'ONE OF THE VERY NICEST THINGS ABOUT LIFE IS THE WAY WE MUST REGULARLY STOP WHATEVER IT IS WE ARE DOING AND DEVOTE OUR ATTENTION TO EATING'

Luciano Pavarotti




READING:

Bombay - or Mumbai as we are now supposed to call it - is a huge city with a vast population nearly half of whom live in slums. The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar is set in Bombay and the two women who are the central characters epitomise the contradictions to be found there.

Sera Dubash is a Parsi widow who lives in a spacious, modern appartment. Bhima is her servant, for over 20 years she has worked for Sera and her family, cleaning their home, shopping at the market, preparing food, and although neither of them would ever acknowledge it, a bond of trust and a sort of friendship has grown between them.

Despite her comfortable life, Sera has had a difficult married life with an unpredictably violent husband and the mother-in-law from hell. Since her husband's death her adored daughter and charming son-in-law have moved in with her and she is beginning to enjoy life.

Bhima on the other hand lives a life that is almost unimaginable for anyone living in the west. She has a room nearby which she shares with her teenaged granddaughter Maya, for whom she would sacrifice everything she has. Maya is attending college and Bhima hopes that her education will enable them to escape the slums, where they have little privacy, no running water, and have to share the most primitive of communal latrines. But something happens to Maya which puts a strain on Bhima, and eventually it reaches a crisis point which fractures the relationship between herself and Sera.

The lives of the two women are told in flashback and the reader slowly becomes aware of the events that have formed their lives into what they are today, what divides them and what brings them together. Sera and Bhima are both strong in their different ways, but it seems that even in modern India the accidents of birth, class and cultural traditions still shape a woman's life more than anything else.

A really interesting and absorbing book which was both informative about contemporary Indian life and a moving story of two individuals.

Rated 5*



RANTING:

I thought we were supposed to be in the middle of the worst economic recession known to man; banks are collapsing, house sales are stagnant, the unemployment rate is rising rapidly and the news media are lambasting us with doom and gloom, local councils are warning us that rates will have to rise and services will have to be cut.

And in the midst of all this, how does Leicestershire County Council decide to spend £6000 of rate payers' money?
Fitting sophisticated Satellite Navigation Systems to 14 of the council's lawnmowers.

I'll just repeat that.
They have spent six thousand pounds fitting Sat Navs to fourteen lawnmowers.

I know, I know, you couldn't make it up.

Apparently the council employees who use the lawnmowers to keep the parks, fields, road verges and other public open spaces trim and tidy have been complaining that they might get lost in the long grass.
Have they been cutting the grass or smoking it?

I have steam coming out of my ears....I think I should go and lie down until I have become calm again.




RECIPE:

The Scotch Egg has got a reputation for being one of the worst examples of take-away fast food which is such a shame as a proper Scotch Egg is perfect for picnics, padkos, and packed lunches. There is no comparison between a home made Scotch Egg and the horrible, orange-crumbed travesties that are produced commercially and which can be found in the chiller cabinets of supermarkets, motorway service shops, not to mention cafés and pubs up and down the land.

Nobody seems to know where the name comes from, but Fortnum & Mason's,
the Queen's grocers in Piccadilly claim to have invented them in 1851. Maybe they did, but I suspect that the recipe had been around for quite a while, probably in Scotland, and so F&M called them Scottish Eggs. Anyway, whatever their history, they are a doddle to make and apart from vegetarians everyone seems to like them, particularly children.

You can add any number of things to the sausage meat to change the flavours. I've had SEs with crumbled Stilton or finely diced black pudding added to the mix, not to mention chili and herbs. The one thing you MUST have is good ingredients; top-quality sausage meat (or buy the best available sausages and slip the skins off), fresh free-range eggs, and proper toasted breadcrumbs are all essential. Although they are usually made with hen's eggs, you can also make dinky little ones for canapes if you use quail eggs. Serve them hot with homemade tomato sauce and mashed potato, or cold with chutney and salad

SCOTCH EGGS
Makes 4 large ones

5 large free-range eggs (4 for the SEs and one for coating)
450g good quality sausage meat
3 spring onions
1 tablespoon finely chopped parsley
1 heaped teaspoon finely chopped herb of your choice ( chives, thyme or sage)
A good pinch of ground mace
3 tablespoons plain flour
Salt and pepper
Dry breadcrumbs for coating
Sunflower oil for frying

Put four of the eggs into a saucepan, cover with cold water and bring to the boil, then simmer for exactly 9 minutes. Remove the eggs and plunge into cold water.

Finely chop the spring onions, and add them to the sausage meat together with the chopped herbs, mace and some salt and pepper. Use your hands to mix everything together really well then divide the mixture into four and make into patties.
Put the flour onto a plate and season with salt and pepper.
Break the remaining egg onto a plate and beat lightly with a fork.
Tip a good quantity of breadcrumbs onto a plate and spread out.

Shell the eggs and roll each one in the seasoned flour then wrap a patty of sausage meat round it, stretching it and pinching any gaps together so that the egg is evenly covered. Then roll it in the beaten egg and finally roll it in the breadcrumbs pressing them on gently so that it is completely covered.

Put about 5 cms of the oil in a deep casserole or saucepan and heat until a small piece of bread goes brown within a minute of being dropped in it. Carefully add the SEs and fry in the hot oil for about 6-7 minutes, turning them often until they are evenly brown.
Remove from the oil and drain on kitchen paper towel.

TODAY IS THE START OF CHINESE NEW YEAR, THE YEAR OF THE OX.
I have been told that people born in the Year of the Ox are: responsible, dependable, honest, caring, honourable, intelligent, artistic, industrious and practical.
However, they are also: petty, inflexible, possessive, dogmatic, gullible, stubborn, critical, intolerant and materialistic.

If you were born between February and the following January in the years 1925, 1937, 1949, 1961, 1973,1985 or 1997 you're an Ox.

READING:

Last week I picked up a copy of A Poisoned Mind by Natasha Cooper from the new books shelf in Highgate Literary and Scientific Institution library. Even though I have a huge pile of books waiting to be read, something about this one made me get stuck in straight away, and I was immediately hooked.

On the cover there is a comment from a renowned crime writer describing the book as one of the best legal thrillers she’d ever read, and I would agree.

The story opens on a failing Northumberland farm, where a company called Clean World Waste Management have leased some land as a site for two chemical waste disposal tanks. The tanks blow up causing a conflagration in which the farmer is killed and the surrounding farmland is polluted.

Angie, the farmer’s widow, aided by members of an environmental pressure group, is taking the corporate giant to court in an attempt to get proper compensation.

Trish Maguire QC, whose sympathies lie with the widow, finds herself having to set aside personal feelings as she has to represent Clean World Waste Management. As the trial proceeds she begins to wonder what exactly has been going on, the eco-hippies who are supporting Angie may have a hidden agenda – not all do-gooders are truthful it would seem.

At the same time, Trish is coping with a troubling friendship between her teenage brother David (for whom she and her husband are responsible), and Jay, a schoolmate he keeps bringing home, who comes from a dysfunctional and abusive family.

Which situation is more poisonous, the chemical waste explosion, or the alcohol and drug fuelled lives of Jay’s family?

I had never come across Natasha Cooper’s books featuring Trish Maguire before, but joy of joys there are another eight for me to read – A Poisoned Mind is the latest – so I intend to read them in order so that I can follow Trish’s progression up the legal career ladder. She is a heroine I took to immediately, intelligent, feisty, professional and very real.

What a treat I have in store.

Rated: 4.5


RANTING:

If a colleague, friend, relative or loved one died in police custody, whilst serving in the armed forces, or when accidentally hit by an emergency vehicle you would probably want to attend the inquest to find out how and why they died, and who was responsible.

Citizens would be deprived of this right if this government has its way.

Last year the clause in the Counter-terrorism Act which would have allowed some inquests to be held in private was dropped, following fierce opposition from all sides. However the proposals have been included in the legislation covering Coroners Courts which has just been introduced to Parliament.

The plan is to have juries, families, and the press excluded from some inquests which would be held in secret with hand-picked coroners, on the grounds of – you guessed it – ‘national security’. I’ll bet that they will use it whenever some death might be going to be an embarrassment, or an inquest might point a finger at the failings of government departments

The whole idea of secrecy in trials or inquests makes my blood run cold – it smacks of Stalinist Russia, and of the old apartheid regime in South Africa.

Why is this Labour government so hell bent on getting this clause on to the statute books?

Yet again they are chopping away at hard won liberties which once kept this country a beacon of freedom and democracy. We must not let these rights be whittled away one by one.

RECIPE:

This dish is a hybrid, not quite a fritatta, not quite a Spanish omlette, a bit like a quiche without a pastry crust. It takes hardly any time to make and is a great meal served with a salad, stretching two salmon fillets to feed four people.

SALMON ‘n EGGS

Serves 4

8 large eggs

2 fillets salmon (300-400g)

Juice of half a lemon

8 spring onions

2 tablespoons chopped coriander

Salt & pepper

1 tablespoon (approx) butter

2 tablespoons corn oil

Pre-heat the grill.

Cut the salmon fillets into smallish dice.

Finely slice the spring onions.

Beat the eggs until slightly frothy, season sparingly with salt and pepper.

Heat the butter and oil in a medium sized frying pan, and when hot add the salmon pieces and drizzle the lemon juice over them. Stir over a gentle heat until the salmon has changed colour and is nearly cooked through, then tip in the eggs, the chopped coriander and the spring onions. Using a wooden spatula, gently mix everything together. Then let it cook for about a minute. Lift the edges gently with the spatula to let any runny egg seep downwards before placing the frying pan under the pre-heated grill for a couple of minutes to allow the eggs to firm up and brown very slightly on top.

Cut into four wedges and serve garnished with coriander leaves. A side salad of tomato, cucumber and lettuce with a tangy dressing is perfect with this dish.

A LITTLE OF WHAT YOU FANCY DOES YOU GOOD. Or, in my case, a lot.

READING:

When I was a child one of the books I absolutely loved was “A Little Princess” by Frances Hodgson Burnett, of course I read and loved “The Secret Garden” too, but “A Little Princess” was my favourite. It wasn’t till years later that I discovered that FHB was a prolific writer, and not just of children’s books. So it was with some anticipation that I finally got round to buying a copy of “The Making of a Marchioness” and I was not disappointed, it was a real treat.

The story of a well-bred but penniless woman in her thirties, Emily Fox-Seton, who against all the odds manages to win the heart and hand of a wealthy nobleman the Marquess of Walderhurst, could be called a Cinderella story, and to a certain extent so it is; but it is much more than that. It defines the obsession with and importance of class in Victorian England, the role of women in that society, and the status of marriage. Emily is not the brightest of women intellectually, but she is an innocent, a truly good, unpretentious woman, and in a venal world she triumphs because of her innocence.

The book is in two parts, indeed it was originally published as two books, the first book being “The Making of a Marchioness” and the second book being “The Methods of Lady Walderhurst”. The second part is about what happens after she has been married, and is far more melodramatic. Emily is not safe in her role. There is a villain, her husband’s heir-presumptive who has returned from a life of loose living in India, accompanied by his Anglo-Indian wife, full of rage and spite at the thought he may loose his hoped for inheritance should Emily produce a child. Captain Osborne and his wife pose a very real danger to Emily and she has to return to anonymity to protect herself from their murderous plans. The plot is not particularly complex but through the various twists and turns which lead, needless to say, to a satisfactorily happy conclusion, the reader is brought up against some quite strong themes, racism, domestic violence, duty and the Victorian way of death.

In all the books I’ve read by FHB the main character has had to struggle against unfair odds to gain their rightful place in the world, together with all the material trappings which she considered so essential (including an engagement ring with a ruby “the size of a trouser button”!), and that is what makes them so popular I think. They are aspirational fairy-tales.

Apparently this was Nancy Mitford’s all time favourite book, and I can see why. It is about a world she would have understood only too well, and there are echoes of 'The Making of a Marchioness' in her books ‘The Pursuit of Love’ and ‘Love in a Cold Climate’.

The edition I have was published by Persephone Books – one of my favourite independent publishers- and has the benefit of an excellent introduction by Isabel Raphael, and an afterword by Gretchen Gerzina who has written Frances Hodgson Burnett’s biography.

This is very much a feel-good, comfort read, and I do recommend it to you.

Rated: 5*

RANTING:

What an EGGstrordinary EGGregious decision by the BACC that a 50 year-old, black-and-white advertisement for eggs featuring the late lamented comedian Tony Hancock cannot be re-shown on TV.

The advert shows Hancock having a boiled egg for breakfast, and the catch-phrase – written by Fay Weldon, who is now a famous author – was “Go to Work on an Egg”. Succinct wording with a subtle double meaning made it a classic. According to a BACC spokes-idiot the advert must not be screened because:

"The concept of eating eggs every day for breakfast goes against what is now the generally accepted advice of a varied diet and we therefore could not approve the ads for broadcast."

For pity’s sake! We all KNOW that you shouldn’t limit your diet to one single food – and no one in their right mind would subsist on eggs alone. Anyway who would want to?? Eggs every morning could be quite boring. What about those who eat cornflakes every single morning, or drink too much instant coffee – I notice those ads are not banned.

Do these pillocks think we are all stupid ?..

RECIPE:

Just to stick two fingers up to the health nazis, I decided to use eggs for supper this evening, LOTS of eggs. I made my own version of a British classic, Omlette Arnold Bennet. Arnold Bennet was a famous author/playwrite who spent a year living at the Savoy Hotel when writing one of his novels. He loved the smoked fish omlette the chef made and demanded it so often that it was named after him; the true original recipe calls for a spoonful of bechamel sauce and a spoonful of hollandaise in addition to the other ingredients, but not having a large hotel kitchen at my disposal I have dispensed with those and made a version which is not quite as rich. The DH loves it, and it makes a filling meal for one, or a starter for two.

OMLETTE ARNOLD BENNET – MY VERSION

125g smoked haddock (about 2 fillets)
Milk
1 bayleaf
1½ tablespoons freshly grated parmesan
4 large eggs
2 tablespoons crème fraiche
1 tablespoon double cream
Butter for cooking
Salt and pepper

Put the haddock fillets in a shallow microwaveable dish and pour in just enough milk to cover them, add the bayleaf. Cover dish and cook on high in microwave for 3 minutes.

Remove fish from poaching liquid, and break into large flakes, mix the crème fraiche with the flaked fish and put to one side.

Separate one egg and beat the white to soft peak stage. Add the yolk to the 3 remaining eggs in a bowl, add a splash of water and beat till fluffy. Season with black pepper. Don’t add salt as the smoked haddock is quite salty. Fold the egg white gently into the egg mixture.

Pre-heat the grill.

Heat a small frying pan and melt a knob of butter in it- swirl round so the butter coats the base of the pan and then gently tip the egg into the pan. Use a palette knife to draw the edges of the omelette towards the centre of the pan, and then gently spread the fish mixture over it. When it is almost set pour the double cream over the top and sprinkle the parmesan on top. Place the whole pan under the grill for 3-4 minutes until the omelette is puffed up and golden brown.

Carefully slide it onto a plate without folding it.

Crusty brown bread and butter is wonderful with this.