Some pupils from a Lincolnshire primary school swapped the classroom for the great outdoors as they headed out on a fact-finding mission to a local egg-farm in Beckingham.
The children were some of the first from the county to take part in an initiative that aims to inform people of school-going age about where the food on their plate comes from, and how it gets there.
During the day the kids were treated to a special behind the scenes lesson that was concerned about the lifestyle of the hens, what they do on a day to day basis, where they play and where they lay their eggs.
How do you eat?
And for those who answered ‘with a knife and fork’ you may be right, in a literal sense, but for those that replied by saying ‘with your hands’ you are onto a winner.
The real question is how do you eat with your senses?
Taste is an obvious one, as is sight, but what about touch, smell and sound?
According to researchers at the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Pollenzo, Italy, people have forgotten how to engage all their senses when consuming their food. By default, Shona Miller, a student at the institution claims, the majority of us rely too much on the visual aspects of a dish as we have become accustomed to being bombarded with colour and imagery through a continuous exposure to advertising.
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They say that no food disappears from the culinary bibles altogether. Sometimes they may vanish for a while and then make a renaissance decades later, or they may lay dormant before somebody brands them as ‘cool’ and markets them as the latest in a long line of ‘super foods’. Or, as is the case with this tale, you could be sat wistfully reminiscing and then, suddenly, flavours and memories come flooding back.
When I was younger there was fennel in the garden; growing tall – or maybe I was just short – it tended to act as a quasi-fence separating grass, soil and path; other times the clumps became battered goalposts; and then, it was used to cook with.
But, for some reason, it vanished.
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Today, for those who are unaware, is Saint Patrick’s Day. The one day a year where everybody, including myself, becomes Irish, celebrates and dons some emerald coloured clothes.
So, what could be better than combining Ireland and food for today’s entry to the CS Catering blog?
The answer, clearly, is nothing.
References to the tradition of Irish food can be traced back right to the formative years of Irish literature. The hero of Irish mythology, Fionn mac Cumhaill, gained his intelligence and wisdom from eating a salmon.
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Paella is synonymous with Spanish cuisine, but after witnessing a rapid evolution of its composition in recent years, three chefs are aiming to reclaim one of Valencia’s most iconic dishes from being continually debased.
Wikipaella has been created to ‘police’ paella, so says co-founder Guillermo Navarro. “It’s a dish that’s really trendy;” he laments, “and there’s a lot of people taking advantage of it and selling what they call authentic, traditional or Spanish paella.”
Initially, Navarro thought it was a problem unique to foreign countries, but a visit to Madrid wielded equally unsavoury results. “In Madrid, 90% of the paellas that you eat can’t be compared to real paella.” [ Read More ]
So today is the day where we all rummage through the cupboards, find all the eggs, flour, milk and butter we can find, mix them all together and whack it in a pan.
Surely it hasn’t creped up on you?
Poor puns aside, today isn’t solely about naleśniki, panqueques or palačinka. As lovely as crepes are accompanied by a modicum of freshly squeezed lemon juice drizzle and a sprinkling of sugar, sometimes we just want a little bit more.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that, variety is, after all, the spice of life. [ Read More ]
Author
Damien Wilde