Price of pasta has now doubled in the UK

Most of us are feeling the pinch from the ongoing cost of living crisis and, unfortunately, the latest figures spell out bad news for pasta fans.

While the rate of inflation in the UK reportedly peaked at 11.1 percent in October of last year, the price of food just keeps going up - and sits at an eye-watering 16.7 percent.

News of the staggering increase in price was revealed by a BBC investigation which found that pasta now costs 95p when it was just 50p two years ago.

Needless to say, pasta is far from the only everyday item to significantly go up in price.

A basics shopping basket that would have set people back £15.79 in 2021 for 15 everyday essentials now costs a whopping £5.34 more - £21.13.

Take a humble jar of jam as another example - it would have cost you around 73p in 2021 but now, just two years later, you can expect to pay around £1.15.

Kay Staniland, the director at Assosia, a retail researcher and quality checker, said of the findings: "It's inflation on top of inflation at the moment."

While prices have been on the up for a long time, as we all know, the situation took another major hit with the ongoing war in Ukraine, which upped the price of gas and had a huge effect on the supply chain.

James Walton, chief economist at the IGD - a research charity - has speculated that we've not even seen the worst of inflation when it comes to the price of food.

But there is some good news, as while he expects inflation in this department to hit between 17-19 percent in the first half of 2023, he expects it will quickly start to fall after this peak.

Walton said: "The food supply chain is extremely complicated. The products can change hands many times, before they come to us as the consumer.

"And so it takes a long time for the costs increases at the start of the supply chain to be passed down all of the steps until we actually encounter them in the store."

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) reported the increase in prices of everyday essentials gives a heartbreaking insight into how the cost of living crisis is affecting people.

They found that one in five people have simply opted to eat smaller portions because they can't afford more.