Category Food thoughts
Squirrel anyone?
There’s a particular Guardian columnist worth reading occasionally. Intelligent and articulate whilst often pretentious and sometimes misguided, George Monbiot is keen on making contentious comment in order to keep his political and environmental views in the public eye. Well, just recently, his column caught my eye and, after wading through some fairly flowery prose, it […]
Are you being served?
We all know there are things that irritate us about waiting staff. It’s a particularly subjective and personal matter but, in a recent unscientific survey carried out by yours truly, there appears to be some common complaints. Over all, it doesn’t seem to matter how competent the waiter is, whether he can carry six plates […]
Don’t be fooled by processed food
It’s like a war out there. Who would you trust? After all, it’s down to you. You’re the one who’s going to determine whether you survive and ultimately succeed. It’s apparent, just by the fact that you’re reading this newspaper, that you’ve got what it takes; that you’re intelligent enough. So, who do you believe? […]
Weighty matters
So, it’s official. Clothes are now to be sold in four sizes: small, medium large and normal. It appears that along with 60 being the new 40, fat is now the new normal. What next: uneducated being the new clever? But, weird as it may sound, uneducated is promoted as clever and, dare I say, […]
The critical nature of restaurants
“Who does this Oldfield bloke think he is?” you might ask. An engineer writing about food is surely about as relevant as the pope pontificating about marriage. Ah, but here’s the rub. Do you really need to be experienced in something to be an expert in it? His Holiness will be surrounded by advisers full […]
Fish stocks
Studies and surveys might drive you mad but they’re also a great source of inspiration; particularly for an aspiring columnist with few original ideas of his own. If I find myself bereft of inspiration for an article about food I only need to open a newspaper to read that there’s been a new study that […]
We all ate all the pies
In the words of the the mighty Monty Pythons: what did the Romans ever do for us? Roads? They just created congestion. Central heating? It’s over-used and has made us soft. Aqueducts? Hardly needed when there’s bottled water. Pies? What do you mean you didn’t know the Romans brought us pies? It may have been […]
We should be ashamed
The debate about food banks bothers me. It’s a very emotional subject, rightly so, but there are aspects of the whole food bank subject that make me uncomfortable; and not just because people are suffering. The fact that we obviously need food banks is a very sad indictment on what we consider a modern, civilised […]
Get the portion size right
So, how do we get fat? I always thought that it was fairly straightforward: you like your food too much, put an excessive amount on your plate and therefore shovel down more fuel than you’re actually going to use. As a result it then gets stored on your stomach and fewer members of the opposite […]
Mobile phones in restaurants
Mobile phones have changed the world. I know hardly anyone without one these days; even most diehards who, two or three years ago, swore they’d never get one are now surfing the web and texting while on the go. It’s been an incredible revolution over, I guess, the last 20 years. I had my first […]
Bill Oldfield 