Ready Meals

[story]

OK so there is no real way of knowing what you are eating by reading the ingredients on the packet.

Surely home cooked food must suffer from the same sort of bullshit assuming we buy the ingredients for it from the supermarket?

Yes, if you're buying shit ingredients.

Like "jerk chicken seasoning" has all manner of garbage in it."

The idea is to buy wholefoods, as in Whole Foods, meaning foods that are entire, and as close as possible to the way they grew.

 

[story]

It might do - what about flour, say. Is that only flour, or flour with anti-caking agents - or flour with other agents they aren't obliged to tell us about?

So you buy good quality wholemeal flour.

 

[story]

But do you?

If you use something like tomato purree in your recipie, aren't you back to the whole salt, sugar, E number shit that you thought you were avoiding by doing it yourself?

Yes, if you buy that type of puree. There are good wholefood purees around too.

 

[story]

Flour has to be enriched with several vitamins before it's allowed to be sold

Even wholemeal flour?

I did not know that....

 

[story]

Well I don't honestly expect a decent reply but it's always worth a try! And I'm sad enough to find it fun

*subscribes to thread*

 

[og ogilby]

You said "How would it be better if I'd made it at home?"

I'm saying that it would be better if were made at home because home-made would be made by a person, while a ready-meal would (in all likelihood) be made in a series of machines.

I contend that food made a by a person has more... well, soul, or something than food made by a machine.

I suppose it could be argued that machine-made is best, but I'd disagree.

I think it was Bob Dylan who said "you should never eat anything that was prepared by someone who doesn't love you."

I wish Bob loved me and would come and cook me something decent while I wasted my life on my computer.

 

[story]

I know a woman who never cooks for someone unless she loves them. She says it never turns out well.

She is a very good cook

 

[og ogilby]

you had time to write an email yet you had no time to cook?

I do have time to cook and I used to enjoy it when I cooked for a bunch of friends that always ate at my house but circumstances change and now if I do cook, it's usually just for me. I don't get the same enjoyment cooking just for myself.

 

[Firky]

When I was knackered and had worked a long day I used to pop into Waitrose and buy one of their posh fresh ready meals and tehy were really good if cooked in the oven (they want to befor £5-6 a shot), but by enlarge they're foul things.

If it can be microwaved... avoid it.

 

[fredfelt]

I read in the paper the other day that the trend of processed foods is more sugar and fat. This is becuase efforts have been made to reduce the salt content and hte sugar and fat is increased to keep it tasting 'good'

 

[mentalchik]

All that chopping can get a bit tiresome

Well yes sometimes it can actually..............


i very rarely get ready meals...............sometimes on a friday i might get a curry from the supermarket.........


not everyone enjoys cooking all the time, i know i don't, a lot of the time it's a chore tbh......


can't see anything wrong with using ready prepared stuff now and again, it's not a form of heresy !

 

[og ogilby]

Food producers are very aware of the publics worries about fat, salt sugar etc and try to make their products as healthy as they can in order to sell the meals. Are people who cook at home as carefull with the ingredients they use or is pleasing the family/friends the main consideration.

If you cooked a meal tonight do you think it was healthier than the ready meal I bought from the supermarket?

 

[spanglechick]

yes. i add no salt at all.

 

[og ogilby]

My friend used to say that my mashed potatoes weren't as good as those made by another of our friends.

I threw another lump of butter into the next pan of mash I prepared and hey presto, my mash was so much better.

 

[og ogilby]

yes. i add no salt at all.

I never add any salt to any of my meals but it's already in there in fairly "large" quantities.

 

[Chairman Meow]

My friend used to say that my mashed potatoes weren't as good as those made by another of our friends.

I threw another lump of butter into the next pan of mash I prepared and hey presto, my mash was so much better.

Well yes, it would be.

My main consideration when I cook is taste, not health. The ingredients I use depends on my mood, and what I feel like. If I'm making a cake, its going to have the best choc butter sugar etc I can get my hands on. If I'm making soup and bread to take to work I'll add as little salt as possible and add as much veg as I can. It all balances out, and at least there are no preservatives. That's the theory anyway.

 

[xenon]

yes. i add no salt at all.

I just can't do with out it. Pasta, potatoes, eggs tase extremely bland with out something on them.

Shopping, chopping and cooking I just can't be bothered with sometimes. Some days I tend to eat like a machine. Cover the food groups with no real effort at making a meal as such. Consume 3 bits of fruit, have some meat with frozen vedge and any pickles I've got.

 

[Firky]

Salt is tasty. Don't really care about fat, sugar and salt - eat a balanced diet and you'll be grand/

 

[og ogilby]

Salt is tasty.

I like it in butter.

 

[catrina]

insect body extract was one of the additives discussed on the programme this morning in a tin of baked beans. That's pretty gross.

Frozen veg is just frozen veg, though, that's fine.

 

[og ogilby]

insect body extract was one of the additives discussed on the programme this morning in a tin of baked beans. That's pretty gross.

Honey?

 

[quimcunx]

But, if the ready meal isn't full of fat, salt or sugar and is made from the same ingredients as you would use at home, what's the difference other than price?

But most of them are.. and a lot more besides.

they're all right to have sometimes but not as a staple.

 

[catrina]

But do you?

If you use something like tomato purree in your recipie, aren't you back to the whole salt, sugar, E number shit that you thought you were avoiding by doing it yourself?

Don't cook with processed ingredients, then! Tinned tomatoes are tinned tomatoes and they're often much better quality than the ones you can get in this country. But tomato puree is reformed into a tube, clearly it's been processed.

It's very, very easy to get away from processed foods altogether.

no, it's crushed beetle bodies that makes a beautiful red food dye, apparently.

check out the bbc website, they had a whole program on this this morning.

Anything labelled 'flavoured' will be flavoured with whatever ingredient it says. Anything labelled 'flavour' is only made to taste like what it says it is, it probably doesn't have any actual natural ingredient in it, though.

If you know the jargon, you will be able to figure out what's healthy and what's not.

 

[og ogilby]

But most of them are.. and a lot more besides.

I'm not talking about ready meals in general, I'm talking about meals that, "according to the labels", tick all the right boxes as far as healthy eating goes with none of the nasty stuff in them.

 

[xenon]

Don't cook with processed ingredients, then! Tinned tomatoes are tinned tomatoes and they're often much better quality than the ones you can get in this country. But tomato puree is reformed into a tube, clearly it's been processed.

It's very, very easy to get away from processed foods altogether.

no, it's crushed beetle bodies that makes a beautiful red food dye, apparently.
...

Cochineal

Been used for centuries. Although didn't know it was in tins of beans. As is pork. According to that site.

 

[Mrs Miggins]

I'm not talking about ready meals in general, I'm talking about meals that, "according to the labels", tick all the right boxes as far as healthy eating goes with none of the nasty stuff in them.

We've already established though that "according to the labels" is only half the story....

I'm with Chairman Meow - it's not so much about health to me but about taste. All ready meals have an "artificial" taste about them. Something that's just not quite right.

I also really enjoy cooking and find it relaxing so the idea of opening a packet and shoving it in the oven takes all the fun out of eating for me.

 

[Mrs Miggins]

Cochineal

Been used for centuries.

I believe cochineal fell out of favour at some point relatively recently but then had a bit of a renaissance when people started to rebel against "E numbers" - it is a natural product after all!

 

[og ogilby]

We've already established though that "according to the labels" is only half the story.

Thinking back to your post yesterday when you noticed that all the percentages of the ingredients they gave a percentage too only added up to about 35%, I'm wondering if they chose only to put a figure on the ones they wanted to highlight and the other 65% comes from the ingredients with no percentage next to them.

Ingredients: Water, lamb (14%), red peppers, cooked chickpeas (10%), carrots, onions, apricot purée (5%), dried apricots (3%), baby potatoes (3%), lamb stock, tomato paste, cornflour, olive oil, parsley, mint, garlic, ras-el-hanout spice blend, coriander, cumin, allspice.

Apricot Purée - apricots, sugar.
Lamb - Lamb (99%), potato starch. Lamb stock - lamb stock (lamb, water, salt), salt onion juice, carrot juice.

If you notice there is no percentage figure given for water but I reckon it must have been 30% of the product, but not a good selling point for a fairly expensive product.

 

[Roadkill]

I used to eat loads of ready meals. These days, on the rare occasion I do get one I don't enjoy them: they all have that synthetic, bland taste and amorphous consistency, they're very expensive and the portion sizes are minuscule.

I'd much rather cook for myself. Yes it's healthier, but it's also a lot more satisfying. And for the occasions I really can't be bothered cooking, I make double portions of casseroles and the like and stick them in the freezer. Defrosting them is no more hassle than hotting up a ready meal.

 

[Chairman Meow]

I used to eat loads of ready meals. These days, on the rare occasion I do get one I don't enjoy them: they all have that synthetic, bland taste and amorphous consistency, they're very expensive and the portion sizes are minuscule.

I'd much rather cook for myself. Yes it's healthier, but it's also a lot more satisfying. And for the occasions I really can't be bothered cooking, I make double portions of casseroles and the like and stick them in the freezer. Defrosting them is no more hassle than hotting up a ready meal.

That's what I do do, although I make huge vats of stuff like soup, spag bol, beef and red wine pie etc. I also make pizzas every few weeks with sprog. I prefer to spend a few hours at the weekend making sure the freezer is stocked so I always have something for evenings when I can't be arsed cooking. The only problem is now I need a bigger freezer.