Early Risers.

[BSW01]

Goodnight all 

[monkeysarefun]

20 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

To which my reply is "Do you charge?"

 

Some do.  Some don't.  If you are prepared to invest in a meat pie it should come with (free) sauce as standard.  

Used to be 5c back in my school days now it's 20c for a little plastic capsule of it but if you ask for two they'll often throw in the second for free, as long as it is going on the one pie; if you bought two pies you'll pay for both sauces!

[monkeysarefun]

31 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

Federal legislation to identify spam on mobile telephones seems to have done very little for landlines

My other half always answers them for the sole purpose of messing with their heads enough to get THEM to hang up on HER.

Tis funny to hear.

[simontaylor484]

Sauce that is hard to.source 

 

Last time I bought a sachet in a chippy it was a large up it was 25p

[Ozexpatriate]

1 minute ago, monkeysarefun said:

My other half always answers them for the sole purpose of messing with their heads enough to get THEM to hang up on HER.

I've done that with human spammers. Most of them are robocalls.

[The Stationmaster]

G'night all

[Gwiwer]

38 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

I don't know which is worse, this or "John" (probably from Bangalore) trying to sell final expense insurance, or the ubiquitous "Your car warranty has expired".

I get very few on the mobile and we don't have a landline.  But outside today, whilst awaiting my Uber, I had a call from "Unknown Number" which showed as a mobile.  It might have been the Uber driver though they normally only call through the app if they even need to at all.  I answered just in case.

 

"Hello.  This is BT Test and Trace calling about your case".  "No you're not - I know this is a scam call" "Oh yes I am and you must .... "  

 

What ever it was I "must" do I never found out because I disconnected the call and blocked the number.  Shortly after which the Uber, which I had been tracking on their app, arrived as expected and took me to a most enjoyable several-hours catch-up chat with Former Neighbour (Upstairs).  We could have gone on for much longer than we did and I sensed that we both wanted to but I had to return home at a decent hour!   

[monkeysarefun]

12 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

I've done that with human spammers. Most of them are robocalls.

Here all the calls have subcontinental  accents saying they are from Telstra and my router is misconfigured and affecting the whole internet and they need access to my computer so they can jump on and fix it.

Kerry spends as long as it takes expressing supreme thanks at their caring enough to let us know and remorse at the trouble we are causing until they hang up. Sometimes they swear at her first, the potty mouths.

 

( When I actually do call Telstra, the responder invariable DOES have a subcontinental accent, so the scammers got that detail right!)

Edited April 24, 2021 by monkeysarefun

[monkeysarefun]

58 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

Kanga meat is very different from meat-pie meat.  Lean, gamey and with a reddish colour even when well cooked.  Often served heavily seasoned which meat pies also are not.  

Apart from seeing wallaby pie on the menu at various places in Tassie, I don't think it's a done thing.

 

Koala pie on the other hand...

(Actually this image is from Singapore zoo aussie-ing it up, we don't do this!)

[Adam88]

1 hour ago, pH said:

I wonder what he might think of this book:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chickenhawk_(book)

 

It might not be one he’d be keen to read, though.

 

 

 

 

I was recommended to read this by a retired (but post-Vietnam War era) USN helicopter pilot.  I found it made for interesting comparisons with the numerous Great War, WWII and other aviation memoirs I've read.

 

Incidentally, my acquaintance explained that flying helicopters is very easy: move the collective one way and the trees get smaller, move it the other way and they get bigger.  I'm not sure how he managed to fly the things when he was at sea and out of sight of any trees though.

[J. S. Bach]

Night Owl from the Piedmont.

[chrisf]

Greetings one and all

 

All this talk of pies has jerked my memory.  Yesterday I came close to making one.  It would have contained some leftover chicken breast, onion, mushrooms, spuds and chicken Oxo.  However, I fought shy of tackling the pastry and had forgotten all about the ceramic blackbird that I hope still lurks in the kitchen drawer.  I ended up cooking the contents and not bothering with the crust.  Though I say so myself,  the result was tasty.  It staved off the evil day when I resort to the Vesta chow mein.  That day will not be today, for a steak awaits my pleasure.  It comes in a tray with a portion of butter with some sort of additive - possibly parsley, possibly not.  I got used to not having Sunday lunch, for in the good old days of out and about and here and there I was seldom at home at lunchtime on Sunday.

 

I spent a few minutes yesterday putting arrangements in place for May Day.  As some gentle readers will recall, it has been my practice to watch the morris dancing at dawn on 1st May at Katharine's Cross in Ampthill, afterwards meeting friends who live locally for breakfast in the pub followed by quality control of real ales elsewhere in the town.  That ruddy virus has banjaxed that, though we shall salvage something from the wreckage and put the world to rights over a few cans.  Today I should get on with sorting out hotel bookings for an event in July that shows encouraging signs of going ahead as planned.  However, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

 

Warm thoughts to Dave and his dad and anyone else on the sick list .  Best wishes to all

 

Chris

[TheQ]

Mooring Awl, inner Temple Hare,

 6 hours sleep but the first two were very broken up trying to find a comfortable position...

 

Pies, very few commercial pies I find any good, pukka pies the favourite of many chip shops appear to be gravy which had some meat pass by. Tesco's I find have thick pastry and little contents what contents they do have is a thickened gravy with the odd lump of meat.

 

The worst were of course at school.

Scotch pies have a raised edge  and thin water crust pastry so far so good, in the school version the centre cap was so low you were lucky if there was an 1/8th inch meat under it.

The steak pie with flaky ish pastry whilst having something resembling meat in it,  the contents were mostly gristle  with a relationship to car tyre rubber.

 

Other than pork pies, few commercial meat pies seem to have a decent quantity of meat in them.

The best I get are in a couple of cafes where I know they really do make their own.

 

Having brought the mobile home fridge down to the house, it took less than 24 hours for SWMBO to dislike the small size of an under counter fridge, so the replacement will be either a tall free standing fridge , or a tall fridge freezer with a 60/40 split.

 

Plan for today, drill the reference hole for the keel bolts, measure, measure again, measure from a different point, measure again, then drill.. hole drilled drop in a temporary bolt to locate the beneath hull weight spreader plank..

 

Ah Ben the snoring Collie  is no longer snoring, I suspect he will appear by my side giving me the hint...

 

Time to.. go he's arrived.

 

 

[Andrew P]

Another glorious start to what looks like a glorious day. I'll be off down for the papers in a mo.

 

I didn't get my daily (almost) walk yesterday due to going for the Jab, but with the boys and wives around for a Socially distanced Birthday garden party it ensured that the jaws had plenty of exercise.

 

Then of course there was the washing up.

 

The Boys left about 4pm and the Twin Girls and better halves arrived about 5 to start all over again.

 

Then of course there was the washing up. 

 

Have a good day one and all and stay safe and well, Keep on Truckin.

[jamie92208]

7 hours ago, pH said:

I wonder what he might think of this book:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chickenhawk_(book)

 

It might not be one he’d be keen to read, though.

 

 

 

An excellent  book and well worth reading.  At the start it has a famous quote about an aeroplane being 10,000 parts staying togethervand wanting to fly butva helicopter being 10,000 pieces that are doing their best to break apart and don't want to fly, orcat least something along those lines.

 

Talking of aircraft, Happy Birthday to Dave Hunt.

 

We atecKanga meat on our last night in Sydney in 2019 atva restaurant in The Rocks. It tasted good and reminded me a bit of venison. Very lean.

 

Anyway, good moaning from a very sunny Charente.  It got hot in the afternoon so the boss cancelled the remaining items on daily orders.

 

This morning I'm off to the market then we are going to a friend's for lunch. That should take care of most of the day until curfew.

 

Regards to all.

 

Jamie

[iL Dottore]

20 hours ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

...Talking of which, finely ground almonds "flour" is a great substitute to use for gluten-intolerant and diabetics. Expensive in small bags in the supermarkets but available quite cheaply in big bags in cash-and-carry stores such as Bookers.

Well, yes and no. Ground almonds, potato flour and chestnut flour all are used to make very delicious cakes, but they really aren’t a satisfactory substitute for wheat flour when making pastry. Calum Franklin (Britain’s top pie maker - https://holborndiningroom.com/pie-room/) has been experimenting with ways to achieve a decent gluten-free pastry. His latest recipe includes, amongst other things, xantham gum.

Returning to chestnut flour for a moment; an absolutely delicious cake/tart (it’s a bit of both) is the Tuscan Castagnaccio - made with chestnut flour, pine nuts, olive oil and rosemary. Served with some sweet ricotta, it’s very more-ish (and for true indulgence, a glass of Vin Santo is recommended to go with it)

19 hours ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

As a commercial crop???

 

Tarte Tatin was first invented at Lamotte-Beuvron, a bit south of Orleans. Commercial apricot growing in France is mostly in the deep south around Rivesaltes.

Tarte Tatin:  surprisingly difficult to get right, thus underscoring the mantra that in cooking, as in music, “the easy things look hard and the hard things look easy”.  And a recipe that absolutely, positively, cannot be done with a standard domestic (plastic handle) frying pan!

18 hours ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

I thought that BFG had been invented by Berni Inns, or perhaps Bejam.

I think that the BFG, as experienced by generations of British diners as the finish to their meal of prawn cocktail and steak and chips, is very much an Berni Inn interpretation of the cake that we get around here which is known as “Schwarzwalder Kirschtorte“.  This is made with sour cherries, kirsch and plenty of cream and chocolate. And is quite different to what you get in the UK.

18 hours ago, JohnDMJ said:

.....I wonder how many of such 'Dress for Dinner'?

Until my parents-in law-died, we always used to “dress for dinner“ at Christmas (nothing fancy, just basic black tie).  Nowadays, for the most part, when I “dress for dinner“ it is usually for a formal meal with my club which means full Highland regalia as opposed to dinner jacket and black tie.  One of these days I might horrify ER by posting a picture of me in full Scottish regalia.

17 hours ago, 45156 said:

..not least Lily, who has been at the vets for post op checks every other day, and we were meant to have "stitches out" today, but it didn't happen, at least not for the lower rows, as there's still too much tension, and she's still on Tramadol, and also Loxicom and Noroclav - .....

Poor little thing, I hope that you are spoiling her rotten and making sure that she is as comfortable as possible. I find that I worry more about my dogs when they are ill than about any of my nieces. Probably because with children you can explain and reassure, something which is not possible for our dogs

10 hours ago, TheSignalEngineer said:

I'm with iD on the design of a pie. Ideally you should just be able to pick it up and eat it like a pasty. That's a bit difficulty if it doesn't have a pastry bottom

 

For the definitive answer I consulted the Rules of Entry for the pie trade's competition, The British Pie Awards. The document contains the following stipulation

 

"3.  All Pies in all Classes of the British Pie Awards must comply with being ‘a filling wholly encased in pastry and baked’. Entries which do not comply e.g. lattice topped, fruit topped, potato topped, samosas or any fried products etc will not be submitted for judging."

Game, set and match! 

Perhaps it’s time for us true “real pie” aficionados, the “Brethren of the Doublecrust“ to start a few private prosecutions (see previous ER posts) of those villains who stick a piece of shop bought pastry over a pimped up stew and call it “a pie“

8 hours ago, Tony_S said:

When we were looking at ovens there was a category of those that could be plugged into a 13 amp socketand were fitted with a 13amp  plug. The oven we chose  requires a 16amp capable supply so is supplied wire ended.  In other counties it gets a 16 amp plug fitted. Ours has pyrolitic cleaning which uses all the heating elements to generate a very high temperature. Other cooking options use combinations of elements probably using more than thirteen amps. 

And with commercial ovens, the wiring can get even more complicated: starting at four pin plugs and going from there. Mind you, you certainly need to have a properly installed and rated electricity supply for a commercial oven. I looked at one of the smallest commercial ovens available and unlike most domestic ovens which only get as hot as about 300°C, this “small“ commercial oven had a top setting of 450°C. That takes a serious amount of electricity.

6 hours ago, monkeysarefun said:

Apart from seeing wallaby pie on the menu at various places in Tassie, I don't think it's a done thing.

 

Koala pie on the other hand...

(Actually this image is from Singapore zoo aussie-ing it up, we don't do this!)

Well that’s going to have ChrisF spluttering into his Weetabix, make no mistake!

 

I wonder if koala ever did end up as dinner – either for the indigenous inhabitants of Australia or for starving European explorers?

 

And on that edible note, I will leave you with the following (quite literally) food for thought: it is estimated that humans regularly eat only about 10% of the plants and animals on the planet that humans can eat.

 

Discuss!

 

enjoy Sunday
 

iD

Edited April 25, 2021 by iL Dottore

[Barry O]

Ey up!

Sunny here but we did have a frost last night.

 

Nothing planned for today, I may sit in the garden and catch some sun.

 

Stay safe!

Baz

Edited April 25, 2021 by Barry O

[Andrew P]

Happy Birthday Dave Hunt, and thoughts still for your selves and your Dad.

[TheQ]

Nice 99% cloud free, but a cool east north easterly. , Mr Fox I think had been been busy again, more feathers..

Ben spent some time wandering around following Mr Foxes trail.

 

Having just looked it up, whilst koalas have been eaten the the past, they are not the food of choice by anyone. Eating purely eucalyptus leaves, they are supposed to taste very very bad....

You only eat them when the alternative is death...

 

Of which we had to open the emergency pack of uht milk.. it was off... As was the second,, SWMBO, is just checking the other, if it she arrives without her tea, I'm heading for town shortly..

 

I too dress for dinner on the rare occasion we eat out, I too also wear full Highland dress, it's not Scottish dress, as the lowlanders never wore the kilt..

 

 

She has tea.. trip to shops postponed till tomorrow...

[Winslow Boy]

8 hours ago, Barry O said:

Interesting day at the office. 

 

One team tried to bend the laws.. then my colleague  did.. not sure I should continue umpiring..it is not good at the moment.

 

I have tried all sorts of pies in Oz and New Zealand. Most have been fine.. with or without the ketchup.. makes up for the fact neither countries can make a good cup of tea!

 

Baz

Now Mr O you have left us all in suspense here.

 

What was that was bent? Was it the Laws of Physics, the Laws of the Land or just the Laws of Cricket? Prey tell o wise one. We are waiting to hear with baited breath. Will there be lurid reports in the tabloids of a massed brawl in the outer highlands of Yorkshire. We need to know.

[monkeysarefun]

1 hour ago, iL Dottore said:

wonder if koala ever did end up as dinner – either for the indigenous inhabitants of Australia or for starving European explorers

Because of their diet they are apparently like a giant eucalyptus lolly with fur  on.

[TheSignalEngineer]

Cooler and a bit cloudy this morning. A small step towards normality this morning as the grandsons have a cricket match and I am nominated kit man for them as SiL is otherwise occupied. Then I need to call at thr garden centre so I may go to see if the M*d*l shop is open as I have run out of a couple of sizes of Evergreen strip.

[Andrew P]

5 minutes ago, TheSignalEngineer said:

Cooler and a bit cloudy this morning. A small step towards normality this morning as the grandsons have a cricket match and I am nominated kit man for them as SiL is otherwise occupied. Then I need to call at thr garden centre so I may go to see if the M*d*l shop is open as I have run out of a couple of sizes of Evergreen strip.

If you mean Dave and Ron at Pointon, yes a great Shop. I miss going there, (and into the Cafe for a Latte' and CAKE) when I used to visit my Modelling mates, at Hazel Grove and Poynton. 

Edited April 25, 2021 by Andrew P

[Tony_S]

Morning all, and birthday greetings to Dave.

It must be Sunday as there will be croissants for breakfast. Our weekly food supplies are arriving this morning, Aditi delayed the usual Thursday delivery as she wanted to reorganise her vegetables! There was an egg surplus too so a very nice quiche was made and eaten. 
I enjoyed watching the practice and qualifying for the historic Grand Prix from Monaco yesterday. The 1950s sports cars were really shiny. One of the Ferraris in the F1 classic (Lauda and Hunt era) had an expensive looking interaction with the barrier. 

I suspect we will go for a walk today, just local to nearby fields and back. 
Tony

[New Haven Neil]

Morning world, and best wishes to Dave 'the Crab' Hunt on another rotation completion.

 

Sunny yet again dans le rock, but a thin wind making the 13c feel rather less.  Not sure what daily orders will bring, the CO is already in the garden making....dust.

 

Feeling a bit off colour today, didn't sleep well at all, then when tidying up in the kitchen found last night's anti-inflammatory and painkillers still on my supper tray.  That'll be it then. Pah, as the man says.