Onkel Josef

There's an old Ukrainian saying: "Only a fool posts a picture of Joe Stalin at the top of his blog, without an accompanying new blog entry". So be it. Let the lips of every man sing, "Oldhall is a traditionalist, after all"

But none of that really matters, if you're just wondering what I ate yesterday. I say "yesterday" not to fool you into thinking there's anything secretive about what I've eaten today, or even because love was an easier game to play then, no, rather I describe yesterdays activities because it's early morning, I just woke up. Well. I say 'early', but it isn't really so early... but I did just wake up.

Just to confuse you, I'll tell you what I ate in reverse chronological order! Fasten your seatbelts, put on your magic decoder rings!

Late last night I had a bowl of Crispy Rice with milk. I didn't notice if they were name-brand crispies or those do-it-yourself jobs, you know, where you grow rice in the morning in your bath tub, harvest it in the afternoon, dry the actual rice pods in the hot late-afternoon sun, until they're all puffy, and ready to eat by evening. That may have been the case, I just don't remember.

My actual evening meal was pasta, stout round tubes of pasta (I don't know what they're called) with a sausage-enhanced red sauce. Although this meal is what we like to call "leftovers", it was still yummy. The sausage was in big chunks, so that IPM can avoid them... she doesn't like sausage. This may seem strange to you, but think of it this way (as a sort of 'mental crutch'): the way you and I feel about mushrooms, or some other Satan-spawned so-called food, she feels about sausage. I think it's important to try to understand the perspective of others.

Here I am Trying to Understand the Perspective of Others

I was supposed to eat that pasta dish for lunch, but instead I bought two sticks of bread in the morning, and ate those. It's possible that I skipped breakfast.

Eats

I ate a turkey today. Or at least, it feels like I did. Also, peas. Yes, it's true, I ate peas. Plus, gravy; there was gravy involved, there's no question. I almost forgot the bread; there was freshly baked bread, so I ate it. With butter. Mashed potatoes graced my plate, I devoured them. Not by themselves, tho', I made sure there were peas with each bite, as well as turkey, and you can't eat turkey without gravy, of course.

The Great Fall

Here at Prawn Hats Towers, I like to start off every entry with, well, THE START, that is, the first thing of the day. This entry is certainly no exception, I will start the description of my day with what happened even before I opened my peepers... and that is- I had a headache. How often does this happen, that you wake up with a headache? Some profound chemical imbalance between my ears, no doubt. So, perhaps you've guessed by now, my culinary day started with a pair of puny purple pain pills.

They didn't help

Once I reached my place of employment, I cracked open my food. Oh boy!

First, I consumed some scrummy pineapple, freshly whacked to bits by IPM a mere hour previous. As soon as I reached a post-pineapple state, the inevitability of my sandwich weighed heavily on my mind. (As did my headache.) But back to the sandwich... With trembling fingers, I peeled open the hydrocarbon wonder of my sandwich bag, to expose... the bread... the peanut butter... and finally- the jam. In my helpless fury, the jam and peanut butter made a maelstrom of sticky sweetness, on my fingers, on the sandwich bag, pebbles of chunky peanut landing on my keyboard, wedged between the V and the B.

It was a pretty good breakfast.

By lunchtime, I still had my headache, and I was scrutanising my recent activities for some reasonable cause; surely I had committed some punishable offence! I swallowed two more pills.

Lunchtime!

I had leftover fried chicken... some thighs, some drumsticks. I have to tell ya, though, chicken skin doesn't generally sit well when I eat it. What part of my digestive treasure hunt is at fault? I surely don't know. And just as surely, I avoid chicken skin. Now, I know what you're thinking, and you're wrong- I didn't make myself sick. But, at the same time, I can't say I was full, either.

I made it all the way to 3:30PM before The Great Fall... yes, I bought a portion of onion rings. Thankfully, you don't get as many onion rings as you used to (plus they cost more). So, while I didn't make myself exactly sick, I did make a pig of myself. Sigh.

Naturally, after a greasy portion of 'o' rings, I had a wicked sweet-tooth.... I found some gelatinous sugar things... and ate them all. I then remembered the fudge Robert gave me to take home... I ate it. Felt... so... nice...

The evening meal was beef, in a beer sauce, and jacket potato. Again IPM outdid herself with what will sure become a repeating culinary classic of colassal, um, cuteness, maybe?

On-the-Spot Jam

No, it's not the latest George Clinton rump-shaker.

I started the day by asking for TWO peanut butter and jelly sandwiches this morning, because I knew I didn't have any leftovers. I did have a cut up pineapple, and so, the plan was- the pineapple + one sandwich for breakfast, then the other sandwich for lunch + whatever miscellaneous fruit sittin' on my desk.

Instead, I ate it all at breakfast. Well- not all at once, but over the course of a few hours. And, um, not exactly all of it, I still had apricots on my desk, plus one orange. Nevertheless, by lunch-time, I wanted more to eat. Or, I wanted to eat more. Whatever.

So, I popped over to the store and bought a seeded baguette, plus two thingees of raspberries. Now, I know what you're thinking, and I have to tell you, you're right: I shoved the baguette full of those sweet 'n' juicy raspberries, and it was just like bread with jam. Except no sugar, no pectin, no grape juice added, no corn syrup...

Did you ever think about corn syrup? I mean, really think about it? Look- picture an ear of corn, alright? Now- imagine what you have to do to it to get sugar out... it boggles the mind.

A Small Mention

I just wanted to alert you all that the 'fresh' peas I bought 'n' ate from Marks & Spencer last week were NOT from Kenya, as they have been in the past, but instead... Guatemala! Maybe I should not have told you right off, but rather make you guess. Some people enjoy it if you make a 'game' out of things.

Such long distances those peas traveled to be chewed up, in my mouth.

My Mouth, Co-starring Other Facial Features

Mall Food

It was shaping up to be a quiet afternoon, two family members gone-down-south to fulfill a shopping list, one family member being a redundant J, hangin' with the doppelganger.

So, the first-born descendant joined me for a trip up the A1, past the Angel of the North, all the way to the industrial grittiness, the working-class reliability, of Newcastle/Gateshead. Oh yes, and the mall there. Now, I'm not a big 'mall person', when I visit America I quickly get my fill, and, truth be known, last weekend I visited that big mall in Manchester. But only because I had to kill some time... this week, no excuse, I CHOSE to go to Gateshead.

My telephone took this photo

It probably was not a typical Gateshead afternoon, because of all this World Cup business, everyone visiting their favourite watering hole, if you will, rather than digging the newest of the new fashions at Miss Selfridge. What I'm trying to tell you is- the place was deserted (mmmmm... dessert...). We did all the typical mall things, as one does, but pretty soon it was time for a cup of tea. As one does.

We found a place, they had a variety of cakes, but their special deal was- cream tea for two, for under five quid. Well, boy howdy, I'll have me some o' that!
Jus' special for all you furriners who can't be bothered to google it, here's what cream tea is: a scone or two, with whipped or (preferably) clotted cream, and strawberry jam. And tea. So you pile heaping piles of jam 'n' cream on your split-open scone, and politely sip your tea, because it's civilised.

Four pound ninety-five is a great deal for cream tea x2, Joe Bob says check it out.

After our snack things started to feel a bit Twilight Zone-ish, becuase we were the only people in the mall. Well, not really, but it kind of seemed that way.

It was time to start considering our evening meal!

As I drove away from Gateshead, I made a mistake I've made many times, a character flaw on my part, most likely... when suddenly faced with the decision, to either select "A1 North", or "A1 South", I pick the wrong one. See, I needed to go south, I should've picked "south". But, since I was in the north, I picked "north". Rather than turn around and look for a meal on the way home, I noted that my errantly northward projection put us smack dab in the middle of a town. I had nary a clue as to the name of the town (Gateshead, perhaps?), but it looked like there was plenty of food there. The people did NOT look starved. Plus, there were LOADS of cops, just everywhere. We found this place:

So there you have it- we were in "Swalwell". A town perhaps not easy to pronounce, I really don't know. I should've asked someone how to pronounce it, but everyone seemed so pleased about the World Cup, it just didn't seem like a decent thing to do.

I selected Pata Lata Chicken, and it was excellent! Perfect, just great, amongst the best I've ever had. Will I ever visit Swalwell again??? I hope so!!!


First-born had a "Speciality" dish, because it had potatoes, she really digs potatoes in her curry (get it?), called "Paneer Chicken". This, again, was a new one for us.

But she didn't feel that it was outstanding, and would not order it again.

Our restaurant-supplied dessert chocolate looked like this, only smaller:

Goodies

The last thing I want to do is turn this blog into an advert for some corporate omnivore, but having said that, "last" is a pretty serious word, and although I don't aspire to a title change such as "Budweiser's Prawn Hats", there are probably things I'd like even less. Drowning in boiling pickle juice whilst Billy Joel sniggers at my misfortune is the best I can think of, on this short notice.

But that's not what I want to tell you about.

I want to tell you about how much I enjoy some Marks and Spencer groceries. For example, fresh peas. Grown and picked in Kenya. Altho'... I do take exception to two untruths on the packaging:

Untruth #1: It says you should cook them. This is an awful lot of work, and changes the taste. Alright, fine, sometimes you want hot, cooked peas, but sometimes you want cold, crunchy peas that speak volumes regarding what it's like to grow up in Wisconsin in the early 70s.

No, really! Try it and you'll see.

Untruth #2: It says you should wash them. Again, you could do this, I'm not saying you ought not, but if you do your peas will taste just the water you used. The delicate balance of taste, aroma, and overall feel is- changed. Perhaps if there was an easy way to wash and dry, it might be different. See, I'm very open-minded.

I once told my friend Dick about how much I enjoyed my fresh Kenyan M&S peas, you see the reason I told him this, and the reason I'm now telling YOU this, is that Dick often travels to Kenya. He knows people who find seasonal work in Kenya shelling peas. Or picking them, or something. He KNOWS these people. So- I told Dick this so that he could thank his Kenyan friends, on my behalf, for their hard work in the field of peas (that's a pun, get it, field of peas?), and I also mentioned that I rarely-if-ever, wash them. Dick wrinkled his nose and furrowed his brow, "you REALLY ought to wash them. I mean- please. Please wash them." So I did, but I haven't done so since.

I was going to tell you about other M&S culinary delights, but I'm ready to get up and walk away now. See, I've not even made any hyperlinks. Maybe later.

Peas, M&S The Best Ever Mashed Potatoes, and Marc Bolan