Just got to the uk last week to do a 3week tour visiting family and i really miss my salads and schnitzels!
Picked up a few old faves long the way, gregs pasty for on the move shopping, english bbq stuff, pizza etc etc.
All i have to say, is yuck. Only been in switzerland since april but tastebuds have adapted to not wanting stodge.
I never noticed it before when i lived here but i think i understand why england is getting so fat.
And the fat kids? I never noticed them before! Theres so many, i am used to 'normal' figured children over here!
So as much as i love england, all the food i thought i missed, i probably dont! (bar dairy milk! Mmmm...)

I just simply can not agree with this, but maybe the clue is in "Greggs"

Well it all depends on you really. Its pretty lame to say that just because you can't see, or be bothered to see anything else, everything is stodge You could live on Greggs if that's all your willing to see, just like most Swiss office workers near to me seem to live on that shite from the Migros take away at lunch.
The UK is streets ahead of Switzerland when it comes to diversity & choice of food - esspecially when it comes to lunch/food on the go - Don't want a pasty then go to an M&S or a Pret or a local sandwich shop that have dozens of fillings - where you'll find all sorts of yummy & healthy things. Christ - they've even got Waitrose in motorway service stations now.
Not to mention the Street food revolution that's kicking off in London & starting to spread across the country.

You've only been here for 4 months - come back after another 4, when you've paid yet another 7 francs for a small roll with a slice of cheese & a single gherkin or a sweaty slice of quiche, and have this conversation again

I agree with you. There is a lot of stodge sold. The quality of the food here is much better than in the UK. It is more expensive though, BUT - to get FRESH food in the UK also costs a lot.

I despair at the microwaved Brake Brothers rubbish that the majority of pubs and cafes serve in the UK. Try and find me any "pop in" place in the UK that serves food which is anything close to the Marche motorway services here.

I agree that there is good street food in London now - but it is quite limited, hopefully it will spread.

And I'm not sure when the words Pret a Manger and "healthy" were last accurately used together - but its quite a marketing trick they pull off. A smoothie and a sandwich from Pret has (in most cases) more calories than anything that McD's sell

No, it's not.

No, it doesn't (compared to CH)
I paid £23 for 840g of lamb racks from Selfridges food hall last week.

GB 23 for a piece of meat that serves three? That's why mums go to Iceland. And therein lies the problem.

Thanks for that

I think what I said is true. You don't. That's what makes the world go around

Or two?! You won't get much more than 450g of meat from that much lamb rack. How sure how that supports the point that UK fresh food isn't cheap

Last time I bought a beef fillet in the UK I got 900g for less than £25 - in Sainsbury's not Iceland. That fed at least four people and was accompanied by a selection of health sides dishes.

Health, good quality foods at reasonable prices are readily available in the UK if you can be bothered to cook them instead of hitting 'Greggs'.

Four actually, but you've kind of missed my point.
£23 from Selfridges. i.e. top quality & probably one of the most expensive places in the UK to buy such a piece.

How much d'you reckon that same weight of average quality lamb rack from a Migros meat counter costs?

Anyway, I digress - lets not turn this into a UK/CH price comparison.

Like for like, CH is no better quality wise than the UK. You can pay through the nose in both places, just as you get average quality produce from the major supermarket chains in both.
Sure, the UK has more than it's fair share of crap fast food, but go outside of the cities in CH & you're pretty stuffed too.

What the UK does have though is a thing called competition, which means that actually, there is a choice for most wallet sizes & tastes -doesn't matter if you're a millionaire or a pauper, you're both stuck with a 20 franc plate of Bratwurst & chips or Spag Bol in most ski/mountain/country restaurants [in CH] for example.

Every time I had a sandwich from Prett, it contained so much sauce, I felt like I needed a bath afterwards!

You have to admit that even if British food doesn't measure with its Swiss counterpart, the British pantomime still does.

I think that the truth is somewhere in the middle.

In terms of dining out (from very casual to high-end), I would say that food in Switz would score a high average. You very rarely get truly bad food here, but equally you also rarely get amazing food here. It's very often just OK, does the job, pleasant enough. This is based on a culinary scene with relatively limited choice of styles/ethnicities.

By contrast, the UK is much more like the US in this regard. You are far more likely to get a really bad meal than in Switz, but by the same token, it is also far easier (and cheaper!) to find absolutely amazing food, too. There are way more outliers. There's also a considerably greater choice in types/ethnicities/styles of food.

I think that say's more about your eating habits, or other peoples TBH. Anyone who eats pasties or fish and chips too much and will end up like a telly tubby. It's more about what you eat really and that largely is personal choice, walk past the chippy, burger bar or pie shop and you'll find plenty of healthy alternatives in the UK... It's whether someone chooses to do it that counts.

I think what you said is nonsense TBH. Rubbish food can be found anywhere including here, most just earn more and pay more for it here. Good fresh food is widely available in the UK and more varied than here for much less. If you want to look for processed rubbish you will find it, and a plate of cod and chips is nice and always on the menu when I go back, but I wouldn't dream of it every day.

I think most food here is monotonous and bland, and the number of WOW meals (excluding the size of the bill) I've had here in 4 years is small.
Just because food bought in CH has a white cross rather than from Blighty and sporting a Union Jack doesn't make it any better... honestly

Maybe you are right. But if you go to a typical British high street with its Wetherspoons etc, I think you are much more likely to get frozen / reheated food than here where I think you are more likely to get something prepared on the premises with a little more freshness and character. But I agree that a mass produced sandwichin Migros is as crap as one in tesco!

Cant' argue against Wetherspoons, my 85 year old uncle took me to one for lunch last year in Preston That was probably the worst thing ever to be put on a plate (well mostly on a plate) I've ever encountered, and served with all the warmth and charm of a Dr's receptionist. They were charging £4.99 for 2 meals, the menu did look good... it just tasted awful. The place was packed to, and I didn't see a man with a gun forcing folks in, so banging shit out at a very low price seems to be a winner for them.

I took him to a cafe a few days later, about the same time of day and not 100m from the hateful Wetherspoons (which he suggested again), and we had 2 grilled chicken salads that I didn't know whether to eat or climb they where so big, cruchy veggies a well cooked moist chicken breast, with dressing on the side not drowning the thing, with still warm crusty bread for £8 for the 2, and it was no where near full... case rested

I'll stick up a bit for Spoons as I worked there for a while. A lot of stuff is reheated, and if you are paying £4.99 for two servings of spaghetti bolognese it would be naive to expect anything else. Things like steak, burgers and breakfasts are done from scratch, and the ingredients are from Brakes who supply many restaurants. Some stuff is rubbish I grant you, but stick to the burgers and steaks and you get decent value. We certainly had no shortage of people in - we did about 350 curries every Curry Club night in a smallish pub...

My Swiss experience is limited as I've only been for a recce trip, but I popped into Migros to get a sense of the place and I thought the veg selection was much better than my local Sainsburys. Price is another issue obviously...

Back in the UK we always went to a weatherspoons.............for the price of the beer!

Two burger meals for £5 was just an added convenience

My experience is a bit different. In the UK I lived close enough to a Tesco Extra, a regular Tesco, Sainsbury's, Waitrose and ASDA. Here, I live close to a Migros MM, a Migros M, a huge Coop (the Silbern one, Tesco Extra size), and a smaller Coop. I find the fruit and veg selection here to be a bit better than Waitrose (the Waitrose near me wasn't a large one) and ASDA but no where near the Tesco Extra I usually shopped at. The quality, however, is on par with ASDA, which I considered to have the lowest quality of the supermarkets I used to shop at in the UK. I haven't found much at Waitrose quality. There will always be exceptions, but in general, that's what I've found.

As a Londoner, we have a vast range of different foods.

If you choose to eat in a place where they buy from caterers & sell at low prices, about the only thing consider safe / eat able (edible) is a steak.

OP is correct re the amount of fat children & adults now in UK, due to lack of understanding of food content. UK is following on from USA where they have that problem with all the use of corn and it side residues, that started believe the time of Nixon era.

Switzerland produces excellent Bread.
We in UK have so many rubbish bakers - there is a name for the way they make the bread that I cannot remember.
Usually try and look for Italian, Jewish, Greek or individual baker with reputation