Posts by B Jones
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There was a fairly good unsolved murders show that screened quite late, sometime in the last year. It was full of cheesy gumshoe shots and had some random guy researching all these unsolved crimes, with some straightforward re-enactments - the one I particularly remember was a Japanese tourist who was found in a maintenance cupboard in central Auckland. Despite the cheese, it was perfectly justifiable in the way Sensing isn't - it relied on real information, or informed speculation (clearly noted as such) rather than becoming a promotion vehicle for fraudsters that chips away at people's ability to critically think about the world.
I liked Jeremy Wells before - I totally heart him now. He gave credit where it was due, but didn't hold back for a second where there was an important point at stake.
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How do you steam millk with an atomic? I assume that's the number with the water chamber in the bottom, the bit for the coffee screws into the middle and the top chamber catches the water that's passed through the coffee when it boils.
I've had adequate travel coffee made in a saucepan. Same principle as a plunger but with more careful decanting.
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the problem with wellington
everyone is such a coffee snob, the humble hot choclate is often looked down upon, and what you get is hot milk with a teaspoon of cadbury's drinking choclate (so not nice)Also I've never had a surly person at starbucks, but let's be honest wellington is famous for it's surly barista's
I've yet to find a hot chocolate anywhere that's as good as the stuff I make at home. I got the recipe years ago from the Listener - you melt a slab of dark chocolate with 300ml of cream in a pot over hot water, add a little vanilla essence (or baileys, or whisky, or chilli or whatever you like most with your chocolate), let it cool to room temperature and beat it until holds its shape. You add a spoonful to a cup of hot milk for hot choc without any grainy rubbish at the bottom. This would keep in the fridge for months, but it gets consumed pretty quickly.
Last time I had a hot chocolate at Espressoholic (about 1996) it was huge, tepid and not very good. No idea what it's like now - I gave up on it when it was the last bastion of indoor smoking and I got too old to tolerate perpetually surly and stoned-looking staff. Their counter food was always pretty good, though.
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Oh, the gross misuse of "light" as a marketing tactic. Light olive oil gets used to fry things, chez moi, with the EVO stuff reserved for drizzling over things. Both need regular de-congealing by the fireplace this time of year.
Does SB still serve in takeaway cups? I don't know why anyone would pay more for the quality you get there, when you don't even get chinaware. At least the suburban mall coffee-manglers have cups and saucers.
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SB has played its part by at least making it accessible (unlike the duanting "face control" of Auckland and Wellington cafe culture).
The what? What are there, bouncers on the doors of the cafés to keep the riffraff out?
Coffee was accessible long before SB arrived - Robert Harris and other chains were making terrible cappucinos all through suburban shopping malls in the mid 90s. That's as accessible as it gets.
I'm not convinced by the not-cool in NZ vs cool in the US, though. An expat American friend of mine was perplexed by "hipster" kids hanging out in the Palmerston North Starbucks. There are much cooler cafés in Palmie.
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I think of Gary Brain every time the flight attendant tells us to be careful opening the overhead lockers as items may have shifted in flight :-(
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All this Greek islandry has reminded me of my favourite blend of classics, pop culture and comic opera, The Heroine Barbarian:
I travel with a poet who is perky and parthenian
And scribbles her hexameters in Linear Mycenian
(And many have attempted, by a host of methods mystical,
To tell if our relationship's sororal or sapphistical). -
Points for using "fell swoop" correctly. Foul swoop or even fowl swoop are among my pet hates.
It's easier to remember it correctly if you think of it as something a Nazgul is likely to do.
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Surely factesimal. Much more fun and scienterrific.
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Er, any further discussion on that last reckless example should perhaps be directed elsethread.