The cost of healthy eating

[Kathy]

I had a £2 breakfast voucher from Bike Week.

In our canteen:

2 sausages, 2 hash browns, 1 fried egg, baked beans (or 2 tomatoes), and 2 slices of buttered toast = £2.

Muesli and yoghurt with a small glass of orange juice = £1.95

I wasn't in a fry-up mood, and I quite like muesli and plain yoghurt, but nevertheless I feel somewhat short-changed.

[numbnuts]

...but your tummy will thank you for it 

[redshift]

I can get porridge, two slices of toast with marmalade, and 250ml orange juice for £2.21 in our canteen.  These days the cooked breakfast mostly doesn't appeal anyway.

[JohnP]

I used to work somewhere with a canteen !!!!!!!!!!!!

[Regulator]

I had a £2 breakfast voucher from Bike Week.

In our canteen:

2 sausages, 2 hash browns, 1 fried egg, baked beans (or 2 tomatoes), and 2 slices of buttered toast = £2.

Muesli and yoghurt with a small glass of orange juice = £1.95

I wasn't in a fry-up mood, and I quite like muesli and plain yoghurt, but nevertheless I feel somewhat short-changed.

Raise it with your HR department.  Emphasise that encouraging healthy eating choices by making them comparatively cheaper will benefit the employer in the long run, e.g. fewer sick days.

[Kathy]

I had a £2 breakfast voucher from Bike Week.

In our canteen:

2 sausages, 2 hash browns, 1 fried egg, baked beans (or 2 tomatoes), and 2 slices of buttered toast = £2.

Muesli and yoghurt with a small glass of orange juice = £1.95

I wasn't in a fry-up mood, and I quite like muesli and plain yoghurt, but nevertheless I feel somewhat short-changed.

Raise it with your HR department.  Emphasise that encouraging healthy eating choices by making them comparatively cheaper will benefit the employer in the long run, e.g. fewer sick days.

Can't really be bothered - this is only the second time in eighteen months that I have had breakfast from the canteen (the previous time I was horrendously hungover, and would have had the fry-up had I been able to stomach anything more than a piece of dry toast). I probably won't have breakfast there for another year.

Besides, HR are so fed up with me raising cycling issues with them that I imagine I'm going to get put on their "ignore" list soon...

[mattc]

I had a £2 breakfast voucher from Bike Week.

In our canteen:

2 sausages, 2 hash browns, 1 fried egg, baked beans (or 2 tomatoes), and 2 slices of buttered toast = £2.

Muesli and yoghurt with a small glass of orange juice = £1.95

I wasn't in a fry-up mood, and I quite like muesli and plain yoghurt, but nevertheless I feel somewhat short-changed.

Raise it with your HR department.  Emphasise that encouraging healthy eating choices by making them comparatively cheaper will benefit the employer in the long run, e.g. fewer sick days.

Quite. The fry-up is clearly subsidised at £2, so they should subsidise the healthy options as well.

[Pete]

I used to work somewhere with a canteen !!!!!!!!!!!!

Me, ditto. 

Sometimes the way B&Bs operate bugs me a bit.  I'm not a 'full English' sort of person, so I always ask for the continental option.  What I get is the same toast, the same cereal, the same coffee, the same fruit juice, as those people on the next table who called for the Full English.  And not a penny off the overnight cost.  Ah well, perhaps I shouldn't grumble: B&Bs are still cheaper than hotels.

At a B&B in France recently, on the other hand, the spread on the table before us was like something from another planet.  Crispy fresh baguette, croissants, pain-au-chocolat, yoghurt, fresh fruit, lashings of home-made jam, slices of real cheese, ....  OK OK maybe not all of this was healthy eating, but, I say, 

[Eccentrica Gallumbits]

I used to work somewhere with a canteen !!!!!!!!!!!!

Me too. Now I work somewhere where it's a 10 minute round trip to the chippy (closed because of flooding) or the Farmfoods and a 30 minute round trip to the 2nd-day bargain Greggs.

We all have a drawer full of emergency snacks!

[sas]

w
Quite. The fry-up is clearly subsidised at £2, so they should subsidise the healthy options as well.

Maybe the sausage and egg are really cheap low quality, whereas the muesli is super-deluxe organic hand-harvested by 50 virgins.

[Kathy]

w
Quite. The fry-up is clearly subsidised at £2, so they should subsidise the healthy options as well.

Maybe the sausage and egg are really cheap low quality, whereas the muesli is super-deluxe organic hand-harvested by 50 virgins.

Nah. It really wasn't.

[fuzzy]

I get a tub of butter substitute, a jar of marmite and a jar of peanut butter from Sainsburys for about £3.50 which will last a couple of weeks or more and a good thick cut loaf for about £1.20 which will last a week. The toaster is in the rest room which is next to my office

I do miss my £2.50 bacon baguette with brown sauce from the local shop since I moved from Wycombe.

[rae]

FFS, just go to a shop, get a box of Alpen and pick up a pint of milk on the way in every morning.   Remains of milk does for coffee....

[Greenbank]

FFS, just go to a shop, get a box of Alpen and pick up a pint of milk on the way in every morning.   Remains of milk does for coffee....

We used to have little kitchenettes on each floor of the 4 office buildings and one larger kitchen (with an oven and hob) in the middle office. Easy to bring in your own stuff, cook it, wash up in the sink and everyone was happy.

But then we were bought out by $VERY_BIG_COMPANY and moved offices. Catering is outsourced and I'm guessing the contract states that we're not allowed to have our own cooking facilities. Office kettles are banned. Hot water can be purchased for 18p a cup from the coffee counter or in the canteen. Bonkers.

We have managed to blag a fridge and a microwave but with no sinks to wash up in (we're not allowed to use the sinks in the toilets for washing up) it can be a pain. Some people do persist though; they use a tupperware box as a bowl for cereal so it can be sealed up and transported home for washing each day.

The outsourced catering isn't that bad (it's an office for 1400 so they can put on quite a bit of variety) but it's not amazingly cheap although they do have a salary sacrifice tax avoidance scheme similar to the tax-free bike scheme so it's not too bad.

[Wowbagger]

FFS, just go to a shop, get a box of Alpen and pick up a pint of milk on the way in every morning.   Remains of milk does for coffee....

Alpen's not healthy eating. Full of bloody sugar.

[rae]

we're not allowed to use the sinks in the toilets for washing up  

I had this a while ago.  The solution is to go to the canteen, get a big stack of bowls and walk out with them.   Return them for washing when they are dirty.   If you have nazis preventing this, then simply put a few extra bowls under the one you are using when you buy lunch....or buy some paper plates....

Alpen's not healthy eating. Full of bloody sugar.

1,$s/Alpen/Muesli_Of_Choice/g

[Frenchie]

I had a £2 breakfast voucher from Bike Week.

In our canteen:

2 sausages, 2 hash browns, 1 fried egg, baked beans (or 2 tomatoes), and 2 slices of buttered toast = £2.

Muesli and yoghurt with a small glass of orange juice = £1.95

I wasn't in a fry-up mood, and I quite like muesli and plain yoghurt, but nevertheless I feel somewhat short-changed.

Yep. Our "bars" are extremally expensive and offer little healthy food; yours even seem affordable in comparison.

[Jon P]

Just skip breakfast, I keep salad stuff in the fridge and even grow my own mung bean sprouts, with rye bread and nut butter for lunch.  Probably <£1.50 till supper.

[teethgrinder]

Just skip breakfast, I keep salad stuff in the fridge and even grow my own mung bean sprouts, with rye bread and nut butter for lunch.  Probably <£1.50 till supper.

Eating a good and hearty breakfast is very good for you. It's probably the very best way of keeping your weight down or losing weight.
It increases your metabolism. Eat enough for breakfast that you'll only need to top up, rather than feed during the day.
Even a good fry up is good. You know when you've eaten enough.
I'd do the fry up when B&Bing any day. More calories per £1 and less time(miles) lost for feeding later on.
Except for Travel Inn, "Eat all you like" breakfasts, where the continental is £2.50 or so cheaper than the fry up. You only get a small fry up and you can only eat as much as you like of the continental breakfast stuff. I got caught out once, thinking I could gorge myself on sausages and black pudding before setting off for a few hundred miles. I only have the continental option now and stuff half a dozen or so croissants down my belly, among other delights.

[peliroja]

I get a free bowl of porridge, or muesli, or berries, or yoghurt, or cereal, or waffles, or a croissant, or cheese, or a smoothie, or a fry-up, or an omelette, or..... every morning

[Pete]

Alpen's not healthy eating. Full of bloody sugar.

Tesco's Own Brand "Fruit and Nut Muesli" isn't too bad.  Claims to have no added sugar.  I have a bowlful now and again, with a little milk.  Better than Alpen, anyway...

[Maladict]

we're not allowed to use the sinks in the toilets for washing up 

I had this a while ago.  The solution is to go to the canteen, get a big stack of bowls and walk out with them.   Return them for washing when they are dirty.   If you have nazis preventing this, then simply put a few extra bowls under the one you are using when you buy lunch....or buy some paper plates....

Alpen's not healthy eating. Full of bloody sugar.

1,$s/Alpen/Muesli_Of_Choice/g

Is that a yACF first?

[rae]

Oh, come on, it's not that geeky.....  I'm sure I've seen worse round here.

[Jacomus]

Its pretty geeky 

[Attitudeless Badger]

It made no sense to me!