Now, as many of you will be aware, your humble correspondent earns his corn in part by knocking out fodder. I chef, in other words. I'm reliably informed that I'm reasonable enough at it; I'd like to think so, I try to take a bit of pride in what I do, anyhow. I think it's pretty good, and I have a small core of very happy, very regular, customers.
Note the small part.
Now, I owe a lot to ormskirk. I owe it my higher education and my postgraduate eucation. I owe it my ability to lecture, I owe it a home, approx. ten thousand anecdotes and one book of poems. But, of late, dear old Ormy has been trying my patience somewhat.
This is a town notable for its preponderance of "bakers". Amusingly enough, some of them refer to themselves as "craft bakers". I was unaware that heating up bussed in chicken and mushroom slices qualified as "craft bakery" but we'll let that slide for now. Recently a new "baker" emerged, refreshing in its directness and honesty. Good readers of Coastalblog, I give you Pound Bakery.
That's right people. Sandwiches? That'll be one whole pound! Two ersatz pasties? One pound to you squire! Eight barm cakes? By jiminy, it's a quid! A bacon barm? Go on, guess. By george, I think he's got it, one hundred new pence. Roll up!
Now some of you may not be recoiling in horror at this point, you may be sipping your sprite/lagavulin/smoothy/green tea/cheeky vimto (delete as applicable) wondering what on earth I'm driving at. So okay, some maths.
Most food retail operates at over 66% G.P. That is to say more 66% of what they sell is profit on stock, as it needs to be to pay overheads, rates, staff etc and factor wastage in. Therefore, if you buy two "pasties" (as a cornishman I shudder to type it even in inverted commas) for one pound then (let's be generous, let's say it's 66%, I'm prepared to bet actual cash money that their G.P's closer to the 80% mark, but for argument's sake...) the actual food cost of those "pasties" is 17.5 pence each, probably significantly less. Of this about four pence is pastry, tuppence dried onion and seasoning, leaving you with eleven penn'orth of meat. The cheapest mince retails at around the £3 a kilo mark, and we're talking the worst, most tube-filled and anonymous mince here. Eleven pence of that gets you about 30g of meat. Your average "bakery" pastry weighs about 200g. Work it out. Have a think. then throw up.
So how's it doing in our proud market town? Our little abode with housing through the roof and expensive clothes shops up the wazoo? Queues out the fucking door, mate. Much to coastalblog's grim amusement a woman holding a grand's worth of handbag came out of there this very morning ramming a frankly distressing barm in her gob.
So, Ormskirk, you'll pay through the nose for clobber, for housing, for cars, for anything people can look at, point at, measure. But you'll only pay a quid for your lunch. You people are fucking weird.
Note the small part.
Now, I owe a lot to ormskirk. I owe it my higher education and my postgraduate eucation. I owe it my ability to lecture, I owe it a home, approx. ten thousand anecdotes and one book of poems. But, of late, dear old Ormy has been trying my patience somewhat.
This is a town notable for its preponderance of "bakers". Amusingly enough, some of them refer to themselves as "craft bakers". I was unaware that heating up bussed in chicken and mushroom slices qualified as "craft bakery" but we'll let that slide for now. Recently a new "baker" emerged, refreshing in its directness and honesty. Good readers of Coastalblog, I give you Pound Bakery.
That's right people. Sandwiches? That'll be one whole pound! Two ersatz pasties? One pound to you squire! Eight barm cakes? By jiminy, it's a quid! A bacon barm? Go on, guess. By george, I think he's got it, one hundred new pence. Roll up!
Now some of you may not be recoiling in horror at this point, you may be sipping your sprite/lagavulin/smoothy/green tea/cheeky vimto (delete as applicable) wondering what on earth I'm driving at. So okay, some maths.
Most food retail operates at over 66% G.P. That is to say more 66% of what they sell is profit on stock, as it needs to be to pay overheads, rates, staff etc and factor wastage in. Therefore, if you buy two "pasties" (as a cornishman I shudder to type it even in inverted commas) for one pound then (let's be generous, let's say it's 66%, I'm prepared to bet actual cash money that their G.P's closer to the 80% mark, but for argument's sake...) the actual food cost of those "pasties" is 17.5 pence each, probably significantly less. Of this about four pence is pastry, tuppence dried onion and seasoning, leaving you with eleven penn'orth of meat. The cheapest mince retails at around the £3 a kilo mark, and we're talking the worst, most tube-filled and anonymous mince here. Eleven pence of that gets you about 30g of meat. Your average "bakery" pastry weighs about 200g. Work it out. Have a think. then throw up.
So how's it doing in our proud market town? Our little abode with housing through the roof and expensive clothes shops up the wazoo? Queues out the fucking door, mate. Much to coastalblog's grim amusement a woman holding a grand's worth of handbag came out of there this very morning ramming a frankly distressing barm in her gob.
So, Ormskirk, you'll pay through the nose for clobber, for housing, for cars, for anything people can look at, point at, measure. But you'll only pay a quid for your lunch. You people are fucking weird.
Comments
Post a Comment