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0 pointsshort_sells_poo18d ago0 comments

Living in London, I notice the same. Getting access to true quality produce is not even a question of money now, it's basically just impossible to get full stop. There are a few local shops in the more upmarket areas that survive on the fact that people are willing to pay the 2-3x premium over the prices at Waitrose.

Gone are the days when you could ask the grocer or farmer to give you a peach to taste. People got used to having 24/7/365 access to everything, and supermarkets optimized purely for looks instead of taste and nutrition, because you aren't allowed to taste anything there. The only thing you can go by is the looks. This means looks sell.

I'd hazard a guess the vast majority of brits don't even know what a proper strawberry tastes like, because the only thing they can buy are beautifully polished turds. Everything tastes watery and crap, or conversely just generic "sweet".

I wouldn't even blame farmers. Their life is hard enough. They are operating on razor thin margins in a very uncertain environment. The consumer (against their own interests) demands that they produce beautifully and cheap turds, so that's what they'll produce. And if you try to do the right thing, you simply run out of money because you can't compete with the turds at the supermarket.

I only have empirical evidence for this, but it got much worse since Brexit as well. The variety has gone down a lot, I see shelves routinely empty at supermarkets and they all seem to be focusing on the same ultraprocessed crap.

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gyanchawdhary18d ago· 1 in thread

You should try Natoora in Notting Hill or Daylesford. I live in Belgravia and am admittedly spoiled for choice .. the Harrods Food Hall has excellent seasonal and harder to find fruits, and Daylesford consistently has some of the best British produce I've come across... the one in Sloane street even has the best organic Alphanso Mangos from India.

As for Brexit, I actually think it's been a net positive.

short_sells_pooOP18d ago

You have to be joking, right? So you are saying that it's all fine, because we can just go to Harrods to get quality food?

Nevermind that I hate Harrods and that entire area with a passion. It's a tasteless, glitzy tourist trap.

My post was all about the fact that barring a tiny percentile of people who a) live in an affluent area and b) are willing to pay 2-3x the regular supermarket prices, you cannot get good quality food. And you say "ah it's simples, just go to the most egregiously flashy beacon of division between the rich and poor and you can get good fruit"

Thank you, I can still get good fruit at my local grocer in Wimbledon, because it charges 2-3x over the regular high street prices and there are people around who can pay this. Doesn't help someone living in Croydon and having to go to Tesco, does it now.

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subscribed18d ago

I agree, farmers are not responsible for everything, but definitely for pouring the toxic sludge. That's their choice. Conscious, willful. I doubt they'd make a tea on the water leeching from the landfill so why do they think it's okay to use it on the fields? Nasty.

But I agree, most of the blame lies on the corrupt government (can't think of a better reason explaining why they sanction the above practice or why they gleefully ignore supermarkets role in the "cost of living crisis" - part of it being squeezing the farmers in the same way they squeeze the customers).

And i agree it's been much worse since Brexit - the customer has been conditioned to tolerate worse quality and choice for ever higher prices. Continuous approval to neonicotinoids use in our fields is telling as well.

Gross and saddening. I'm telling my kids to get their education and leave the UK. Being EU country citizens they might even study in some cleaner and saner place.

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