People are eating more takeaway food today than before the Pandemic.
Some new research from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) suggests that our consumption of takeaway food increased during the lockdowns, and that this habit has stayed with us post-lockdowns.
Takeaway consumption was around 400 calories per week per person in the first quarter of 2022, 50% above pre-pandemic levels.
In terms of calories consumed, this increase in takeaway calorie consumption has come at the expense of calories consumed in coffee shops, pubs and restaurants.
Calories bought outside the home.
It would seem that people are consuming less on food when they are 'out out' but more on food cooked outside the home and delivered to them!
A lazy trend...?
What I find most interesting about this is how it doesn't sync with either the cost of living or the decline in people working...
There are more people off sick today than there before the Pandemic, more people on low-incomes, we're facing a cost of living crisis, which includes the cost of food going up.
So we've got a situation of people with less money and more time and yet still people are buying MORE fast food and takeaways than before the Pandemic...
One would have thought ppeople would be consuming FEWER calories bought outside the home, and MORE calories bought in the form of raw ingredients and cooked inside the home as it's somewhere between 2-5 times cheaper depending on the food items to do this.
However I guess it depends on what people are switching from... as the analysis says people have SWAPPED more expensive eating out with less expensive takeaways.
Consumption Patterns...
I mean let's face it 400 calories a week on a takeout isn't really a decent meal!
So this isn't people doing this EVERY day, it's a mixture of your smaller mid-week and weekend 'quick breakfast or dinner' from Mcdonalds by Uber Eats once a week or your monthly blowout.
You want to be on at least 1000 calories for a proper takeout IMHO, THE large Dominos or MASSIVE FISH AND CHIPS, ideally twice that to have a decent nosh, maybe even more!
This is actually probably around what I buy out, excluding meal deals...
Meal Deals not that popular...?
At only 50 calories a day on average bought on lunches etc. in Supermarkets, clearly meal deals aren't that popular, or maybe it's that they're healthier, this is by calories!
That's one a week on average per person, maybe that is about right for some of the working population!
Although I would have thought this would have been higher as a proportion over all...?
Perhaps my love of a decent Meal Deal isn't shared by the nation after all!
Each to their own, I guess!
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We have take-away less than once a week on average as a treat. I do like fish and chips or a nice Indian, but it is expensive these days. Standard fish and chips is about a tenner. What we have done is have more meal kits. We've done Gusto, Hello Fresh and Riverford. Those meals are probably under a fiver each. One of the good things is that we get much more variety in our food with interesting flavours whilst using natural ingredients rather than processed stuff. If I lived alone then cooking might be more of a daily chore and take-aways more tempting.
Fish and Chips my favourite take out! I might have to try Helo Fresh £5 doesn't sound too bad for a meal!
I think people don't want to spend time for cooking anymore, at least on weekdays.
Whenever all our friends visit such beautiful places, we love to sit and eat there because their decorations and hotels are so beautiful.
Are you sure it isn't just a result of averages? Like, the people who get the meals are 600 or 1,500 calories or whatever, but because there's a bunch of people getting 0 calories that way, since they don't deliever at all, the average is reduced to 400.
Similarly how the 'average' birth rate is, say, 1.2. You can't have 0.2 of a child.
Anyway, we order every day, every meal. It's flipped. We cook 'on special occasions' or maybe some weekends, kinda thing.
It's actually pretty normal in cities across Asia. Deliveries + Food is generally cheaper and, of course, far more convenient, than groceries (which you normally also get delivered), and many regular people simply don't use fridges and long-term storage of food for various reasons.
The culture here is just one of massively overworking. Your official work hours might end at 7,8pm, but it just continues into the night, weekends, vacation. For many, there's just literally no time to even step foot in a kitchen, let alone prep something fresh.
Nowadays, there's a ton of healthy options which simply wouldn't be viable doing it yourself for that kinda price - at least in my city.