Monday, February 19, 2007

Quite Mild - Shopping - Salad & Mackerel

Just the one picture today because I've had a 'picture problem' which I've been trying to solve.

Before today, if I right-clicked a picture and opened 'properties' I used to get a comprehensive list such as Camera, lens, aperture, exposure etc..... All I get now is the file-type and the picture size in pixels. No doubt I've done something wrong, but trying to rectify it is proving time consuming. If all else fails I shall seek help on one of my forums, but, at the moment I just feel foolish. Downloading the Nikon firmware could have done it, especially as I had such a lot of trouble doing it.

But, as Andrew W Mathis famously said "It is bad luck to be superstitious".

Bungus's 'comment' about the beef-topside joint being tough was no suprise. In my experience 'topside' is always tough ! They only manage to sell it, so expensively, is that its lean appearance, without fat, appeals to the 'housewife' so called. The practice in my boyhood, if there was no chine (forerib) or sirloin available, was to thread ribbons of fat through the joint with what was called a marbling needle. Then, if it had been hung long enough, it was possible to get it less chewy. Not easy though!

Today we had smoked mackerel fillets, with a jacket potato and salad. Looked good. Sweet Romaine lettuce, cucumber, celery, and cherry tomatoes. On Y's I did some sliced red pepper, and some halved grapes and a few nuts; all of which she likes and I don't. Our only real sin was butter (not stinted) in the jacket potatoes. And, as we bought fresh Pain de Campagne this morning, a few sandwiches for tea. Fillings to order !

Excuse short blog. Maybe back later.....

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Liked the supersdtiious quotation but think it better ignored in case something terrible happens (probably in 3s).

Have to disagree about topside. I have another friend, who prides himself on his culinary skills just as much as RadioG, who swears by topside as the best beef joint; and, being a fat hatwer, I have certainly enjoyed it on many occasions. From a good butcher who knows his sources and hangs his meat well, there is unlikely to be a problem. If in any doubt it is best to steam roast, just in case. The mistake, in my view, is in buying attractively bright light red beef from a supermarket.
I find pork more of a problem; wherever it is from as, however it looks, you can never be sure whether it will have real flavour or not; I recently tried a cheap loin joint from Netto which was acceptable but followed it with a leg joint which was tough and tasteless.
Lamb, of course (apart from a good lean roast leg stuck with garlic and rosemary or very well prepared - over 2 days - best end of neck stewed) is for those who want to feel ill, whereas mutton (and, I suspect, venison and goat) is for anyone who likes the taste and smell of ammonia.
I dare say there are those who will nor entirely agree but, as radioG has pointed out, there are some who think Picasso couldn't paint!