This week's shortage

[Red Baron]

Exactly, Mo. I've added more tins to today's order.

[Redpig59]

There are plenty of tinned tomatoes.

[Phillip Phlopp]

Police have set up road blocks to stop desperate people from England entering Scotland to buy the ample stocks of fruit and veg there.

[Red Baron]

There are plenty of tinned tomatoes.

At the moment.....

They'll soon become currency....

[Caroline]

Plenty of fresh tomatoes on Altrincham market yesterday.....

[Phillip Phlopp]

This two minute twitter thread helps explain Tomatogate.

https://twitter.com/chrislowndes/status ... 3170706434

If you haven't got two minutes here's a TL/DR summary

We buy 40% of our tomatoes from Morocco
The government boasted of a great post-Brexit trade deal with the Moroccans with a new direct ferry route from Morocco to the UK to deliver those delicious tomatoes to the UK 24/7/365
Direct ferry route never happened
That little tinker Putin caused energy problems resulting in salad growers in northern EU European countries unwilling to heat greenhouses to grow early salad crops causing shortages there
Moroccan tomato exporters look at the logistics of exporting the finite quantities of their delicious products and had to decide who will get the tomato, the EU or the UK. The EU is one ferry over the water to Europe and then a road trip to the various customer countries or the UK, one ferry over the water to Europe and then a road trip and then another ferry to the UK, a country dominated by a handful of supermarkets who screw down the price they're prepared to pay the supplier.

Result? Empty shelves in UK supermarkets.

It is more complicated than that of course, best read the twitter thread.

[Phillip Phlopp]

[RockitRon]

Sainsbury's had plenty of tomatoes and peppers at the weekend, until some idiot posted a photo of an empty shelf on "social" media.

I've always tried to avoid the dregs of the Spanish/Canary/Moroccan tomato crop which our supermarkets import in winter. They're tough and tasteless, and don't keep very long.

There are still British and Dutch tomatoes to be had, much nicer if more expensive, as always.

[Phillip Phlopp]

'and don't keep very long' - it makes you wonder how much time has passed from picking to being put on the UK supermarket shelf.


If the UK customer was prepared to pay extra for locally grown food then the local food producer would grow it.

[Red Baron]

Same here, Ron. They're totally tasteless.

The tomatoes I ordered turned up. These ones are British.

I wonder why the great British public haven't worked out that panic buying veg/fruit doesn't work. How long before they go into the bin because they've gone off.

+ I'm not into this removal of best buy dates. It's just putting the waste onto us, I've had cucumbers go off a couple of days after they've been delivered.

I do use the local farm shop which has local produce.

[Redpig59]

I wonder why the great British public haven't worked out that panic buying veg/fruit doesn't work. How long before they go into the bin because they've gone off.

Because they are idiots.
Have you seen who they have voted for lately?

[Lisa]

Sainsbury's had plenty of tomatoes and peppers at the weekend, until some idiot posted a photo of an empty shelf on "social" media.

I've always tried to avoid the dregs of the Spanish/Canary/Moroccan tomato crop which our supermarkets import in winter. They're tough and tasteless, and don't keep very long.

There are still British and Dutch tomatoes to be had, much nicer if more expensive, as always.

Our Sainsburys had two scabby looking green peppers on Saturday and that was it.

[Redpig59]

People will just have to eat meat and pasta like normal folk.

[Phillip Phlopp]

[Phillip Phlopp]

A cheese manufacturer explains...

https://twitter.com/Exploding_Heads/sta ... 3966109699

[Poodlepan]

No fresh toms in Aldi tonight.

[Redpig59]

Oh well...never mind.

[Poodlepan]

I had to have tomato pesto with my big mushrooms and cheese tonight instead of fresh tomatoes, it was lovely though.

[Poodlepan]

Just as long as there's never a cheese shortage.

[Redpig59]

Can you imagine?