Early Risers.

[Ozexpatriate]

25 minutes ago, pH said:

Zamboni shavings from the local ice rink

Zamboni shavings from a local ice rink here are collected by zoo volunteers and transported to the polar bear habitat.

[jamie92208]

Good moaning from the Charente.  Got my ears lowered yesterday and got the shoppingIdone in good time.  Four Barrow loads of logs were brought down to the house as we are lighting the fire more often. I then managed to use my router without injuring myself and started shaping timber for a new pair of shutters.  That is a winter project.  

 

This morning so e odd jobs then I'm off to Ruffec to do a it of shopping g then to watch trains for the afternoon with Andy.  It sounds like a good plan. 

 

Jamie

[iL Dottore]

8 hours ago, TheQ said:

Several club members gave me loadsamoney, yep I'm collecting the money for the Christmas dinners.

Il Dottore ( other person's may be available) may peruse the menus here.

https://www.banninghamcrown.co.uk/menus.

I did have a peruse and I must say the menu doesn’t inspire 100% confidence….

1. Unless they’ve got a kitchen brigade the size of The Savoy’s, I really wonder how they can do such a huge menu from fresh ingredients every day. Especially given the modest prices (I suspect they make huge batches of everything once or twice a week, keep it chilled and finish cooking/reheat when ordered)
2. OK, you need to explain to the gastronomically inexperienced what certain dishes are, but I think some of the wording used is too flowery, unnecessary and redundant. Why state on the menu “fresh bloomer bread” or the steak will be “cooked to your liking”. Surely such things are (to use a Swiss term) “selbsverständlich”?
3. The menu seems to be a mix of solid, traditional food that you would hope to find in a good pub (although I question the use of lamb’s kidney instead of ox kidney in the steak and kidney pudding) and and things for the London Trendies (Mango & Coconut Slice, Confit Duck Leg)
4. Unless it’s one of those (many) peculiarities associated with Norfolk, why have Steak and Chips on the Christmas Menu?

But, as they say, the “proof of the pudding is in the eating”. I wonder what the food actually tastes like.
 

I’ve always looked at elaborate and flowery menus with suspicion, wondering if - like stage magicians - they are trying to distract our attention.
 

Which, of the following, would you choose.

• Sole “Bonne Femme”
• Sole with a white wine, cream and mushroom sauce
• Fresh pan fried sole, glazed with a white wine, vermouth and shallot reduction and served with a rich field mushroom and Jersey-cream sauce

Now I’m hungry. Time for breakfast…

[polybear]

8 hours ago, TheQ said:

Several club members gave me loadsamoney, yep I'm collecting the money for the Christmas dinners.

Il Dottore ( other person's may be available) may peruse the menus here.

https://www.banninghamcrown.co.uk/menus

 

Lasagne, Chips n' Peas.  Gets a Tick from this Bear.....

[polybear]

Bear here....

 

Excitement in the form of a delivery from Morrisons is expected today.  Rumour has it that Curly Fries may be putting in an appearance.....

 

After sending a text to Buddy ex-next door a few days ago to see how he's doing and if he was still in France or back in the UK at the moment I got a call from him yesterday (the first in some months).  The call was somewhat shorter than usual and they seem to be gradually getting further apart as well, which is "disappointing" (other words are available).  Poo.

 

Today?  Yep, yet more of the same.......

 

BG

 

 

[Barry O]

Ey up!

 

Woken by a bit of cramp in my foot.. but a bit more sleep managed after that.

 

Today really is carpet fitting day. Before they arrive I need to move the TV and its stand out of the way, bring my "Warley" demo box downstairs and part load the car.

 

@pH.. lovely carving!

 

Time for my mugatea then to gerronwithit. 

 

Enjoy your day!

 

Baz

Edited November 22, 2023 by Barry O
Spullung

[Gwiwer]

Good Morning All from a land where the sunrise looks like this

 

 

It’s been quite a while since we saw a sunrise. Mostly it has reluctantly broken through clouds or simply not bothered us at all. 
 

There has been an accompanying drop in temperature to single-digit degrees. 
 

Today I am confined to quarters until friend from Penzance arrives and fits the stair-rails. That might take all morning as it requires boring into granite for the bolts. I then get to clean up! 
 

Anything which happens after that is a bonus. But it may well involve more writing of the book as I aim to have that ready to read by Easter. 
 

Take care one and all. Enjoy Wetnessday which currently is not living up to its name. Except in the bathroom. 

[Gwiwer]

1 hour ago, iL Dottore said:

Which, of the following, would you choose.

• Sole “Bonne Femme”
• Sole with a white wine, cream and mushroom sauce
• Fresh pan fried sole, glazed with a white wine, vermouth and shallot reduction and served with a rich field mushroom and Jersey-cream sauce

Fish & Chips please 🤣

 

But if pressed it would be Option 1, 2 and 3. They are, or can be, one and the same advertised with varying degrees of cheffiness 

[BSW01]

Good morning everyone 

 

Up a little earlier than usual, mainly down to the fact that I have a 9:10 appointment at the surgery for my 3 monthly hormone injection. This, as you all know, is my ongoing prostate cancer treatment and unless the doctors decide to change this, will remain so for life. After that I plan to spend the morning in the garden, as I’ve some more tidying up and bulb planting is the plan. Like yesterday, I'll probably the afternoon in the cellar. 
 

Back later. 
 

Brian

[Tony_S]

15 minutes ago, Gwiwer said:

Fish & Chips please 

Sole is the sort of fish I would eat if presented with but wouldn’t choose. I only really like cod or haddock and generally dislike oily fish. Not too keen on seafood either.

 

[Hroth]

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Which, of the following, would you choose.

1. Sole “Bonne Femme”
2. Sole with a white wine, cream and mushroom sauce
3. Fresh pan fried sole, glazed with a white wine, vermouth and shallot reduction and served with a rich field mushroom and Jersey-cream sauce

 

1 hour ago, Gwiwer said:

But if pressed it would be Option 1, 2 and 3. They are, or can be, one and the same advertised with varying degrees of cheffiness 

 

1 is, of course, Terry Pratchetts "Avec", even though it doesn't actually mention the word itself. Its useful shorthand if you know the code and unuseful if you don't.

2 is straightforward and says what you're getting.

3 is foodie verbal diarrhoea.  It deserves to end " with spam"...

 

The list should be ordered 2, 1, 3 according to Gwiwers "Degrees of Cheffiness"

 

I think I'll choose something else, so long as it doesn't include Brussels Sprouts!

 

 

Edited November 22, 2023 by Hroth
Forgot to say that I agree with Gwiwer. Also, rearrang and spelin

[Gwiwer]

42 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

Sole is the sort of fish I would eat if presented with but wouldn’t choose. I only really like cod or haddock and generally dislike oily fish. Not too keen on seafood either.

 

Sole belongs on the bottom of footwear.  Its not a fish I would normally choose but like @Tony_S I could eat it.  I can manage to be quite a polite eater of foods I don't really enjoy if that is what the host offers.  

 

When asked if there is anything I don't eat my standard reply is "Seafood and mouldy food".  Which includes the likes of blue cheese.  But occasionally I will pick an interesting dish from the menu which breaks that mould. I surprised SWMBO (in her pre-Dr days) when she took me to an Italian restaurant in Twickenham.  I chose the "sea" bass (all bass live in the sea) serve with samphire, cherry tomatoes and cockles.  Bass is OK.  The cockles were small enough to be managed though one was closed, rejected and should not have been on the plate and another was gritty.  

 

I'll sometimes opt for Huss (known as Rock Salmon / Eel in some areas) instead of Cod at the chippy but it's quite pricey now.  At one time it was cheaper because few people wanted it.  In Australia my preferred choice was Flounder against the local standard of "Flake" which is Gummy Shark.  

 

Hey ho.  It's steak 'n' chips tonight.  Not a fish in sight.  Not even a pack of their fingers.  I have yet to discover which species of fish actually has fingers.  Perhaps the hitherto un-described Piscecarpus rectangulus?

[TheQ]

A visual reading of "selbsverständlich" gives a translation on selfunderstandinglike, so probably means something totally different.

 

Mooring Awl,

4 hours sleep, 1 hours sleep, 3 hours sleep. Good for me and I was still up before Ben.

Ben the unhappy Collie again, he had a slow plod round the garden needing much encouragement. He's only cheered up in the last few minutes after having half a dose of children's paracetamol.

 

Dull grey but reasonably dry outside. A light breeze.

 

Shortly SWMBO will be off out to the painting group, at which point I'll get Ben's favourite outside toy out.. The wheel barrow with it's big green balls tyres.

 

Steak and chips is of course the standard fall back on the menu, with two works dinners, sailing club, weaving group, art group and model railway group Christmas dinners  at one time turkey was getting boring.

Now I've retired, and since COVID many groups have stopped their dinners., we're going to just one this year , missing out the SC dinner due to a collision of dates.

 

That children's dose of paracetamol has really kicked in now,  Ben has gone to sleep.

 

Plans for today,

Driveway digging,

Tunneling ( guess who forgot to lay in the wire in tube before building the landscape)

 

 

 

[PhilJ W]

7 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

Fake "new car smell"? Is there a used car lot nearby?

No dealers lots nearby but no less than three  car valeting places in view of the filling station including a self service one in the filling station itself. That is probably the main reason for the presence of the deodoriser together with a vacuum cleaner.

[Coombe Barton]

Unable to get into work today as car decided to give me the smell of frying electronics. It's in the garage to see what they can find. Just completed a lecture on Teams.

[PhilJ W]

Morning all from Estuary-Land. No interruptions from bladder control again last night leaving it up to Arthur Itis to be the alarm clock, almost eight hours sleep in all. Not a lot to do today except to fill the pink sack up for the bin men tomorrow as it's the last day that they will be collected. Next week we start on the new system with proper black wheelie bins instead of black sacks and reusable sacks for the recyclables. 

[DaveF]

I like cod/haddock/sole/plaice/salmon cooked simply or in  a nice sauce - as long as it doesn't contain any fungi - I am allergic to them.  I also like proper kippers, preferably from Craster, just along the coast.

 

As for other sea food I used to like cockles bought from the sheds at Leigh on Sea but now they upset me.  Lobster again upsets me, I can usually eat crab and prawns.

 

I had quite a good night's sleep and woke before my alarm so the garden bin was on the pavement well before the bin lorry came at 08.00. It was not as windy as the forecast had predicted so I could have put it out last night.

 

I've had breakfast, done some chores and now have to decide what to do next.  It is a very dull morning so I think I'll settle for a local walk with a visit to the shop to buy some rolls for tea. 

 

Someone put what should have been a very simple question for me to answer on my photo thread last night.  It was just the location of a block of flats in a photo in Nottingham.  I have to admit I had to get out an old street map to find the place - but I haven't lived in or near Nottingham for 50 years and although I have cousins there we don't visit each other.

 

David

Edited November 22, 2023 by DaveF

[polybear]

4 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Which, of the following, would you choose.

• Sole “Bonne Femme”
• Sole with a white wine, cream and mushroom sauce
• Fresh pan fried sole, glazed with a white wine, vermouth and shallot reduction and served with a rich field mushroom and Jersey-cream sauce

Now I’m hungry. Time for breakfast…

 

Bear doesn't "do" fish (though smoked haddock is ok, and I daresay kippers too - though I've not had them for years);  I'm also less than big on mushrooms too. 

Though I suspect that @iL Dottore considers that Bear resides in a culinary abyss anyway.....

 

 

Edited November 22, 2023 by polybear

[iL Dottore]

33 minutes ago, polybear said:

 

Bear doesn't "do" fish (though smoked haddock is ok, and I daresay kippers too - though I've not had them for years);  I'm also less than big on mushrooms too. 

Though I suspect that @iL Dottore considers that Bear resides in a culinary abyss anyway.....

 

 

I see The Bear continues to live down to his usual low standards......

[New Haven Neil]

A'noon, the rock is cool and windy, but the thermy-o-meter indicates 12c - feels like 5.

 

Up early doors to take friend Jayne to hospital in the big city,  for her first experience of the, er, camera where the sun don't shine.  She's a nervous wreck with hospitals, or indeed anything even vaguely medical at the best of times poor girl, ended up she was just about in a dead faint before they even started.  Recovered enough to get the deed done thankfully, once they had poured some of the good stuff in.  Sat with her for a couple of hours afterwards once I got her home, she's OK now if 'slightly ruffled'.  Odd how someone so intelligent can be so nervous about things, I don't mean 'normal nervous', it really is an issue for her.  Checking in on her all afternoon.

 

ION.

 

Not sure there is any.

[New Haven Neil]

8 hours ago, pH said:

This is Zamboni (you can look it up) shavings from the local ice rink, just out of shot to the right.

 

Was it Snoopy or Woodstock that used to drive the Zamboni?

[jjb1970]

I guess I am of an age now where I lived through a couple of cycles of politicians leading us all down the primrose path, people swallowing the spin put on world events and then vowing to learn, never again etc until the next big crisis. Recently I've felt like I'm living in 2003 again. Which brought this song to mind, it was popularised among some in Britain when the Pogues did a cover version in their album 'Rum, & the Lash' but to me the Eric Bogle (who wrote it) did it far better. A much more powerful anti-war song than many more famous (and commercially successful...efforts), one of the few that invokes a genuinely emotional response in me.

 

[Coombe Barton]

4 minutes ago, New Haven Neil said:

 

Was it Snoopy or Woodstock that used to drive the Zamboni?

[PhilJ W]

Afternoon all from Estuary-Land. Just had a quick check of the garden. The foxes have been around and left their calling cards but have not attempted to dig any holes. The California lilac is looking very sorry for itself, I might have to drastically prune it in the spring. There's new shoots coming from the base so that it should survive. All the other shrubs are thriving making a great windbreak as they are all evergreen.

[New Haven Neil]

1 hour ago, Coombe Barton said: