Gingernutbizkit's quest to find a menu plan that eases her conscience!!

Hippygirl

Congratulations on your new family! Lots of hard work, but lots of fun too!

Have you tried the Co-op? They have a good range of Fairtrade products http://www.co-operative.coop/food/ethics/Ethical-trading/Fairtrade/Our-fairtrade-products/

thriftlady_2

Hi Gingernutbizkit You could do worse than adopt a wartime style diet. Cheap, home-produced, local wherever possible, restricted fat, sugar and meat.

Or a traditional Scots diet -wholemeal bread, oats, barley (v cheap), homegrown veg and fruit, oily fish (cheap, healthy and sustainable), meat occasionally, dried peas and beans and whole dairy (kids need whole milk imo), and hardly any refined carbs or sugar.

wogglemaker

Elsien, their free range chooks are really tasty, and much cheaper than Mr T's organic.

But last week I had the fantastic find of 2 organic free range chickens reduced to less than half price in Tesco . One of them has worked out at sunday roast for 3, evening meal for 6 and 3L of soup portioned off in the freezer

gingernutbizkit

liz545 wrote: »

This is quite handy: http://www.lovefoodhatewaste.com/perfect_portions

Thank you. For f+v I followed this website to the NHS 5 a day website. They make portion sizes really simple. 80g for fresh, frozen or canned (drained) and 30g for dried fruit.

Now need to work out portions for other stuff.... will report back.

ging x

gingernutbizkit

Fire_Fox wrote: »

Health is my thing. The more I learn the more I am convinced that a huge proportion of diagnosed conditions are caused by lifestyle!

If any of the children are over or under weight it would be wise to get professional guidance on how to manage this, I am not qualified to give specific advice in this area and of course I don't know the children. I also don't recommend vitamin and mineral supplements, again unless these have been recommended by a health professional.

http://www.nhs.uk/livewell/5aday/pages/5adayhome.aspx/
http://www.lovefoodhatewaste.com/perfect_portions
http://www.healthedtrust.com/pages/guidelines.htm

Not so keen on the source, but the article is interesting and it refers to published research:
http://www.thedietchannel.com/Diet-and-ADHD.htm
Better source, but more emotive:
http://people.csail.mit.edu/seneff/adhd_low_fat_diet.html

Thanks Firefox... some interesting stuff. I totally agree with you about lifestyle choices affected health conditionas (or even causing some). The boys came to us seriously underweight but have steadily put on and are now just inside the healthy ranges

Hippygirl wrote: »

Congratulations on your new family! Lots of hard work, but lots of fun too!

Have you tried the Co-op? They have a good range of Fairtrade products http://www.co-operative.coop/food/ethics/Ethical-trading/Fairtrade/Our-fairtrade-products/

Thank you. Our local cornershop is a Co-Op. Usually only go there for emergencies but think I should check them out more regularly.

The good news about the five a day is that I think we are actually eating more than I thought we were .

Anyway, I'm off to bed now.
Night all, Ging x

ALIBOBSY

Its a very difficult area really. To be honest all the big supermarkets are unethical to some degree. For example not one pay enough per L for milk for dairy farmers to even break even (coop used to be the worst despite their so called ethics-(not sure now). Plus much of the pulses and green beans etc we buy comes from abroad-some grown on land in countries where people are starving, but the land is used to feed us instead of them.

In my ideal we would have a small holding and be self sufficent, but that is not on the cards at the mo lol.
We are growing more and more each year, and intend to do much more foraging next autumn.
I would definately look around for any local suppliers you can but direct from. We have good local farms we can get fruit and veg as well as meat, eggs cheese etc. The vast majority of which is grown/produced locally. The meat is either free range or certainly higher welfare. One farm will actually allow you to take the kids to see the animals and are happy to discuss exactly how/when where there meat comes from how it is produced.

I am suprised how much better the quality is than the supermarkets for all produce, the food is tastier and either the same or just slightly more in cost, although some things such as FR chicken is cheaper than the supermarket. Overall the value for money is far superior to the SM's as well.

ali x

gingernutbizkit

Morning folks,

Thanks AliB for your response. I too would love to have a small holding and be self sufficient but that is just not a reality for me .

I have been looking at local suppliers and have discovered the following:

1) There is a small farmers market in our local town the first friday of every month.
2) Abel and Cole seem to do everything but are a lot more expensive than we are used to.
3) There is a local farm that does f+v box delivery plus some extras but there website is very poor and confusing.
4) There is a WI sale every friday in our local village hall. I make all my own cakes, biscuits etc but thought it might be good for jams, chutneys etc
5) Our local butcher is expensive but with good quality produce.
6) Our local small CoOp does stock some of its fairtrade stuff.

I think the priority at the moment is to use up what we have in the house because I don't think it's ethic now that I have bought it to throw it away. I tried talking to Mrs Ging yesterday but she balked at the idea of eating less meat. I probably should have gone in with a suggestion that we go veggie and then negotiated to eating less meat in our diet :rotfl:. I think over the last year or so I have got good at making a little meat go further so I think that could bring the cost down. WOnder if I can do it without her knowing.

i have a further cunning plan. We both have a day off today so i will be taking her out for breakie to a cafe that only cooks organic local produce. It has a small farm shop atached so i will buy us something for tea tonight. Hopefully there will be a noticable difference in taste and we can talk further. I know that she agrees with me ethically she just focused on uspay off our debts now so that she can retire early and we can have the kind of life we wish to.

Catch you later, Ging x

Valli

Morning Ging!

If you have a Lidl near you next week's (Mon) promo is gardening and they have a nifty looking polycarbonate cold frame for £22.99 (among loads of other stuff) - so useful for growing lettuce etc in over the summer as it will help reduce creepies...BUT I haven't got round to price comparing yet...

Just a thought I make my kids HM rice pudding (a lot - at least once a week) which is easy and cheap (50g pudding rice 25g caster sugar 1 pint milk 2 hours GM3). Can be served with fruit (fresh/tinned) cheap, filling and calcium for DD's bones (and DS's but girls bones are more of an issue I believe). I used to make semolina but it REALLY attracts flipping weevils! So I find it hard to store...
Another thing my kids love is my HM fish pie which can be used to stretch scraps of fish or be made luxurious with the addition of prawns. I semi-cheat ansd make the sauce in the micro but finish it off in the oven. To the fish/sauce I add peas and sweetcorn, too. Sometimes I make two and freeze one...

ALIBOBSY

Nice idea about the meal Ging. I have been suprised myself at how much more satisfying and filling less of a better quality meat is (as well as being tastier). I am less hung up on organic VS normal production and more interested in kmowing how and where the produce comes from, and in the case of meat how it is treated.

We are lucky our local farm has award winning beef, which is rarer breeds and slow grown (no growth hormones etc), but because there are so many hoops to jump through to be certified organic and the fact they do as a least resort use less organic alternatives for vetenary treatment if required they aren't classed as organic. But for me I can talk to the farmers themselves, see how the animals are raised and know it suits my ideals.

The Veg farm shop also are keen to avoid over use of non organic methods, but again are in a simular situation. Because these are small scale producers I suppose they are in a position where satisfying all the criteria needed is probably not economically viable, plus in a semi rural area like this I don't think the demand is as high for what many see as a premium product which doesn't justify the cost.

There stance is simular to how I grow my own stuff at home. I try to be as organic as possible, but if I have to will resort to other methods.

I worry that the "organic" label in supermarkets is used purely to justify a higher price, they have very high levels of waste particularly for veg and there have been cases where the push of suppliers by the big guys on price has led to less ethical products being "rebranded". Plus organic does not always mean well looked after in the case of animals.

Whew all in all a minefield lol. Cut flowers are the same, 80-90% of those sold over here are imported, some from thrid world countries where land that should grow food for locals is used instead to grow cheap roses for valentines for us etc etc.

I love to stick flowers in and amongst my veggies, encourages the pollinators, and look fab in the house. Cornflowers, sweetpeas, etc actually grow better when you cut them .

Re the meat issue, my OH was a total meat fan, but I have gradually weaned him off. Little steps that help are cooking dishes in sauces when veggies can be either hidden or piled in to pad out smaller portions of meat. Tomatoy pasta sauces are great for this as well as chillis. My sister makes a gorge veggie chilli that she served to a group of meat eaters recently and non cottoned on. Would she go for a swap from meat to fish? I find you can get away with less fish than you might need of meat?

DEfinately try better quality sausages, I can't eat the cheapy ones now, they make me gag, would rather serve 2 good sausages each than 3 or 4 cheapy ones. Plenty of mash or veggies makes up for it. Snag casserole is a fav with mash in our house, and again you can get away with less meat-cut up the sauasages in to lumps and add loads of veg.

good luck

ali x

BTW definately use up what is in the house, it would be a crime to waste it, and in alot of ways it is easier to gradually move across to better products. But don't feel too guilty, my kids still want the odd bowl of angel delight, or a packet of biscuits rather than just the homemade stuff, and yes on occasion we get a "gulp" takeaway. Or if at the wrong end of the month the money is really tight, its better to eat something rather than be ethical and starve. I always think if people just swapped say half of their chickens they eat for FR overall it would reduce the number grown in broiler conditions and increas FR production. Eventually this would start to bring FR costs down and so on. Small steps or as a certain chinese leader said "every great journey starts with one step"-or something simular lol.

mumto1_2

if I can butt in... look on https://www.riverford.co.uk for a box scheme. Their Veg boxes are about 15 - 20% cheaper than buying from the SM. Locally grown veg, which Abel + Cole aren't IIRC, and they offer, wine, juice, cider, chocolate, flour, meat, milk, cheese, bread etc as well.