It's based on vegetarianism and a belief that canned / processed food is shit that uses up lotsa metal and paper.

Every week I buy: 7 pints milk 38½p, 1½lb porridge 10p, 3lb wholemeal flour 18p, 3oz yeast 6p, dozen eggs 26p, ½lb nuts and raisins 8p, ½lb cheese 15p, 5lbs potatoes 10p, ½lb tomatoes 10p, ½lb mushrooms 15p, 1½lb fruit 15p, 1lb brown rice 10p, 1lb lentils 10p, cauliflower, cabbage, sprouts, onions, carrots, turnips, leeks, beetroot, cookers - about 60p. In all about £2.50.

This does easily for a week for one, feeds an occasional friend or two, and usually there's assorted oddments left over.

Fresh veg is cheap, full of goodness and prepared by you. Buy from the market. Take a large bag and have everything poured in (saves on paper). Cook in boiling water as quickly as possible in open pan. Save water for soup. Try grating veg. Invest in a pressure cooker from an Oxfam type shop.

Fruit - mostly 10p a pound, but see what's cheapest each week.

Breakfast cereal - porridge is the only decent one. Try making your own muesli: add nuts, raisins, fruit, milk.

Eggs - get only fresh farm, non-battery ones. Take your original boxes back for refilling.

Milk - is good, cheap, and comes in returnable bottles.

Cheese - cottage is cheap. The containers are a drag, but use the big 'uns as storage containers, plant pots, sandwich boxes.

Brown rice - can be bought in bulk (28lb) from most health food shops.

Take time to arrange the food on the plate, it makes it a helluva lot more appetising. Small mouthfuls (try chopsticks) and lotsa chewing make you full up.

If yer a nibbler, chew a carrot, eat a peach (?), peel an orange.

I think I eat well and cheaply - and make lotsa interesting combinations of food.

Pete.