Healthy meals on a budget 6 Minute English
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Introduction
0:00 Hello, this is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English.
0:04 I'm Pippa and I'm Georgie.
0:06 In this programme we're talking about saving money on food.
0:09 Pippa, are you good at saving money on your food shop?
0:13 I think I'm quite good.
0:14 I plan what I like to cook so I don't waste money in the supermarket.
0:18 How about you, Georgie?
0:20 I'm not very good.
0:21 I usually go to the supermarket when I'm hungry,
0:24 so I end up buying lots of snacks.
0:26 Oh, that's a terrible idea.
0:27 Well, in this programme, we'll be learning about one way to save money
0:32 on the food we eat.
0:33 But first, I've got a question for you, Georgie.
0:36 The most expensive restaurant in the world is thought to be a restaurant
0:39 called Sublimotion in Ibiza, which only has 12 customers each night.
Quiz question
0:45 But how much in euros is a meal per person at the restaurant?
0:49 a) €650 b) €1650, or c) €2650.
0:58 The most expensive - I'll go with c) €2650.
1:04 Well, we'll find out the answer at the end of the programme.
1:07 Now, food in the UK is getting more expensive,
1:10 as it has been in many parts of the world,
1:13 and some people are struggling to afford their food shopping.
The discussion
1:17 But BBC World Service Programme 'People Fixing the World' has been finding out
1:21 about a project called Bags of Taste, which helps people save money
1:25 on their food shopping and improve their diet at the same time.
1:29 'Bags of' something is an informal way to say a lot of something.
1:33 The founder of Bags of Taste, Alicia Weston,
1:36 became concerned that people in the UK
1:38 with less money found it difficult to afford a healthy diet.
1:41 People in poverty are eating the worst diets
1:44 and they are getting sicker younger.
1:47 And we know that diets are the single largest cause
1:50 of health inequalities in the UK.
1:52 Alicia found that people didn't know how to cook the kinds of meals
1:56 they'd like to eat,
1:57 and they couldn't afford to experiment.
1:59 Imagine spending lots of money on ingredients
2:01 and then wasting them by cooking them badly or burning the food.
2:05 People also thought making healthy food would be too expensive
2:09 and take too much time.
2:11 So ultimately, we've been able to come up
2:13 with a programme that basically can tackle all of these issues.
2:16 So what we do now is we deliver all the ingredients to their door,
2:19 because ultimately, behaviour change starts
2:22 with actually changing your behaviour at home.
2:25 Alicia says that ultimately, she's been able to come up
2:28 with a solution to help people save money on healthy food.
2:31 We can use the adverb 'ultimately' to mean
2:34 finally, after a series of events have happened. Alicia wants
2:38 to tackle the things that stop people eating healthy food on a budget.
2:42 If you tackle a problem, you try to deal with it.
2:45 Alicia's solution involves delivering ingredients and recipes to people
2:49 and then using a WhatsApp group to talk to participants.
2:53 Each WhatsApp group has a mentor who shares cooking tips and advice.
2:57 To give you an idea of how this works,
2:59 the team at People Fixing the World read out some of the messages on one
3:03 of the Bags of Taste WhatsApp chats.
3:06 Amy, mentor:
3:08 Remember to put the fridge bag in the fridge.
3:11 Can we aim to cook recipe one by Tuesday evening?
3:14 Our first recipe, chana masala, is a classic.
3:18 It needs an onion, which can be a pain to chop,
3:21 so try our way.
3:23 Video posted.
3:25 Ally: Love this method. Chef emoji.
3:28 First time I've chopped an onion like this and it's so neat and easy.
3:32 Georgia: I'm going to cook mine tomorrow.
3:34 Looking forward to it.
3:36 Ally: I've finished making my chana masala.
3:38 I was a bit too heavy-handed with the chilli.
3:41 My husband likes a lot of spice so I'd reduce that next time.
3:45 The mentor in the group, Amy,
3:47 describes the recipe for chana masala as 'a classic'.
3:50 We call something a classic to say that it is well known and of good quality.
3:55 We can also describe a particular book, film, or song as a classic.
4:01 Amy sends a video to show a technique for cutting onions,
4:04 which she describes as 'a pain to chop'.
4:07 If something is a pain to do, it is difficult or annoying to do.
4:11 One of the participants, Ally, said that when she made the chana masala,
4:14 she was a bit heavy-handed with the chilli.
4:17 If you are heavy-handed with an ingredient, you use too much of it.
4:21 And so Ally's chana masala was very spicy.
4:25 Bags of Taste helps people learn new recipes and cook healthy food
4:29 without spending too much money.
4:31 It's certainly a lot cheaper than a meal at the restaurant
4:34 in my question, Georgie. I asked you how much it costs for a meal at Sublimotion,
4:39 thought to be the most expensive restaurant in the world.
4:42 Yes, I said a meal was €2650.
Quiz answer
4:47 Well, you were wrong.
4:48 It's actually €1650, but I think that's still pretty expensive.
4:53 It definitely is.
4:55 OK, let's recap the vocabulary we've learnt,
4:57 starting with 'bags of' which means a lot of something.
5:01 We can use the adverb 'ultimately' to say
Vocabulary recap
5:04 finally, after a series of events.
5:07 If you tackle a problem, you try to deal with it and find a solution.
5:11 If we describe something like a recipe as 'a classic',
5:14 we mean it's well known and of good quality.
5:17 If something is a pain to do, it is annoying or difficult to do.
5:21 And if you are heavy-handed with an ingredient, you use too much of it.
5:26 For example, I made some soup the other day
5:28 and I was a bit heavy-handed with the salt.
5:30 It tasted disgusting.
5:31 Oh, that's not very good.
5:33 Okay, once again our six minutes are up, but
5:36 you can test what you've learned with the interactive quiz on our website.
5:39 Visit [Link]. Bye for now.
5:43 Bye!
