Carluccio’s Start Selling Gluten-Free Pasta
According to the manager of their Islington Upper Street branch, they’ve now started selling the gluten-free pasta they serve in the caffes in the attached shops, where the demand is strong enough.
But yet again we have another reputable company targeting the coeliac market. Who’d be a specialist gluten-free food manufacturer?
They’ll be one main group of winners; coeliacs like me.
Free Speech in the Coeliac Area
Someone, who lives outside of the UK, has said that their coeliac society has objected to criticism of the society, that they wrote in an Internet chat-room.
I’m all for free speech as you know, providing it’s not malicious and very much support the reform of the libel law in the UK. I’m a big supporter of Sense About Science, who are trying to stop commercial interests using the UK’s libel laws for their our ends.
The coeliac area has been pretty free of legal spats so far, but I suspect we will see quite a few in the next few years.
So many companies make a lot of money and they don’t like new entrants to the market and so many doctors have a nice simple living from coeliac disease, and probably wouldn’t like changes to diagnostic methods and then there’s the charity racket. Certainly in the UK, there are loads of retired great and good, who get on the charity bandwagon to have a nice lifestyle. I have no knowledge of the UK Coeliac society as I’m a Marxist of the Groucho tendency, who wouldn’t join any club, that would have me as a member. But as it’s fairly small according to the accounts, it probably hasn’t any places for freeloaders. But sadly there are many charities, that are virtually run for the benefit of their board, if you believe some of the accounts I’ve read in the newspapers.
The problem with the coeliac market is that any good cook, can create their own completely gluten-free meals. I would argue you don’t even have to be a good cook, as some of the recipes I use are very much enjoyed by my friends and family. Most have been stolen from the Internet or borrowed from friends.
Also on the coeliac front in the UK, there is a war out there, partly driven by the recession, in that quite a few intelligent and ethical food technologists see the coeliac market as a place of expansion. Every week I go to Waitrose or other supermarkets, there seems to be something new. Yesterday it was the Honest bread, but there has been Lazy Days biscuits from Scotland and now there may be Estrella Damm Laura beer from Spain. I’ve also seen some luxury foods, like soups, that have been made deliberately gluten-free so that their market is bigger. Established coeliac food companies and even mainstream ones are under threat, but they have nowhere to complain about companies who are being both ethical and commercial. Even the supermarkets can’t help, as I suspect that the new quality entrants can give them better sales and possibly better margins.
A Gluten-Free Lunch in Beautiful Surroundings
I had perhaps intended to have lunch in Carluccio’s in Smithfield, but on the way I walked behind St. Paul’s to take a photograph of the Temple Bar.
Temple Bar
Instead of passing through, as I intended, I spotted a sign saying restaurant and pointing to the crypt of the cathedral.
So I explored and found a restaurant with a full coeliac, not just gluten-free menu. It was more than I needed, so I approached the adjoining cafe and asked if the soup was gluten-free. The waitress said she was a coeliac too and said she’d check and also get me some gluten-free bread if I would like some. In the end I had some excellent parsnip soup and one of Fentiman‘s exotic soft drinks for about eight pounds.
So now, I can add a hole-filler to my walking routes around London.
Giving Away My Gluten-Free Cookery Books
Over the years I’ve been given a lot of gluten-free cookery books, as people think that these are an easy present for a man who lives alone, who is a coeliac.
Most have gone into the cupboard and have never been used more than once. If I need a recipe it’s usually because I’ve got some ingredients and want to cook all of them together, so I just use Google. That’s how I found the recipe for Dundee lamb chops.
So now all those I’ve never used more than once are going down the Oxfam shop in Dalston.
One thing I am going to do is put a pad computer on the kitchen wall.
Ginger Chicken with Lemongrass
This recipe was published in The Times yesterday. It is one of Lindsay Bareham’s and I’ve used hers before, as they are simple, quick and delicious on the one hand and often gluten-free on the other.
The ingredients are as follows and the quantities serve two.
- 20g ginger
- 2 garlic cloves
- 2 onions, 145g in total
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- 4 chicken thigh fillets
- 300g potatoes
- 2 tsp lemongrass paste or 1 large lemongrass
- 300 ml water
- 100g frozen petits pois
The method is as follows.
- Peel and thinly slice the ginger into scraps the size of shirt buttons.
- Slice the garlic into thin rounds.
- Finely slice the onions.
- Heat the oil in a lidded pan, stir in the onion, ginger and garlic.
- Cook, stirring often, over a medium-low heat, encouraging it to soften without browning.
- Slice the chicken into bite-sized pieces and stir into the semi-cooked onions.
- Peel and slice the potatoes into 50p-size pieces. Quickly rince and add to the pan.
- Stir in the lemongrass paste or buised lemongrass, then add the water.
- Bring to the boil, reduce the heat, semi-cover the pan and cook gently for 20 minutes until the potatoes are tender, the chicken cooked through and the liquid slightly reduced.
- Season to taste.
- Add the peas, bring to the boil, immediately reduce the heat and simmer for a few minutes until the peas are tender. Serve in bowls with crusty bread and butter.
I think I’ll give it a try this week.
Snuggling Down
Today, I’d intended to do a lot more, but the cold weather was against it.
So I met my new cleaner and got her instructions on to what I needed to buy to do the cleaning! I then went to Maplins to get a long HDMI cable, so that I could watch the football on a large screen. I’ve actually mounted the television on a swivel, so that I can watch it either from the living room or the kitchen off it.
I’ll watch the football, whilst having supper of a microwaved cod Mornay from Marks and then get over the electric blanket and under the duvet. I’d like to wake a bit later, but hopefully still early enough to see the eclipse of the moon.
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Carluccio’s Offer
Carluccio’s are now giving out vouchers for a two for one offer on main courses to customers. There are a few conditions, but none would seem to apply to the gluten-free menu. They must be used between the 4th January and the 13th of February next year. I suspect that won’t be a problem for me, as I’m now well known in the Upper Street branch and eat there at least twice a week with my son.
Rear Window
I took this picture, through the rear window of a 277 bus yesterday.
Through the Rear Window of a 277 Bus
I then walked round Highbury Corner and had lunch in Carluccio’s in Upper Street, before getting my provisions in Waitrose at the Angel.
Snow in Upper Street
Home was just a walk to Upper Street, with my backpack loaded with veetables and the other heavy stuff and one of Waitrose’s Quick Check carriers with all the other stuff. Once on Upper Street, a 38 bus took me to within a hundred metres of home.
It was all so easy. And yet there were people still driving around looking for parking spaces.
Genius at the Angel, Islington
It has been increasingly difficult to buy Genius bread in Suffolk lately. But there was plenty in the small gluten-free section at Waitrose at the Angel. So I brought one back for my breakfast.
The Anonymous Widower 