How did food fare? A round-up of 2023

Recipe for Buttered Kippers

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

One of the most dismal traditions over the New Year is the media’s review of the year that has just folded. Beyond gloating over public figures who have achieved a new book/film/award/marriage/mansion, there’s generally not a great deal to make you want to applaud. We’re humans, after all, and on the whole not designed to continually scale noble/Nobel heights. We do our best. Except, sometimes we do our worst, which, globally, seems to be the current default position.

The field of food, nutrition and farming is not exempt. On the upside, Colombia, where nearly a third of adults have high blood pressure, introduced a 10 percent tax on ultra-processed food, targeted to double to 20 percent in 2025. One of the first nations to do so, its aim is to reduce cancer and diabetes. Colombian food labelling now also includes alerts to high sugar, salt and additives. On the downside, HFSS is a UK scoring system identifying food and drinks High in Fat, Salt and Sugar. The government has postponed the institution of additional rules following pushback from manufacturers questioning the metrics on which HFSS is measured, and retailers saying HFSS is unfair to them. Aww, shucks.

Back on the upside, Denmark has just become the first nation to publish a detailed plan on how it will transition towards a plant-based food system that covers research, product development and the training of kitchen professionals. It’s not just calling for a more sustainable food system, it’s strengthening its plant-based industry and focusing, among other areas, on plant-based diets in primary schools and higher education institutions.

Also on the upside, considering the ‘wimp’ reputation of plant-based foods among steak-chompers, a tiny survey by the magazine Appetite of 13 Finnish and Dutch athletes found that while they viewed a meat-based diet the norm, the plant-based diet they had adopted was considered by other male athletes to demonstrate a new kind of masculinity. That’s a start…

On the downside, more consumers than before admit to believing ‘natural’ unprocessed foods are the healthiest and safest food options, according to food engineer Dr Camila Perussello. But most had little idea of what ‘processed’ means. They weren’t able to distinguish overly processed foods delivering poor nutrition made from low-cost ingredients from ‘natural’ foods like nuts and olives, yogurt, pulses, wholegrain pasta and rice, oat, almond and other dairy-free milks, all of which are also highly processed, as are fermented, extruded, milled, dried, and extracted natural foods. There was confusion over the fact that unprocessed food rich in sodium, sugar, saturated fats and cholesterol was not healthier than processed food enriched with those very same additives.

Nor was the public aware that popular ‘natural’ foods are also exposed to processing. Healthy soybeans, pulses, peas, and grains are highly processed to create high-protein, low-fibre powders for mixing with unnatural preservatives, oil, colouring, gums and seasonings, for inclusion in the manufacture of what are pitched as healthy ‘meat-free’ sausages, burgers - or whatever meat replacements satisfy the ‘ethical’ consumer. This is Big Food Biz, honey pie, even if plant-based. Profit not altruism is the objective.

Then there’s the rocketing price of food. In the US, in 2022, domestic food prices increased by 11.4 percent, according to the FDA, thanks to a combination of inflation, pandemic-related supply-chain disruptions and tariffs on certain foreign imports. The average monthly grocery bill of a family of three was $902. Figures for 2023 aren’t in, but are predicted to increase by another 5.8 percent.

I don’t even want to delve into the shameful leap in UK food poverty figures - over 7 percent of the population including 12 percent of children, more than 4.7 million people out of 67.3 million.

Brexit added almost £6 billion to UK food bills in the two years to the end of 2021. Border delays, red tape and other costs increased the price of food to November 2023 by 9.2 percent. 1000 calories of nutritious food costs £1.76 versus £0.76 for least healthy food which is why Britain’s poorest households consume nearly 40 percent less fruit and vegetables than the richest fifth.

In the summer of 2023, the Brits, who were promised with Brexit maintenance of the high food standards imposed by the EU, ended, for starters, the inspection of meat products imported from Brazil. Following July 2023 advice from its Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, enhanced checks on beef, poultry and other Brazilian meat products ceased. So, no more Salmonella testing nor added certification tests.

The UK’s pork production is now the lowest in a decade. Importing pork is far cheaper, with Denmark accounting for over a quarter of UK pork imports, a figure that rises to 60 percent when imports from Germany and the Netherlands are included. In not quite yet four years since Brexit (yes, that’s all! though it feels like longer), that import market has grown in only one year since last August by 4,700 tonnes to 65,600 tonnes.

Globally, one of the biggest market increases is in instant noodles. Cheap, costing little in fuel to turn into a meal, they are delicious. In 2022, 121.2 billion servings were consumed worldwide, raising the daily salt intake of the adults eating them from 35 percent to as much as 95 percent, their ‘umami’ largely a result of their extremely elevated salt content.

It’s a market which includes continents like Africa, South America and parts of Asia where noodles are not part of traditional diets. In 2022, it was worth $50.7 billion. By 2032, it is projected to reach $99.8 billion. In Nigeria, instant noodle sales rocketed by 53 percent between 2018 and 2022. In smaller Kenya, serving sales leapt from 50 million to 130 million in the same period, in Colombia by 150 percent, and 110 in Egypt.

This is a recipe for one of my favourite processed foods - the kipper. ‘Processed’ by smoke, it doesn’t need a recipe nor any cooking skills.

The kipper is a herring split down its back, gutted and flattened then submitted to the salting or brining process. Then it’s cold smoked to cure it and flavour it with smoke without exposing it to heat. While originating in Scotland and the north of England, the real McCoy can be bought in the US off the internet, as it can in the UK. All you do to kippers is smear a dab of butter on them, set them under a hot broiler for 3-4 minutes until the butter has melted and the fish beginning to frizzle a little, then eat with hot buttered toast, for breakfast or at any time. If you don’t want a fish-reeking kitchen, ‘jug’ them by filling a large jug with boiling water. Then dive the kipper head first into it, its tail just above the surface, and leave it 5-6 minutes to heat through then pat it dry with paper towels. If you’d like to turn your kipper into supper, make a salad of thinly sliced oranges and onions to temper its oily richness.