Your ViewsKeep your e-mails pouring in, it's good to know that there are lots of you out there with views and opinions. To help you work out what is what, are now little icons to help you see biscuit related themes. And now you can see at a glance which are the most contested subjects via this graph (requires Flash 6.0 plugin). Please keep your mails coming in to nicey@nicecupofteaandasitdown.com | If you like, you can use this search thingy to find stuff that matches with any of the icons you pick, or use the fantastic free text search, Yay! | Your e-Mails |
Sarah-Jane Winn |
Dear 'Nicey',
Great web site, do you, or will you. do any features of nut free biccies? My son has a nut allergy and its a real pain trying to find biccies for him, usually its the very nice but a tad boring full time, Rich Tea's.
Many thanks, keep up the good work, sent the site to my sis in laws in LA and NZ!!! |
Nicey replies: Things like the mighty Penguin tend to be OK as they have their own dedicated production line, due to the volumes involved, so you don't get that may contain nuts thing. United Biscuits have an up to date web page were they list their nut free products.
Hey the Abbey Crunch is listed as nut free, Yay. |
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Tony Raven
Lu Mikado Review |
The feedback you have on the Pocky/Mikado is slightly off. I have some packets of Pockys donated by Japanese friends when they visit. They are made by Ezaki Glico Co Ltd in Osaka, Japan and come in a wide variety of types. Current packs I have are Mousse Pocky in Strawberry or Green Tea flavours. You can find out about them at the Glico Website If stuck AltaVista will do a challenging translation for you.
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Phil Leicester
Tim Tam vs Penguin Review |
Where are they? I sent me mum down Tescos to get some and they didn't have any! (Not an easy feat as she's 5000m away from me) So where are they.
Desparate.
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Nicey replies: Their location amongst the biscuits can vary wildly. However we have been informed that the official Tesco policy is to put them next to the Cadburys fingers.
I'm a bit lost with the 5000m thing to your mother. Still never mind. |
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Sharon Matthews |
Hi Nicey
my collegues and i would like to know what the maximum dunking time is for a Rich Tea biscuit.
As you know it is very frustrating when you lose half the biscuit in your cuppa making it undrinkable
We have tried doubling up the biscuits but this just causes more soggy biscuit problems
Maybe we could all start a campaign for suggested Dunking times to be written on ALL packets of biscuits, not just Rich Tea.
Let me know what you think and if you could answer the original query we would be very grateful.
sharon (manchester) |
Nicey replies: If only it were that simple, however the temperature of the tea is a vital factor, and so guidelines would have to be given for piping hot tea, hot tea, warm tea, barely warm tea and stone cold tea.
I really must do a dunking icon tomorrow. |
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Michael Barker |
Hi again...
I read a mail from Carley about her ex-boyfriend's cups of tea. I've heard this before and am a little sceptical that it makes much difference when milk is added, but it is suggested that you can scald the milk if you add it to hot water. I really doubt that the sugar plays much of a role in the flavour difference.
Perhaps you already know, the BSI considered "tea making" worthy of study and won the 1999 Ignoble prize for litereature for their "BS 6008:1980, ISO 3103-1980 Method for preparation of a liquor of tea for use in sensory tests - Procedures for preparation with or without milk.", sadly I have not read it, I consider £11 a bit steep for a six page document... as that buys roughly 10 packs of lovely biccies!
So what is the difference between adding milk first or last...?
CASE 1: Milk first
A 200 ml cup is pre-loaded with 20 ml milk from the fridge, the cup will bring the milk to room temperature.
20 ml of boiling water is added, so then you might think that the average temperature of the 40 ml of liquid would be 60°C, this is unlikely to be the case as the cup itself will be a nice sink for some of the heat, and this is a non-adiabatic system as it's cooling to the air all the time, I'd guess that the maximum temperature after 1 sec is no more than 40°C.
The temperature of the milk then will rise smoothly to 80-90°C as you pour the rest of the water into the cup.
CASE 2: Milk last
first pour in the boiling water, so you have a cup of black tea sitting at 95°C
Then add the cold milk, the milk will cool the tea a little, but the milk itself will go through a very rapid increase in temperature.
If the milk comes straight from your fridge it might start at 4°C, when added to the cup, it will reach something like 80-90°C after just 1 sec, hence the term "scald".
As to the chemical effect of scalding the milk, and what compounds give the funny taste, I've no idea!
Any dairy scientists out there? I'd hazard a guess that it would depend strongly on the thermochemical properties of the milk,
and therefore what type you use e.g. skimmed milk is very easy to burn, UHT has already been "burnt" etc. etc.
It's more likely that Carley's ex-boyfriend could tast the difference in the type of milk used.
My own method is to add the milk first, but that's only so I can put the milk back in the fridge whilst waiting for the water to boil.
Cheers,
Michael.
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