Too poor to eat properly

Maybe I misunderstood Nonnie I do not disagree with the concept of mixed housing. In fact where I live is pretty much like that!

But PECS that was part of my post, I gave my opinion about what I thought was right, I didn't say that is what had happened. I still believe it is better to mix different types of household rather than separating them into home owners and social housing. How else can people understand others who have different lives?

Yes but the money has not gone into social housing, Nonnie!

newnanny I can understand how you must feel about the judgmental attitude. I am not, and never have been, a LL but I am sure they are not all wicked. I find most people on gn are fair minded and reasonable but there are the odd few who seem quite blinkered.

PECS the reason I asked the question was because the last line of my post was "So I'm not against selling off the houses, just think the money should go back into housing for those who need it." That is why I didn't understand. Perhaps you didn't get to the end of my post?

Grandma2213, is there still a school that allows crisps and choc bars in the lunch box?

I have really started to think about food a lot lately as I frequently have to feed DGC (3 or 4 or more days a week) and always try to provide a balanced meal. When they were babies I blended what we were eating and stored it in mini cartons in the freezer, chicken, pork, beef, fish with vegetables and potatoes, rice or pasta. As they got older I chopped to make them more chunky. Friends of their parents were envious and commented on how good they tasted compared to tins or jars of baby food. I never added salt (or sugar) by the way. It also probably saved them a fortune too!

I believed that as they were fed this diet from an early age they would continue to prefer it. How wrong was I? When they are at home with mum they have fast food or take-aways, pizza, doughballs, tinned soup or pasta being common. School lunches consist of crisps, sausage roll, choc bars etc.

Now when they are with me I struggle with waste. One doesn't like potatoes or any vegetables, one won't eat meat (too chewy even though I pull it or chop it), has gone off cottage pie, bolognese, fish, etc etc . Very little fruit apart from grapes or strawberries (not for DGS yuck!) So far they will all eat sausages though only the blandest ones and bacon butties laden with ketchup. However a MacDonald's or KFC is wolfed down and pepperami pizzas get eaten (not a home made one though)

To be fair, the youngest (age 6) still eats most things including veg, salad and fruit She loves cucumbers and peppers but can't take to tomatoes despite trying several times. She is also the healthiest!!!! Mind you I am dreading when she too turns....

They have all cooked with me too, which is often advised to gain their interest in food, and though I consider myself well educated in the provision of good food for children this has me beaten!! I get so frustrated scraping plates into the bin and being the wicked grandmother saying no to sweets or puddings because they are clearly not really hungry!

My mother had taught me all about boiling vegetables and stewing meat, but nothing fancy like roux sauce
I can make a roux sauce (it was one of the tasks my mother passed on to me) but rice is another matter entirely - so I buy the boil in the bag which is not a cheap option.

nonnie when I have face to face conversations with friends we ask each other questions about what each other have said! Why would I have a 'problem' with your post?? I was genuinely asking you the question ..if social housing has been sold off and not replaced, private LL are not always keen on social housing tenants , so where will poorer folk live?

My mum was a single mother in the 50’s-60’s, there were no benefits to speak of and she drank and smoked, got my clothes (my sisters were older, not sure if they were the same) from the local WRVS branch. We had no indoor toilet, no heating apart from the coal fire (old man living next door would throw a few pieces of his coal delivery over our wall to help us out), but we always had at least one good hearty meal a day. She would send me to the butchers for ‘bones for the dog’ as they were free. We didn’t have a phone and our tv was a rental. You fed money into the back of it, no money, no tv. I remember sitting in candlelight because we had no money to put in the electric meter.

I am not saying folk should go back to living like this, but I do sometimes wonder if their priorities are all wrong nowadays. A roof over your head was always number 1, then food, anything else was a bonus. And strangely enough, most of my childhood memories are of happy times, playing out with my pals all day.

But believe me, life was very, very hard back then!

Its just as disappointing for me to find that some people think I'm lazy, with a drink or drug problem and unable to work out for myself how to budget.

I am a private LL and I am disappointed that so many seem to assume all private LL are terrible people. We have been invited to the weddings of three of our tenants. One tenant has stayed with us for 8 years and 2 others for 6 years. We attend to all issues quickly and fairly and I always say I would not expect a tenant to live in a house I would not like to live in myself. We don't advertise as always have a waiting list and remain on good terms with ex tenants who have moved on. We only put rent up every second or third year. Not all LL are monsters just as not all tenants are all good or all bad.

Its a lovely idea.
I suppose its all the rigmarole of safeguarding and so on.

My sister has a huge garden but as she has got older and her dh has arthritis it no longer gets planted and harvested. She offered a large family on benefits if they would like to use her garden as she knew they were waiting for an allotment and now they plant and grow, have fresh veg season round and give some to my dsis. She feels better as it is a lot tidier to look out at them too. More people who do not use their gardens might offer it for others to use. The council should keep a list.

Re M0nica's point above - I was once at a meeting where there were women from 'comfortable' backgrounds.
2 young women behind me were chatting and one said "I can't make a cake for this weekend because my machine's broken".
And I'm hopeless at pastry too.

Talking of pastry, fresh from cookery class at school, and proud of my superlight shortcrust, I offered to make my family an apple pie. Waiting for the verdict, as my mother struggled to formulate the right words "It would have been nicer if I could have picked it up" - I had made it so short and light that it crumbled when you touched it! :D

PECS why did you ask me that question? I.Don't understand. If there is something you disagree with in my post please say so.

Never had a problem cooking rice. It is pastry that defeats me.

One of my employers sent us on a beginners course on using a computer, years ago.
The trainer was rather put out that a few of us had no idea what she meant when she said
"double click" and "icon" and so on, because it was assumed we knew what that meant.
Of course, all the people who had computers already at home were quite scathing, but, well, we didn't know anything about computers.

Monica, actually rice is a bit of an art that not everyone has the touch for however many years they try

Not understanding a recipe doesn't mean you're thick. "fry the onion in a little oil" doesn't mean anything to someone who has never seen anyone frying or learnt how previously. "Stir the sauce till it thickens" - how thick? I remember my friend showing me how to make roux sauce as young housewives. My mother had taught me all about boiling vegetables and stewing meat, but nothing fancy like roux sauce. But I needed to make something with roux sauce and I remember her saying "stir it on a low heat till it goes sort of different" there is no way I would have dared try that without being shown! And recipes don't tell you how to par-boil potatoes, they just tell you to do it.

Spot on lily

One person in a lift? It must be true then.

Ah thanks for clarifying, M0nica. Could you give me a hand down from this high horse, please?

MissAdventure I quite deliberately did not describe this phenomena as being a problem of poor people. That is the interpretation you have chosen to put on it.

I did not do so, because this problem exists throughout society. Many people, at all levels of income, are now so divorced from the process of cooking that they would be unable to use a recipe book.

I have no idea what the income of the women in the lift with me was, but the lift was in an office block and the women were returning to their desks after their lunch break, but the conversation gave me no reason to think they lived in poverty.