Archive for January, 2007

Live Webchat with Lesley Waters

by Andrew on January 25, 2007 in On The Web with 1 Comment

Lesley Waters Webchats TV is hosting a webcast with Lesley Waters on Monday 29th January at 1pm to talk about the importance of seafood in the diet and the benefits of oil-rich fish.

Lesley will discussing her top tips on what to look out for when buying fish and will be joined by Juliette Kellow – a registered dietician with six years experience as an editor in the women’s consumer health and beauty market, a degree in nutrition and a passion for health, food and diet. You can submit a question via the website.


Borough Market Under Threat

by Andrew on January 24, 2007 in Farm Shops and Markets with 2 Comments

The famous Borough Market in London is under threat; well partially anyway. There is a planning application pending to run a railway line through part of the site that will involve knocking down 23 listed and unlisted buildings in the immediate area.

An on-line petition has been set-up at Save The Borough Market Campaign. If you love the area and wish to save the look and feel of this wonderful area in an otherwise shabby part of town you just have to sign… after I left my mark there was an impressive (pull)9,434 signatures(/pull).

French Food Killed Napoleon

by Andrew on January 22, 2007 in In the Press with No comments

Napoleon was not assassinated by the British; a new report suggests he was felled by poor quality French Food.

American researchers have concluded that stomach cancer exasperated by French military food was the possible cause of death, so says Cosmos.

In the latest twist in a long-running medical saga, the research team reassessed Napoleon’s clinical history, the original autopsy and other documents, and compared this evidence with data from 135 gastric cancer patients.

Napoleon died aged 51, in 1821, while exiled on St. Helena. It has long been held that he was poisoned with arsenic from his British captors. The report suggests though that standard military fare – a diet lacking in fresh fruit but full of salted meat – was the cause.

The autopsy found a huge tumour that ran at least 10 centimetres down the side of Napoleon’s stomach. It also came across ‘enlarged and hardened’ gastric lymph nodes – indicators, according to the study, that this cancer was in an advanced, tertiary stage.

Farmhouse Breakfast Week 2007

by Andrew on January 21, 2007 in Tasting Events/Shows with No comments

Breakfast Omelet Today marks the start of Farmhouse Breakfast Week 2007. Its aim? encouraging people to get active as part of a healthy lifestyle with the theme “Make Time for It!”.

There are a series of events across the country (displayed on a flash-driven map) which range from ‘buy one get one free’ breakfast deals, an open breakfast at Didcot town centre and dozens of farmers markets. Schools play a big part in the week with educational sessions on the benefits of breakfast (and we are not talking daily fry-ups here people) with healthy eating breakfast clubs.

ASDA stores across the country have various promotions on too, while yesterdays Independent published a selection of rather delicious sounding recipes.

A full website is available covering National Farmhouse Breakfast Week, which should keep you busy exploring as the sausages sizzle and that fruit smoothie maker given to you at Christmas gets a dusting down…

Coming Soon – air mile food labels

by Andrew on January 20, 2007 in Supermarkets, Taste with 1 Comment

Excellent news that both Tesco and M&S are to introduce ‘air miles’ labels on their food.

The aircraft stickers will appear on produce at Marks & Spencer and Tesco from Easter. The logos are still being devised but the M&S version is likely to state ‘Flown’ on the label whereas at Tesco the favoured phrase is ‘Air- freighted’

The actual number of miles is not going to be displayed however, which may or may not be important. But of course, as the article points out, it can be that air-freighted products can be more environmentally friendly than out of season grown food – all those heated greenhouses have to get their power from somewhere.

Also surprising is that so little food is flown into the UK, only between 3 and 4 per cent. The costs making it prohibitively expensive.

The aircraft sticker is apparently based on a logo used 20 years ago to promote freshness. This is before my time – anyone have details or an image of what this original image looked like?

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