Thursday 14 May 2015

The Other Half

The television has become such a low priority for me these days that I frequently forget to watch programmes that I had previously thought would be worth viewing. Consequently, I missed the last Vera, forgot about Safe House half way through, and still haven't seen anything of the new Home Fires series.
Image result for channel 4
(image from theguardian.com)

I did manage to watch "How the other half eat" on the on-demand system for Channel 4 on the tablet earlier this week, just because I was feeling nosy as to how they made the programme.  It was an interesting twist that the ones eating all the junk and ready meals were the mega-rich family, spending £300 a week in their local Sainsbury's to feed 6 people, whereas Mrs Average Income was spending a more reasonable £80 in Aldi each week to feed 4 - although I think you would get an awful lot of food for £80 in Aldi and perhaps even she could have spent less if money was an issue.

Mrs Average was making everything from scratch, they were eating balanced meals and eating together at the table; Mrs Rich was more haphazard about it all, and there was a "cupboard of dreams" to which the children had unrestricted access, full of chocolate, sweets, cakes and other general rubbish - and of course, when the families had their rules and food swapped, Mrs Average's children did actually make themselves little piggies in this cupboard whilst Mum was despairing of them ever eating another vegetable, I think.

I found Mr Rich quite snobbish: "beef cobbler is something that one ate at primary school in the seventies" for example.  They turned their noses up at some of the recipes that they were advised to make, and Mrs Rich was in despair at the amount of time she was expected to be in the kitchen.

I watched it as a one-off, and I don't know that it is a series - I don't think I would watch it every week if it was a weekly event.  We all know that there are all sorts of domestic regimes out there, and each family do their own thing ever so slightly differently from the next family in the street.  If you are a long-time reader here, you'll know that we are more like Mrs Average, and I expect that you are too.


3 comments:

Attila said...

Thanks for mentioning that programme, I'll watch it later and no doubt shout at the screen at regular intervals!

Angela said...

Not watched The Other Half thing yet. Have been dozing in front of the Home Fires. Watched Safe House right through on catch-up whilst working on a Holiday Club project. You didnt miss much!!
95% of my TV is catchup - the other 5% is the news!! blessings x

Morgan said...

After mentioning Safe House on Thursday, I caught up with the episodes I missed, watching on the tablet whilst doing other things, but at least I am sort of up to speed for the last episode on Monday! I haven't even started Home Fires yet, and now the YFG says that there is a new Sunday night thingy called Johnathan Strange and Mr Norrell on the BBC that she thinks will be interesting - I'll never catch up with it all!! Lovely to hear from you xxx