Monthly Archives: March 2009

So that’s why I don’t deflect compasses

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To give blood you have to have 13.5 somethings per something in your iron count. I have 13.3. Put another way, when they take the drop of blood they drop it into a tube full of blue liquid and it has to sink within 15 seconds. Mine floats.

I’m assured I’m not anaemic but still … Must be just one of those things. My diet hasn’t changed and I haven’t been ill. Maybe I’ve always been just at the upper end of the 15 seconds. So, plenty of lean red meat, pulses and brown bread required. And less tea, which blocks iron take-up, apparently.

Nah, stuff that.

UPDATE: Best Beloved comments that this is obviously what lay behind all those floating witch trials. They weren’t rejecting the water of their baptism, they were just severely anaemic.

To the Tower!

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Here’s a useful tip. If you’re going to a Sunday morning service in the Chapel of St Peter Ad Vincula within the Tower of London, and provided you’re pre-booked in (or just plain convincing, smartly dressed and clearly not a terrorist) you can get in for free. See, there is a plus side to an established state religion. Of course, it’s probably best that you actually go to the service after that if only to establish some cred.

Or, in today’s case, to attend (arriving five minutes late due to a crash [not ours] on the M4 and having to awaken a slumbering teenager at 7.30am on a Sunday) the christening of Junior Nephew in the same building that has previously seen the christening of his sister and brother and the marriage of his parents. This is a chapel royal and they do it … differently to Christ Church on Long Furlong.

The medals worn by the vicar on his robes are the first clue (six of them, one with bar and a mention-in-despatches). The robes themselves are another. As the service progressed I had cause to discover (and feel quite pleased that) I can still mumble my way through the Venite, the Te Deum and the Jubilate, all in 1662 English. And I can safely say that the highly spiritual meditative aid that starts “Oh it’s great great brill brill wicked wicked skill skill to have a friend in Jesus” has never rattled these particular rafters.

The rafters are however rattled by a marvellous choir who can hit their notes so perfectly that the sound just seems to come out of the air around you. We finished, as you would only expect, with the National Anthem and the final verse of “Eternal father strong to save”-

Oh Trinity of love and power
Our brethren shield in danger’s hour.
From rock and tempest, fire and foe
Protect them wheresoe’r they go.
Thus ever more shall rise to thee
Glad hymns of praise from land sea.

In case this all seems a little overpowering, it’s also worth mentioning that the choir master has a pony tail, he looks (from behind) like the lead singer of the Commitments, and at my niece’s christening four years ago he played “The wheels on the bus” on the chapel organ for the benefit and delight of Senior Nephew.

Sometimes it’s good to take a break, eh?

On previous occasions we’ve taken the opportunity to see the Crown Jewels, but not this time as the queue was winding around the block and there’s some things even chapelgoers can’t jump. As I recall they have a conveyor belt down either side to carry the tourists past, thus preventing build-ups of gawkers which is a very good idea. With only a small effort you can make the perceptual shift that you are standing still and it’s the Crown Jewels that are gliding past, like a very expensive edition of the Generation Game. “A priceless diamond. An orb. A sceptre. A cuddly toy …”

Then we repaired to Zizzis in St Katherine’s Dock for lunch, where I had the seafood risotto “with a hint of chili”. I would say more than a hint – it gave me several harsh nudges, a couple of curt requests and at one point it was outright barking orders at me. Very nice. I’m loath to admit to any good coming out of the Thatcher era at all, but sheer honesty often forces me to admit that quite a lot did and one of these things is the renovation of the Docklands. If a building has to be one thing or the other, would you rather an Italian restaurant with a slightly experimental menu or a moldering warehouse that’s no good to anyone except rats? Not a hard choice to make.

Occasional recipes: Marilyn Monroe’s Chicken Cacciatore

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I have no idea if this really is Marilyn Monroe’s recipe (or variation hereon), but why would iON Oxford Tube, the Oxford Tube’s inflight magazine, lie to me? Anyway, this comes from page 21 of issue 3, apparently winter 2009, though I’d have said in March 2009 that’s impossible and winter 2008 was probably what they meant.

Anyhoo. They say/ [I say]:

  • 4 chicken quarters [or 2 drumsticks each]
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • crashed black pepper and salt
  • 1 yellow pepper, sliced
  • 1 small chopped onion
  • 2 cloves chopped garlic [um, 5, I think it was]
  • 1 glass dry white wine. [A glass? Just what the heck is a glass in official terms of measurement? I dunno, so I gave it exactly one wine glass full and it seemed to work.]
  • 2 tbsp white wine vinegar
  • 1 cup chicken stock. [Cup? See remark about glasses of white wine. Best Beloved suggested about half a pint and again it seemed to work.]
  • 1/2 tsp crumbled oregano [omitted in favour of lemon thyme, that being what we had to hand]
  • 2 bay leaves [simply omitted]
  • 1 cup finely chopped mushrooms [here we go again … I just went with my judgement of what looked like a good quantity]
  • 1 can peeled tomatoes, juice reserved [whatever that means. I put the whole lot in and, you guessed it, it seemed to work]
  • 2 tbsp fresh, torn basil leaves [see bay leaves above]
  • 1 tbsp slivered black olives [I don’t think I’ve ever had a slivered olive in my life. Black olives! Whole! Lots of them!]
  • 3 anchovy fillets [a tin from Tesco has more than 3 and did fine]
  • freshly grated parmesan [so much nicer than the pre-ground type you get in sprinkler cans which smells of sick]

Season the chicken with blackpepper and salt. Heat olive oil unilt a haze forms over it, then saute the chicken until skin goes golden brown. Transfer onto a plate.

[I know from experience that this will just fill the kitchen with chickeny olive oily smoke. Instead I roast the chicken pieces for 30 mins at gas mark 5. Meanwhile …]

Saute the yellow pepper, add onion and garlic and cook for 8-10 minutes [more like 5]. Add the vinegar to deglaze the pan, then add the white wine and boil until the jucie is reduced to about 1/4 glass. Add black pepper, pour in chicken stock, turn down to low, add tomatoes and half their juice [or, as I say, the whole lot], oregano, bay leaf, half the basil [if you’re having any of this] and the mushrooms.

Return the chicken to the pan, cover, reduce heat and simmer for 30 mins. Transfer the chicken onto a plate.

To the sauce add the black olives, remaining basil and anchovies. Stir and cook for two minutes. Spoon over the chicken and sprinkle with parmesan. Serve with buttered spaghetti.

[Now, at this point I want to know why I have never heard of buttered spaghetti before. Where has it been all my life? Just think of it. Roll the words around on your tongue. Buttered … spaghetti. It’s spaghetti, and it’s buttered. Got that? Buttered spaghetti. I have just done you a greater favour than you can possibly imagine.]

And, wow. If Norma Jean was in the habit of cooking that little lot up then she wasn’t half as dumb as she appeared. It’s rich, make no mistake, but with a range of flavours jostling for attention and each one pointing out to you what an utterly fabulous meal this is. Go to it, people.

And remember, buttered spaghetti.