A random thread for food things that don't really warrant a thread of their own

[hellymedic]

Suspect your menu has too many adjectives!

[ian]

It was actual a simple festa de tomate com burrata, which did indeed feature a wide variety of tomates and was rather nommish. Unfortunately I wanted a can of sardines and they didn't have one. I may be forced to rectify this tonight. I'm supposed to be at a conference dinner but I'm not going because this is my third conference in as many weeks and another evening of enforced small talk and business conversations may just kill me. I'm off the clock and sipping my first beer.

[Eccentrica Gallumbits]

I bought kiwi berries today. I'd never heard of them before. They're delicious.

[T42]

Missus got me some excellent Orange Pekoe from Whittard's.  Instructions said 2g per 200 ml so I used 4g for a 400 ml mug. Then had another one. Then spent two hours trembling as if I'd just knocked back half a dozen espressi on the trot.

[hellymedic]

Do you think we're getting more caffeine sensitive as we age? I think I am!

[T42]

Dunno. When I'm cycling I can get through half a dozen shots with no problem. And vice versa.

[Thing2]

I've been sensitive to caffeine for years (as in can just about tolerate 2 cups of tea if finished before 9am), and it is getting worse as I get older. I've had to stop drinking beer flavoured with coffee recently as I was having too many problems sleeping.😞 I've been known to drink coke on brevets without too much problem on occasions (and with spectacularly bad problems on others - fortunately on the tandem I just need to hang on and don't need to worry about steering or anything.... ). I can certainly tolerate more caffeine when cycling, but only if it doesn't make me feel nauseous.

[Legs]

Master Daniel (6m) is thought to possibly have intolerance to protein in cows' milk (what most people refer to as lactose intolerance but isn't actually...).  To ascertain whether this is actually the case, Mrs Legs (BFing) has been withdrawing from contact from all dairy products.  Cue much hilarity and screwing-up-of-faces when taste-testing such abominations as soya milk and, even worse, soya milk baby formula!    Nothing is a suitable alternative to cow-juice in tea and coffee.  Oat milk (who knew?) is okay in cereal.

[Quint]

I can have a Cafe Americano (two shots) before I go to bed and sleep like a baby

[hellymedic]

Master Daniel (6m) is thought to possibly have intolerance to protein in cows' milk (what most people refer to as lactose intolerance but isn't actually...).  To ascertain whether this is actually the case, Mrs Legs (BFing) has been withdrawing from contact from all dairy products.  Cue much hilarity and screwing-up-of-faces when taste-testing such abominations as soya milk and, even worse, soya milk baby formula!    Nothing is a suitable alternative to cow-juice in tea and coffee.  Oat milk (who knew?) is okay in cereal.

Lactose and cows milk intolerance are VERY different animals.
Lactose-intolerant folk, such as my Dad and barakta (both adults) can enjoy Lacto-free (modified) cow juice in their foods. This is palatable enough for my Mum to stop buying unmodified cow juice at home. It hardly tastes any different from standard cow juice and has a longer shelf life.

Milks that contain no cows' milk protein taste VERY different and are often despised by those accustomed to cow juice. They can be a lifeline for affected infants thobut.

[barakta]

*nods* *waves* from lactose intolerance corner... milk protein allergies are quite different especially with breastfeeding and mother to child transmission issues.  I know a few women who have had to give up all dairy while breastfeeding for this reason - with great improvement in child health once it settles and I think some of the children grow out of the issue later in life.

Soyamilk *IS* revolting! There are different brands and sweetened and unsweetened though so do try a few. Alpro is a good brand, but sometimes cheaper ones are better. It is not good in coffee cos it's acidic and you get curdling... It is OK to cook with...

Oatmilk is the least disgusterous of the cowmilk alternatives that I have tried... It wasn't terrible in tea if you get the right brand - it is worth trying a few different brands and don't try and make it yourself... I can't remember the one I found least bad if it was Alpro or something else.

I have tried soya milk of various kinds and I appeared to develop some kind of reaction to it about 4 months after the lactose intolerance - it makes me RETCH.  I can however eat soya products and soya in things, so feck knows what that's about. It's annoying cos people buy me soya milk trying to be kind and helpful and I have to explain "sorry, worse than lactose containing cow milk for me".

Coconut milk is claggy and tastes sickeningly sweet and you need loads in tea - blech. It's OK to cook with for a sauce or something.

Almond milk is like a cross between soya and coconut milk, it's OK for cooking but not nice in tea. It's merely tolerable. A friend prefers it for things like hot chocolate.

Ricemilk is just sweet white watery substance and I don't see the point, you need about 200ml to make tea  taste sweet and weird. Pointless don't bother.

I haven't tried any of the nutmilks like hazelnut cos they're not easily obtainable here but I hear good things but from people who think vegan food is nice so not to be trusted .

I have found I can drink black tea which I didn't used to be able to. I should probably see if I can cultivate that cos I can't drink coffee at all, nevermind black cos it gives me hideous acid reflux.

Some of the Alpro soya products are pretty good, the chocolate desserts are genuinely nice, not cheap but very tasty and don't need refrigerating. I detest yoghurt but again there's soya yoghurts both flavoured and unflavoured which may be OK.

Vegan cheese is an abomination but there is a thing called Garry or something which all the vegans went nuts for. I haven't tasted it, but I'm sure it's foul but if you don't consider it cheese it might be edible. Other tricks can include using mustard and other things to make sauces instead of creamy stuff - as ever with this stuff it's trial and error.  Find some vegan blogs or twitter feeds, copy the good ideas, ditch the bad ones and some people have had their taste buds removed.

[Cudzoziemiec]

You forgot about pea milk! I've never tried it but I've seen the cartons.

[Legs]

Thanks for the useful posts, folks. 

[citoyen]

Oatmilk is the least disgusterous of the cowmilk alternatives that I have tried...
Coconut milk is claggy and tastes sickeningly sweet and you need loads in tea - blech. It's OK to cook with for a sauce or something.

My wife isn't a fan of oat milk, but she does like Koko in her tea - which isn't exactly the same as the coconut milk like you get in cans for use in Thai cooking, more like a coconut version of soya milk. If I accidentally take a sip from her cup of tea, I find it unpleasantly sour.

Thanks for the useful posts, folks. 

Don't worry, normal service will be resumed soon.

[ElyDave]

My wife occasionally goes on a bender for these and we also have occasional vegan visitors. 

My experience
- Almond milk makes a good hot chocolate (not cocoa, real 100% cocoa dissolved in milk)
- Soya - too sweet
- Oat milk not tried, but one of the oat cream substitutes left a funny metallic aftertaste

[T42]

A question for Italian-food experts:  Watching Montalbano eating spaghetti, it would seem acceptable to put a forkload in one's mouth and then pull in the danglers through a combination of deft forkmanship and back-heeling (so to speak) with the lips. However, with some kinds of pasta, tagliatelle in particular, one or more of the danglers might still be connected to its buddies in the plate, and all of a sudden you might realize that the quantity ascending gobwards is increasing rather than the opposite.  You can be the best strand-separator and fork-twiddler in Christendom (and the UK) and still have this happen to you.

In such circumstances, is it polite to simply chomp through and let the rising mass plummet back into the plate? If not, what do you do?

[hellymedic]

I searched for the food shrinkage thread, with no success.

Tropicana has shrunk their 'litre' cartons to 950ml and their Family Size cartons from 1.75 to 1.6 litres.

Now Sainsbury's chickens have been resized/redefined.

A small chicken is now 1.2kg, having been 1.35kg before.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Butter and margarine as metaphor in 19th and 20th century literature.

[citoyen]

Last Tango In Paris wouldn't have been the same if he'd used a tub of Flora.

[Jakob W]

Annoyingly I can't recall where I read this recently, but apparently in one of the US dairy states (Wisconsin maybe?), it used to be illegal for restaurants to serve margarine; it was also forbidden to sell yellow margarine (to avoid confusion with real butter), so the packets came with a little sachet of food dye you had to mix in yourself...

[Eccentrica Gallumbits]

A question for Italian-food experts:  Watching Montalbano eating spaghetti, it would seem acceptable to put a forkload in one's mouth and then pull in the danglers through a combination of deft forkmanship and back-heeling (so to speak) with the lips. However, with some kinds of pasta, tagliatelle in particular, one or more of the danglers might still be connected to its buddies in the plate, and all of a sudden you might realize that the quantity ascending gobwards is increasing rather than the opposite.  You can be the best strand-separator and fork-twiddler in Christendom (and the UK) and still have this happen to you.

In such circumstances, is it polite to simply chomp through and let the rising mass plummet back into the plate? If not, what do you do?

I think the correct behaviour is to share the plate with a dog, either a posh female spaniely thing, or a rough diamond male mongrel. Eventually the two of you will be eating from the same clump of strands and the strands will split (and you can have a kiss). Watch out for Siamese cats.

[T42]

Our dogs would certainly agree.

[pucklie24]

I made lemon curd yesterday, well actually my bread maker made some lemon curd yesterday, but it is lush!

[Ham]

What's the matter? I can give it up any time I like. No problem.

That was today's harvest.

[Ham]

Kefir, it's the latest thing, dontcha know.

£1.60 for 250g @ waitrose

Or,



99p a Kg from my local shop

ETA and yes, I've started in on those chollies