Tea & Toast Syndrome is dangerous

Now I am on my own I eat less healthily. Some weeks I am supplied with delicious home cooked food by my son or son in law, usually too much, so I might turn the leftovers into soup or freeze a portion. It might mean I end up with food in the fridge, especially vegetables, going to waste as the meals arrive unexpectedly.
Currently my ability to cook is limited, so I am not eating a full range of healthy foods. Sometimes tea and toast with Marmite is just what I need.

RosiesMaw Mon 30-Oct-23 08:26:55

Good post, I couldn't agree more!

And M0nica too


Enjoying tea, toast, butter and jam/marmalade doesn't mean we've given up on eating. If someone is unable to cook for themselves or just can't be bothered, there are many ready meals available, both in the supermarkets and firms which deliver them to the door.

However, even if the food is there, the appetite for it might diminish as people age, have medical problems or simply cannot exercise as they used to.

Norah this is very true, I've seen it happen several times
I also believe that many people slow down and shut down as they pass - less food being part to that. ☹

I love food (when I’m not anxious - anxiety just wipes away my appetite) but I hate ‘cooking’. Can’t be arsed to follow a recipe after 50+ years of kitchen creativity. Ahem. I used to enjoy it more when I was younger - made my own pastry, baked it blind, added salmon, cheese, egg etc to make quiche and then chopped up a green salad to go with. No more!

If I fancy quiche, I buy one. Okay ‘ready meals’ can get the no-no of horrors but 2 or 3 such meals in a whole week is fine I think.

My 91y old stepfather cooks as I do now. My mum died 5y ago and like many of you on here, used to have a chicken carcass gently simmering on the hob with pearl barley, onion etc. Delicious but sadly such gourmet treats if one isn’t interested are just too much - effort, enthusiasm, time.

He (and I here) pop a chicken thigh or two in the oven, buttered and herbed. Forget it for 45 mins and voila! Open a tub of cheese coleslaw. And a bottle of wine ... 😁

Or a baked potato in the oven (or start off in microwave if conscious of cost of oven use) and, after 45 mins, slide a pork chop alongside for another 45mins.

Delicious easy meals. No effort. No pans of boiling water for weak muscles in arms. No recipes to faff with. No chopping boards needing standing up for ages. Just open the oven door, push in the food, close the oven door and eat something delicious in under an hour.

It works well for my dear stepfather who is pretty amazing. He did sausages the other day, sliced an onion over them and a spoonful of olive oil. He’s getting good at this he says! Eating for one can’t be easy but it can be done.

henetha

This surprises me. I go to great lengths to avoid salt as I thought it was bad for older people. I never add it to anything.
But I do eat fairly well 3/4 days of the week, when I have the energy. I didn't realise that lack of salt is bad.
I do feel weak and get bad cramp etc. So I will now increase my salt intake a little.
Don't we learn useful things from GN. Thank you for raising this subject.

I avoid foods high in salt as I was advised to, as I have a heart condition. I have porridge and blueberries or sugar free muesli with Oatly milk for breakfast with lemon tea. Just had a GP annual checkup and was told I was “fine”.

I can't see me ever living on tea and toast as I don't drink tea and can't remember the last time I ate toast, unless it had at least cheese and beans on it and tbh that was a while ago.

If cheese or eggs are tolerable (we don't) it seems to me breakfast could be easily sorted = cheese toast, egg salad toast, scramble egg cheese toast. Even my brother managed scrambled eggs for 40 years as a bachelor.

Add bacon or sausage to eggs and cheese and you're easily eating real food . Make loaves of bread, freeze in slices - voila!

I also believe that many people slow down and shut down as they pass - less food being part to that. Mum and Dad both did. I detest eating, without a partner I'd starve for lack of effort.

This surprises me. I go to great lengths to avoid salt as I thought it was bad for older people. I never add it to anything.
But I do eat fairly well 3/4 days of the week, when I have the energy. I didn't realise that lack of salt is bad.
I do feel weak and get bad cramp etc. So I will now increase my salt intake a little.
Don't we learn useful things from GN. Thank you for raising this subject.

merlotgran

I remember Joanna Lumley saying that when she was a struggling actress she was so poor she lived on toast and marmite.

I don’t think it did her any harm! 😂

Just recently, following a very nasty and lingering viral infection, I’ve had a positive craving for marmite on toast. Can’t get enough of it at the moment.

We alternate breakfast. One day it’s porridge with fruit and the next it’s multigrain toast with Roses’s Lemon and Lime marmalade which is delish. Sometimes I make Overnight Oats with raspberries and 0% fat Greek yoghurt. That is gorgeous.
About once a month we go out for a traditional cooked breakfast.

I never got rid of my family sized freezer , now it’s stocked with frozen soups and stews / casseroles from batch cooking in one portion containers ,
Frozen packs of vegetables are great for no waste , I just cook enough for a meal .
Bread is home made in my breadmaker and sliced , frozen in two slice bags ready for the toaster
I have porridge for breakfast with a dollop of Greek yogurt,
But I’m still overweight, in spite of portion control and healthy choices

Sensible posts from Maw and Monica and I second the request for small quantity packages from supermarkets - I often don’t buy vegetables because I know I can’t use them up and I loathe throwing food away. And there is a limit to how much soup appeals even as a means of using things up. I do suspect I am not eating enough protein, though, and will try harder - I think I am subconsciously avoiding washing up saucepans, which is ridiculous.

Any restricted diet will be a problem, we need all the food groups to stay healthy, adding medication into the mix doesn’t help.

I hate cooking, but love eating so very little chance of me being under nourished
But a good tip for those not so food orientated

Franbern

RosieMaw Great Post. As I have got older, I have found that Doctors reach fr their prescription pads far too quickly. With just that ten minutes they are allowed for a patient, they have no chance to look at anyone holistically. I am convinced that much medication is to stave off effects of other prescription medication.

This.

Basically, what we are offered is simply treatment for symptoms.

Unless it's glaringly obvious, the cause of the symptoms are never investigated.

Which is why there are too many reports of cancer being 'overlooked' until it's too late. Although, I have no idea of the numbers of people who are affected.

If you have pain, or a fever, or any other of the myriad symptoms of disease - it's because something's 'gone wrong' and taking an analgesic for the pain, or fever, will simply cause problems further down the line.

Kudos to those doctors who do investigate... requesting scans, blood tests, etc, to determine the cause of your symptoms.

... as mine did - 12 years ago. She pushed and pushed for blood tests, more blood tests, and a colonoscopy... which revealed a bowel tumour, which she suspected. I am here today because of her diligence.

It is reckoned that one in ten people over 60 suffers from malnutritionnor is in danger of it.

As Rosiesmaw says the reasons are more likely to be loss of appetite, disability, medical condtions that cause the first two causes and dementia than simply not bothering once they only have themselves to cater for.

I do think many more single peoepl, not just elderly, would eat better if fresh foods were available in smaller quantities.

In the summer superdrug always has an area of their shelves with small travel sized packs of almost any toiletrry you could want to take on holiday. Couldn't supermarkets have sections in the fruit and veg area, meat and cheese sections for small packets of food suitable for one or two portions.

RosieMaw Great Post. As I have got older, I have found that Doctors reach fr their prescription pads far too quickly. With just that ten minutes they are allowed for a patient, they have no chance to look at anyone holistically. I am convinced that much medication is to stave off effects of other prescription medication.

I remember Joanna Lumley saying that when she was a struggling actress she was so poor she lived on toast and marmite.

I don’t think it did her any harm! 😂

With all due respect OP I think this sort of article is unnecessarily alarmist.
There are many reasons very old people eat less and probably less healthily- loss of appetite being often the main one, also ill-fitting (or missing) teeth, loneliness , inability to stand for any length of time to cook, difficulties with arthritic hands, inability to carry or deal with hot pots and pans safely. I’m sure many of us can think of more.
My father died at 88 and in his latter years after Mum died, liked only a sandwich for tea which his carer prepared and left after one of her visits. He might have had a hot meal at lunch time but ate very slowly and often left half of it. He had lost the joy of eating - although on an occasional lunch out “OAP size” fish and chips was acceptable. He more or less sat in his chair all day, reading, or watching tv but was neither overweight nor skeletal. Just winding down.
The symptoms you describe were almost certainly due to your low sodium levels because of medication or personal physical state. Not tea and toast.
Nowt wrong with tea and if anybody chooses to start their day with toast and butter (not that disgusting low fat spread stuff) good luck to them.
A sensitive digestion may mean toast is easiest to cope with, with or without cheese/eggs/marmalade/peanut butter/honey or whatever anybody fancies and these preachy articles putting the wind up us are unwelcome and unnecessary.
I am a bit tired of the “healthy eating” lobby especially as they can never make up their minds and each new fad out shouts the last plus is more often than not the result of (potentially harmful) processing and additives .
Low fat!! Low carb! Low sugar! Low alcohol !Low sodium seasoning! No more than 3 eggs a week! No whole milk!
Then there’s Dairy free cheese? Plant based sausages?
The list goes on and the so-called healthy eating experts tend to as well.

I’d like to read that article if you could post the link javkiehill56, I’m definitely a toast and no protein culprit for breakfast, I never feel like anything more. I have coffee but I’m sure it’s no better than tea.

I only came across this because I was doing some research and looked at some medical website. It's not the toast that's to blame, it's our habit of only having tea and toast. The article said that it occurs in older people who usually make do with this to start the day, and are on medications of one kind or another.
I'm not giving up my tea and toast, I'm just adding maybe a scrambled or boiled egg first. High protein yoghurts maybe. and things like that.
I posted this just to make everyone aware that we need to pay more attention to what we eat.

Australian raisin bread is the best! There's nothing quite like it here in the UK.
Yes, Callistemon I’ve just had a visit to family there and we had to stop off at a McD for raisin bread. A novelty to me as the butter pat in the bag had melted and I got myself in a bit of a mess. Tasty snack though!

My friend ended up in hospital with low potassium levels, because she was taking more than the recommended dose of over the counter stomach medicine,

After being on Omneprozole for years, needed because of problems caused by my medications, I had to change to Lanprozole a couple of years ago.
My bloods last week showed my sodium levels were fine, despite on having tea and toast for breakfast. I can't face anything else first thing in the morning, so will be sticking to that regime.

Not sure if toast causes drop in sodium as it has quite a bit of salt.
Think the meds are the problem here.

That's interesting, I have taken Omeprazole for over 20 years, they didn't mention it at the hospital at all. I am back there this morning to check if my levels are good, and I will certainly ask the question. They are blaming it on a combination of blood pressure medication. Thanks for pointing this out, what do you take instead of Omeprazole?

And blackcurrant jelly, even tastier!!