![]() But global coffee reserves are at their lowest for two decades, and inflation plus climate change has pushed bean costs up and up.Įven instant coffee, which is made with cheaper beans, is getting pricier, so where will we get our caffeine hits? Are we going to give up and switch to turmeric lattes and fancy herbal teas? Or will we all hop ourselves up on caffeine-rich energy drinks? (Frankly, most of us will probably swallow the price increase – have you ever tried to quit?) Mustard CoffeeĬoffee is a big deal in the UK – we drink 95 million cups a day (snapping at the heels of tea, at 100 million cups). Then there is silken tofu which, with a pinch of black salt, makes a passable scramble or frittata and in baking, bananas, apple sauce and ground flax seeds all act as neutral-tasting binders. There’s no easy substitute for boiled eggs and soldiers, so we may all need to buy a hen, but vegans swear by egg alternative aquafaba, the leftover cooking liquid in tins or jars of legumes, which can be used to make surprisingly good mayonnaise or whipped into meringues. ![]() Given that we each eat more than 200 eggs a year in the UK, that could pose a bit of a problem. The price of chicken feed has gone up nearly 50%, and egg farmers say their margins are almost non-existent, so a shortage is predicted by the end of the year. Whether it’s unaffordable or unavailable, here are the items you might be missing, and what you can use to fill the gaps. There is still enough food to go around, though, so rather than panic, it’s time to think laterally. The UK has to import about half its food supply, and here – unlike in poorer countries – people are going hungry not because of a lack of food on supermarket shelves, but because they can’t afford to buy it. When supply chains get choked up or farmers can’t make ends meet, food becomes expensive, fast. Nor is it just about shortages: food inflation is predicted to hit between 15 and 20% this year. Many chefs advocate putting animal protein to the side, and making it less important in a meal We produce a lot of food here: the UK is close to self-sufficient in grains such as barley and oats – although 2020 was a bad year for wheat – but the global grain shortage caused by the war in Ukraine still has knock-ons for us, ratcheting up feed and fuel prices, and making it harder to produce dairy, eggs and meat. When you’re used to being able to buy anything you like, it’s a shock to be reminded just how global this island’s food supply really is. It’s not just lettuce: thanks to a combination of war, weather, and rising energy and feed prices, the UK could see less of everything from mustard to coffee, wine to risotto rice. It wasn’t just one shop – because of strikes in Spain, fuel costs and the weather, none of the supermarkets had any. But this spring, I couldn’t get hold of any lettuce – hardly a crisis, except I was writing a book about salad. I have known about the frailty of the UK’s supply chains for a long time – I first wrote about the problem over a decade ago, and I too survived the great loo roll shortage of 2020.
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