LORD BORDER'S 50 MEAL

Evening Star, Issue 22955, 12 May 1938, Page 20

LORD BORDER'S 50 MEAL

FRIED FISH AND PLUM DUFF . Lord Horder recently tasted the meal which doctors have decided contains the minimum nourishment necessary for health in the main meal pf the day. He was one of 250 guests of the Children’s Minimum Council at a luncheon held at the London School of Economics. The cost of producing the luncheon was ,5d a head, the dishes being made from recipes in the B.M.A. Cookery Book. The meal consisted of tripe and onions, with potatoes; or mince and rice and .swedes; or fried cod, parsley sauce, i (J and qjashed potatoes; and stewed vffigs arid custard or steamed plum duff. Lord Herder chose fried fish and plum duff, which he ate with apparent relish. Many of the guests, doctors and politicians, chose tripe and onions. . Lord Horder said that the luncheon was not a stunt, but was a genuine effort to demonstrate that the. B.M.A. handbook was capable of being put into everyday practice. So long as millions of herrings were thrown back into the sea, so long as surplus milk was sold for various manufacturing purposes at one-third the price it cost as food, there would always be something a little incongruous in the efforts at demonstrating on how little the children’s nutrition could be maintained. He could not escape the conclusion that the solution of the problem eventually lay along two lines of improving wages and improving food production and distribution. ■

Mrs Yates, of Mile End. an unemployed inan’s wife, sat next to Lord Horder. She said that it was quite impossible for unemployed families to provide such a meal out of their allowance, although it was considered by the B.M.A. to be the minimum required for health and strength.