Are 30p Meals Really Possible, Including Hidden Costs? No, Not Really

November 14, 2022 Eleanor Scott

Mmmmm. Assorted cheap ingredients that parliamentarians don’t eat. Students and fieldwork volunteers might though. I ate them so you don’t have to. Although you probably do have to, because we’re all broke now.

Food is political. ‘Lee’s 30p meals’ still occasionally trends on Twitter. Sometimes it’s ‘Lee’s 10p meals’. Lee Anderson - quite a big fella himself - is the daftie Conservative MP who decided that the British people could live on meals that cost just 30 pennies per person. Apparently he saw it done at a food bank kitchen - completely ignoring the facts of food donations, the massive aconomies of scale and the energy costs - and now he has visions of the impoverished doing the same. Student or budget setter, cook or parent, this is the new narrative of aspiration. Trouble is, ‘30p Lee’ is an idiot.

Pickled Vegetables and Coleslaw - Low carb & Healthy

July 14, 2018 Eleanor Scott

Whether preparing food on a dig, during other fieldwork activities, or at home, chopped and dressed vegetables are a flexible dish, simple to make, easy to store in tubs, and they tick all the boxes for all eating requirements - vegan, gluten-free and low-carb. Importantly, the acetic acid in the vinegar can help to avoid blood glucose 'spikes' in people with, for example, Type 2 diabetes; and the vegetables that are used are easy to store in boxes in the shade till needed by the fieldwork kitchen. Use as a side dish, as a replacement for something else (eg potatoes), a starter, or a snack.

Fieldwork Food and Diabetes

June 18, 2018 Eleanor Scott

Welcome to the 2018 season of posts about inclusive fieldwork food for volunteers, students and staff on archaeological digs and fieldwork projects.

I'll be writing a lot this season about the sorts of meals that are good for fieldwork volunteers, students and staff who need a low carb diet - people who have diabetes, pre-diabetes, iatrogenic high blood glucose (eg on some thyroid treatments) or otherwise needing to monitor blood glucose levels. It's not a rare issue; and, with the rapidly changing demographic and the fee-paying expectations of archaeology volunteers and students, it's not one that is going to go away. Plus, in my view, no-one should be dissuaded from participating in fieldwork because of having a diabetic condition.

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