This is heartening

Im no vegetarian and don't keep up to date as much as I should with whats going on with animal welfare, but having seen the disgusting conditions in which chickens are kept, (2 Sisters) in a recent newspaper review (month or so ago), I decided it is best not buying any more chicken until I know, absolutely, how it was kept. I don't trust any supermarket. I don't like the idea of fish gasping for breath and dying from asphyxiation either,but I am guilty of fish and chips once a week. I'm concerned about where best to buy meat from, where I know the animal has had some sort of existence.
Would anyone know which brand to trust for beef,pork and chicken?
 
Rather strangely watermelons are grown about 30 miles away from here, nearer to Spain where its even hotter. They are very popular, routinely sold whole, and once we bought one which was so large it had to be transported home in the car with a seatbelt on so it didn't cause any nasty injuries should we have to do an emergency stop!
 
bigyetiman said:
If you live alone, or you are the only one who likes a particular, the little packs of fruit are brilliant. A whole water melon would take a while to get through. The packs are also handy for people like our neighbour who has trouble gripping a knife and cutting anything hard, like pineapple.
Hope you get more than one sugar snap pea.
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I don't like watermelon, but I've been known, frequently, to eat a whole canteloupe in one day. Years ago, when I lived just about an hour from the Mexican border, in New Mexico, we could buy canteloupe at roadside stands, 3 for €1!
 
Margaid said:
I have to confess to buying melon and mango in small boxes. There's something wrong with my fridge and if I buy a whole melon it will go "off" before I eat it. Same with salad leaves. I can't eat my way through three of four different lettuces quickly enough - my own aren't ready yet, but I do have one small sugar snap pea on the plants!!
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Bloomin birds have eaten all my lettuce seedlings, twice! And all my beetroot seedlings. Several rows of them! :x
One pea? I cleared the last of the peas this week, and will be taking out the plants in the next couple of days! My broadbeans are finished too.
 
LadyA said:
Margaid said:
I have to confess to buying melon and mango in small boxes. There's something wrong with my fridge and if I buy a whole melon it will go "off" before I eat it. Same with salad leaves. I can't eat my way through three of four different lettuces quickly enough - my own aren't ready yet, but I do have one small sugar snap pea on the plants!!
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Bloomin birds have eaten all my lettuce seedlings, twice! And all my beetroot seedlings. Several rows of them! :x
One pea? I cleared the last of the peas this week, and will be taking out the plants in the next couple of days! My broadbeans are finished too.
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Yes well I'm always late getting stuff in. Peas and runner beans just coming into flower and some of mixed leaves seedlings are recognisable. Something is nibbling small holes in the (slightly) larger leaves :evil:

In the meantime I'm so lucky to have an accredited rare breed butcher just down the road - they have a board up telling you where the various meat has come from and, because they are rare breeds and the farmer's passion they are well looked after.
 
I took a tough line with snails when we lost our carrots LadyA. Re-homed 60 of them after dawn raids in the Veg plot. Found that CD's hanging up so that they spin in the wind and reflect the light has removed our bird problem- it was blackbirds digging up the leaf mulch mainly.
 
Our hens can move faster than Lewis Hamilton if they see a melon approaching.
We took an equally tough line with slugs when they started chomping their way through the beans and some new plants in the flower bed. OH found 83 converging on the runner beans one night.
We have a fantastic crop of onions this year, and did get a good supply of gooseberries in spite of the squirrels. Enough for some jam and some for freezer.
The wasps are now eating the figs, which are nowhere near ripe
 
I’ve heard of this legendary thing called a fresh fig. I’ve only ever encountered figs as those brown, sticky things at Christmas.
Gooseberries are excellent. Love gooseberry crumble.
Slugs and snails and small birds are seldom a problem here. And the big birds are all carnivores. No wasps at all. Where people have sunken gardens or good wind protection then some things eg gooseberries, do grow quite well.

So here nearly all fruit and vegetables come from Tesco. I was down town yesterday buying wasabi peanuts. Can’t grow wasabi, Japanese horseradish, either.
But meat and fish are another story. A carnivores paradise here. Hence a huge demand for Pataks sauces, Chinese sauces, harissa etc. Whilst down town I had a lunch of linguini. Cod, mussels, langoustine in a white wine and cream sauce with that spaghetti which is finer than the norm. But not a vegetable or a salad in sight. In fact even to be seen buying lollorosso would cause people to question ones sexuality!
 
Hen-Gen said:
Whilst down town I had a lunch of linguini. Cod, mussels, langoustine in a white wine and cream sauce with that spaghetti which is finer than the norm. But not a vegetable or a salad in sight. In fact even to be seen buying lollorosso would cause people to question ones sexuality!
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You'd be all right though, wouldn't you, HenGen - they're used to you!
 
???
On the main island I have a degree of anonymity.
It did cause a ripple of amusement here recently when whilst drinking a pint of bitter I stated that only poofs drink lager.
Self mockery is not a highly developed form of humour round this neck of the woods.

As you see, I’m not big on political correctness ?
 
If that is a standard lunch on the Isles Hen-Gen I am moving up there. I am not a vegetable/salad lover either. OH is so we go perfectly together. I like cider, where does that figure on a Shetlanders radar ?
 
bigyetiman said:
If that is a standard lunch on the Isles Hen-Gen I am moving up there. I am not a vegetable/salad lover either. OH is so we go perfectly together. I like cider, where does that figure on a Shetlanders radar ?
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Not really standard but we have a new bistro that has opened up in “da toon”. Cider is not my drink but Tesco seems to be well stocked including all those strange fruit flavoured brands.
I would move here soon because with all this global warming cottages will be snapped up and prices will rocket. We’ll all be selling up and moving to Faeroe!
Hope you’re all surviving the heatwave. A balmy 17C here today, three houses for sale and three council houses available and the population declining to 61 next week when 4 people go. You know it makes sense to move up. No nasty mammals, chickens safe, virtually no snow in winter and mild Januaries. OK, the wind is, ahem, bracing in winter! Immigrants welcome.
 
I would have to google lollorosso to know what it was - can you have a lager and lollorosso with an umbrella maybe?
Ah! I suspected it might be a lettuce - that might work though! :)
 
38 in Birmingham but spent the day in air con office (with a fan.) Was a bit worried about the dog and chickens at home but they were fine - panting a bit. I've put a USB fan in the roost tonight to move the air around. The train limped into Leamington station this evening. Was meant to go on to Marylebone but didn't make it.
 
Hen-Gen said:
I would move here soon because with all this global warming cottages will be snapped up and prices will rocket. We’ll all be selling up and moving to Faeroe!
Hope you’re all surviving the heatwave. A balmy 17C here today, three houses for sale and three council houses available and the population declining to 61 next week when 4 people go. You know it makes sense to move up. No nasty mammals, chickens safe, virtually no snow in winter and mild Januaries. OK, the wind is, ahem, bracing in winter! Immigrants welcome.
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Sounds tempting, HenGen.
Can you do anything about the long winter darkness?
 
I don't do those poncey fruit ciders, apart from pear ones which aren't too bad. It all sounds very tempting Hen-Gen. Do you need a bus driver up there ? Right now cold is far more appealing than this heat
 
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