This one’s another rant so I’ll understand if you leave now.
I needed a pork knuckle for a particular recipe and thought I had nothing better to do but pick one out of the chill cabinet at my local (large) Sainsbury’s branch yesterday. Not so – there were none to be had so I went to the butcher counter but the helpful assistant there told me that Sainsbury’s only sell boneless pork. I innocently asked what they did with all the bones then, thinking that they were removed by the butcher in-store and that perhaps I could buy a quantity of same, but she stunned me by saying that all pork is delivered to the stores minus the bones! Does that mean that I can never hope to buy a pork knuckle in Sainsbury’s? I guess so.
I know that there are thousands of people out there who would run a mile from any meat product that was even vaguely recognisable as an animal part, but I am not one of them and I also know that I am not the only woman in Britain who still cooks from scratch, avoids the ‘ping dinner’ aisle of any supermarket like we would a rabid dog, and who just wants to know that I have choice. (Sainsbury’s appear to have stopped stocking extra hot Tabasco too and I’ve given up hoping for brown gluten-free pitta to be re-stocked after it suddenly disappeared off the shelves months ago.)
I mourn the passing of local butcher and fishmonger shops as a result of supermarkets pricing them out of existence and I object to large conglomerates dictating ‘choice’ based on shareholder dividends, profit margins and so-called customer surveys. (I’ve been a supermarket shopper for over forty years but have never been asked to take part in a customer survey and don’t know anyone who has, do you?)
After Sainsbury’s we went to Waitrose’s, a store I have never been annoyed with but when we were queuing for coffee and tea in the cafe area it was apparent that JP had a variety of sticky buns and cakes and sandwiches to choose from but for me, the gluten-free range was limited to just three things – all of which were pre-packed brownie types and chocolate or fruit based. I love chocolate and fruit as much as the next person but I do not like chocolate cakes or chocolate brownies or anything else where the chocolate or chocolate derivitive is baked in and anything with a heavy fruit content sets my blood glucose levels soaring skywards and beyond. I’ve come to terms with the fact that as a coeliac diabetic I have fewer choices in restaurants and cafes but I somewhat grumpily settled for a bag of crisps with my coffee. Later in the day I well and truly saw red when I read an article in the summer edition of the Waitrose Love Life magazine advertising a new gluten-free range of ‘teatime treats’ which were not all laden with chocolate or fruit and which are their own brand. So why weren’t they available in their cafe???????????
Rant over.
carvingtimefromlife 