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Things from the internet:

1. A government e-petition to "Make wrongly describing a casserole with a pastry lid as a pie a criminal offence." (Thanks to Will for the tip-off.)

I'm torn; clearly this is a cause after my own heart, but I feel slightly bad about wasting Government time. On the other hand, as [livejournal.com profile] onebyone pointed out, the "review" stage has already happened and the petition is unlikely to get to the required 100K, so all the time that's going to be wasted already has been. I also take slight issue with the petitioner's rather hardline approach to genuine top-crust-only pies.

2. Someone's made me a to-do list! 25 Pubs You Must Drink In.

6 down, 19 to go. Though for clarity I'd like to confirm that the Birch Hall Inn is not in Whitby, it's in Beck Hole. It took me a minute or two to work it out, because I've never heard its name (in fact, I've never heard anyone call it anything other than "the pub in Beck Hole".

(I've drunk in The Spaniards Inn, the pub in Beck Hole, Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem, The Eagle and Child, Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, and The Dove.)

The Jerusalem Tavern, Clerkenwell, is unknown to me and pretty convenient for a post-work drink, though, if anyone fancies joining me.
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Early March, you say? Doesn't that mean it's about time I wrote about the annual rapper dancing competition, DERT? Why yes, it is.

Going for a Burton )

Leodensians! People of Leeds! The dance extravaganza, beer bonanza and all-round travelling circus that is DERT rolls into your city next year. See you there ;)
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Well, as some of you may recall my task last weekend was to work out how to make beer cake. Cake which tasted like, and contained, beer.

Preliminary results from the beery-cake investigation board are now in.

The report is quite long. It does contain pictures of cake. )
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So... anyone got any ideas on how to bake a beer-flavoured cake?

Having been caught up in the heady excitement of my rapper team's Facebook page, I have accidentally agreed to make someone a cake "made out of beer". I have remarkably little idea of how to proceed.

A quick google suggests that recipes for chocolate and stout cake exist. My mum makes a Guinness cake, but (although it's lovely) it tastes more of fruit cake than of Guinness. I'm currently inclining towards this Spiced Beer Cake recipe - though again I'm worried that the spices (while nice) will detract from the beery flavour.

Any advice? Please note I don't want a cake that looks like a foaming tankard, or is iced to resemble a bottle... I want a cake that contains and (preferably) tastes noticeably of beer.

I need to bake my cake next Thursday (to be delivered on Friday), so not a lot of time for experimentation...
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And while we're talking about packaging changes...

They're messing with my beer! )

In other news, I am now back from WGW and will shortly cease wittering about label-changes and review some bands instead.
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Sitting down with my tuna, vegetable and noodle stir-fry I thought I'd rescue one of those bottles of lager languishing in the fridge after Frances' party. There turned out only to be two left - a bottle of Stella, and a bottle of Brahma.

I don't really like Stella. The other, however, was an unknown quantity so I gave it a whirl.

I can now report that Brahma, which claims to be Brazilian, is flippin' disgusting. It tastes of practically nothing yet still manages to be even nastier than Budweiser.

That'll teach me to filch my housemate's beer :(

(Not relevantly: when I was little, my next door neighbour used occasionally to refer to someone as "a proper Brahma" (probably not spelled like that). It was used in a similar context to that in which people say "you are a one" or "you're a right one". Anyone else familiar with this ? Neighbour was from Darlington via Yorkshire...)
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So, suppose I wanted to start a petition can anyone recommend a decent online site for doing such a thing ? This isn't to be a Government petition, but should look reasonably respectable so I can pass a link to the institution which I would like to act on it.

If you're curious, I'm hoping to collect enough "signatures" from WGW-goers to persuade the Spa to get at least one barrel of decent ale in for the goth weekend. They have the pumps - and they put hand-pulled beer on in folk week - so it's possible, we just have to persuade them it's worthwhile.

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