A customer checks shelves at Asda amid UK fruit and vegetable shortages (Image: AP/Yui Mok)

It’s a crisis that defies the odds and has a peculiarly British dressing, reminding one of post-war rationing or petrol shortages of the 1970s. Nostalgia might be in vogue these days, but how retro can you make the humble tomato or captivating capsicum?

At a time when Brits normally turn their attention to the last rounds of the Premier League and the FA Cup, something is missing from the aisles and crispers of the country’s supermarkets and corner stores. Instead of a shortage of energy (especially gas), which many analysts forecast lasting until the end of winter, and a lack of jobs (ditto), it’s the core ingredients for a good salad are MIA.

It’s late winter in Britain and the economy is in a better place than previously thought, with lower debt thanks to an explosion in tax revenues following inflation and a strong jobs market. (Sound familiar, Treasurer Chalmers?) Activity across the economy is strengthening and energy prices have not taken as big a bite from incomes and the economy as predicted nine months ago.

But someone has made off with supplies of vegetables like tomatoes, capsicums, cucumbers and lettuce, leaving a gaping hole in the British diet — or, well, in their Big Macs and kebabs. On Wednesday, even Britain’s biggest supermarket group Tesco followed rivals Asda, Morrisons and Aldi in imposing customer purchase limits on some vegetables after supplies were hit by disrupted harvests in southern Europe and North Africa.

Morrisons announced limits of two per item on packs of tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce and capsicum, and Asda is restricting shoppers to three items each on eight fresh produce lines, including broccoli, cauliflower and raspberries.

On Wednesday, Tesco and Aldi joined the rationing, each limiting purchases of capsicums, cucumbers and tomatoes to three packs per customer.

I’m waiting for the latest shoplifting reports to appear — people caught with a pack of tomatoes under an anorak or a cucumber stuffed down their Levis. And if this goes on, watch for a new black market. A salad pack or two falling off the back of a lorry somewhere on the road from Dover, perhaps? Is Arthur Daley still in business?

The crisis has been exacerbated by lower winter production in greenhouses in Britain and the Netherlands due to high energy costs. This is partially because horticulture was excluded from the UK government’s Energy and Trade Intensive Industries scheme, which helps with energy costs. Obviously there’s a collective of salad-haters there in Whitehall (have you ever heard of an Eton old boy eating a salad?).

On Tuesday, Britain’s National Farmers Union head Minette Batters warned that production of salad ingredients is forecast to fall to its lowest level since records began in 1985. That’s when Maggie Thatcher was in her prime — and the iron lady knew a veggie or three and their importance to national morale. 

So how tough is it really? Well, some grocers say cafes and restaurants are turning up at their local supermarkets to snap up salads early in the morning before ordinary shoppers get up. Wholesale markets are running short and now it’s back to rationing to try and save the day.

The Financial Times warned that shortages and rationing could continue for weeks, so it must be serious. But with the Friday forecast for London around 8 degrees, it sounds more like a stew-and-mashed-spuds day anyway, or even a nice roast chook with rosemary and — thanks to global warming — a cheeky Sav Blanc from somewhere in Gloucestershire.