Your Views

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Your e-Mails

Nick Hayland	Dear Nicey, My wife has recent exchanged a perfectly serviceable model with a clear glass one with chrome fittings. Not only do you have to remove the lid to fill it (unlike using the spout of our reliable old model) but it makes such a racket that the first time we used it I thought it was going to explode. Also, as we live in hard water area, we have to spend countless amounts on kettle cleaners to remove the merest hint of lime scale. All together wholly unsatisfactory. Our old jug kettle also had a red ball to show water level, but unfortunate fell victim to lime scale. This never stopped us, though. We just developed a knack of lifting the kettle and testing its weight for the appropriate amount of water. Not much of a party trick, but one nonetheless.
	Nicey replies: Yes Mrs B (nee Biscuit Enthusiast Mandy) has got one of those. Despite filtering our very hard water through a Brita Jug it still ends up looking like one of those liquid filled shaker snow storm things. I too have suffered with a jammed red ball on occasion.
Len Smith	Waitrose Gold, Is this Lyons Red Label in disguise?   Tastes like it. Len Smith
	Nicey replies: It could be couldn't it?
Ian and Barbara Smith	Great site. We were dismayed to discover from Fortnum and Mason that chocolate covered Bath Oliver's are no longer available. I expect some marketing "geek" somewhere, who has no discernment, has reached this decision. A nice lady in F & M, who knew her biscuits, put us on to you. We need a national campaign to save one of our countries great products. What will Christmas be without them? Why can't these wretched people just leave a good product alone? What do you think? Ian and Barbara Smith
	Nicey replies: Well Bath Olivers are made under license from Fortts by Jacobs, we presume the chocolate covered ones are too. Two glimmers of hope are the acquisition of Jacobs within the last two weeks by United Biscuits (McVities,Crawfords,KP), which might see some changes the most likely being a focus on Jacob's brands and a move away from generics. Who knows this may benefit the Bath Oliver (my dream scenario is that they fix the Club biscuit back to how it should be while they are at it). The second strand of hope comes in the form of the recently revived Huntley & Palmers, which really is an attempt to combine the brand name with a range of premium products utilising other manufacturers. H&P at one time owned Bath Olivers and so have a historical association with them. We know the MD of the new H&P has been exploring the idea of adding Chocolate Bath Olivers to his range. Actually we were in Bath last weekend and took this picture of what we believe to be the ancestral home of the Bath Oliver, which is now a pub in Green Street Bath, but once was a bakery operated by the late Dr Oliver's (inventor), coachman Atkins, to whom he bequeathed the recipe and lots of flour.
Jo Crowther	Apologies for the WI type question but does anyone know a recipe for fig rolls? I live in the middle of nowhere in Italy and have changed my eating habits accordingly but occasionally things start calling. The home made tomato ketchup for the home made bacon sarnies was ok but decidedly watery. Now I have 3 big fig trees absolutely laden and fig biscuits are something which my kids are being denied in their admittedly idyllic but proper-biscuit lacking lives. They sell them on the internet I've noticed but at fifteen quid postage I would have to hire a divorce lawyer when the bill came. If it helps to get a level of backwater-ness I made gingerbread men last week with some very dried up old powdered ginger (not nice) and no-one for miles had ever heard of ginger before. And when my husband went to America in January they asked how he would manage with the language.....yours in need. Jo.
	Nicey replies: Hello Jo, To make commercial fig rolls you need a big machine for extruding them, so what ever you come up with will inevitably have a bit of a homemade look to it. I think your main challenge is to get your figs to resemble the fig paste inside a fig roll, no doubt beginning with drying them. Maybe you'll have to see if the locals have any fig processing tips you can assimilate. After that you are really into jam rolly-polly territory using a sweet pastry that I think you'll find needs some egg yolk in it.
Sarah O'Sullivan	Nicey, I've noticed you being a bit mean to Lipton's Yellow Label on several occasions now. Granted, it is a bit of a poor brew, but in foreign climes it can be a blessing in disguise, but more usually, the only thing on offer that resembles tea. I've been saved by it on foreign trips as far afield as Mexico and Thailand. Given the usual choice of Yellow label or chamomile (in the form of a bunch of flowers in one notable case) Lipton's will win every time as far as I'm concerned. I do wonder if Lipton's tea is really so bad, or it is just that most Britons only ever encounter it abroad with the attendant odd tasting milk they have over there. Sarah O'Sullivan PS In Thailand I went so far as to try Nestle's iced tea, for I which apologise and offer only the excuse that the weather really was very, very warm indeed. The iced tea was, alarmingly, rather refreshing.
	Nicey replies: Yes too many catered skiing holidays with enforced Lipton's Yellow Label when the body is crying out for PG.
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