Searching For Food At Edinburgh Waverley
Coming back from Edinburgh Waverley, I booked on-line for the 14:30 train for the princely sum of £64.35. After picking up my ticket, I thought I’d ask if there was any sensible food in First Class. The guy I asked was honest and said, that if he was me, he’d have something before travel. As my friend had said that last time, all she got was sandwiches, I decided to look for a snack. Especially, as I had a cooked sausage and bean casserole in te fridge that just needed heating, so I didn’t need much.
I first tried the First Class Lounge, which was guarded by this notice.
East Coast’s First Class Welcome
There was no food and the coffee machine was broken. So that was a waste of time.
I had plenty of time, so I walked out of the station and to a restaurant I’d eaten in behind Harvey Nicholls. No luck at all!
On my way back to the station, I popped into the Balmoral Hotel and asked if there was anything gluten-free in the bar. The Western European waiter spoke worse English, than all the waiters I’d encountered in Poland. I thought Edinburgh was in Scotland. As he couldn’t understand my dietary needs, I quickly left and went back to the station.
Costa Coffee had what looked like a nice salad, but they’d polluted it with pasta. Why do people ruin perfectly good salads in this way?
I then tried the other coffee outlets and there was nothing I could eat. Even Marks and Spencer were out of gluten-free sandwiches. At least the manager said sorry which is more than anybody else did!
In desperation, I thought I’d look out of the other side of the station and saw this cafe.
The City Art Centre Cafe
So I asked and they said that the beef and red wine casserole was gluten-free.
Beef And Red Wine Casserole
It was a choice I didn’t regret.
It would appear that despite eating many good gluten-free meals in Edinburgh, trying to find one by the main station is a lot more difficult.
But I’d certainly go back to The City Art Centre Cafe again
Lunch At Henderson’s
Henderson’s is a long-established restaurant in Edinburgh. My friend and I had lunch there.
My chilli was excellent.
Skin Cancer Trial Results Exciting
That is the headline on this story on the BBC web site. Here’s the first few paragraphs.
The results of two international trials against advanced skin cancer have been hailed as “exciting and striking”.
Both treatments, for advanced melanoma, are designed to enable the immune system to recognise and target tumours.
The last statement is key. After all one of ourposes of your immune system is to fight infections and any other dangerous things it finds in your body.
Research has shown that coeliacs on a gluten free diet, have a reduced cancer rate compared to the general population.
So should everybody avoid obesity, too much drink, smoking and gluten, if they want to reduce their cancer risk?
I don’t have the data, so I won’t make a prediction. But the man, who helped to identify the link between smoking and lung cancer, Richard Doll, was a coeliac and was obviously on a gluten-free diet.
He lived until he was 92.
He obviously looked at the data and probably massaged his immune system.
Cooking Salmon The Mary Berry Way
I’m trying to get my B12 levels up and to this end. I decided to cook myself some salmon.
I found this recipe on the BBC web site, that was created by Mary Berry. It’s called baked salmon with parmesan and parsley crust.
Cooking Salmon The Mary Berry Way
I cooked it using two salmon fillets from a pack and substituting a slice of Genius bread for the breadcrumbs, by pulverising it with the parmesan and parsley in my Little Chopper.
I shall be cooking it again as it was good and very tasty.
Asparagus Fish Bake
I cooked this recipe on Thursday night and there was enough to warm up the part I didn’t eat for yesterday.
The original recipe is here and as it is an American one, I’ve converted it into sensible units.
I used the following.
- 6 medium fresh asparagus spears, trimmed and cut into 2.5 centimetre pieces
- A two-pack of Waitrose haddock
- 1 chopped onion
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 1 tablespoon gluten-free flour
- Salt
- Pepper
- 200 mg. milk
- 100 gm grated cheddar cheese
- Two decrusted slices of Genius bread
- 1/4 teaspoon dried parsley flakes
And this is the method used.
1. Place the asparagus in a small saucepan and cover with water. Bring to a boil; cook for 1-2 minutes. Drain and place in a 1.3 litre. baking and top with fish; set aside.
Asparagus Covered By Fish
2. In a small saucepan, saute onion in 1 tablespoon butter until tender. Stir in the flour, salt and pepper until blended. Gradually whisk in milk. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 1-2 minutes or until thickened. Remove from the heat; stir in cheese until melted. Pour over fish.
3. I then sprinkled the breadcrumbs I made with the Genius bread over the top.
Ready For The Oven
4. Bake, uncovered, at 350° for 20-25 minutes or until crumbs are golden brown and fish flakes easily with a fork. I nearly did cook it at 350°, but of course that was the little-used Fahrenshite. I used 180°C.
The Cooked Bake
It was delicious and the second portion needed about 15 minutes at 180°C to warm through after twenty-four hours in the fridge.
The more I create crusts with Genius bread, the more I think, it’s an ideal way to cover a bake or pie.
A Summary Of My Health
Doctors have always been puzzled about my health. In my early years, Dr. Egerton White struggled to find, what was wrong with the sickly child I was.
I used to miss one school term in three and it was probably the Spring Term, but as I’m relying on memory I could be wrong. I was always suffering from rhinitis, sore throats and often coughed for England. At one time, I was diagnosed with scarlet fever, but as I was the only case in London and no-one caught it from me I do wonder if it was a misdiagnosis.
Dr. White, at one point thought I had an egg allergy, but in the end I got the usual treatment of children in those days, they took my tonsils out.
Sadly, none of my medical records of those days exist, as they got lost somewhere between London, Felixstowe, where my parents had retired and Liverpool University.
But as my current doctor and I have agreed, whatever has bugged me over the years didn’t kill me as a child, so hopefully it is unlikely to kill me now!
Spending time at Felixstowe on the windy East Coast seemed to improve my health, but I still had lots of small problems like athlete’s foot, terrible dandruff, joint and foot pains and an overactive gut. I should also say that I suffering pain from my left arm, where the humerus had been broken by the school bully.
My mother’s health incidentally was generally good, but my father suffered from terrible rhinitis and catarrh, which wasn’t helped by his smoking of a pipe. His father had been similarly effected and found that the best way of coping was smoking and drink. Consequently, he died in his forties.
Moving to Liverpool for four years for university and work, seemed to dull my troubles and I can’t remember any new problems until a few years later, when I was living in a flat in London, when I started to get pains in my knee joints. One doctor recommended an operation, but luckily I decided to pass.
Things seem to get better in the mid-1970s, when my wife and I moved into an eleventh floor flat in the Barbican.
Generally, for the next thirty years or so, my health was pretty good, although my arm, where it had been broken, could be painful in hot weather. We had moved to Suffolk and generally spent a lot of time outdoors.
Then in the early years of this century, I was diagnosed as a coeliac by Addenbrookes and went gluten-free. My health changed for the better, with most of the joint pains and gut problems disappearing. But I still seemed to suffer from the odd bad Spring, although it got better, when my wife and I could afford to take luxurious winter holidays.
Then my life fell in, in that my wife of forty years died of a squamous cell carcinoma of the heart in 2007, followed by our youngest son, who died of pancreatic cancer in 2010.
My health got worse on the death of my wife, with hay-fever like symptoms at times.
I then had a serious stroke in Hong Kong, whilst on holiday. Luckily, they gave me the superduper clot-busting drug, and my brain is no worse than it ever was!
As I lay there for about three months with the sun streaming through the window, some of my old symptoms returned. Rhinitis was pouring down my throat, like it hadn’t since the 1960s and my left humerus was giving me some of the worst pain ever.
Since then, I’ve sold up in Suffolk and moved to Hackney, so that I have access to public transport.
The rhinitis is often present, usually in the Spring, and my body feels very much as it did, when I was at school. I’ve also started to get conjunctivitis in my eyes
In one instance, I collapsed and was taken to hospital. They were puzzled, but did report that I had something like water on the lung. A couple of days of oxygen and I was able to come home.
This Spring, my small problems have been getting worse, with constant wind, itchy skin and especially eye-brows. Then I was found to have a fungal infection in my toes for which Terbinafine was prescribed.
This reacts with my Warfarin, but as I test my INR daily on a meter, I’m able to keep it under control. I should be able to, as I have a Degree in Control Engineering.
One thing that seems to help cope with the muck pouring into my mouth and throat is fresh lemonade, as it scrapes the muck into my stomach. The odd glass of weak Scotch has a similar effect. At times though it all goes away and white wine tastes like white wine, rather than vinegar.
Are These The Best Crepes In London?
Walking back to the station, I came across this stall in a market selling crepes.
The only reason those in Cafe Breizh were better was that they came on a plate with a drink of cider.
But this crepe was one of the best I’ve ever had. If not the best! And I’ve eaten many with large amounts of Gallic flair under a French sun!
A Gluten-Free Cafe By The River
I went to Richmond for a walk by the river in the sun. I was surprised to find a cafe with a prominent gluten-free menu. So I couldn’t resist a gluten-free cheese and onion quiche with my cup of tea.
A Gluten-Free Cafe By The River
It was excellent. And it was lovely to sit in the sun!
Exploring Heidelberg
In the morning it was still wet, but at least it wasn’t raining hard. So I checked out of the hotel early and moved my bag to a left luggage locker at the station. I then bought myself a one day tram ticket for Heidelberg and started to explore.
I started in the centre and had a good breakfast of an omelette, juice and coffee in a cafe by the Rathaus.
It would appear that this is generally a safe breakfast in Germany for a coeliac, just like it was in Poland.
Breakfast By A Hard Rock Cafe
As the hotel food was so unobtainable and about as likely to be as gluten-free as a lorry load of freshly harvested wheat, I decided to get my breakfast on the walk to the station, where I would get my train to Berlin.
I had an excellent omelette with a wide range of identifiable fillings, a proper cup of tea and a large glass of orange juice, served by a charming waitress, whose English was better than wot mine is in a small cafe next to the Hard Rock one.
Breakfast By A Hard Rock Cafe
It’s underneath the white umbrellas in the picture.
The Anonymous Widower 