CHEAPER MEALS

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 103, 2 May 1914, Page 12

CHEAPER MEALS

«> LIVING ON THREEPENCE A DAY AN OFFER TO A BISHOP. C^an a Bishop be fed on 3d a day? The question arises out of the statement by Mr. F. J. Cross at a meeting of the Church of England Men's Society in London, that if the Bishop of Southwark could spare three months from his diocese he would feed liim on 3d a day, and bring him back healthier than before. The Bishop did not accept the offer, but Mr. Cross has already made the experiment, and he told a Daily Chronicle representative how it was done. "For 3d a day," he said, "you can get more nutriment than is actually necessary. It is all a question of selecting the foods. I have found that I can live in luxury on 4d a day, in comfort on 3d a day, and, if hard pressed by adversity, even on 2d a day. I have tried a week on each. "It is all a question of recognising that the cheapest food is the most nourishing. Oatmeal, haricot beans, and bread figure chiefly in the 3d a day menu, and with a little trouble most tasty dishes can be prepared." This is how a Bishop would faro if he allowed Mr. Cross to feed him on 3d a day, or Is 9d a week. Here is Mr. Cross's bill for a week, on which he actuall saves a penny : — 2 loaves of white bread at 2Jd ... 44d 1 loaf of standard bread 2^d lib oatmeal ... 2d lib haricot beans .., ... „. l£d 1 pint milk , 2d lib dates ... ... 2d lib rice „ 1-Jd 2oz dripping |d soz margarine, at 5d per lb ... ljd £lb potatoes £d Jib sugar , id ioz tea Jd Sundries, pepper and salt ... id Total 20d iui\ Cross admits that it needed much thought and careful shopping to get his stores, and of course one could not go into the average suburban shop and ask for worth of tea and |d worth of dripping. But the above is a correct account of what he consumed. Here, then, are the meals that the bishop might expect on a typical day : — Breakfast : Porridge, with milk and sugar or salt. Toast and margarine. Lunch : Haricot beans, with pepper and salt, bread or toast, dates. Tea (Saturday and Sunday only) : Tea with toast (or bread) and margarine. Dinner: Rice, with sugar and milk, toast or bread, with" dripping or margarine. Dates occasionally. "I do not wish anyone to have to live on 3d a day," said Mr. Cross, "but it would be well if the unemployed, or those having very small inbomes, realised the nourishing value of oatmeal, beans and peas." Mr. Cross has also lived a week on 2d a day, and even then he saved a halfpenny. In this diet, 8d worth of bread was the chief item, oatmeal cost l^d, cheese and margarine Id each, haricot beans and rice id each, and jam, sugar, milk, tea, and "sundries" each. Mr. Cress does not recommend this dietary scale for comfort, and his offer to spend as much as 3d a day on a bishop still stands. A TWOPENNY DINNER. A / strictly vegetable diet does not, however, appeal to the social workers who have undertaken to feed working girla at Deptford, London. In this thickly-populated and busy part of London two large houses have been taken and transformed into a club for factory girls. Hitherto the • girls have had to eat their bread and margarine in the streets or squatting underneath machinery. Now they will be able to eat at leisure in a roomy dining-hall with pretty mural decorations and hung with muslin curtains. The girls who will benefit by this enterprise are employed in the making of cocoa, jam, sweets, and of boxes and shirts. It is thought that meeting frequently at a common dining centre the way to organisation will be paved. The* meals are really splendid value for the money, as *a specimen menu proves :— Monday : Beefsteak pie. Tuesday : Stewed tripe. Wednesday : Toad-in-the-Hole. Thursday : Stewed mutton and dumplings. Friday : Soup, baked pudding, v In every case potatoes, bread, and occasionally a second vegetable are included in the twopenny meal. Penny snacks, such as small'meat pies, rissoles, sausage rolls, sandwiches, and various pastries, are also sold. A cup of tea costs a halfpenny, while girls who like to bring their own food to the centre can have it cooked for them at a cost of a halfpenny. It is expected that the girls' payments for dinner will cover the cost of food, with perhaps a small margin. A CONSUMERS' CAMPAIGN. The problem of cheap and yet cheaper food is a very real problem at Home, and its solution still appears to be as far off as ever. The cheap meal is but* a palliative, depending Very often more upon private philanthropy than on scientific business management. The increased cost of living was considered at a recent conference of women at Toynbee Hall, when eighteen societies and organisations were represented. Miss Margaretta Hicks moved a resolution advocating the establishment of a maximum price for the necessaries of life and a minimum Avage for all workers. She said that the retail price in London of 23 of the principal foodstuffs, including bread, meat, bacon, butter, and eggs, had advanced 17.9 per cent, between; 1896 and 1910. Since then the necessities of life had risen considerably more. The_ latest figures also showed a fall of 5s in the purchasing power of £1 during the last 1? years. She advocated an organisation of women as buyers, with agents to call at their houses on the lipies of the provident clubs. If this were done working women, instead of trusts, would- control the markets. It would be a brave shopkeeper who would dare to raise prices when all his customers were organised. The resolution was carried, together with riders to the effect that organisations of women should be encouraged to oppose all increase of prices. It was also decided that the attention of Parliament should be called to the question of the rise in prices. # Mrs. Abbott (Women's Industrial Council) suggested that the London County Council should provide classes to help women to detect adulteration. The resolution was carried with an addition that prosecution could be made effective as a deterrent to adulteration by the imprisonment without the option of a fine. A deputation was then chosen to wait upon the Home Secretary and the President of the Local Government Board.

The British Government is to ask the Commons to sanction a grant of £13,000 for special investigation into the movements of ice. in the North Atlantic. Tho grant it provided for in the Estimates for Mercantile Marine Services for 1914-15, (uul iveprogonttf mi imjrtutte of £11,000 ou .the »m vst9.d for tffev p^rp.OH iHt £«Ai'<