The Meatrix

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An excellent way to show the harm of factory farming, and all it's many consequences. OK, the organisation running this parody promotes meat eating via non-factory farming. But that's a damn sight better than eating factory farmed meat!

Hmm... A Guide to New Barnet

Whilst trying to research the history of a local disused fire station that may soon be demolished to make way for more housing, Grrrrr...

I came across the following...

Guide to New Barnet

What a lovely idea for a small area, make a little site with links to every other site on the net that originates from the town. All the homepages that could be found, along with basic history. Web sites for all the local businesses/organisations that could be found, etc...

I am so tempted to add to this, in particular they have a little minimap of my area, with hotspots to click on with photos of each location. Although it's a bit sparse. I might fire up my new camera and take hundreds of photos of the area and make a more detailed photo map.

Much respect to Steve Oughton for this site.

NB. There is a picture of part of the fire station on the home page for this site, the only one I could find. 5th picture along from the left in the strip image below. Intriguingly, the first picture is of my local, The Railway Bell.

The Cost of Berries

On Thursday, I made a Summer Pudding. It's a simple thing; just a pudding basin lined with bread, filled with a quick fruit/sugar compote. (I have linked to the Delia Smith recipe, as mine only differed fractionally. I made a 1 1/2 quart pudding, whereas she does a 1 1/2 pint one, plus I used 1lb blackberries, 12oz redcurrants, and 8oz strawberries, rather than her fruit choices. A little more sugar, and bread too to cope with the larger quantities.)

Now this is a traditional refreshing summer treat, quite tart, but lovely and sweet too, made by many people all over the country. However, I would not attempt this if the fruit did not come from the garden, for one reason.

Cost.

What is up with supermarket prices for berries?? Strawberries aren't too bad, a 1lb punnet cost me £1.80, mind you that was 1/2 price. But redcurrants, and more over, blackberries and raspberries are ever so dear. 120g of Blackberries, ie. 1/4 lb, costs £2! Redcurrants are about the same. At that rate my pudding would've had £8 worth of blackberries, £6 worth of redcurrants, and £1.80 of strawberries.... That's £16, before you've added the sugar and bread!!

Alright, my pudding was rather large, and would probably serve 10, but even so.... Those fruits aren't that hard to cultivate, I think the problem must lie in keeping them fresh. Their shelf life isn't fantastic. I suppose you could buy frozen berries, you can get a mixerd summer fruit 1lb bag for ~£2, 2 of those with a couple of peaches thrown in would work, and cost about £5. But the fruit needs to be fresh really...

Oh well, I hope Britains home gardeners keep up the good work, otherwise these sort of traditional treats are going to be priced out of reach...

Vegan Burritos? Definitely...

Well my brother and I love mexican food, as does his girlfriend. Now they are both devilish meateaters, :(, and regularly have burritos when they live away, but rather obviously make them non-vegan.

So I decided to try doing them as close to how my brother likes them, but vegan. Surprisingly, it was exceptionally simple; no modifications hardly at all. And guess what, my brother and his girlfriend like the vegemince and bean ones better than their normal ones. They don't buy meat mince anymore. :D

pack of tortilla wraps (vegan - Sainsburys own-brand are)
pot of salsa - make sure it's vegan, or make your own.
250g RealEat Vegemince
350ml hot water
fajita seasoning packet - Discovery brand is vegan by the look of it, Schwartz is as well.
tin of red kidney beans
2 bell peppers - or mixed peppers to roughly that amount, small/medium strips
1 medium onion, finely chopped
oil
(optional) lettuce, shredded
(optional) vegan mayonnaise/sour cream

Get a large deep frying pan, chop the onions finely, and the peppers in to small/medium strips - fry them for a little while. When the onions/peppers are semi-soft, add the mince and the fajita seasoning and toss the mixture together. Add the water and mix well (some packet seasonings absorb water and need their own, add extra if this is the case). Drain and wash the beans and add them to the mix. Cook for about 10 minutes, or until there is no liquid left, but the mixture is still moist.

Warm up the tortillas in a microwave or under a grill for a short time, I find 3 together on a plate take about 30 seconds, don't do too many at once as they will all stick together.

Lay out tortillas, imagine the tortilla as being divided in to 5 equal width strips. If you number these strips from left to right, 1 to 5, we leave 1 empty, put lettuce in strip 2, put the mince mixture in strip 3 (more mince than lettuce), put salsa in strip 4 (not too much, as too much liquid will make it fall apart), and then put a little mayo on strip 5 to help seal it. Once you've put all the fillings in, just roll it up, and tuck the bottom end inside. Voila!

NB. Do not put any thing too close to the edge, and don't overfill, or you won't be able to roll them up, and they won't stay like that if you do.

If you can't get Vegemince, which is the best in my opinion, then you could use soya mince, or even skip the mince, and replace the beans with a couple of tins of refried beans (check to make sure they're vegan).

Fajita seasoning often has some sort of milk fixer in it, like so many powdered things. You can make your own, if you reckon you can judge the quantities you like. They tend to be primarily: salt, chilli, paprika, onion powder, garlic powder, cayenne pepper, ground coriander, oregano, lemon/lime juice, cinnamon (hardly any) and a few other bits and pieces.

Brambles - They Are Not Weeds!

weed, n.

1. (a) A plant considered undesirable, unattractive, or troublesome, especially one growing where it is not wanted, as in a garden.
   (b) Rank growth of such plants.
2. Something useless, detrimental, or worthless.

Brambles are always referred to as weeds, as they are prolific over most of England at least, and have rampant growth, spreading out to all corners. This description would hold with parts of the defintion of a weed (growing where it is not wanted, rank growth), and because brambles are covered in thorns, you could add troublesome.

However, I have always thought that the most important part of a definition of a weed, is the "useless, [and] detrimental" parts.

How can a plant that produces the most delicious fruit you can find be 'useless', or 'detrimental' for that matter. They also look lovely at this time of year when they are in fruit. The thorns may be an issue, but if I were a plant that produced such wonderful fruit, I'd protect it too.

My nan has a thicket of brambles in her back garden, and she wants them all removed, as they are weeds. :( I have been trying to show her that they are great, by picking a fair portion of the blackberries from them every week. Then making some puddings from them.

To start off with I've tried making a basic apple & blackberry filling, and using it to make a crumble and a pie.

To make the apple & blackberry filling, I used the following.

8-10 oz blackberries (checked, and washed)
1lb 10oz cooking apples (peeled, then thinly sliced)
4 tbsp caster sugar
2 tbsp water
3 tsp arrowroot

Just dissolve the sugar in the water in a saucepan, add the apple slices, and cook down for a few minutes, then before the apples are very soft, add the blackberries, mash some of the blackberries down a bit. Then add some arrowroot to thicken, stirring in. Add more sugar if you need it, or more arrowroot if there is too much liquid. (NB. Don't allow the apples to brown much, I put the apples in to the sugar solution as I cut them, this halts the browning a bit. If not, put a tbsp of lemon juice in a bowl and toss the apple in it as you cut.

Then I just put the mixture in to a pie (using basic sweetemed shortcrust pastry) or in to a dish and cover with crumble topping (8oz plain flour, 5oz soft light brown sugar, 2oz butter (or substitute)).

Delicious they were! If I get enough fruit at some point I might make some blackberry jam.

So brambles, they are not weeds, they are a great provider. Nature loves them too, on my nan's patch there were ladybirds, wasps, hoverflies, leaf shieldbugs, spiders, flies, mites, even a frog had come! :)

To The Cinema By Myself...

Until this week, I have never been to the cinema alone. Sad thing to do I always reasoned, after all, the cinema and films are a social thing, something you do with friends. I could not understand how some of my mates managed to go and see films on their own without feeling awkward.

This has changed...slightly. :S

Recently, I purchased an "Unlimited Card", which is a subscription service for the cinema I use. £10/month for unlimited viewings. I've had it for 2 weeks, and have seen 4 films so far, IIRC.

Now as I am a bum, and have lots of free time, thankfully free as I wouldn't be able to afford it if it cost me anything, I could spend my time at the cinema. However, lots of my friends don't have the card, and couldn't afford to go often. Besides, many of my mates have jobs, some people do apparently, and can't get the time to see some stuff. But I want to see things! Lots of things!

The last problem is my taste. I like many films, not a huge fan of serious realistic films, often described as "gritty", but I like the rest. This particularly includes "kids" films. Now last time I looked the age certificate for a film was a lower bound, not an upper.... Why does everyone grow out of good stuff? Mad people.

So I bit the bullet and went to see Garfield The Movie on Wednesday, and Home On The Range this afternoon (Thursday).

So I sat in my usual seat, on my own, looking like a pillock, but that's normal, amongst a cacophony of parents and little kids (the schools are all on holiday), and... enjoyed the show.

It was a bit awkward, but I wouldn't have got to see them if I didn't go by myself. So unless I get friends that actually share any of my interests anytime soon this might become a regular feature. Tons of films to see this month after all!