General Chat

Susan, you are so right when it comes to celery, which is another one of my bugbears when it comes to food. Most celery in the shops is imported from Israel, and is green. If you buy a head of celery, you have to pull off all the green sticks, to get to a couple of very small white sticks in the middle, to eat with a pot of salt (as I like). It is a good job that I make lots of soups, and use up the greem sticks, or it would be a total waste. I am sure that eating green celery cannot be good for you. Afterall, you would not eat green potatoes, would you
Julia in Derbyshire

I COOKED A TINY BITT OF BEEF LAST NIGHT,,,
AN I GOT DRIPPING REAL DRIPPING
JUST ENOUGH TO HAVE A DOORSTEP OF BREAD
AN DRIPPIN,,ERRR RIGHT NOW,,,MMMMM

I do agree with Jean that your taste bud's change over the year's but what about celery! I remember when you used to be able to buy big white stalk's of celery and it would be all covered in dirt. The smell was so pungent it will fill the house. Now all you can buy is a stalk of green stuff, not a smidgen of dirt in sight and with hardly any flavour what so ever. Not lovely and crispy like it used to be, just chewy and stringy these day's! Mind you, i used to dip each slalk into half a ton of salt before i ate it in those day's!!
Edit: I think my stalk should have been stick! Mind you the green stuff is a bit like chewing on a stick!! :>)

DO YOU REMEMBER WHEN A BOTTLE OF MILK

HAD A CREAMY TOP
MUM WOULD CAREFULLY SAVE IT FOR DAD

We kept a Guernsey cow for 14 yrs and the milk was lovely. I took some in to work once and the cook decanted it into bottles. The next nurse that came into the kitchen asked what It was, she had never seen milk that looked like that, with a head of cream on it!

I've tried growing my own vegetables, but the slugs & snails have a field day!
I can't use slug pellets (not that I ever would) because I have slowrms and hedgehogs in the garden.
I know I'm capable of growing my own - I had wonderful crops when the children were young - but I also had ducks that ate the slugs & snails!!!
I, in turn, ate the many 'home grown' ducklings the mother duck brought back from the woods, where she insisted on laying and brooding her eggs!! They were REAL free range!! LOL

edit: We all also drank raw milk.

We find many things dont taste the same, but a lot of that is due to changes in your taste buds as you grow older. We neither of us like ready made foods which all seem over spiced and full of garlic or peppers. Cant find a suasage that is not spiced.
I have made my own bread for over 40 yrs but have recently started to use my Kenwood to do the mixing. It is nicer tasting than shop bread, but not the same as properly kneaded bread. On that subject, bought a large loaf in an emergency, from a bakers. It was twice as large as my own, so I weighed it, only to find it was lighter by a few ounces than my own loaf. Now this could lead to mistakes in diet for diabetic people.

Winchester is a city - a city with no greengrocer, butcher, or fishmonger, and a useless Sainsb**** in the city centre, with no deli counter - and very few local products. It also has a small M&S with limited produce.

My daughter used to live in a small town about 15 miles away - Bishop's Waltham, which has a good butcher, fishmonger, baker, grocer - all independent- and a Co-op in the centre of town, with a Budgens about 100 yards out of the centre.
Every time I visited her, I'd lug bags of fresh meat and fish (for freezing) and vegetables home on the bus - and it all cost less than in a supermarket!

I WOULD LOVE HOME GROWN FOOD BUT MY GARDEN IS WAY TO TINY
BUT THIS YEAR I GREWW TOMATO'S IN A HANGING BASKET
FFOUR PLANTS THREE VARITYS OF LITTLE ONES


WE HAD OVER 700 TOMS

I WOULD LOVE A FARM SHOP BUT NONE NEAR

Eddie, I do not buy any of those frozen things you mention, with the exception of oven chips. If I could successfully find a way to do my own, I would do, as I do most other things that we eat. But we are not all fortunate to live near Appledore, with the boats full of fresh fish, as much as we may wish to.
I have a local milkman who delivers, so I think I do the right thing all round, especially as I have an allotment also.
Many people have to make the most of what is available to them, and if that is shopping in a supermarket, for whatever reason, then that is how it must be.
And how many more times do I have to mention that we are not all able to access a pannier market. If you had come back to other threads of this ilk, where you have said similar, you would have read what I had to say to you about that subject
Please accept this, and move on from these foodie threads where all you do is extol your own vitues of shopping/cooking/ and food in general.
Julia in Derbyshire

That's all very well if you've GOT local bakers, butchers and fishmongers. There isn't a decent bakery within miles here, I do get it from the farm shop sometimes where it comes from Hobbs House in the Stroud area (very nice but very pricey!)

And as for prices.
68 pence per litre for real farm milk is cheap enough.
Bread is less than a quid for a granary.
Today I bought 4 ginormous cod fillets and a whole Huss, caught last night, for less than a tenner.
The spuds for real chips are Maris piper at £3.50 for 10 Kilos.
Tomorrow is rump steak for tea, at less than a tenner a kilo.
It does n't cost anymore to eat real fresh food if you avoid the trap of the supermarket and use the local farmers or pannier market.

As a man who does ALL the family cooking and food shopping I must say I would never buy supermarket produce.
I have no clue where the meat comes from in a supermarket whereas the fresh meat from my butchers has been walking around the local fields.
The fish comes fresh from the Appledore boats not frozen a month ago on a factory ship.
My greengrocer buys as much produce from local allotments and farms as she can. It is neither irradiated to preserve it or transported from halfway around the world
If I'm too lazy to make bread the local baker is baking fresh bread all day. The rubbish in the supermarket is part cooked in a factory
then frozen until needed.
Supermarket milk is often cheap nasty imported stuff, bottled here so it can be called "British", whatever that means.
Frozen oven chips? Frozen roasties? Frozen yorkies? Ready made mashed potatoes? Just don't even go there!

Its well & good to support your local butcher, baker etc. There are 4 issues & they all have trade offs. Quality, price, shelf life & convenience.

Properly baked bread, normal full cream milk etc, although tastes better. It costs more & only last a few days before going of. The cream that sits on top of the milk that causes the pinta to go off so quickly.

Supermarket bread although not as nice, is cheaper (due to manufacturing process) & lasts up to a week. The milk because it is homogenised can last up to 11 day.

Many people cant afford the higher priced quality items, especially during a recession. Nor wish, or have the time to shop every few days.

Julia, The "Beast in the Field" is that the Farmer? or did you see me Grazing? **M**.:o)>

Oh dear Merlin babes, what a fau pax on my part.LOLOL
Piers, I do support my local butcher,baker and candlestickmaker, whenever and wherever I can, but there are just somethings you have to get from the supermarket.
Always get my fresh meat from the local farm shop, deep in DH Lawrence country. You can see the beast in the fields as you drive up to the farm shop, the lambs frolicing and the pigs in their little 'nissen huts', as well as the fowl pecking around the farm-yard. All their ready made products for sale, are made on the premises by the farmer's wife and her jolly helpers. Nothing is too much trouble for them.
Must dash off, out to buy some more Aran wool. LOLOL. Back later.
Julia in Derbyshire

Ladies..... Abandon the Supermarkets...... Support your Local Butcher, Baker and Candlestick Maker lol

I'm back to drinking real milk - with cream on top!
It only costs between 8 and 10p more than homogenised stuff.
I went back to it because of something someone told my sister - that the fat globules in homogenised milk have been broken down so much they can enter the bloodstream - and cause cholesterol, whereas the natural sized fat globules just pass through the body.

Re Bread, I,m Lucky, insomuch that we have a lovely Bakery shop here,all baked on the premises.Real Bread not the junk from Supermarkets,Tastes Great,Get it fresh every morning except Sundays.**M**.Julia,if they tasted like "Sweat" no wonder they were,nt nice.I assume you meant Sweet.PMSL.

My bread rolls were just the opposite Angelsong, they were sweat.
I must have missed that bit with the first loaf, as we were following Emmerdale and switched over halfway through, only catching the Sourdough, bread. Have just looked at www.channel4.com/food, and the recipes are on there. Will have a go at that, in the week as hubby is interested in having a go. We also use a breadmaker in the main, but do the bread rolls in the oven.
Sorry Dizzi, didn't mean to hijack LOL
Julia in Derbyshire