Maeve organised a trip for the Wine Circle to Springhead Brewery, Laneham, North Nottinghamshire (http://www.springhead.co.uk/)
We had a fantastic time: good food, interesting tour, marvellous beers. I commend a visit to any who have not been. I think that, if I live a good life, Springhead might be where they send me when I die.
My only negative observation is that they’re far better brewers than photographers.
We had dinner with a six friends from the wine circle at the Royal Oak in Aubourn on Saturday night. After a fine repast, I was stuffed to the gunwales with piggely pie, loitering in the bar area, finishing my pint of Black Sheep best bitter. Sid called out to me “Rob, help me”. I turned to find him slumped backwards across bar and bar stool, looking decidedly dodgy. I rushed to him and caught him as he began to slide to the floor. His usually pink complexion had turned greenish grey, he was sweating profusely but felt cold, whilst losing consciousness. Now I knew Sid was diabetic, so I guessed he was suffering a hypo, wrestled him back onto his stool and asked the barmaid to call an ambulance. “Not nice but no cause for panic” thought I. As an afterthought, I checked Sid’s pulse: nothing. Checked the other wrist and carotid: still nothing. Forget the “no need to panic” comment: Sid is dying.
I shouted Maeve and Elsie, Sid’s wife, over and we dragged Sid onto one of the padded bench seats. Still no detectable pulse, but he was breathing and wandering in and out of consciousness. So I called for quiet and listened to his chest. His heart seemed to be thumping away at a reasonable pace: so why didn’t he have a pulse? I no longer thought Sid was dying but I couldn’t make sense of the symptoms he presented.
Ten minutes later, Sid was waking up and regaining some colour, as the paramedic arrived. She had him hooked up to ECG and tested for blood glucose (9.7 mmol/l) in minutes. She gave us her diagnosis: Sid had suffered a vaso-vagal event. The silly old sod had eaten and drunk so much as to put his guts into shock. This had caused his body to divert virtually all blood circulation to his guts, accounting for his blanched complexion, undetectable pulse and loss of consciousness. Given his diabetes and previous heart attack, she recommended that he be taken to Lincoln County Hospital for a thorough check-over, but he was not in any danger. He was discharged at 01:00 next morning.
A saw an item in on a news magazine last night that made me wonder. They were discussing the resurgence of malnutrition as a problem in the North of England. One interviewee, a single mother of two, told how she sometimes went without food herself, in order to guarantee that her children were fed. I salute her dedication. But then she showed the meal she was making for them: chicken nuggets, tinned mushy peas, and frozen chips. Chicken breast, dried marrowfat peas and potatoes are significantly cheaper than the ingredients she chose (and probably healthier too). I’m guessing the reason behind her choice is that she can’t cook.
It is an absolute disgrace that folk should suffer such poverty in a country as rich as the U.K. I fully support the interviewee’s right to demand better.
There’s an old saw that says if you give a man a fish, he will eat for a day; if you give a man a fishing rod, he will eat for evermore. I wonder whether a few cooking lessons might ease the situation?
“Every cloud has a silver lining” says the rather optimistic saw. Maybe there will be some good to come from the horsemeat scandal(s). Maybe, just maybe, people will want to steer clear of pre-processed microwave food and support their local butchers. We can but hope.
I am happy to be blessed with an excellent butcher (Bellamy’s) less than a mile from my home. Use it or lose it!
13 Thursday Sep 2012
Posted in beer, ecology, economics, food, multi-national, recycling, reuse, Uncategorized
Recycling is more ecologically sound than sending packaging to landfill or incineration or dumping. I doubt there’s much room for contention there.
Would reusing packaging be better than recycling? I recall a time when many bottles (pop, beer, milk) were reused. I expect arguments against based on economics and logistics. Isn’t this where we expect governments to show their worth and work for the good of all? If there was a standard set of jar and bottle sizes to make them interchangeable, worldwide, across many suppliers and products wouldn’t that solve much of the logistical problem? So the same jar might contain Scottish jam one week, French pickle next, and Australian peaches after. Too much transport? Surely, that just encourages us to use local produce or pay the price: even more ecologically sound.
20 Friday Jul 2012
They make a powdered version of Viagra now, so you can stir it into your coffee.
Does that make your sex life even better?
No but, when you’re dunking biscuits, it stops them going limp!
OR….I just found this alternative whilst bimbling around the net:
An elderly Irish woman visited her physician to ask his advice on reviving her husband’s libido.
‘What about trying Viagra?’ asked the doctor.
‘Not a chance’, she said. ‘He won’t even take an aspirin.’
‘Not a problem,’ replied the doctor. ‘Give him an ‘Irish Viagra’.
It’s when you drop the Viagra tablet into his coffee. He won’t even taste it
Give it a try and call me in a week to let me know how things went..’
It wasn’t a week later when she called the doctor, who directly inquired as to her progress.
The poor dear exclaimed, ‘Oh, faith, bejaysus and begorrah!
T’was horrid! Just terrible, doctor!’
‘Really? What happened?’ asked the doctor.
‘Well, I did as you advised and slipped it in his coffee and the effect was almost immediate.
He jumped straight up, with a twinkle in his eye and with his pants a-bulging fiercely! With one swoop of his arm, he sent me cups and tablecloth flying, ripped me clothes to tatters and took me then and there passionately on the tabletop!
It was a nightmare, I tell you, an absolute nightmare!’
‘Why so terrible?’ asked the doctor,’ Do you mean the sex your husband provided wasn’t good?’
‘Freakin’ Jaysus, ’twas the best sex I’ve had in 25 years!
But sure as I’m sittin’ here, I’ll never be able to show me face in Starbucks again.
17 Tuesday Jul 2012
Posted in food, Life, Musings, Thoughts, Uncategorized
“His wit’s as thick as Tewkesbury Mustard” quoth Sir John Falstaff (Henry IV part II, William Shakespeare).
Tewkesbury is a town in Gloucestershire, at the confluence of the rivers Severn and Avon, at the edge of the Cotswolds.
Tewkesbury Mustard is a fiery blend of raw mustard and horseradish. It’s a perfect accompanyment for Lincolnshire sausages. Give it a try!
03 Sunday Jun 2012
…..now welcome for dining.
.
Well, OK, but I couldn’t eat a whole one.
We moved to Newark Road, North Hykeham, in December 2003. One of the first pubs we tried was the Centurion, also on Newark Road. We were with Maeve’s pal Tracey and her two boys that day, and we popped into the Centurion for a bite to eat. “No children” we were told, so we went elsewhere. Eight years later, none of us has ever been back, even though it’s less than a mile from our home.
Pubs are going bust at a prodigious rate all over the country. The sign suggests times must be tough and management at the Centurion can’t afford their anti-child stance any longer. Somehow, I still don’t think we’ll go back.
19 Saturday May 2012
16 Monday Apr 2012
Posted in food, Life, Musings, Thoughts, Uncategorized
I like water and I drink lots of it. But when I buy food, I expect it to taste like food. Increasingly, the meat, poultry, eggs, fruit and vegetables I buy taste of nothing. Even when I pay the extra for organic produce, things don’t seem much better.
I don’t have sufficient space at home to produce much. The little I do produce however, tastes a million times better than anything I can get in a supermarket. Now, I’m a rank amateur: if I can grow and rear food that tastes good, why can’t the professionals?
I brought two conference pears to work today that I got from ASDA (Walmart) yesterday. They taste of absolutely nothing. Only the texture and appearance tell me what they’re supposed to be. I might just as well be eating ping-pong balls!
I wonder at the nutritional value of food like this. Should my “five a day” be “fifty a day” in order to compensate for water content?
