Cheapo Meals: Tinned Tomatoes on Toast

March 14, 2023 Eleanor Scott

Half a can of tomatoes on toast, with seasoning (salt and black pepper) and a sprinkle of dried mixed herbs, that could cost as little as 20p - good news for students and fieldwork cooks

The 16th century acquisition of the versatile tomato from Mesoamerica influenced the culinary direction of travel in the Mediterranean world, wider Europe and Asia, once collectors and traders learned the full value this exotic plant. Tomatoes remain inexpensive and versatile - and tinned (canned) tomatoes on toast is a very cheap meal indeed. If you need or want to eat healthily for pennies not pounds, read on.

Are 30p Meals Really Possible, Including Hidden Costs? No, Not Really

November 14, 2022 Eleanor Scott

Mmmmm. Assorted cheap ingredients that parliamentarians don’t eat. Students and fieldwork volunteers might though. I ate them so you don’t have to. Although you probably do have to, because we’re all broke now.

Food is political. ‘Lee’s 30p meals’ still occasionally trends on Twitter. Sometimes it’s ‘Lee’s 10p meals’. Lee Anderson - quite a big fella himself - is the daftie Conservative MP who decided that the British people could live on meals that cost just 30 pennies per person. Apparently he saw it done at a food bank kitchen - completely ignoring the facts of food donations, the massive aconomies of scale and the energy costs - and now he has visions of the impoverished doing the same. Student or budget setter, cook or parent, this is the new narrative of aspiration. Trouble is, ‘30p Lee’ is an idiot.

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