Ministry of teh Food [Slim]

Caught the first episode of Jamies Ministry of Food last night. It's a revival of the government drive to get people cooking at home at the start of the century. Jamies mission is to target chavs who can't cook and eat takeaways and ready meals and teach them some meals, and then get them to teach their mates, and make a happier healthier country.

It's a noble cause, but why is it even required? How did we get into the situation where people can't fry an egg? How can anyone on benefits afford to eat a takeaway every night? The producers probably did this intentionally, but there's one scene with a young mother in tears because she can't afford to bus it to the supermarket to buy food so has to go to the chippy, a moving scene that's punctuated by her dragging on a fag to the background noise of her massive flat screen TV. How have people reprioritised food out of their lives in this way?

One thing I'd add to his campaign is that that people also could do with learning to use leftovers more. We do at least one soup a week with leftovers that would normally go in the bin. For a family of five, that's a fair ole bit of dosh saved.

What I don't get also is the skills issue central to the show. I can understand this from a convenience standpoint, you can't be arsed to chop veg, you'd rather just heat it up. But if you can heat up an Tesco ready meal, you can heat up a raw spud and make it into a baked spud. Cover it with cheese and salad and you've got a meal. How is this in any way challenging?