Food on a pension: what's it like to shop, cook and eat when you're old?

Andrew Webb looks at the eating habits of the elderly, and tries to cook while wearing a suit that mimics some of the most common conditions that afflict them, with interesting results.

My right knee is stiff, and I’m unbalanced by the extra weight on my left ankle. But the worst thing is I can barely see. I’ve taken a leap forward into my own possible future, thanks to a set of empathy tools provide by Age UK that mimic the most common physical ailments affecting the elderly. Aside from the weights on my legs, I’m wearing a set of glasses that give me macular degeneration. I’ve also got on gloves that reduce skin sensitivity and produce the effects of arthritis in my hands. Finally, I’ve a set of ear plugs that make me partially deaf. Dressed like this I attempt to go to the shops and cook a meal. The reason I’m doing this is for Radio 4’s The Food Programme, looking at food and the elderly. You can listen to the show on the iPlayer or get the podcast here. 

No such thing as ‘The Elderly’

The first thing I learnt is that there’s no one single group we can call, ‘the elderly’. Some retirees I met during the programme were fit as fiddles, having paid into and enjoyed the fruits of the welfare state all their lives. They also might have final salary pensions and paid-off mortgages. And yet I meet others who are struggling, suffering not only with living on a basic state pension of £104.45 a week, but also the mental, social and physical aliments I’m about to experience. But before I do that, I hit the road to find out what pensioners are actually having for lunch.

The Ambrette

The Ambrette is a fine dining Indian restaurant in Margate, and on the day I visited - Sunday - it was fully booked. It wasn’t always this way according to chef and owner Dev Bismal, who said that lunchtime trade nearly ruined his business. 

“We tried buffets, and attempted to chase the business market, but there’s not much of that round here,” says Dev. Dev was going to close for lunch, but then inspiration hit: he and marketing manager Emma Cooper would try and woo pensioners and retirees in for lunch, of which there are plenty in this corner of Kent. 

“It’s saved our business,” said Emma. They now offer a discount card to the over 60s that gives members a three course lunch (with extra amuse-bouches) Monday to Sunday for £10.95, rather than the normal £19.95. “The beauty of it is that the discount applies to the whole table, as long as the card holder books in their name and presents their card in person.” One upshot of this is that the restaurant has heard of cases of people saying, ‘shall we bring your mother?’ after being told about the scheme when booking. 

I asked Dev whether there’s a cultural dimension to this; a respect for older family members we seem to have lost in the country. He agrees. “Senior family members are like umbrellas in Indian family life - they are like great trees which the whole family shelters under.” 

So have they had to make any menu or dietary concessions towards the senior diner? “No, the only thing we’ve changed in response to their feedback was the chairs. People said they were too hard, so we’ve put cushions on them,” said Emma. The Ambrette has done a wonderful thing: they’ve targeted and then looked after a group in society most restaurateurs dismiss in favour of enticing young adults. But according to Age UK, the amount of money spent annually by people over the age of 65 in the UK is over £100 billion. As Emma says, “who else has got the leisure time and disposable income to have a long lunch at the start of the week?” 

Age UK day care centre

The people who use Age UK’s Yalding Centre in Bermondsey, South London also like a good meal. For some of them, it may be the only hot meal they eat that day. As you’ll hear in the programme, many local authority day centres are facing a tough time because of the cuts. Yalding is safe, but many others haven’t been so lucky. “I’d be devastated if this centre close,” said Violet, a spritely lady who still cooks at home, but enjoys the company and social elements the centre provides. Other guests are more advanced in years, or have physical impediments caused by strokes, so find cooking at home very difficult. For all of them, this centre is a lifeline, and many come here everyday. “It’s a youth club for us oldies!” says one guest.

I ask a lady called Margaret who’s lived in the area all her life about her memories of food. “We bought everything fresh, right here on The Blue (the central high street of shops in Bermondsey). My mum would cook a big joint on Sunday, and in those days we always ate our main meal in the middle of the day, as my dad would come home from work. I still prefer to eat like that,” she said.

Today’s menu is tomato soup or salad, followed by roast chicken or beef stew with roast potatoes and vegetables, and apple pie for pudding, and tea or coffee, all for £5.50. Manning the stoves is Kenny Kenhide, who has to keep a close eye not only his budget, but also things like salt and fat levels, as well as other dietary requirements the guests may have. I’m invited to stay for lunch, and have to say that the food is fresh, well cooked and tasty. Centres like this are vital. According to Fiona Callister of Age UK, three million old people are or are at resk of being malnurished, and 93% of them live in the community. 

An 80-year-old me in the kitchen

So, how did I do after ‘time travelling’ into my own future to shop for and cook something simple? Well, it wasn’t easy. Jane Barmer from Age UK said I may start to feel withdrawn after a while in the suit, which I at first dismissed. How bad could it be? We’d arranged to do my shopping at Morrisons, and while the staff there couldn’t have been more helpful, after two hours I was getting more and more frustrated. There was one particular moment, where I was struggling along and a lady suddenly zipped past me from behind. It’s something I’m sure we’ve all done, quickly brushed passed an old person. But I hadn’t seen her coming due to the suit, and it made me jump. 

Having got what I thought I needed to make scrambled eggs, I headed for the checkout. Here Jane gives me a purse with my money in, which again proved a struggle finding the right coins. So far, it’s taken me over an hour to do something that ordinarily would have taken me 15 minutes; I’ve had enough. “Let’s have a sit down and a cup of tea,” I say, but the tea machine is a fancy touch screen automatic thing and I can’t see the controls or figure it out. “Forget it,” I say, plonking myself down on a seat. We make the decision to end the experiment and I take of the glasses. Everything shoots into high definition 3D and saturated colours; I have my senses back! Jane tells me that most of the eye diseases suffered by older people are treatable if caught early, and I make a mental note to book an opticians appointment. 

Back at home

At home I put the goggles back on and try another set of gloves Jane has that have electric wires attached to a power pack. These give my hands small electric shocks that produce the uncontrollable shaking associated with conditions such as Parkinson’s disease. I then attempt to make scrambled eggs. Cracking the eggs is perhaps the trickiest bit, as the 1..2..3..crack! run-up you take before striking the egg on the rim of the pan becomes 1..2..3..4..5..6..thud. What I eventually turn out isn’t up to my usual standard, being overcooked and rubbery. And I didn’t have time to do any toast. 

Next I try to chop an onion, something fundamental to most savoury recipes. Suddenly a task I can normally do whilst listening to the radio, drinking wine, and chatting to my wife all at the same time suddenly takes massive amounts of concentration. And that was just one onion. You can see why some old people living alone just give up cooking; it’s hot, heavy, dangerous and too tiring. It’s easier to live on tea, biscuits and the odd sandwich. Cooking is such a big part of my life; it’s not only my job, it’s also how I relax and I take joy and pride in putting a meal on the table for my family. To lose these things must be devastating, and I for one am genuinely worried.

So what have I learned?

For some over 60s people, life is great: long lunches, cruises, strolls around the garden centre, and suppers with the grandchildren. For others there is nothing but malnutrition, loneliness, the loss of the ability to prepare a meal, and the spectre of mental deterioration in the form of dementia. 

I’m left with the sense that when it comes to old age, when you give up, you’re half gone. The guests at The Ambrette told me that by getting dressed up and coming out they force themselves to interact with society, to be seen, to meet people and to keep the flame alive. The pensioners at the Age UK day centre go nearly every day for stimulation, whether they know it or not. Food and drink are such binding human experiences, whether it be a big family Sunday lunch, or supper on the sofa. Cooking and eating together with friends and loved ones helps define who we are. I’ve had a glimpse of what it might be like to lose that, and met people at the front line who are hanging on to that ideal.

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