Food

Linkasaurus Rex

A bunch of FT writers and close associates have NEW BLOGS (or bloglike entities) which demand some of your attention: … read on …

walluc bistro

ramshackle in a way you (i) don’t associate with london — candle-lit and shabby — walluc is the kind of place that you think mightn’t be there the very next morning; by day there’s a laundromat there, you can only find it and enter when the moon is up or something similarly folk-tale-ish

the walls are dense with weird bric-a-brac, posthorns, ladders, a silhouette of a scarecrow; they don’t take credit cards, they forgot to even offer us dessert, and weren’t around to be asked for stuff half the time — there was a mysterious noisy party going on somewhere deep in the bowels of the place; the pictures on the stairs down to the kitchen and washrooms were just frames with no pictures in; the menu is italian on one side, french on the other — tho fondue is surely swiss… and it was totally haunting and recommendable

40 redchurch street, just off the brick end lane of bethnal green road

THEY DON’T SERVE BUTTER <— wtf?? this is bafflingly awesome

instant nutritious summer salad for when it’s too muggy to even think

sistrah doctrah becky taught me this when i left home: maybe she invented it!! i’ll have to ask…

YOU WILL NEED:
Young spinach leaves
Avocados
Pine nuts
Haloumi*
Vinaigrette**
Tomatos (optional)
Peppers (optional)
Crispy prefried bacon slices (optional)*** … read on …

lunatic food trumps

so i was in chinatown with T and she was stocking up in the lisle street mini-supermarket and i was really just tagging along, low on cash — and i felt, as i always do in that particular supermarket, that it was incumbent on me to buy something i never et before, because what is life if we merely troll along in our own safe space all of it eh, i mean, EH? (obv this is where i sarcastically link to an ENEMY’S BLOG to underscore what a feeb he is compared to mighty me)

er ANYWAY yes, what i bought was FRIED DACE WITH SALTED BLACK BEANS, and i just et em cold and they were nice, in a salty-ish way — the fish was crunchy brown in its friedness, and about sardine sized, and the black beans were er er as you’d expect if you’ve had em… ie i’m not going to attempt a description, so boo to you if you wanted one

bonus translation komedy: on the tin, which is labelled in chinese (cantonese i imagine), dutch and english, it says “DO NOT CONTAIN THE ANTISEPTIC” and “BEWARE OF CAN OPENING”

Baking “Conversions” Gone Wrong

This is mentalist stuff!

I pretty much believe the internet is full of great recipes to try, but the world of American volume-based recipes using cups and “sticks” of butter just doesn’t work in the UK. I end up poking anxiously with floury hands on my laptop trying to check whether a teaspoon is a teaspoon is a teaspoon. Well, NO MORE. I am coming up with a definitive cheat sheet for the fridge, but it is NOT HELPED by finding ridiculous sites like the above which claims the UK equivalent to 1 US “cup” is “3/4 of a cup and 2 dsp”. Leaving aside the fact that I am British and am not quite sure of the difference between a desertspoon and a teaspoon (the REALLY weeny spoons, I guess?) - NO! UK measurements do not involve cups! They involve weights, in grams, or at a PUSH I can accept pounds and ounces in old money. What NONSENSE is this site claiming?!

Or if anyone would like to say that the UK started it with Pints and Imperial Pints and I am just thick, they are welcome to Try It, but frankly - weight based measurements are the way to go. I mean, even if you DO measure by volume, a cup of flour is different to a cup of WALNUTS or whatever. The standard in the UK is metric, I just find it downright bizarre have NO clue what that site is referencing. I now judge it: UNHELPFUL! And my cheatsheet is back at square one as how can I trust anything else on that site?

And speaking of which, where can I buy a set of balance scales from these days? Are they the sort of things found in Past Tymes stores and bought by Live Roleplaying Enthusiasts? (Sorry Tom).

A thing I did not know and a thing I did know

i. Tooty Frooties are still being made!

ii. They are still completely horrible :(

Chestnut Cupcakes, a recipe

(I made these chestnut cupcakes a while ago and forgot to post! Naughty me. But never too late for fairy cakes, eh? Based on a recipe I found here. Followed that with some tweaks - my version is below, nicely metricised as well)

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Chestnut Cupcakes with Chocolate (Kate) Ganache ♥♥♥ - makes at the least 12, probably some more depending on how much you fill the cases innit. … read on …

Brandwatch: Marathon (and on and on)

Marathon is back! Back!! BACK!! : Mars have cashed in one of their longer-standing “free goodwill” chips by restoring - however briefly - 70s/80s icon Marathon to its brand portfolio (whether it’ll completely replace Snickers, and for how long, are unknowns).  The comments on this Brandrepublic story are withering - how unimaginative, the marketers scoff, how short-sighted.

AS IF! Not that I feel the re-re-brand is anything other than a deeply cynical move but it’s a well-timed one and likely to succeed in the short-term without damaging the brand in the long term. The cohort of consumers who identified with Marathon are now getting beyond the age where they buy countline confectionery - how better to get them to at least re-try the product? Nostalgia - especially for a cheaper age - works well in times of economic difficulty - and so does the parochialism which Mars is tapping into by jettisoning its ‘global’ Snickers brand. It’s a bit of free publicity in a sector where headline-making innovation is thin on the ground. And it’s sufficiently long after the Marathon brand was dropped originally for the move not to look like any kind of admission of error by Mars.

Manga Review #2: Addicted To Curry

For my next go at manga I decided to try one that isn’t famous - Addicted To Curry in fact hasn’t been licensed for publication in English-speaking countries, so I was reliant on online “scanlations” - fan translations on scanned images. The amount of work and dedication that must go into producing these is phenomenal so thankyou O unknown copyright infringer!

I chose Addicted To Curry on title alone. Here is what it’s about: a schoolgirl has been left in charge of her father’s curry house, which is failing because she can’t cook. She saves a dying man in the street who turns out to be an amazing young chef and an old friend of her father’s. Together they work to make the curry house a success! Every episode features: … read on …

KFC AM: Breakfast Chicken Watch

There is a time for fried chicken and I am fairly sure it is not breakfast. (”Speak for yourself!” - massed ranks of FT pubgoers). KFC is launching its new “KFC AM” range this week in London. The menu is “aimed at working men” - it will contain bacon and the “AM Twister” shown on the cover of this week’s marketing suggests….A SAUSAGE IN A TWISTER WRAP???

KFC, listen to your core chicken constituency. KFC AM only makes sense if you mean ONE AM and what you mean is some kind of gravy bucket dirty chicken deal. I can only think that the indie sector has you rattled in this new chicken 2.0 era of the long tail (”Long tail? Stick it in the chicken popcorn maker.”) At this rate SF and HF will be making you a laughing (chicken) stock.