My Franch Holiday

A while back, in my Economy Gastronomy post, I wrote that I had been living off about £15 a week for food for two people for a few months. Maybe some of you read that and went, "woah, what a liar", or possibly, "why?", or maybe even "£15? She's the lucky one, I have to walk ten miles every day to eat food from a rubbish dump". No matter what your reaction, I feel like I must explain myself.

I decided to go on holiday with my dear beloved to Franchland, so we could visit a few of the places that we used to when he lived there. We stayed in Granville and drove up from St Malo, and had a blast visiting Cherbourg and Mont-St-Michel. But, in order to fund this jolly, we had to seriously scrimp on the shopping, fasting in order that we may feast our little hearts out eating chips and steak twice a day the whole time we were there.

(Mont-St-Michel - like Lord of the Rings meets Harry Potter. Totally fricking awesome, didn't think I'd like it half as much as I did, but it rocked.)

We worked out a budget of £60 per week for food, and then, whatever was left at the end of the week, we put into a pot to save for France. We ended up taking over £700, which should indicate how much we've been scrimping. But, it was worth every single last can of Tescos Value Beans, because I bought everything that wasn't nailed down, including copious amounts of fleur de sel de Guerande and salted caramel everything. My cupboards are now full of delicious French foods from the supermarche, and I am content. AND I'm back up to £60 a week for food, and I feel absolutely rich beyond my wildest dreams. I even bought a sliced white loaf of bread from Sainsbury's the other day, which is the first time in ages I've not baked my own. Yes, baking your own bread is fun to begin with, but when you have to do it three times a week to save money, the novelty soon wears off, even with a breadmaker.

(Picnic on the beach at Granville - worth every scrimping minute)

As far as how you live on £15 a week, it's pretty easy. Bake your own bread, like I said, that saves money. Having a well stocked larder and freezer is obviously a cheat, but also pretty damn essential. I buy huge packets of chicken thighs and drumsticks and freeze them in pairs, which is very thifty. Mince is a massive essential around here, as well. Eating very little meat makes things easy. I make massive batches of chilli and bolognaise when I can. Eggs are great value and Sainsbury's do these great family packs of free range ones which are really cheap.

I reckon it generally just helps if you're really stingy, and your OH doesn't mind eating wheat biscuits and marmite sandwiches every single day of his life (he actually insists on it). Even so often, I'd cave and buy something with my own money, rather than our joint account, so I can't claim to be totally angellic about this, but I'm sure you can see why I feel totally vindicated in laughing my ass off at the fantastic savings to be made from following Economy Gastronomy.

Economy Gastronomy

I watched a hilarious programme last week, which I'd seen advertised when I was on holiday in France (TV from the Channel Islands, gotta love it) but forgot about until I browsed through the On Demand section of BT Vision, looking for a cooking show. I sort of knew Economy Gastronomy was going to be lost on me when I heard one of the presenters, Allegra McEvedy, claiming you could make three or four meals out of one £16 fish, one of which was evidently composed mostly of bones... Anyway, I watched the second episode, which followed a family that spent £17,000 a year on food, and still managed to eat crap. Magically, Allegra and Paul Merrett reduced their outgoings by something like three hundred quid, down to over two hundred a week. Needless to say, having spent an average of £15 a week on food and household stuff like cleaners, shampoo and toilet rolls, for two people for the last three months, I was unimpressed.

In a way, I feel sorry for the presenters, as obviously their hearts are in the right place, but the concept's had to be jazzed up for TV so it sounds more exciting. But still, when Allegra McEvedy cooked up over £20 of beef for a daube which was supposed to last three meals, and then added in a tonne more other ingredients which surely doubled the price, and then one of those meals turned out to be lunch, I totally lost the will to sympathise. It must be a really hard gig, but surely they could have reduced their weekly bills by a lot more than they did. I want to see suffering. Blood, sweat and tears. And don't even get me started on the marinade recipe which appeared to call for just the juice out of a jar of preserved ginger...

Economy Gastronomy is on BBC2 Wednesday at 8pm, or can be watched on iPlayer at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00m5wtl. If, you know, you want a laugh.