Firstly, there is no need to stockpile or buy more food than you normally would. If you are not ill and are only undertaking social distancing, you can still visit the shops to buy normal supplies. The government has no plan to close supermarkets and any shortages at the moment are only being caused by panic buying.
If you are sick and need to self-isolate, in most caes it will only be for two weeks and hopefully you will be able to ask others to help provide food if that’s necessary.
We’ve also got some tips from our Food Services Specialist Group to help you plan your shop and how to make best use of the food that you buy:
- Use up your fresh ingredients first. You don’t want any food to go to waste, so use up perishable ingredients before foods with a longer shelf life.
- Know what keeps longest. Fresh foods with relatively long shelf life includes root vegetables such as potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots, onions
- Carefully wash, rinse and drain salad leaves and fresh herbs and spin dry in a salad spinner, place into a suitable plastic storage tray, cover and keep refrigerated. By following this procedure your salads and fresh herbs will last for several more days than if just stored in the fridge un-covered.
- It might seem obvious but make sure you aren’t storing things in your fridge that don’t need to be in there. For example, fresh tomatoes, un-peeled onions, un-peeled jacket potatoes, whole butternut squashes don’t need to be stored refrigerated. Removing these items from your fridge and storing them in a cool dark place will free up fridge space for more perishable items.
- If you are stuck at home, take the opportunity to tidy and declutter your kitchen cupboards to free up space for ambient food products. This is a great opportunity to get rid of those unused & unwanted items that end up “living” in your valuable storage space. Remember to re-cycle as many of the items you are discarding as possible.
- If you do get sick, it is worth having a few easy to cook and prepare foods in the house on standby. Canned soups, microwavable rice and frozen ready meals are easy options that you can keep in stock in reasonable quantities if you don’t have the energy to prepare more complex recipes.
If you’re looking for recipe ideas or more advice on cooking and food preparation, our Let’s Get Cooking programme have some great advice. How about trying one of these great recipes:
