StewBlog

Cooked up some of this stuff tonight. I based it on a recipe from the Wagamama cookbook but changed a few things. Here's my version...

Ingredients
Three de-boned chicken thighs cut into cubes of roughly the same size.
One large thumb of finely grated ginger.
Two large cloves of finely chopped garlic.
One heaped teaspoon of dark brown sugar.
100ml dark soy sauce.

Mix all this stuff together trying to dissolve most of the sugar and stick it in a bowl in the fridge to marinade overnight, like I did last night...

Fill a wok with a load of sunflower oil and get it nice and hot, so that a cube of bread sizzles nicely when you pop it in. Make up a batter with one beaten egg, a teaspoon of oregano, a teaspoon of thyme and a little corn flour to thicken.

All you need to do now is take out your lovely cubes of marinaded chicken, trying to pick up as much garlic and ginger as possible, and dunk them in the batter mix before dropping them into the wok of hot oil. Watch them sizzle away until they turn golden brown (5 - 8 minutes) and fish them out onto a kitchen towel to absorb the oil. Sprinkle with a wedge of lime and they're all ready!

I have to say, these turned out fabulously well! Lovely with a cold beer...

Just booked my flights for James's stag weekend in July. Never been to Berlin before so I can't wait! I'm definitely planning on visiting this thing while I'm out there.

And so it came to pass that another train crash, slowed down to fill an hour of Wednesday night television, was broadcast to a surely incredulous audience as our valiant teams went head to head, literally airing their dirty laundry in public.

I've tipped the not-so-easy-on-the-eye, Jenny Celerier, to get to the final, so I was pleased when she volunteered to be project manager this week. The most entertaining candidate so far this year, Raef Bjayou, volunteered to head up the boys team and once confirmed in the position let fly with a string of hyperbole: 'Let's kick some ass!' he exclaimed, followed by a nervous chuckle, realising that he'd abandoned his velvet verboseness for an altogether earthier oratory. Surely a calculated move to bridge the gap between the prince and the paupers?

For the task this week, Sir Alan had rented a couple of industrial landrettes for the day, so the teams had to go out into London and find things to wash, dry, press and return within 24 hours to make as much money as possible. They also had a couple of clients laid on which the two teams would have to pitch to in order to win their business. First up, was a hotel with 1000 items of bedding to launder... The girls had the first bite of the cherry and offered to do every item at £4.99@ Quick calculation brings the total price to £4990... Now, as I've said before, I'm no good with prices but I reckon you could buy 1000 items of bedding brand new with 5 grand, so it was no surprise when beads of sweat appeared on the hotel managers forehead when the girls told him their price. So excruciatingly embarrassing it was, I could barely watch the television when he finally told them it usually costs him around £200 for the same service - Nincompoops! The boys team offered £200 and won the business, and my what a lot of business it was! Raef commented that there were 'some seriously nasty stains' on some of the bedding before sending a few of the boys back to the laundrette to get cracking on it... Superb delegation!

I think it's fair to say that Jenny Celerier and Lucinda Ledgerwood do not get on and this clash of personalities was put under the microscope for this task... The project manager was too headstrong and this ultimately split the team and lead to chaos. The girls actually lost items of clothing and got things mixed up so yet more embarrassment unsued as they delivered their laundry back to bemused customers, bereft of the odd shirt or pair of boxers!

Sir Alan picked up instantly on the girls disharmony in the boardroom but allowed himself time for a little humour at the expense of the girls' implementation of a 24-hour personal customer hotline during the task. As Sir Alan asked, why anybody would want to check on the progress of their Calvin Kleins at the laundrette? Quite right - Why would they?

Shazia Wahab got the boot in the end, but I don't think she did all that much wrong really... Jenny Celerier should have gone because she is a maniac.

I actually found this station whilst scanning my digital radio several days ago, but I didn't know what was going on... until I found this news story this morning:

A radio station that broadcasts nothing but the sound of birdsong from a British country garden has become an unlikely hit. Half a million listeners have tuned in to the Birdsong station and the company behind it has bowed to public pressure and upgraded the recording. Starting at 6am every day and closing at midnight, the station plays a 20 minute-long recording of birds singing in chorus on a continuous loop.

It's quite relaxing but a bit weird to listen to it at night. Maybe a good alarm clock, but I hear the birds in the morning anyway...

A story in this morning's news about a bloke who lives just up the road from me...

A Kent man is vowing to eat nothing but wild food he can forage, including road kill, for a year. Fergus Drennan, 36, will gather his food within a ten-mile radius of his home in Broad Oak, near Canterbury, reports the Daily Mail.

Mr Drennan, 36, will be living at home and has allowed himself the use of a fridge, freezer and cooker but will not resort to additional ingredients such as flour or eggs. He hopes that by cutting out processed foods his overall health and well-being will improve dramatically.

I'll be on the lookout for a man wandering the streets wearing nothing but animal furs... Good luck, chum!

I heard on the news this morning that a new directive from the EU (yes, another one) is due to come into force that will necessitate sessions with psychics, including tarot readings, spirit channelling, crystal ball reading etc, to be classified in the same way as other consumer transactions. This means that if you visit a psychic, and based on your experience you make a change in your life that perhaps causes you some financial or emotional hardship, you have the right to sue the psychic and it's up to them to prove that their advice was not fraudulant... But, how can a psychic ever prove to you that they really did, for instance, speak to the spirit of your deceased careers tutor who recommended that you give up your job and join the circus?

As a scientist, I'm probably more sceptical than most of psychics and their claims, but it still fascinates me. I'm certainly not prepared to say it's all bunkum. I believe we all have a soul but science alone may never be able to prove its existence, so the claim that there is no sound evidence that psychic abilities exist doesn't necessarily mean they don't. In fact, does it matter or not whether these abilities are real? If somebody thinks that a deceased relative has made contact with them through a medium, who also fully believes that they are contacting spirits, and both are at peace with that knowledge, is any harm done?