cfm

The guaranteed gm free products containing soy are not much better ethically speaking

Areas the size of Belgium in the Brazilian rainforest are being cleared annually by illegal loggers. The logged land is then used to plant non-GM soy beans. The Brazilians are making huge profits from this illegal activity by tapping into the public demand for GM free foods. http://www.looking-glass.co.uk/news/library2003/2003-10-soya-rainforest.htm

Soy products are a new introduction to our diet only used for last 50 years but used more and more all the time. Soy products used in the east were invariably fermented which removes toxins. So it would be very OS not to use any soy products.

see Should we worry about soya in our food? http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2006/jul/25/food.foodanddrink

Twinks hobnobs are far superior especially to any ready made types containing the hidden gm products.

gailey_2

Am loving twinks hob nobs so is family so will keep doing them and plan to do more making as already make majority of meals from scratch.
The gm thing scares me as its so hard these days with so many food scares and stuff to avoid.
Sunflower you sound like you got it sussed and your family are very lucky, hubby now says redaymeals dont comapre to my homecooked its just when im not around hes lazy so need to start more batch cooking and freezing.

anniestar

Just a very quick post. I tend to buy Tesco value mushrooms. They come from Ireland. Checked again today hope that is of some use.

buxtonrabbitgreen

I don't think one can eat organic on a small bucget and I don't try. I always buy free range eggs at my veggie peta mamber son's insitence. But I buy the eggs from the local farm shop and they are much cheaper than the supermarket. The milk is also 30p cheaper than supermarket. It is not marked as organic but it comes from the same local farm as the eggs and cream.
I don't buy organic or free range meat except rarely when it is reduced. Though I have to say the difference in tast and texture of a free range chicken is immense.
I am more interested in buying fair trade and do.
Vegetables we grow some of our own and usually only buy what is in season.
Our farm shop has organic pork at the moment which I am considering buying. But it is about £70 for half a pig. Is that a reasonable price?

Caterina

This is an incredibly interesting debate, thank you all for making it possible!

Caterina

Nitha

I have found the cheapest way to eat organic veg is to use the box delivery system like river nene. I'm not sure about meat really, I think to be honest if you are worried you might be better off going meat free. Fish I would say your best bet is frozen (unless you're by the coast) as freezing is a natural preservative. Some people even recommend frozen veg over fresh for the same reason. Lidl do organic milk which is cheaper than tesco last time I checked, although I've never noticed a difference. The only person in my home drinking organic milk is my son and that's formula rather than cows milk as he's not yet 1.

gailey_2

I guess to sum up guys we all have different priciples that are important to us that we dont want to comprimise on

organic camp
free range
fair trade
shop locally and independanly helping smaller shops like grocers,butchers and local farms to get quality stuff at hopefully slightly cheaper prices.

Buxton in the words of sainsburys yes can taste the diffrence a corn fed free range bird is much tastier than a larger battery bird as I keep pointing out to OH. hes trained on eggs now.

Nitha when daughter was small I breatfed and then later mix fed and used hipp organic. when weaning I pureed organic veg like a phych as oftem found it reduced and pureed and froze far too much was bit phychotic really!
Then when she stopped breastfeeding at 13months we switched from hipp organic to organic whole milk however since shes past 2 and nearly 3 we have lapsed on organic particuarly milk as its so pricey but do ensure she gets quality meat and lots of fruit and veg I think I was more cautious as she was a baby and my 1st!
I just want to teach her were food comes from give her strong principls I have and ensure she has healthy nutritous diet but do feel organics beyond my reach on current budget but wont budge on eggs/meat each to their own I guess .

I think its quite inspiring people can keep to their priciples on tighter budget by comprimising and shopping around as it all makes a difference.

Debt_Free_Chick

Just an observation on chicken .... corn-fed chicken is not automatically free-range/organic. If it doesn't state free-range/organic, then it's intensively reared corn-fed chicken.

Just in case some of you think that corn-fed means your chook has had a nice life.

Penelope_Penguin

Hi there! We have an existing thread - Can OS be Ethical? I'll merge this one to it later

Penny. x