The supermarket picky bits war has begun – and the British tapas fight is quite unhinged

Great British Aisles: the picky bits epidemic shows Britain increasingly wants to eat like it’s on holiday – and, thanks to heatwaves, it increasingly feels like it is - (Getty/iStock)

We’re all familiar with the millennial picky-bit tea: Babybels, olives, leftover roast chicken, mystery charcuterie, more cheese, definitely more pickles than necessary and whatever else can be assembled with minimal effort. Eventually, someone rebranded the whole thing as “girl dinner”, which made eating half a baguette, six cornichons and a family-sized tub of hummus sound less like giving up and more like a lifestyle choice.

Now, though, it has evolved into something else entirely and invariably involves burrata, giant butter beans with chorizo and £50-a-kilo Serrano and Iberico cheese “rollitos”.