Quinoa
I’ve never knowingly tasted quinoa, but it does come up occasionally on the gluten-free lists I belong to.
I was thus drawn to this article about the grain in the Guardian. The title
Quinoa: good, evil, or just really complicated?
Probably sums it all up well.
Gluten Free Bread Hunting In Brixton
By accident I heard about WAGfree in Brixton, which sells wheat and gluten free products in Brixton Village underneath the railway line. so I just had to go and find them and buy some bread.
It wasn’t difficult to find and these are some pictures I took, together with some of the bread, when I got home.
I liked the bread, although some might find it a little bit cakey. In some ways it was a pity I arrived when I did, as I was too early for their savoury products like quiches.
On the other hand, they can’t be doing too badly, as they just opened an outlet in Selfridges.
I thought that upmarket shop was one place, that certainly isn’t WAG-free! Certainly one footballer I know off, who is married to a coeliac, will probably be visiting.
I shall go to Selfridges myself next time, as it’s an easier journey.
Tesco Don’t Know Their Horse From Their Gluten
Tesco seem to have withdrawn their Free From gluten-free burgers after the horsemeat scare.
But they made a mistake in Oxford and got caught out by the BBC, as they report here.
As I’ve said before, the odd bit of horse won’t hurt me, but the levels of gluten in the usual burgers on sale in supermarkets most likely will.
A Friend’s Favourite Food
One of my friends loves sausages. In fact, rumour or should I say their sister says, they would eat nothing else as a child.
Yesterday, when I went to the Empress of India, I visited the butcher, called The Ginger Pig, opposite and bought some gluten-free sausages. I had them for supper tonight.
Sausages For Supper
They were excellent. I did save a couple to make a sausage sandwich to play along with Danny Baker on Saturday morning.
They are actually from Yorkshire. But as a Suffolk man, who loves his Newmarket sausage, I’ll forgive them that, as they were very good sausages.
Breakfast At Leon
I left home to do some photography without having any breakfast, so in the end I went to Leon in the depths of Canary Wharf to have one of their poached egg pots and a cup of tea.
A Proper Mug Of Tea
How often have you had tea in a fast food restaurant in a proper china mug, that was virtually full-up? Especially, when the two items cost just £3.75 together. I took a picture of the poached egg pot in this post.
Goats Cheese Closes Tunnel
This story from Norway, could almost be read as a classic spoof, like London bus found on the Moon from the Daily Sport. This is the first three paragraphs.
A road tunnel in Norway has been closed – by a lorry-load of burning cheese.
About 27 tonnes of caramelised brown goat cheese – a delicacy known as Brunost – caught light as it was being driven through the Brattli Tunnel at Tysfjord, northern Norway, last week.
The fire raged for five days and smouldering toxic gases were slowing the recovery operation, officials said.
I wonder if Waitrose stocks this cheese? Brunost sounds so dangerous, that it could be used as a substitute for Semtex.
To The Other Side Of Hackney For Lunch
My youngest son used to live near Victoria Park and to get there I used to drive down Lauriston Road. I also used to go there to get postcards for various clients and businesses from a company called Just Postcards. The company did move to Norfolk I think, but they are no longer on the web. A pity, because they did a good job.
So today, I went to the area to check out a pub called the Empress of India. I was not disappointed with my lunch.
Lunch At The Empress Of India
As you can see I had some beef with cauliflower, capers and kale. It was gluten-free of course. I washed it down with a glass of Hogan’s cider.
I chose it because I’m very much a sucker for capers, but then if you’ve been to the Aeolian Islands, you always are.
History doesn’t record much of Queen Victoria’s taste in food, but would she be amused that a good pub/restaurant is named after her.
It is one of these places that is very convenient for me, as I just get a 277 bus all of the way.
An Irreplaceable Winner
Michael Winner who died yesterday, is one of those people you just can’t replace. You can always put him down as another Great British Eccentric like Patrick Moore or Henry Blofeld, but in some ways he was more than that!
He may not be looked upon as a great director of films, but he did make some good ones, although not all were to my taste. I remember the film, West 11, being discussed in the papers in the early sixties. It was one of the first serious roles for that tragic actress; Diana Dors. And then there was Hannibal Brooks, which must surely be one of the most unusual war films ever. But look at the credits and cast lists of his films and he certainly could persuade the best to work with him.
But no-one is saying this morning he didn’t have lots of personal charm.
As to his restaurant reviews, I can always remember C, searching for them in The Sunday Times and then having a good laugh.
I doubt, we will see the like of Michael Winner again!
A Welsh Take On Horseburgers
This article in the Mirror talks about and links to a video that has gone viral. It concerns a pantomime horse suffering from grief over the loss of its parents in a Tesco store in West Wales.
The Arches Underneath
I had gone to London Fields station to find the E5 Bakehouse, that delivers bread to the pub next door. I hadn’t expected this line of railway arches, that had been creatively turned into small business units.
The E5 Bakehouse has a rather good cafe and I had an excellent cup of tea before moving on. There was no gluten-free bread or cakes, but there was at the Happy Kitchen.
I bought a cake for later and it was certainly worth the couple of pounds I paid for it. They said it was a bit stale and that they would have some new ones tomorrow, which they were baking for their stall in Broadway Market.
My one problem with the cake, was that if this was a stale one, just how good is a freshly-baked one? I shall go and get another in a few days.
As I look back on my visit to this immaculate row of railway arches, I can imagine C, my late wife, swooning over that bread in the bakehouse and I was almost feeling resentful at being a coeliac. But then I did have that glorious cake!
Good luck to all, who try to run a business in these difficult times! And especially those, in a small niche market like gluten and everything else free cakes. Except of course quality!
The Anonymous Widower 