Vicky Goes On (Again)

Tag: Food

  • Inflation. Everything costs £20

    In the olden days (anything longer than 5 years ago, but which 5 years? This could be a much longer tangent but basically, time is an illusion and everything was either “the other day”, “5 years ago (but resolutely NOT 2020), or “in the past“) I always thought of Coke (Coca-Cola) as being 50p and figuring out the cost of foreign money from that. About 5 years ago (see tangent) this changed to £1. Listen, I know we all know the Freddo cost price index but I am no economist so I used the price of a can of Coke. Now, here’s the horror: A can of Coke, when not purchased as part of a Meal Deal is £1.55. One POUND and FIFTY FIVE PENCE. In GBP.

    My friend Kelinda writes: ‘Why is everything £20?’
    And she’s right. Everything is £20. I leave my house to buy some vegetables for an evening meal and the price is £20. What are these vegetables made from? I’m not even shopping at Waitrose. This is Asda. And my wages are alright, you know? I spend £150,000 a week on food shopping and I don’t even buy the meat. Everything is either £5 or £20 or £1000.

    And here’s the kicker – it really, really doesn’t have to be this way. B&M reported earnings will be between £510m to £560m in 2025 which is an 18% decline. So fucking what? It’s still a lot of fucking money. Why is everything in capitalism growth, growth, growth? Because of the shareholders. Look, I get that the shareholders want their sweet, sweet green but you cannot seriously look me in my eyeballs and say £510 million GBP Sterling cash money is not a lot of money. You cannot talk straight out of your mouths and expect me to think, “yeah, you know what? You should be putting Coke up to £3 a can. Coca-Cola is a poor li’l company with no money at all. Won’t somebody think of the shareholders?”

    £11m was paid out to the UKs privatised water companies as part of the “water restoration fund” in April 2024. £78BILLION was paid by water companies to its shareholders since privatisation started in 1989 (with much thanks to the Private Eye for the figures). All that and approximately 590 million litres of water are lost DAILY by Thames Water alone. I pay those bitches over £50 a month. Literally falls from the sky and I pay that. (OK, I pay half but the point damn well still stands).

    What are we supposed to do? Pay £20 for eggs, bodywash, tomatoes. And then £30, £40, £700? Where will it end? When do we say, “enough. I am not paying £14 for a Freddo!”?

    A lot of companies are going bust but I wonder if it is because they’re also pricing themselves to extinction? Capitalism is supposed to be about market forces and the consumer dictating through their wallets what we want and what we are willing to purchase. But, I’m not willing to spend £4 on a tomato. And what are we left with? We do need to purchase food. We literally cannot sustain ourselves singularly. We are homo sapiens because of agriculture and tribal living.

    OK, this is too much. I’m going to get a chicken coop and some tomato seeds. BRB.

    Oh, and don’t get me started on shrinkflation. Kerrygold butter is now 50g less for the same price. The feckin’ gobshites.

  • The Joy of Eggs

    eggs, eggs, eggs

    We give a lot of love to potatoes, and rightly so. Potatoes are great. Elite. Mashed, boiled, roasted, fried… and so many ways to fry them too for a different experience each time but I wanna talk about eggs.

    Let’s talk about eggs, baby.

    A number of people have told me that they “HATE” eggs. Like, how fucking dare you!?

    Eggs make mayonnaise and salad cream (and it still blows my little mind that the only difference is salad cream is made using cooked yolks or something like that. I’d look it up but I will not.) Eggs can be boiled, fried, poached, hard boiled, soft boiled (with “soldiers”. Which they do not do in the US. And we wonder why they are so weird?), coddled, baked, scrambled…

    Scrambled eggs

    Whenever a chef comes along showing us the best way to cook scrambled eggs they’re always damn near raw looking. “Add some creme fraiche, whisk on a low heat, sprinkle with parsley.” No, I won’t. There are 2 ways to cook scrambled eggs. Number 1: Whack it all in a pan and cook, cook, cook to your liking. Number 2: Mix in a bowl and then add to the pan with butter or oil lightly heated already and cook to your liking. Here’s another point: I like ’em both kinds of way and I like ’em slightly firm to bloody done and cooked right proper. (sidenote: I tried really hard to not use words like “loose” and “firm” to avoid scatology and sexual double entendre.)

    Boiled eggs

    How do you like your eggs in the morning? I like soft boiled eggs with soldiers. I have an egg cup in the cupboard and everything. But, here’s the problem. It’s so difficult to know exactly and for sure that you have got it right. I did get it down to an exact science once but then I started buying different sized eggs and it all went to pot. Now, I know, I could look it up and set a timer and blah, blah, blah. But I just scramble them or fry them. And I can fry a good egg, let me tell ya.

    Fried eggs

    I cannot stand a fried egg with any, and I mean ANY raw albumen. You serve me a snotty egg and my whole entire day is ruined. Yes, it is that deep. If I ever go to a cafe I will always order scrambled eggs, if possible. I’d rather have mediocre scrambled eggs than a snotty fried egg. I will die on this hill.
    If you also hate snotty eggs but don’t know how to cook them I suggest using a tablespoon to gently spoon the hot oil over the yolk. Just a li’l tip for you. For free.

    Coddled eggs

    You know when you try to poach an egg so you use one of those pans with the little sections in it and it sits in like a hot water bath? THAT, my friend, is actually a coddled egg. A poached egg is directly placed in the hot water. So, now you know. We had these fancy coddling egg pots which we never used. I should find them and steal them and have fancy coddled eggs.

    Poached eggs

    I do not like poached eggs because they are too wet and often snotty and too much is made of them being difficult to cook (I watch a lot of Channel 4 show ‘Four in a Bed’) and I will bet my bottom dollar they’re not THAT hard to cook. People like to overcomplicate things. Bastards. Get a coddler.

    Also, eggs are great because they are used in cakes and biscuits.

    I know that vegans exist and I respect that, you, and your life choices. But I love eggs more than I love you.

  • Chinese dinners

    Chinese dinners

    A lot of my dinners are some variation of “Chinese” takeaway food. I’ve put Chinese in quote marks simply because it is not authentic at all.
    I used to live in Kilburn and then moved to West Hampstead and there was a severe lack of British Chinese takeaways. You know the ones, metal containers with cardboard tops, paper bags full of greasy prawn balls, FREE prawn crackers. Since moving to N17 I have found TWO (2) Chinese takeaways that were amazing. One in Dalston and one near Wood Green BUT in the meantime I developed some dinners that were, in my opinion, pretty flipping good. After much trial and error I now use the following on top of most protein and rice or noodles for a quick and tasty meal.

    Soy sauce saucy sauce for anything

    Lee Kum Kee anything is used mostly. https://uk.lkk.com/
    You can find this in most supermarkets!

    Ingredients:
    SOME premium dark soy sauce
    A drizzle of oyster sauce
    Wee bit of honey (or some brown sugar)
    Sesame oil
    Garlic
    Cornstarch

    Yeah, but what do you do? Huh?
    In a pan drizzle a little sesame oil and crushed garlic. Add some soy sauce, oyster sauce, honey and swizzle it about. Add some cornstarch flour to some cold water and dump into the soy sauce pan. Take off the heat and continue to mix, mix, mix. The cornstarch slurry will thicken this sauce. If too thick – add some water and back on the heat whilst continuing to mix.
    That. Is. It.

    This is a salmon and stir fry thing I made.
    I put the salmon in some kitchen foil with a drizzle of soy sauce and popped into the oven for about 15 mins at 180°c
    I stir fried onion and garlic with some broccoli whilst I cooked some basmati rice in a rice cooker*. Dished it up, added the above soy sauce saucy sauce thing and sprinkled with sesame seeds.

    Don’t it look good?

    (Approx. 600 calories, if you care)

    *I CANNOT COOK RICE ON THE HOB AND I CANNOT LEARN