Feed me now, Seymour

Whether it's rating the best mince pie, talking about creative ads or comparing family traditions, the Christmas season is here. But, says Dr Nick Wilkinson, Officer for Wales, what are our national priorities when it comes to food security?
A mince pie with a star shape

One way to justify eating my body weight in mince pies is to make it task oriented. So at the end of November I determined we as a family needed to run our own taste test. This required an initial scoping exercise of assessment criteria, writing of lists, pilots of cold and warm pies, assessment of the legitimacy of frangipani toppings... and by the beginning of December I had already eaten the average person’s intake for the whole of Christmas. A good start!

Why? Perhaps it’s my duty to this very British tradition of yuletide joy. Records of the ‘mynst pye’ go back to the early medieval period, but nowadays this British traditional bake has morphed from the Tudor rectangular shaped pies to the fun, decorated, double-bite sized sweet treats, consumed in the UK at a rate of 800 million per year.1  

If we take a median price of 17 pence (range 8-42p) per commonly available mince pie, that’s a bill of £136 million, or 0.11% of a total UK Christmas food bill of £12 billion2 - a lot of pies, a lot of food and a lot of money.

Food should be fun, as well as safe and healthy, and this sentiment can be found in another of our seasonal reveries - the Christmas ad. This year we saw a celebrity carrot awarded cheese (keys) to a Wonka type paradise and great lengths of table heaving under the weight of perfectly glazed food - although I have to object to the characterisation of the sprout, nor is there ever any mention of the inspired Brussels sprout satay (recipe available by return). 

Christmas foods and Christmas ads, always steeped in tradition, make a big splash and whether it's rating the best mince pie, talking about creative ads or comparing family traditions, you know Christmas is around the corner. 

However, this year we’ve also seen a renewed attention to others less fortunate. One grocer has withheld from advertising, reallocating the elaborate cost of producing a Christmas ad to lower the cost of their food and another has promoted donating presents, even if it’s given by that common and garden, usually bin raiding critter from the US, the racoon. Not sure that quite works for me and nor does a venus fly trap - if you watch carefully I think you’ll see there is one fewer child, Audrey, by the close of the ad. Little shops of horrors. 

So despite everything we don’t get it quite right. The ease of the indulgent pie makes me a little irksome by the afternoon, less said about corpulence, and our national priorities feel a little off kilter. This is not bah humbug, just how do we create more opportunity. It does seem to be an own goal when funding pressures mean withdrawal of a vital asset for the most vulnerable, such as holiday access to free school meals. This is at a time of increased fuel costs, disproportionately high levels of child poverty and greater expectations on families. 

Food insecurity results in sporadic meals, often unhealthy food choices and changes in mood and behaviour, whereas a consistent healthy diet improves school participation and educational outcome, vitally needed when persistent absence from school has shot up and shows no sign of abating. To fund free school meals in Wales over the winter holidays would cost £6 million – this seems small compared to the total money spent on the consumption of mince pies, if that is for me alone!

Case history

A six-year old child presented with irritability and discomfort and what felt like bony swelling partially restricting her knees. The child has learning difficulties and neurodiversity and for the preceding few months would only eat tinned custard. There was no clear evidence of inflammation and gut involvement was confined to some bleeding of the gums with minor bruising. Xrays showed thinning of the bones and a pencil outline with subperiosteal opacities from haemorrhages - characteristic features of scurvy.

To me, this case history drew attention to the importance of a dietary history and how quickly vitamin stores can become depleted.