seem to recall some debate on R4 re these suggested servings – one suggestion was that some foods contained high salt, sugar etc that for any sensible portion would place them well over the daily allowance and thus rate a red traffic light under the current UK labelling arrangements – small portion sizes avoided this.

Even your humble breakfast flakes, 30g portion barely covers the bottom (well half way up then) of a normal bowl !!

Just wonder how many customers actually take notice of the labels anyway!?

Looking at the larger population, they do not care what is printed on the packaging.

More informative is the number of slices. Seriously who amongst the readers knows the readers knows the average weight of a slice of pastrami and hence what 25g actually represents? As I would only ever have such an ingredient as one part of a larger collection one or two slices would be enough. Especially when considering the price,

During lockdown I realised just how short a time a packet of porridge or muesli lasted me as I was in the habit of half filling a deep bowl. I cut down to two heaped spoons, sometimes only one, which initially seemed drastic, but actually proved to be enough.

preserved meat is also on the watch list for nitrites which have suspected of being carcinogenic

as for porridge/museli – oats are still cheap, waitrose muesli is considerably cheaper than the fancy brands and you can always dilute it with either their base (abt 2/3rd the price) or as i usually do jumbo oats tho now the ‘health food’ shops tend not to sell the large 5kg bags that worked out much cheaper

Do I detect the recent onset of cabin fever? Is this a serious engineering discussion?

I find cornichons a bit intense, and prefer larger gherkins, sometimes sold as 'dill cucumbers'.

My dad was a German emigre and told me that when he was young in the 1920s (jeez, that's a century ago now!), kids would buy them wrapped in paper to eat like icecreams on hot days – and mild ones really are nice eaten like that. From English shops, I think Polish ones are best.

Like others, I reckon the pastrami portion size is deliberately understated on packaging so as to cut the allegedly 'suspect' content, especially saturated fats, sodium in general and nitrite in particular.