Joe,

I lived in the UK for a while and still travel there on a monthly basis. Organic foods are truly more expensive.

Overall, however, eating is cheaper in the UK than in Malta. What used to cost me a pound at Tesco’s or Morrison’s costs me one fifty here. (Granted I missed the local tomatoes, olives and pork).

However, a healthy lifestyle is not about going on a diet or just eating organic foods.

Cooking techniques, knowing your saturated from non saturated fats, natural sugars, balanced diets, and so on, is the key contributor to reducing weight.

People seem to think that a good meal is about enormous portions with food cooked in butter or veg oil and swimming in cream. That just gives you indigestion.

Steaming chicken, for example, retains the natural flavours of the meat rather than mask it with deep frying oil. I find that sea salt significantly enhances flavour more than your processed variety.

Halal meat, for example, is less expensive but more tasty than the normal equivalent.

It’s one thing buying a ready cooked meal in a freezer bag and it’s another thing cooking yourself.

From what I saw in the UK, people do not like going through the process of cooking a meal. They prefer something quick – just stick it in the microwave or buy some take out is the usual recipe.

Keeping healthy is also about self-control.

Anyway, is our obesity problem going to be solved by a bunch obese people?

Joe is right – here in Scandinavia it is the same.

It is cheaper to eat poor quality processed foods than vegetables. Swedes do eat loads of vegetables though (their salad portions at lunch break are larger than the actual lunch course itself) and they all seem to be exercise maniacs.

One of the things I enjoy most when in Malta is visiting the farmers’ market in Ta’ Qali and marvelling at the cheap and wonderfully tasty fruit and vegetables there.

I barely touch meat (well except fish and some rabbit) when I am in Malta.

That is true but wouldn’t the photo be a great backdrop to use on a billboard for the anti-obesity campaign.

Jozef is a chef. I can vouch for him.

And whatever anyone says, it is far, far cheaper to eat like an athlete than like your average Maltese.

One kilo of beans, lentils, brown rice, oats, frozen peas, frozen mixed vegetables, quinoa or any form of complex carbohydrates is cheaper, by weight, that anything you can buy off a restaurant counter, and it’ll last you for days.

Add egg whites (more protein per kilo than prime fillet, and cheaper) and canned tuna in brine.

The only thing which can push up the grocery bill will be fish and chicken breast. Strictly speaking, if you can get your protein elsewhere, you don’t need them.

Of course you can buy organic stuff and double the price of everything, but you can be sure that anything to eat from even the healthiest “eatery” is not organic. Or they wouldn’t be in business. Far better to buy non-organic, bog-standard food and cook it yourself.

And for heaven’s sake, drink tap water. It’s clean, it’s safe, it’s cheap. It saves the environment because you’re not using plastic bottles.

Yes, I agree with you of course, especially as it is also consumed in huge amounts.

I chose to mention only junk food for the simple fact that I’ve noticed that queues outside take-away shops who sell unhealthy foods seem to be getting longer from year to year – obviously, take-away outlets all over the islands are on the increase because they are in demand.k food

I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that there are thousands of people, including children, who for various reasons live mainly on junk food.

[Daphne – Pasta is not part of the French diet. And yes, Italian pasta portions are small.]

You’re right, pasta is not traditionally part of the French diet although it commonly accompanies meat dishes. The French are big meat-eaters, cook a lot with butter and cream, eat saucisson, pates and cheese regularly. However the portions they eat are tiny with salad or carrots being staple first courses.

Daphne, re pasta and bread. Are the Maltese aware of how the French and Italians eat and their portions?

[Daphne – Pasta is not part of the French diet. And yes, Italian pasta portions are small.]

Kevin, same applies to catering: in the UK fast food outlets are the cheapest places to have lunch. It comes at about a third of the price of a simple meal in say a gastro pub.

Kevin, I don’t know about prices in Malta. In the UK, eating processed, industrial food is much cheaper than buying organic food be it meat from a butcher or veg from a good outlet.

The problem with today’s society is that many prefer quantity and poor quality rather than eating the right quantities of high quality food.

It’s a world epidemic.

Obviously, education plays a bit part in all this. Where I live in the UK it is very hard to come any obesity. If you go to working class areas, you’ll be confronted by the extreme opposite.