un poulet n'est pas toujours un vrai poulet

I know, two posts in one day, can you tell I'm sitting at home at a bit of a loose end?

Always on the hunt for a new blog, I recently came across The Belly Rules The Mind, where a happy chappy from the West Midlands talks about all the normal things that food bloggers do. One of his recent posts related to a chap by the name of Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall. I don't how wide a presence Hugh has outside of the UK, but he's basically a celebrity chef, who goes on a lot about sustainably and local, organic food shopping. I think he also did a show where he grew his own produce in some rather nice home counties mansion or something. What he's on about are things normally very dear to my heart, but he can be a bit pompous.

Anyway it was on Belly Rules The Mind that I discovered there'd been a bit of a hoo ha in the UK when Hugh raised the issue of factory raised chickens in the UK, which were selling for one pound ninety nine at Tescos (one of the country's largest supermarket chains).

I've seen the HFW story on a couple of sites now, with various arguments being floated about. The discussion has included:

• this method of raising animals is inhumane and basically wrong
• large scale food production such as this produces sub-standard food, sold to the poor resulting in poor nutrition, leading to poor physical and intellectual growth (ie. the rich get richer and the poor get poorer)
  
• the poorer sections of society can only afford to buy this standard of food in the attempt to clothe/house/feed their families in the current economic environment
• those who are not comfortable in the kitchen use low cost, mass produced food products as their main source of nutrition for themselves and their families
  
• HFW is a bit of a tool, and it's very easy for him to take the moral high ground from his Chelsea flat, and is totally out of touch with the shopper on the street

Quite frankly, I can see both sides of the story, I've been the struggling student, and have eaten some seriously cheap food to get by, but have never had to worry about how my low finances effect anyone other than myself (ie I've never had to feel children on a low budget). On the other hand, although I am a dedicated omnivore and believe it is part of my genetic makeup to be so, I think we have an obligation to ensure that the animals that we eat are treated with some level of dignity before they are killed for consumption. Added to this is the argument that western consumers probably consume too much animal protein, and we should be looking to increase the plant content of our diets. Not only to make us healthier but also as large scale livestock production consumes too much arable land as centralised populations take over more and more of the earth, and produces considerable amounts of greenhouse gasses.

And this can be related back to the 'what we feed our kids' arguments. Is feeding your children chemical loaded meat from unhappy animals (the karma police will get you) really the best thing for them. Wouldn't it be better to bake them up some vegetables, or make a chickpea salad or lentil stew? 'But not everyone knows how to do this' I can hear the devil's advocate say. Well i say, tough cookies sweetheart. I'm not asking parents to enjoy cooking the way I do. To spend their whole Saturday putting together some gourmet creation for their families. But if you've taken on the responsibility of having children, you have a responsibility not to feed them things that will make them sick. This means high levels of fat, sugar, salt and e-numbers. Surely this is child abuse? Just as bad as making them sleep on the floor or depriving them of an education. They put this crap inside them for god's sake. Basic, nutritional, sustainable food cooked into simple to prepare meals is within reach of all but most unlucky of western society.

I would love to hear opinions.....

end of the long weekend

well it's 9.15 on monday evening, and this will be my last what did you eat today? post for easter. mine should be more along the lines of what didn't i eat. i'm almost looking forward to getting back to work so i don't need to eat three full meals a day anymore.

almost

i skipped breakfast today. breakfast is normally my favourite meal of the day, and one i really enjoy going out for, but i figured i didn't need it this time. particularly as i didn't get up until after 10am and i was going out for lunch

my first job when i arrived at my mother's was to chop the chillies for the piri piri sauce - oh, and to drink a glass of champagne - sorry, sparking white


this was mixed with lemon juice, garlic powder and olive oil and quite frankly would knock the socks off of even the most hardened spice eater. truly.

this is the chicken before it was cooked. it's marinated in a coriander base, and this is what the piri piri looked like once it was done

... ... ... and this is what the chicken looked like after it had been on the barbeque for about 30 minutes. it was truly delicious. it was smokey and flavoursome, but the meat was soft and tender. we ate it with indian bread and a couple of salads and a dab of the aforementioned killer sauce. isn't she cute? she looks like she's about to do some little dance. the chicken dance most likely. tee hee.


and this is a random shot of some deranged looking macrame owl that my mother has hanging by the outdoor table. my grandmother made it a million year ago, and this seems to be it's final resting place. no doubt it keeps the evil spirits away!!


to finish lunch off we had a small slice (and it was small) of flour-less chocolate cake, that had been made to the recipe of a french friend of my mothers. oh yes, and the second bottle of sparkling wine. hic!


and you might think that this was enough food for tot day. really truly it was. but if course i had dinner plans! so i caught a bus into the city (there was no way i had the energy to ride my bike) and went to my friend mirror mirror's new flat. she's just launched herself into the world of chinese language newspapers and is working from home and it's driving her nuts!

we did the short walk to china town to a new place, well not that new but i hadn't been there yet! we started off with szechuan bean jelly and cucumber in peanut sauce. doesn't sound very appetising i know but you spread your wings when you have a lot of chinese friends and this is something i actually quite like a lot. managed to talk her out of the ox tripe and tongue salad.

then we had a thing that she orders all the time but i don't know the name of it. it's a beef and rice noodle and bean sprout sort of thing in a spicy soup that you eat with rice. i an normally famed amongst the chinese for really being able to pack away the food (that's why you're so fat they all tell me in that delicate way that the chinese are so famous for), but tonight it was commented that i hardly ate anything. because i didn't. it was delicious tho. oh, yes and there were also chestnut and sesame seed pastries. i will have to try them again one day when i have more fortitude!!!

so there we have it. easter is over and i am fully cooked and eaten out. and only about 2 mini eggs (although we did have some white rabbit lollies at the lights yesterday).

i'm up at 6 tomorrow and off to the gallery for this year's art show, so i'm now off to sleepy bobos. there are two cats already on the bed that are calling my name.......