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Tesco

timH said:
I’m not sure about food being expensive elsewhere. I’m in France at the moment and you can get a fresh massive lettuce for the equivalent of £1.20 which lasts for days and a store baked standard baguette is just 65p. Even bacon (lard fumee) from the local butcher is so much better. Maybe a bit more per kilo but once cooked it stays the same size and doesnt shed twice its weight in water. There does seem a lot of things at home we get ripped off on. Celery may be cheap but its so stringy and pale with no flavour. Hence people end up eating Ultra Processed Food with manufactured flavour and full of stuff that’s no good for you. It’s much easier to “eat the rainbow” here in France and at the local restaurant you can get a three course menu plus coffee for £15 a head. I live in Jeremy Hunt's constituency where fish and chips in a pub is approaching £20 and the chips are frozen and the "pea puree" has no flavour. Quel domage as they say
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You can get the tastier stuff in the UK too. People eat fast food because it's quick and easy and because they don't care about what they eat. I too have lived in France, there's a food culture that means that a resto offering frozen fish and chips for £20 would go out of business. The UK? Good enough.
 
timH said:
I’m not sure about food being expensive elsewhere. I’m in France at the moment and you can get a fresh massive lettuce for the equivalent of £1.20 which lasts for days and a store baked standard baguette is just 65p. Even bacon (lard fumee) from the local butcher is so much better. Maybe a bit more per kilo but once cooked it stays the same size and doesnt shed twice its weight in water. There does seem a lot of things at home we get ripped off on. Celery may be cheap but its so stringy and pale with no flavour. Hence people end up eating Ultra Processed Food with manufactured flavour and full of stuff that’s no good for you. It’s much easier to “eat the rainbow” here in France and at the local restaurant you can get a three course menu plus coffee for £15 a head. I live in Jeremy Hunt's constituency where fish and chips in a pub is approaching £20 and the chips are frozen and the "pea puree" has no flavour. Quel domage as they say
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You can get the tastier stuff in the UK too. People eat fast food because it's quick and easy and because they don't care about what they eat. I too have lived in France, there's a food culture that means that a resto offering frozen fish and chips for £20 would go out of business. The UK? Good enough.
 
stevec67 said:
You can get the tastier stuff in the UK too. People eat fast food because it's quick and easy and because they don't care about what they eat. I too have lived in France, there's a food culture that means that a resto offering frozen fish and chips for £20 would go out of business. The UK? Good enough.
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Very true. That restaurant like many others has a salad bar for starters plus a choice of three mains - two meat based and one fish (no veggie obviously) Thats how they keep it so cheap and good. I was telling a uk colleague this and she immediately turned her nose up. I didnt bother saying I’d rather have three good choices than twenty crap ones.
 
Mick P said:
If you take the trouble to drive to an out of town centre shop, everything is cheap.

If you take a walk down to a small shop, you can expect small shop prices.

It's your choice.

Is that so difficult to understand or is it a case of moaning for the sake of it.
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Sound advice as ever Mick. I’ll pass it on to me sainted 84 year year old ma, who doesn’t drive, can barely walk, and who depends on the small co-op across the road to spunk her pension on a loaf and packets of PG Tips.
 
Finnegan said:
Sound advice as ever Mick. I’ll pass it on to me sainted 84 year year old ma, who doesn’t drive, can barely walk, and who depends on the small co-op across the road to spunk her pension on a loaf and packets of PG Tips.
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Now now now - Tescos are in a competitive market and nearly went out of business some years ago. They are up today and down tomorrow and right now are being duffed up by Lidl and Aldi.

If it is any comfort, although your dear old Ma is paying more for her loaf and tea she does not have to worry about the cost of running a car to drive herself out to the out of town centres. She's playing a good system.
 
Minio said:
Back in the eighties we had proper convenience stores with a grocer man in a brown dust coat.

I could run across the road, get milk for my tea and get back before the kettle bolied.

And pick up the odd carrot for my dinner.
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I have 3 supermarkets less than a 5 minute walk away. I mostly shop daily.
 
Finnegan said:
Sound advice as ever Mick. I’ll pass it on to me sainted 84 year year old ma, who doesn’t drive, can barely walk, and who depends on the small co-op across the road to spunk her pension on a loaf and packets of PG Tips.
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If only it was possible to use online ordering.
 
Finnegan said:
Sound advice as ever Mick. I’ll pass it on to me sainted 84 year year old ma, who doesn’t drive, can barely walk, and who depends on the small co-op across the road to spunk her pension on a loaf and packets of PG Tips.
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That's the thing with these Hell's Grannies. Whenever they get their pension they just go right out and spend it. Milk, tea, a tin of meat for the cat. They just don't care.
 
When in Spain I tend to shop in Mercedona which is the best supermarket chain by far and also the local Spar for a top up.

The food tends to be sourced locally (I am in Andalucia the main fruit and veg farming area) and it is fresher, more tasty and about 20% cheaper than the stuff sold in the UK. They also tend not to import out of season stuff whereas we eat stuff like crappy blackberries imported from South America in December.

I would guess that bringing food across the channel doesn't help and to be frank, unless you buy from a farm shop, you are buying second class in the UK.
 
Finnegan said:
It’s about all she can do to figure out how to use her tv remote.
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Have to get my OH controlling a Firestick this weekend, all part of the plan to keep her as up to date as poss. Otherwise by the time i die i suspect she'll know every episode of Judge Judy from memory.
 
stevec67 said:
You can get the tastier stuff in the UK too. People eat fast food because it's quick and easy and because they don't care about what they eat. I too have lived in France, there's a food culture that means that a resto offering frozen fish and chips for £20 would go out of business. The UK? Good enough.
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That's maybe a slightly optimistic view of restaurants in France these days. The kitchens in many places, especially lower and mid-range ones in high traffic areas, are primarily assembly operations using sous-vide or frozen ready-made components.
 
I quite like Tesco, and their business model is very clever. Here In SW Scotland we have an Aldi, a Lidl and 2 Tesco (+ various smaller). Either Aldi or Lidl are far cheaper, but the quality is not clear cut. Tesco 'finest' are very good indeed, but Lidl 'deluxe' even better. Basic stuff is roughly Aldi then Lidl then Tesco so we just shop at all 3 depending on what we want but
before Covid, out weekly shop averaged out around £60. Now it's over £100.
Really must ease off the navy rum:)
 
Tesco is very clever, their HQ is down the road from us, they keep head hunting my best data scientists, like Ocado who kept stealing my roboticists - also stealing engineers from the company my wife works for.....
 
garyi said:
They have 5 types of mayonnaise all of them hellmans etc.
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I was holidaying in TRNC (the Turkish north of Cyprus) a few years ago. It amused me that in the supermarkets "Hellmans Real Mayonnaise" was censored with the "Real" word blacked out.
 
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