'HERE LIES JOHN BUNN, WHO WAS KILLED BY A GUN;

HIS NAME WAS NOT BUNN BUT WOOD,

BUT WOOD WOULD NOT RHYME WITH GUN

AND BUNN WOULD.'


British graveyards are full of fascinating, entertaining epitaphs - every month I shall put a new one up on the blog.

READING:

There were moments in my childhood where I felt so completely at odds with my parents that I was sure I must be adopted, and that somewhere in the world were two people who were my REAL parents and who would be charming, loving, and most of all, sympathetic and admiring of me. Of course this was not the case, I was the real child of my parents and merely suffering a typical bout of misunderstood youth. For the novelist A.M Homes whose memoir The Mistress’s Daughter I have just finished reading, such feelings were all too true. She WAS adopted as a newborn baby, and had always known the fact. She, like many other adoptees had always wondered about her biological parents, and had made some half-hearted attempts to trace them.

“In my dreams, my birth mother is a goddess, the queen of queens, the CEO, the CFO, and the COO. Movie-star beautiful, incredibly competent, she can take care of anyone and anything. She has made a fabulous life for her self, as ruler of the world, except for one missing link – me.”

However when, aged 31, her birth mother, Ellen, makes contact with her via the lawyer who had arranged the adoption, it comes as a complete surprise.
She discovers that Ellen was 22 when A.M. was born, and had been the mistress of Norman, an older married man, since she was 17 years old. Ellen has also contacted Norman to inform him she intends to trace their child, and so A.M. writes to both of them.

Almost immediately it becomes apparent that Ellen is a very difficult and needy woman. She never married, and has led a rather ramshackle life, both financially and emotionally. She considers herself sophisticated, but seems to be stuck in a time-warp of the early 60s. It is obvious that she has contacted A.M. because of her own needs rather than any desire to fill any needs of her daughter.

“Why won’t you see me?” she whines. “You’re torturing me. You take better care of your dog than you take of me.”
Am I supposed to be taking care of her? Is that what she’s come back for?
“You should adopt me – and take care of me”, she says.
“I can’t adopt you “, I say.

When A.M. first meets her birth father Norman in his lawyer’s office, the conversation is stilted and extremely odd.
“Tell me a little bit about you”, I say.
“I’m not circumcised. My grandmother was a strict Catholic, she had me baptised, I’m not circumcised”.

He also insists that they both undergo DNA testing to make sure she is his child, and when the results prove it to be the case he tells her that he will now introduce her to his family – he has four other children, all born before she was, and he is still married to his first wife. However, though he continues contact with A.M. for a while, he is reluctant to follow through with this promise, and eventually rejects her completely, even refusing to give her the DNA paperwork which proves his paternity.

Ellen dies unexpectedly a year or two after they have met, and A.M. is left even more painfully confused about who she is than she had been originally. Norman’s subsequent rejection, in effect abandoning her for a second time in her life, enrages her, and she embarks on a quest to discover everything she can about her ancestry.

Using all the tools of the electronic age she turns detective, following the tiniest clues and thanks to the wonders of the internet, and diligent fossiking in old archives, she builds up a picture of each of her parents and their antecedents, as well as the family history of her adopted parents who have remained solidly supportive whilst all this turmoil has been going on.
“The desire to know oneself and one’s history is not always equal to the pain the new information causes”.

Eventually she has a child of her own and at last becomes settled in a sense of self.
“I am my mother’s child and I am my mother’s child, I am my father’s child and I am my father’s child…
Did I choose to be found? No. Do I regret it? No. I couldn’t not know.”

Other people’s lives always seem more interesting than one’s own life, merely because their lives are unfamiliar. In this memoir A.M Homes has managed to distil what it is that people crave when they seek out their family backgrounds, a sense of belonging, a sense of place, and a sense of self. I found the book totally compelling.

Rated 5*

RANTING:

“Today I am going to kill something. Anything.

I have had enough of being ignored and today

I am going to play God. “

These are the opening lines of a poem entitled Education for Leisure* by Carol Ann Duffy, one of our most celebrated modern poets.

For the past 5 years, AQA one of the biggest exam boards in the UK, has included the poem together with others by the same poet, in an anthology of poetry used by students sitting English GCSE.

It is a challenging poem which gives much food for thought and I imagine it would generate some interesting comments during classroom discussions.

In all the years that the anthology has been included in AQA’s English syllabus, there have been three complaints about the poem. Two complaints about it both by the same person, referring to the narrator carrying a bread knife with the possible intention of hurting someone,

and one complaint about the line in the poem which refers to a goldfish being flushed down the loo.

Based on a back of the envelope calculation using GCSE numbers given on the OFQUAL website (Office of Qualifications & Examinations Register), I estimate somewhere in the region of ¾ million 16 year olds have written AQA’s GCSE English exam in the past 6 years

So – over several years and ¾ million students only THREE complaints. AQA say they have bowed to these complaints, given the current media publicity about knife crime, and have instructed schools to remove the poem and/or the anthology.

Why not do away with Romeo and Juliet? surely it is not an appropriate play for young people to study in Britain today; it features stabbings, gang warfare, the teenage protagonists are bunking out to have pre-marital sex and it climaxes with a double suicide. And as for The Merchant of Venice....

In fact, why doesn't AQA go the whole hog and just remove anything by W. Shakespeare from the curriculum, his plays are just far too violent and in the current climate of panic over knife crime it would be better that teenagers were not exposed to such influences.

Sorry if I seem snarky, but really AQA has been ridiculously weak - they should have had the guts to tell Pat Schofield - the complainant - that it is a POEM, not an instruction book. Removing that poem won’t stop knife crime – hells bells, the poem won’t have caused any knife crime in the first place.

What will they feel they should censor next ?

*Today I am going to kill something. Anything.

I have had enough of being ignored and today

I am going to play God. It is an ordinary day,

a sort of grey with boredom stirring in the streets

I squash a fly against the window with my thumb.

We did that at school. Shakespeare. It was in

another language and now the fly is in another language.

I breathe out talent on the glass to write my name.

I am a genius. I could be anything at all, with half

the chance. But today I am going to change the world.

Something's world. The cat avoids me. The cat

knows I am a genius, and has hidden itself.

I pour the goldfish down the bog. I pull the chain.

I see that it is good. The budgie is panicking.

Once a fortnight, I walk the two miles into town

For signing on. They don't appreciate my autograph.

There is nothing left to kill. I dial the radio

and tell the man he's talking to a superstar.

He cuts me off. I get our bread-knife and go out.

The pavements glitter suddenly. I touch your arm.

RECIPE:

Way back in 1975 Shirley Conran wrote a bestselling book entitled 'Superwoman' in which she came up with the line "Life is too short to stuff a mushroom", and for many years I agreed with her. But then the delicious large open brown mushrooms known in the UK as Portobello mushrooms became widely available and I revised my ideas. These are wonderful as a side dish, as the vegetarian option on a braai/barbeque, or on their own as a light supper. The foul weather we have been enduring in Britain this summer has meant that these have had to be baked in the oven each time I've made them - too wet for braaing these past few weeks.

STUFFED MUSHROOMS

6 large flat mushrooms – Portobello or similar
3 spring onions, finely chopped
120 g white breadcrumbs
2 cloves garlic
1 heaped tablespoon finely chopped parsley
Salt & pepper
Olive oil

Optional extras:
A slice of cheese placed on top of each mushroom prior to baking.
A fried egg placed on top of each baked mushroom.

Pre-heat oven to 200°C

Remove the stalks from the mushrooms and chop finely.
Heat a little olive oil in a sauté pan and gently fry the spring onions and chopped mushroom stalks until onion is soft but not brown.
Put the breadcrumbs, chopped parsley, minced garlic, spring onions etc into a bowl and season with salt and pepper. Mix together, add a dash or two of olive oil if needed to make the stuffing slightly moist.
Divide the stuffing between the mushrooms and press it in carefully.
Drizzle a little more olive oil over each one.

Place the mushrooms on a baking sheet and place in the oven for 15-20 minutes until the mushroom is soft.

Alternatively, the mushrooms do well on a braai (use tongs to lift them), place round the sides of the grid when the braai is ready for cooking.

SED QUIS CUSTODIET IPSOS CUSTODES? Juvenal
"But who is to guard the guards themselves?" is the translation, but I think the modern interpretation is "Who is watching Big Brother?"

READING:

Every year in June or July, the Books sections of our newspapers publish lists of books that various literary pundits have recommended for summer reading. Well this year I have stolen a march on them and am going to suggest you add Beneath the Bleeding by Val McDermid to your personal holiday reading list.

Val McDermid is one of the best known British crime writers; indeed it was from her books that the very popular TV series Wire in The Blood was created. When you pick up anything by her you know you are in for a gripping tale, you can hardly bear to put the book down as you just HAVE to see what will happen next. Beneath the Bleeding delivers all that and more. The main characters are Dr Tony Hill, a psychological profiler who works closely with DCI Carol Jordan of the Bradfield Police. This duo have featured in many of McDermid’s books, and their complex relationship is always part of the story. Having said that, it is not necessary to have read any of the previous books in which they feature in order to enjoy this one, as it does stand on its own.

The book opens with an incident which results in Dr Hill being confined to hospital for the greater part of the tale, in the same hospital an internationally famous footballer, star of the local team is gravely ill. It turns out that the footballer has been poisoned. DCI Jordan has to find out who would poison him, how, and why. Hill takes his mind off his physical problems by trying to work with what little information they have in order to get a picture of the likely poisoner. When others start being poisoned too, it becomes a major investigation and time is of the essence.

Then, if that weren’t enough to be going on with, there is an explosion at the city’s football stadium, and dozens of people are killed and injured. Carol and her team are first on the scene and immediately begin the investigation, until the Counter Terrorism Command people arrive and take over. The twists and turns of what may be a terrorist attack, or may be something else, are intricately plotted, and McDermid uses the tensions between the local police force and the CTC to good effect, she has obviously drawn on the information divulged at various recent terrorist trials to describe bomb making techniques. The book also highlights just how fast racial tensions can be exposed when an incident like this occurs.

As always the police procedural aspect of the book is fascinating – McDermid emphasises just how much IT specialists are used within the police force to search hard drives and other nooks and crannies of the computer world in the solving of crime.

The ending left me slightly sceptical, but a friend who also enjoyed the book thought it was very plausible – I wonder what you would make of it.

A great beach read, a great anytime read.

Rated 4.5*

RANTING:

Since 1997 we have been at the mercy of the most controlling, power hungry bunch of politicians we have ever had the misfortune to be governed by. I thought the last Tory lot were bad, but they were merely sleazy, the Blair/Brown regime are far worse and far more dangerous.

Britain is being turned into a nightmarish totalitarian state, and we are so supine we are letting it happen. We are to be spied on in every aspect of our lives. We already have more CCTV cameras than ANY other country in the world – we are watched on just about every road, every street, in every railway station, every shopping centre, public swimming bath – the list seems endless. This, say the police, government and local councils is for our own good, to prevent crime and to solve crimes. Does it do that? Does it hell. Has crime been prevented – no, it has risen, but never mind, the cameras have enabled jobsworths to snoop on us from dawn to dusk.

Then, when the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) was placed on the statute book, the Government said it was for the prevention of terrorism. They use that as the reason for everything they do these days. And what has RIPA done to save us all from terrorism so far? Not a sausage, but the borough council in Poole used it to permit the surveillance of a family who they suspected (wrongly) of applying to send their four year old daughter to a school in another cachement area. Scary stuff eh? lucky they watched them don't you think? On the other hand Gosport District Council used RIPA to justify their surveillance of people who were under suspicion of committing serious crime (this is a necessary criteria under the regulation of the Act) – and this REALLY serious crime was…..dog fouling in a local park. Wow - you really need to have a specially draconian Act of Parliament to put a stop to that.

This misuse of legislation is what is known as Function Creep. A piece of legislation intended for one thing ends up being used for another thing entirely. And so, bit by bit, our liberty and our privacy is whittled away.

The latest lunacy proposed by the Government, is that the ISPs (Internet Service Providers) should supply them with ALL our emails, plus all our mobile phone calls and text messages. The Government would keep all this information on a huge database for 12 months so they can access any email, call or text sent or received by anyone in the UK. Whaaat! Are we to be allowed no privacy at all? Why not steam open my birthday card from Aunty Marise as well, just to check she isn’t planning the destruction of the western world as we know it?

Apart from the fact that the Home Office’s track record of keeping data secure is laughable (don’t get me started on that…), function creep would soon set in, and who knows who would end up reading our emails. It is a nauseating thought.

I'm off to join a protest group - want to come too?

RECIPE:

Its a pity that when most people think of Guacamole, what they think of is the bland, preservative packed, artificially green mush sold in a plastic tub in a supermarket, when the real thing is easy peasy lemon squeezy to make, and tastes so fresh and delicious. I will confess that I am not an avocado fan in the normal way of things, but I do enjoy a dollop of guacamole on a crispbread. This is a dish which originated in Mexico, and the name comes from a corruption of the Mayan words 'ahuactl' which means avocado, and 'malli' which means sauce. But I suppose all you clever clogs knew that already.

GUACAMOLE

3 ripe avocados
½ red onion, very finely chopped
2 large ripe plum tomatoes, skinned, cored and de-seeded
Juice of 1 lemon or lime
1 large red chilli, de-seeded and finely chopped
1 bunch fresh coriander leaves/stalks, finely chopped
Salt and pepper

Halve the avocados, remove the stones, and scoop the flesh into a bowl (make sure you get all the very green flesh which is just under the skin).

Use a fork to roughly mash the avocado, don’t turn it into a pulp, some texture is good.

Add the finely chopped onion and chilli, the finely diced tomato, the chopped coriander and the lime/lemon juice. Gently mix everything together and then season to taste with salt and pepper.

Store in the fridge with a piece of clingfilm pressed down on the surface of the Guacamole to prevent air getting to it and making it go brown.

Serve with pita bread, savoury crackers, grissini or spread it on dry toasted slices of baguette as a crostini.

...AND SO, LADIES & GENTLEMEN, AS THE FLORIST OF TIME TAKES A DAFFODIL OUT OF HER VASE, AND THE GREENGROCER OF FATE TAKES A LEEK OUT OF HIS WINDOW... we say farewell to Humphrey Lyttelton who died a few days ago, he will be greatly missed.



READING:

Today I thought I should write about a couple of blooks I’ve read recently. What is a blook I hear you ask – well, a blook is a book that has come from a blog, and there seem to be a lot of them about. As a blogger myself I was intrigued as to why/how some blogs were turned into books and did some snuffling about on the web to find out. There is a whole new industry it seems with publishers approaching popular bloggers to get them into print. One fascinating blog I have read for several years is Random Acts of Reality by Tom Reynolds who works in the London Ambulance Service; his blog has been turned into a book called Blood Sweat &Tea, and it has sold very well – as I read his blog I haven’t bought the book. There is also Wife in the North, and the blogs that seem to feature the sex industry which have become blooks, such as Belle de Jour,or the sex life/fantasies of the blogger, Girl with a One Track Mind.
All very steamy I’m sure, but not for me.

The first blook I read was Julie & Julia: my year of cooking dangerously, by Julie Powell. This book came to my notice ages ago, and loving both reading and cooking I made a mental note to get a copy. At that point I had no idea that it had developed from a blog. Julie Powell, a young Texan living with her husband in New York, felt trapped in a job she did not enjoy, and challenged herself to cook all the recipes in Julia Child’s legendary cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking. So The Project was born, 524 recipes to be cooked in 365 days with Julie documenting her progress in a blog. The book which has sprung from this blog is sometimes very funny, sometimes very irritating, sometimes endearing, but it will not teach anyone how to cook that’s for sure. I enjoyed the book far less than I had expected – I suspect I am the wrong age for it; I wanted to tell Julie to stop being so disorganised and to clear up properly in her kitchen! (doesn’t say much about my character does it?). Never the less it is a light, amusing read, and it gave me my favourite saying of the moment “Man up, dude”!

The second blook I read was Anonymous Lawyer by Jeremy Blachman. This one was different in that it is a novel, but a novel that began (and continues) as a blog. Anonymous Lawyer is hiring partner at a large global law firm based in Los Angeles and he has just started a blog. On it he vents his spleen about his colleagues ‘The Jerk’. ‘The Tax Nut’, ‘The Fat Guy’ et al, and dreams up ways of torturing paralegals, junior associates, and the crop of legal students who join the firm each summer for work experience.
He moans about Anonymous Wife and her spending habits, and worries about Anonymous Son and Daughter. As far as he is concerned the whole blog is just a secret bit of fun, but one day he gets an email from someone in his firm who knows he is the writer of the blog, and his job is suddenly in jeopardy.
This book is written as a series of blog posts interspersed with email exchanges, and although it is interesting in the way it shows the ruthless work practices within big corporate law firms in the USA, it is quite hard work reading it as it never seems to go anywhere, there is no inherent structure to the story. In fact it would be better if read intermittently as a blog, rather than all strung together. The whole thing is a fiction as Jeremy Blachman is not a partner –nor anything else- at any big law firm, he went to Harvard Law School, and started the blog almost as soon as he graduated. Read the blog by all means, borrow the book from a library if you must, but don’t spend money buying it.

RANTING:

I am getting fed up to the back teeth with every single-issue group using Global Warming as an excuse to try to force us to live life the way they think best. The latest group to do this is the vegetarian/vegan posse who now say that eating meat, eggs and dairy produce is worse than driving a 4x4 on unleaded petrol 24 hrs a day, and all the industrial emissions in the world rolled into one.

Oh yeah, says who? Two scientists in Chicago apparently – both of whom are vegetarians, surprise, surprise. TWO scientists in the whole international science world.

Paul McCartney has become the celebrity spokesperson for this group (not too surprising as his late wife established a successful factory-produced line of chilled and frozen veggie foods). He gave an interview to PeTA, (which stands for People for Ethical Treatment of Animals), saying that we must all go vegetarian to save the world.

Well he and PeTA can fuck off, I am NOT going to start eating Quorn; hands off my Osso Bucco, my roast leg of lamb, my steak and chips, pork chops with caramelised apples, Brie, Stilton, scrambled eggs, liver and bacon, and Cheddar, not to mention the Christmas Turkey. I take great care over the food I buy, cook and eat, meat is only a small part of my family’s diet, but it is a vital part, and much enjoyed. I don’t think some of these people have ever thought about the taste of food, or why we have evolved over thousands of years with our dental structure specifically designed to eat meat, and I am very, very dubious about the links with global warming.

This could force me to the barricades to defend my right to remain an occasional carnivore.

RECIPE:

It is a Bank Holiday weekend here in Britain (and in South Africa), and I want do some gardening over the next three days, so meals must be minimum effort. This is an all-in-one dish, it can be prepped in advance, adapts easily for larger numbers and is ridiculously good given how simple it is. I cut the recipe from a magazine over twenty years ago and still make it regularly. Over the years many friends have asked for the recipe, so it has spread far and wide across the globe. Now you can make it too. Start it the day before, or in the morning ready for the evening meal.

LAZY MEDITERRANEAN CHICKEN PILAF

Serves 6

5 Tablespoons lemon juice ( juice from approx 2 lemons)
3 cloves garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon dried mixed herbs or Herbes de Provençe (if you like you can use a mixture of Basil, Oreganum and Thyme)
Salt + Freshly ground black pepper
12 Chicken thighs, bone in, skin on; or 6 chicken breasts with bone and skin.
1 medium/large onion, roughly chopped – not too fine
150g sliced mushrooms
1 red or yellow pepper, de-seeded and chopped (or half red, half yellow for more colour!)
50g of sun-dried tomatoes in oil, drained and chopped
18 small black pitted olives
250g Basmati rice
850 ml of boiling chicken stock

In a large bowl combine the lemon juice with the garlic, dried herbs, pepper and salt. Add the chicken pieces and toss well to coat.

Cover the bowl with cling-film and marinate for 2 hours at room temp or 24 hours in the fridge, tossing the meat occasionally. (You can put the chicken, garlic, lemon juice and herbs in a large plastic bag to marinate, gives more room in the fridge, but make sure it is tightly sealed.)

Grease a large, shallow, oven-proof dish and scatter the chopped onion over the bottom. Cover this with the sliced mushrooms, chopped pepper, tomatoes and olives, and then the rice. (You can do all this hours in advance)

Pre-heat the oven to 200°C.

Remove the chicken from the marinade.

Arrange the chicken pieces, skin side up, in a single layer over the rice. Pour over any remaining marinade and then the boiling chicken stock.

Place, uncovered, in the oven and leave undisturbed for about 1 hour or until the chicken is cooked and all the stock has been absorbed by the rice.

Serve with a mixed salad.

HERE'S A LITTLE PROVERB YOU SURELY OUGHT TO KNOW;
HORSES SWEAT AND MEN PERSPIRE, BUT LADIES ONLY GLOW.


READING:

On World Book Day which was last week, Boy A by Jonathan Trigell was voted as THE Book to Talk About from a list of 10 contenders (to see the other books listed, click HERE) and I think it a worthy winner.

Boy A has chosen the name Jack Burridge for himself, his real name is never divulged, because Boy A is one of two lads who murdered another child when they were ten years old. Boy B was found dead by hanging whilst still in a Young Offenders Institution.

Now aged 24, Jack has been given a new identity and is tentatively beginning a life out in the real world. Jack has a job, and his minder/mentor who introduces himself to people as Jack’s Uncle Terry, has found him lodgings with a local woman. No-one knows his true background.

Boy A lives a very fragile life, terrified of relationships, never forgetting what he is guilty of having done. He is always aware that the tabloid press are relentless in their attempts to find him. When, because he and a workmate happen to be first on the scene of a terrible car smash, he saves the life of a little girl, he is hailed as a hero which he finds very frightening, as the local press send a photographer round to take their picture. He is also worried about having too much to drink in case he gives himself away, and when some of his workmates befriend him he has problems as they dabble with recreational drugs which are all off limits to him. Eventually he embarks on his first romantic relationship, which is also means a sexual relationship, something he has never had before. As events unfold the reader gets a real sense of foreboding, Jack is too vulnerable, his anonymity cannot be sustained indefinitely.

The story is very obviously based on the notorious case of the two boys who murdered James Bulger in Liverpool 15 years ago. Since then it has been revealed that at least one of those boys has been released on license, and needless to say there have been all sorts of stories in the tabloid press and circulating on the internet as to where they might be, and how they have “got away with murder” as they are no longer incarcerated. As a youth court magistrate for many years, I have visited Feltham YOI several times, and this book conveys the ghastly atmosphere, the bullying, and the deep unhappiness that permeate the place. It punishes youths, no doubt of that, but I doubt that it rehabilitates many.

The author has skilfully managed to cover the complex attitudes society has towards children who kill; how they are seen as more monstrous than adult killers, and how many feel they should be punished incredibly harshly for the rest of their lives. On the whole the public seem uninterested in WHY these children would kill, as they are considered to be almost sub-human.

“She could remember at the time of the trial, everyone she knew was horrified, imagining what it would be like if their child had been murdered in such a way. No one had stopped to think about what it would be like if their child was the murderer. That was why the boys had to be evil, they had to be alien: other, demons”

The book will certainly give readers food for thought, and it would be a fantastic book club choice as it raises several very debatable points of view.

Rated 5*

RANTING:

If I stub my toe, do I immediately look round to see who I can sue? Well no I don’t, but some people would. Scrolling through the BBC news website today I read an item which made me so mad I could spit.

Mr and Mrs Boardman are a couple in their eighties who live in Lincolnshire. Mrs Boardman has heart problems, and recently they had to call an ambulance for her. When it arrived at their house and she had been seen, one of the ambulance men returned to the vehicle to collect a stretcher and fell in their driveway. He has now instructed a lawyer and is seeking damages from the Boardmans for personal injury. The East Midlands Ambulance Service who employ the ambulance technician say that he is doing this on his own behalf and it is nothing to do with them.

The Boardmans were shaken and distressed when they received the letter from this man’s solicitor, and I’m not surprised. It would distress me too. They say they would now be scared to summon the emergency services even if they need them. Accidents happen, you can’t always blame someone else, and it is just plain greedy to try and exhort money from frail elderly people because you fell over whilst doing your job.

What kind of crazy society have we become?

RECIPE:

Supermarket shelves are stacked high with crisps, nuts, cheesy wotsits and other snacks for serving with drinks, but they are so expensive and greasy that I am on a bit of a campaign to find other appetisers. I can eat houmous 'til the cows come home, and am partial to taramasalata and bits of pitta bread too but after a while it is good to ring the changes. This is ever so easy and very moreish, veggie friends like it, and I kid myself that it is healthy too!

CANNELLINI BEAN MASH WITH CUMIN

Serves 4-6

2x 400g tins cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
5 tablespoons olive oil
4 large cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped
1 teaspoon cumin (I use half ground cumin, and half cumin seeds)
3 tablespoons lemon juice
Salt & pepper
2 tablespoons (approx) finely chopped fresh coriander.

Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan, add the cumin and chopped garlic and cook for a few minutes stirring well – do not let the garlic brown.

Add the beans and mix all together well. Cook gently for 5 minutes, stirring all the time. Remove from heat. Either mash the beans with a fork, adding the lemon juice and extra oil if it is too solid and dry, or whiz in a blender, so that it forms a rough puree. It should not be too smooth so do not over blend. Stir the chopped coriander into the bean mash. Season well to taste with salt and pepper.

Serve with warm grilled bruschetta or toasted pita bread.

This is also delicious spread in sandwiches with sliced tomato and cucumber.

TGIF ---its been a fairly hectic week and I 'm going out for dinner with friends tonight, toodle-pip!

READING:

I have been having a bit of a Crime Fiction fest (In between reading other books, some of which I’ve written about on this blog) and recently came across a book by Laura Lippman entitled By a Spider’s Thread featuring a feisty female PI called Tess Monaghan. To my joy and delight, this is just one of a whole series of books with Tess as the lynch-pin. Isn’t it wonderful when you find there are six or seven books by an author you’ve just discovered, and can look forward to reading?

By a Spider’s Thread is set in Baltimore, and is a cracking crime/mystery about the disappearance of orthodox jew Mark Rubin’s wife and three children. The police will not do anything about the case as it appears that Natalie Rubin left the marital home of her own accord. Mark cannot believe that she would do that and so he hires Tess to try and trace her and the kids. I don’t want to say any more about the storyline as it would spoil the plot for future readers, suffice to say it is well plotted, comes to a satisfying conclusion, all loose ends are tied up very plausibly, and the characterisation is first class.

For years I have been reading the crime fiction by Sara Paretsky featuring her gritty female PI V.I. Warshawski and all are set in Chicago; this book reminded me of them in some ways. Apparently Laura Lippman has set all or nearly all her books in one city Baltimore, and they too feature a single woman PI. I need to read more of her books, but on first acquaintance I prefer Tess Monaghan to Paretsky’s V.I Warshawski – she is a warmer character.

Rated 3.5*

RANTING:

Political correctness raises my blood pressure – and I suspect it does the same for many of you. So read no further if high blood pressure worries you…because this is another example of Local Authority craziness.

Some councillors in Totnes (an ancient seaside town in Devon) have suggested that any furniture owned by the councilwhich is upholstered with leather – such as armchairs, sofas, or the inlaid leather tops of antique desks, should have the leather removed and replaced with plastic to avoid offending vegetarians.

No, it is NOT an April Fool’s Day joke (it’s almost May in case you hadn’t noticed) it is just one more example of the way some folk have become totally out of whack with common sense.

I’m not anti-vegetarian (although none of my best friends are veggies), but I do get hacked off at how much we are all supposed to pander to particular groups. If I am producing a meal for people and there is a non-carnivore among them I will always prepare a vegetarian option. But if I go to eat a meal prepared by a vegetarian, will they have provided a meat option for me? Will they hell. Not that I object to that, in fact I wouldn’t expect it – but recovering the leather furniture with plastic???? What madness.

And if I were a council taxpayer in Totnes, and my local taxes were going to be used on this lunatic idea I would be down at the Town Hall making a serious protest.

Ominvores of the World Unite !

RECIPE:

So Marco Pierre White, the über celebrity chef, has come out as a fan of Knorr chicken stock cubes, after all these years of masquerading as a purist who has made the average cook feel guilty for not making every thing by hand from scratch. Whatever next - is he suddenly going to come clean about using Paxo stuffing, or packet Bechamel sauce?

Seriously though, I am not fanatical about anything in cooking, though my instant stock of choice is Marigold Swiss bouillon which contains less salt and no MSG.
But I do make chicken stock regularly - approximately every fortnight. The reason is that whenever I do a big shop at Waitrose or Costco, I always buy a Rotisseried chicken. As soon as I get it home I strip the cooked meat off, and it gives about 8 servings, ideal in with pasta, with salad and baked potatoes, and in sandwiches for packed lunch or padkos. Then the carcass goes into my trusty pressure cooker together with a few other bits and bobs and low and behold 1.5 l of stock.

NO BRAINER CHICKEN STOCK

1 chicken carcass (and if you happen to have a chicken thigh or two lying around which you can add, so much the better)
2 carrots, scrubbed and cut into big chunks
2 celery sticks cut into biggish pieces ( use the tougher outer sticks from a head of celery)
1 medium onion cut into 8 pieces (if you leave the skin on, it gives the stock a lovely golden colour)
3-4 stalks of parsley
1 stem of fresh thyme (or teaspoon dried thyme)
1 bay leaf
5-6 grinds of black pepper

Put everything into a very large lidded pan. Cover with 3 litres of cold water and bring to the boil; Simmer covered for about 1 hour, cool and strain. Keeps in fridge for 3-4 days. Freezes well.

I haven't given pressure cooker instructions, because they all differ slightly, but about 20 mins at pressure is ideal.

A BOOK OF VERSES UNDERNEATH THE BOUGH,
A Flask of Wine, a Loaf of Bread - and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness -
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.
from 'The Rubiayat of Omar Khayyam'


READING:
I’m a sucker for encyclopedias, directories, dictionaries and all other books which gather bits of information together and catagorise them. I also love cooking, eating and reading about food. So when I saw this on the new books pile in my local library I simply couldn’t resist borrowing it, with, I must admit a view to deciding whether to buy a copy for myself when it came out in paperback.
The Compendium of Nosh by Jack McLean looked as though it would be just my sort of thing. Alas, not. As it says on the jacket blurb, the author is “opinionated, idiosyncratic and completely unreconstructed”. This book told me more about Jack McLean than about anything else, and I’m not sure I am terribly interested in him and his views, certainly not enough to buy the book – and I certainly wouldn’t recommend it to any of my foodie friends. To give you some idea of the style of writing, and the appalling level of information provided, here are some examples quoted in their entirety:
Darjeeling:This expensive tea is grown in the snowy foothills of the Himalayas. It is much exported to Russia.
Knaildlich: These dumplings made from matzo meal are part of a traditional Jewish Passover soup. They are dreadful.
Mulled wine or ale: Wine or beer heated up with sugar and spices. It is traditional at festive occasions and is thoroughly unpleasant.
If you are at all interested in food, its origins, regional differences in foods and how we use ingredients, don’t bother wasting your time on this book. The author, with an arrogance that is breathtaking, styles himself The Urban Voltaire.

Rated: 1*

RANTING:

A summer picnic (or a winter one for that matter) wouldn't be a proper picnic without a glass or two of wine. And one of the essential items in any picnic kit is a corkscrew, although with the advent of screwcap fixings on wine bottles that isn't quite as vital as it once was. What I will never, never buy - or hope to be served - is a Tulipa, a pre-filled, foil sealed plastic glass of wine. These are the brainchild of a company called Al Fresco who have spent half a million quid "developing the concept". Apparently they are going on sale in the UK in a few months time, priced at £3,75 for a pair. There will be a choice of an Australian red or white wine and a Californian rose.


I can see the clever dick thinking behind this "... imagine that you are going out for a picnic, and you've forgotten the wine, corkscrew, wineglasses. Just pop into a convenient branch of XYZ Boozers Ltd and pick up a double pack of Tulipas" This is a truly ghastly idea and begs so many questions - When will the wine be poured into the glasses? what processes will be needed to foil-seal the glasses, how long will they sit around on a shelf waiting to be sold?

I am not particularly reknowned for my Green credentials, but even I can see that this cannot be an environmentally friendly concept. The "glasses" are plastic and not reusable, the foil seal makes for more waste, and the packaging/production process must use energy rather than conserve it. How much simpler, cheaper, and more eco-friendly to simply open a bottle of wine and pour it into glasses - or mugs, or ladies shoes - whatever fancy takes you.

And how much better it will taste - and after all, that is really the point of drinking wine in the first place.




RECIPE:
As part of my current belt-tightening regime, I am determined that no food is to be wasted. Lurking at the bottom of the fruit bowl were four apples, no longer crisp and looking rather unappetising, so I decided to use them together with some rather squashy tomatoes, a head of winter celery which was languishing in the fridge and an onion to make soup. This is a recipe I stumbled across years ago, I can't remember where, and it is ever so easy. It is low-fat, low calorie (if you leave out any garnish of cream!) and yet sophisticated enough for a special dinner - and it makes my halo positively glow when I consider the virtue of frugality!

APPLE, CELERY & TOMATO SOUP

125g butter
400g onion, roughly chopped
400g apples, roughly chopped (do not bother topeel or core the apples)
400g celery, roughly chopped
400g tomatoes, quartered (do not skin the tomatoes)
750ml chicken or vegetable stock
Salt & Pepper

Melt the butter in a big pan and sauté the onion until soft and golden. Add all the other chopped ingredients. Pour in enough stock to cover the vegetables and bring to the boil, simmer gently for about 30 minutes until all is very soft and almost collapsing into the liquid. Using a hand-held blender (or a food processor) whizz everything together until no lumps remain. Pour the soup through a sieve to remove all the coarse fibres of skin, apple core, celery strings, tomato pips etc.

Add the remaining stock and season to taste.

Serve piping hot with a very thin slice of apple floating on the surface as a garnish, and a thin swirl of pouring cream.

Melba toast is great with this.

MY CANDLE BURNS at both ends; It will not last the night; But, ah, my foes, and, oh, my friends - it gives a lovely light.


Edna Saint Vincent Millay

READING:

Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem is a surreal detective story set, you guessed it, in Brooklyn New York. Lionel Essrog is one of four adolescent orphans from St Vincent’s Home for Boys who are taken on by a local fixer/tough called Frank Minna who intends the lads to become “Minna Men”, his sidekicks in the fly-by-night detective-agency-cum-limosine-service he has started. Lionel is known as the Human Freakshow as he suffers from Tourette's Syndrome
and is continually shouting out nonsense and swearwords, compulsively counting things, touching things and twitching or “ticcing” as it is properly called. Because of his condition Lionel’s innate intelligence is discounted by everyone, until one terrible day when Frank Minna is murdered and Lionel is compelled to really become a detective, and to try to find his way through shady undergrowth of Brooklyn’s gangster land and the web of threats and favours that surrounded Minna.

Jonathan Lethem had written Sci- Fi before he wrote this novel, and has obviously been influenced by Philip K. Dick’s writing. What gives the book its USP is the character of Lionel and his daily, even hourly, battle with the behaviours caused by his condition. He is isolated from forming any real relationships by his Tourette’s Syndrome, which is brilliantly described and which I found incredibly moving. I wasn’t sure quite what the author wanted this book to be. As a detective story it is satisfactory but fairly mundane, so was Lethem primarily trying to write a book about someone with Tourette’s?

Tourette’s is a condition which is life-long and there is virtually no treatment for it. People who suffer from it are often shunned in society. I well remember my very first day as a magistrate, 20 years ago. I had to sit in court at Horseferry Road in London. One of the very largest and busiest magistrate’s courts in England. As you might imagine I was nervous, and slightly stunned by the sheer volume of clients who passed before the bench. A case of criminal damage was called on, and into the dock came a man of about 30, f-ing and blinding and throwing his arms around, he paid little attention to the chairman of the bench telling him to be quiet. The chairman was an elderly chap in his late sixties, and he became very red in the face as the man kept shouting “fuckfuckfuckfuckcuntfuck” etc, and he threatened to have the man sent down for contempt of court. I suddenly realized that the man had Tourette’s (although back then I knew it as Gilles de la Tourette’s Syndrome) so I gathered my courage and managed to whisper to the chairman that I would like us to retire. When we did, I explained what I knew of the syndrome – which was not that much – but persuaded my fellows that the Probation service should be asked to get the man an appointment with a neurologist at Guy's hospital, and find him a place in a hostel (he was living on the streets) and that that would be a far more positive outcome than just locking him up. Sadly, I expect he appeared in other courts at other times poor chap, but at least on that one occasion I felt I had achieved something worthwhile, not a feeling I have had very often in my little corner of our creaky justice system.

RANTING:
Are we going nuts as a society? Maybe it’s just me going nuts, but I am getting really irritated with the ridiculous warning labels on packets of food or household goods, I think it is creeping into this country following the US model. Check out this website about idiotic warning signs in the USA

Today I was making my usual weekly dash round Waitrose when I came across the most blatant example of an illogical, crazy warning I have seen .

A promotion was going on in the fruit & veg section. A Waitrose employee was standing at a little table offering customers free samples of a line of produce – you know the kind of thing, a whole lot of little plastic dishes with a tiny taster in each, and a waste bin beside the table for the used dishes. There was an artistically arranged pile of packets of the goods for customers to purchase once they had been seduced by the tasting. Prominently displayed on the table was a large laminated sign reading ‘May Contain Traces of Nuts’ – and what you may ask, was the product being promoted? Why it was Nuts, packets of Waitrose’s own label nuts. Cashews, almonds, brazils, macadamias, pistachios, and some packets of mixed nuts. There was nothing else in the packets, just nuts.

‘May Contain Traces of Nuts’ – I should bloody well hope they did – they WERE nuts and I went nuts. I rushed up to the employee and asked them (very politely) why they had that stupid warning sign up and I was told ‘we have to have it by law* in case someone who is allergic to nuts eats something without realizing it has nuts in it.’ - ‘but’ I said, ‘these ARE packets of nuts, the samples you are handing out are nuts, why would anyone with a nut allergy even consider taking a sample? You don’t need this warning label’ Anyway, there was no point discussing it with her, she was merely following company policy.

I drove home thinking about how stupid our society is becoming – having to be warned about the obvious all the time, why are we letting this happen? Where will it all end?

* It is not true that you have to label for inadvertent traces of nuts, I have just looked up the UK’s food labeling regulations to be sure. Having said that, I can see that it might be sensible to put such a label on a packet of food containing a mixture of ingredients where there is a chance of the food having some nutty component. I just think companies are taking it to excess without looking at logic because they are scared witless of being sued.

RECIPE:

After that nutty rant, I thought I would include a recipe that definitely contains nuts. This is a cauliflower salad - well I call it a salad - that has variations across Spain and Italy. I like this Italian version, and presume it came from the town of Rimini. You can make it all year round as it is just as good in winter as in summer. The other good thing about it is that you can prep everything several hours ahead, and just assemble it at the last minute, so it is really good as a starter when you have guests.

CAVALFIORI A RIMINATI

Serves 4 as a starter, or 2 as a main course.

1 medium cauliflower, leaves discarded, broken into small florets.

Generous pinch of saffron

75ml olive oil

1 large red onion, thinly sliced

50g pine nuts

50g raisins

Extra-virgin olive oil to dress

Small handful chopped fresh mint

Small handful chopped flat leaf parsley

Heat a saucepan filled with a generous amount of salted water, add the saffron and when it comes to the boil, pop in the cauliflower.

Cook for just 2-3 minutes, so that the cauliflower picks up a little colour from the saffron but stays very much al dente.

Drain well, and spread on a tray to cool quickly.

Meanwhile, put the oil in a frying pan over a high heat. When it is just starting to show wisps of smoke, add the onion. Fry briskly for 5-6 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the slices start to look crispy and caramelised. Add the pine nuts and raisins. Stir and cook for a couple of minutes (the raisins will swell and the pine nuts should colour a little). Tip into a sieve and drain off the excess oil, then transfer into a large bowl.

To serve, toss the cauliflower with the onions, raisins and pine nuts and season to taste. Drizzle generously with the extra-virgin olive oil and scatter with the chopped herbs.

The salad is also good when topped with shavings of a salty sheep milk cheese such as Pecorino.