Channel 4 viewers have been left horrified by three university students being ‘moddycoddled’ by their mother, and wasting some £40-worth of her ingredients every month, despite not living with her.
On last night’s episode of Batch from Scratch: Cooking for Less, presenters Joe Swash and Suzanne Mulholland visited charter surveyor Fiona, 53, in Yorkshire.
Her children Lucy, 21, Finn, 20, and Archie, 19, are all students at nearby colleges but are still ‘home more than they’re away’.
Even though the trio are all on student loans, Fiona is still supporting them and does all of the shopping in the house.
And those tuning in were baffled to see how much food they ended up binning, how messy they left the kitchen, and how unbalanced their diets were.
Recently divorced Fiona – who had to move to full-time work to make ends meet and provide more for her children – confided how her new long hours means she struggles to plan family meals, and the kitchen has become ‘free for all’.
‘It would be that question, “what’s for tea?”, and if I say I’m not sure they just go “oh ok I’ll get my own”,’ she shared.
‘It’s about just thinking about each other and planning and it’s good to just have that time together I think.’
Channel 4 viewers have been left horrified by three university students being ‘moddycoddled’ by their mother, and wasting some £40-worth of her ingredients every month, despite not even living with her
Those tuning in were baffled to see how much food they ended up binning, how messy they left the kitchen, and how unbalanced their diets were
But many were frustrated about how much of the responsibility Fiona was taking on by herself.
‘Jesus, how many adults in that house and things are virtually walking out of the fridge,’ one wrote on X. ‘Do none of the “children” think to clear out stuff whilst cooking for themselves. Ridiculous!’
‘What age are these “children” exactly,’ another questioned. ‘This isn’t all on the poor mum?’
A third remarked: ‘All the blame doesn’t belong on the mum, the kids are adults! They better make them take responsibility too.’
Speaking on the programme, the students admitted it is also ‘hard’ for them to cook because there is always someone crowding the kitchen, or using up the ingredients.
‘Everyone’s all over the place,’ Finn said.
‘They eat a large quantity,’ Fiona added. ‘A pack of mince for me, I might’ve made it feed four people. They’ve managed to eat it between two of them.’
Fiona’s hectic new work life means she has also been straddled with cleaning the messy kitchen as well as trying to balance her day-to-day life.
During the episode, the presenters taught the family a series of batch meals they could make – with more veg and fibre on the menu than their usual fare
‘Nowadays I would potentially skip meals and have a couple of biscuits basically,’ she said.
A lot of the meals consumed by her kids were also red-meat-rich, with veg nearly always ignored.
‘In seven days there was only one day where they weren’t eating red or processed meat,’ Joe revealed.
‘One of the weeks we looked at, the boys had four kilograms of red or processed meat,’ Suzanne added. ‘Now that is four as much times as the government recommendation.
‘While eating protein is important, eating more than 500 grams of red or processed meat means you could be more likely to develop health issues like bowel cancer.’
‘I’m providing it aren’t I,’ said Fiona. ‘So I actually if I bought other things they’d have to eat other things.’
During the episode, the presenters taught the family a series of batch meals they could make – with more veg and fibre on the menu than their usual fare.
The new plan is set to save her £4,470 a year – and 274 hours, as well as eating 60 per cent less red, processed meat.
‘We’ve learned loads of new things, haven’t we,’ Finn said. ‘To help us out as well, which is great, and help each other.’
