Gourmet Britain

Gourmet Britain!

Nothing defines a gourmet lifestyle like purchasing prowess. The British if nothing else are dedicated shoppers. They avidly read all labels and take note of all E numbers, although not caring what they do, or what they are. They always check on the country of origin, although “Buy one get one free” and “reduced to clear” are not officially recognised as independent countries by the United Nations. (Nanny sate NIMBYism )

Buying British is important but free trade should not be overlooked, and can be ethically beneficial. Equal importance is thus given to UK goods as to the intergalactic republic of Saturn and Jupiter.

Quality marks

Britain is a nation of animal lovers and are environmentally concerned. This is why stringent rules and regulations exist in the UK to ensure animals and crops are farmed ethically and compassionately.

To ensure the public are aware of the high standards various marking systems exist. For example the red tractor means expensive, compassion in farming -very expensive, and Organic, don't be daft put it back. All products bearing these markings will remain on the supermarket shelves indefinitely until trumped with a large yellow label clearly stating “Reduced to clear.”

High street vs Supermarkets

The high street is for charity shops, bookmakers, banks, and loan sharks.

Supermarkets is where you buy everything.

It is true years ago there were independent shops selling vegetables, meat, fish, clothes, and groceries. Now this is done by the supermarkets. Supermarkets do no serve the public, they make profit for shareholders. Shareholders compete with other shareholders for market domination. This is called a price war. Price wars are what consumers want and need. During these wars, prime steak can be cheaper than Spam, dairy products cheaper than water, and alcohol cheaper than screen wash.

Innovation is the weapon of the price war. Dairy products can not be sold unless in the shape of a teddy bear, or cheese in strings.

Footfall is vitally important in price wars. The footfall of customers coming into the supermarket indicates how effective price wars can be. The footfall of producers leaving the supermarkets indicates short sighted the profit margin can be.

Vegetables

all supermarkets have fresh fruit and vegetables near the entrance. The waste of fruit and vegetables is phenomenal. Vegetables mature and rot at differing rates. It is a perceived fact that the conversion of vegetable starch into sugar reaches it optimum 4 seconds before the fruit rots. The pursuit of this 4 second fruit Nirvana is all consuming. This is why shoppers head straight for the reduced to clear rack to gain a march on the Nirvana moment. Refrigerators throughout the UK are full of sprouting, moldy, slimy, fruit, and vegetables that have just past the Nirvana by a second or two.

Meat and Fish

All meat and meat products are hygienically wrapped in disposable wrapping. It is essential this wrapping is disposed of safely. You would not want a child to eat the wrapping as they would have difficulty in discerning the plastic wrapping from the plastic meat. The packaging informs you if the meat is Dry cured, air cured, brined, smoked, hung, beaten or just neglected. It doesn't mention taste, Why should it if there isn't any.

Fish can be sold even if the eyes are dull and there is a strong smell of ammonia providing a reduced to clear label is firmly attached.

Labels and allergens

some people have allergies to certain foods. These can be life threatening, so it is important the food is labelled correctly. This does not mean that labels should be boring and uninteresting. Products containing Whey can be written in Portuguese or Serbo Croat, to stimulate the British linguistic skills.

At present there is little opposition to the domination of the supermarket. Attempts have been made to promote grow your own. This would mean dirty hands broken nails, and looking at snails.

The alternative is Farmers markets. Isn't that what they do abroad?

Fresh fruit and vegetables, meat and dairy products sold by the producer. All food tasty, and traceable, with the ability to talk to the producer about keeping, handling and how to cook.

I doubt if it will take off, just because they do it in the rest of the world is no reason the British should follow suit. After all Britain is a gourmet country.

Morish

Scar face Scarlatti's last requests was handed to the judge. Scarlatti was due for execution in the morning and it was customary to grant one last request. However requesting something that was morish was not acceptable.




The war on drugs was being won. Class A, B and C drugs were almost extinct. The battle against morish indulgences was not so easy especially Brie. Penicillium camemberti bacteria was difficult to control. Prisoners had been known to soak sponges in milk and leave in a warm place until the white mould grew. A black market of Brie culture soon sprang up in all prisons. When prisoners put the warmed culture in the ventilation shafts the prison soon became a breeding ground. If they could not control morish products in prison how could they control it in the outside world?




The government took firm action and created a Morish Czar, with overreaching powers, but not too over reaching. Every action or idea must first receive political approval. The first action was to classify morish with a system of letters, Class A the most serious included Brie, Chocolate, Cheesecake, souffle, and gateaux. Class B, sticky toffee pudding, ice cream, and Pavlova. Class C, Hobnobs, shortbread, Dundee cake, Selkirk bannocks and Border tart.




It was a known scientific fact that morish food is responsible for obesity. Obesity is the prime cause of diabetes, stroke, heart attack, bowl cancer, IBS, and listlessness(The prime cause of unemployment). Without morish food, the food industry need not invest in fancy packaging and brand identity. Brown paper sacks can be used for all vegetables as a carrot looks just like a carrot so no need to put it in a see through wrapper.




All morish food comes from abroad, i.e. chocolate and anything French. Strict border controls have to be enforced. Anything sounding foreign should be stopped and returned to country of origin. This rule came quite handy when dealing with Nigel Farage.




A crackdown was instigated on the organizers of morish food and advertising. Jamie Oliver, Delia Smith and Mary Berry were placed in special measures. A new quango was set up Offood to investigate reports of miss selling carob and sugar substitute. A special watchdog was set up under the education department to ensure all children, no matter what age or background receive wholesome bland food in school dinners. Fortunately considerable work had already been done with school dinners to ensure a bland conformity across the board. Even schools such as Harrow and Eton have been in the forefront with sago and tapioca. The most controversial area seems to be Marmite where half the population think it is a luxury indulgence, while the other think it should be used only in prison reform.




Great strides have been taken against morish food, which only leaves the problem of Scar face Scarlatti's last meal. The judge knew it could become a precedence. Finally a judgement was made. Scarlatti would be taken to a cell and injected with heroin. He would be allowed to snort two lines of cocaine before being given a portion of mousetrap cheese. He will be so far out of it, that he will not notice, or care, that the cheese is not Brie.

birthright

“I Sean Rafferty the fourth. 2.1 leprechaun fifth class (failed) claim my birthright.”

“Sean Rafferty the fourth.2.1 means.” asked the Judge

“My grandfather was the fourth Sean Raffery. There were twelve in all, but he was the fourth. My father was the second Sean Rafferty out of sixteen but I am the first Sean Rafferty from my father.”

“How many Sean Rafferty's does your father have.”

“There are only twelve at the moment, but I'm the first.”

“You could use another name apart from Sean?” the judge said

“We do.” said Sean

“Oh really and what name is that?”asked the Judge

“Rafferty” replied Sean

“Remind me again” said the judge “what actually is your birthright?”

“Dat I am the stupidest ting on earth, dat I am believed to have a crock of gold at the base of every rainbow, and only Irish men that have drunk fourteen pints of Guinness, on the Saturday of the 29th February, can be believed, to have seen me.”

“You surely have that.” said the judge “Stop wasting court time.”

“Dats the ting your honour, the owner of this bowler hat is stupider than me.”

“Don't be so perverse. Case dismissed. Next”

“No wait yur honour, not so hasty. Admittedly I don't have the eiijit that owns the bowler hat but I have this mortgage proposal form.”

Sean handed the proposal form to the clerk, who in turn handed it to the judges bench. The three judges studied the proposal.

“but this is a proposal from the Bank of Made up Names and Make Belief, formally HSBC.”

“That is true your honour.”

“And how, may we ask, did a fifth rate leprechaun get such a proposal. Have you ever worked in the laundry?”

“Never yur honour, I've never done an honest elves days work in my life.”

“I should hope not, can't have leprechauns speculating that they are honest. What did you do to elicit such stupidity, you surely must have played a trick, or used some sorcery?”

“No yur honour it was like this. I was hav'in a few with with the elves and fairies it being 17 of March, and I must have had a bit too much. It was hard to believe as I was only having small sips,”

“Many small sips I imagine.” Said the judge

“Well the Jamesons was two for one, the Guinness buy one get one free with triple nectar points, and the Bushmills on special with quadruple nectar points if you bought home made Irish stew. So I had a word with the cashier, swapping the bought and free ones until in the end, I ended up handing back the nectar point and the stew and taking the booze for nothing. It's what leprechauns do.”

“I assume you had small sips of what you bought, or not from the shops,”said the judge. “And the small sips added up to?”

“Just two bottles of Bushmill two bottles of Jamesons and a crate of the dark stuff.” said Sean, “well it was an elf holiday the day after.”

“I thought you leprechauns were always on holiday?”

“That's true your honour but when its an official holiday we don't have to pretend to be lazy we can do it natural like.”

“The man in the bowler?” asked the judge.

“Dats the ting, I was above ground when the sun cum up, I had no where to hide. Then I remember that new building site, for affordable homes, they were going to build for the workers of the new Chinese factory, before the recession. It's just rubble now, so I thought I'd hide among the demolished buildings, and pretend to be an unwanted gnome. I saw a piece of wood with Dunroamin on it, and an old cauldron, so I just sat between, hoping to be missed.

Then the man in the bowler arrives picking over the rubbish, when I belched. Cheese and onion crisp, always makes me belch, nothing to do with the Jamesons.”

“Of course not.” said the judge.

Quick as a flash the man in the bowler sees me and the cauldron and says that I was a leprechaun and he claims my crock of gold. Then he looks in the empty cauldron and asks if its mine. Well it was at the time because I had touched it and what a leprechaun touches automatically becomes his by default. Well he is not best pleased.”

“Well what happened?” asked the judge.

” the man in the bowler soon established the cauldron, the rubble, and the land, was mine by default and he offered me a loan.”

“On what, the rubble?” asked the judge.

“ No. On the six bedroom detached bungalow, swimming pool, and tennis court to be built on the site.”

“Are you expecting us to believe you will do a days work, and build a bungalow.”

“Certainly not your honour, I just has to lie that I will. It's what leprechauns do best.”

“And the man in the bowler hat owns the land, right.”

“No yur honour, I own the land. I don't really, but on paper I do. And I am going to build a house. He gives me the money for that, with a mortgage. I can then buy gold, to give to him, as forfeit.”

“where does the money come from?”

“The bank yur honour, only not from the bank because the money is dirty.”

“It has stains?”

“No you honour, I wish you'd keep up. The money belongs to the Mafia, and terrorist, but they are not suppose to have it, as it is all in cash, not cheques. So the bank has to lend it out, to get rid of it. So I have the money, or the man in the bowler has the gold.”

“But you don't earn money, how can you pay it back?”

“Ten percent of the money I am suppose to get, pays insurance for non payment to the bank. The loan is now an asset. If they bundle it with other assets, they become a security, and securities can be traded as derivatives on the market.”

“No one is going to be that stupid to buy money, and assets, that don' exist. I just can not believe you it could never happen.”

“Fred Goodwin RBS your honour.” said the clerk

“OK, one off, RBS.”

“Lehman Brothers.” said the clerk

“OK maybe Lehman as well, but no one else.”

“Northern Rock, Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs,”

“Point taken.” said the judge “So why Sean did he tell you this.”

“Because I asked him, and if I agreed, and knew, I wouldn't tell any one else.”

“That's disgraceful.” said the Judge

“But I did the right thing, I told him I was an undercover finance reporter.” said Sean

“What did he say.”

“Well he asked what paper, so I told him the Daily Mail. And he said he would have preferred it if I was from the Telegraph, but the Mail is OK. Then he took off, leaving his bowler hat behind. So the man is obviously stupid, and I thought that might endanger my birthright.”

“Did you tell any one.”

“Yes yur honour I told the fraud squad.”

“In Ireland.”

“No.”

“In the UK then?”

“No,”

“Well who did you tell?”

“I told the fraud squad in Switzerland.”

“You told the fraud squad in Switzerland, about fraud in a Swiss bank, and expect them to investigate. Your Birthright is secure, you must be the stupidest leprechaun I know. Get out and stop wasting my time.” said the judge