No cheese? Does Ann Widdecombe think she’s Marie Antoinette?
In modern Britain, however, it is not brioche the peasants can’t afford, it’s cheese.
Widdecombe, ballroom dance survivor and former MP, made an appearance on Politics Live this week and was asked her thoughts on BBC research that shows the cost of a cheese sandwich has risen by 40p in the past year – a hike of one third.
“Well then,” she replied, unperturbed by news that doesn’t affect her, “Don’t do the cheese sandwich.” I love the phrasing of this. It’s very gals lunch date. “I don’t do wheat; I’ll just do an egg white omelette.” “I don’t do living-in-a-economically-functioning-country so I’ll just do tap water.”
By “cheese” the BBC means mature cheddar. Not a burrata or a nice Epoisses. Just some cheddar, the most basic of staples.
What would you replace it with? Some kind of meat paste, assuming you don’t have aspirations of vegetarianism. Ethical eating is the preserve of the wealthy.
Don’t do the cheese sandwich, say the comfortably off, as they wonder why bleeding heart liberals whine about the links between the obesity crisis and poverty. Just have some satiating but extremely cheap, highly processed and a bit nasty. You’ll be fine.
This is the sort of trope that rears its head every so often when someone comes up with a recipe that costs 70p a portion and gives the ignorant well-off the chance to criticise the poor for not eating well.
The cheese sandwich question has been raised in the same week that a Sky News investigation found parents are stealing baby formula to feed their infants because they can’t afford to buy it.
The report found parents were watering down formula, substituting formula with condensed milk or simply shoplifting it. Again, something sweet, non-nutritious and highly processed like condensed milk is cheaper to buy than formula and people still balk at the links between poverty and the obesity crisis.
This is shocking but not surprising. In 2020 I wrote about this issue after…
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