2nd December 2012

In which the elfs and I investigate the publicity of Mediæval Bæbes...

Today's song is the classic Gaudete which you may well know the Steeleye Span version of. Here is the version performed by the Mediæval Bæbes:

I think their album covers show an obvious change in publicity tactics. For example here's their first album, Salva Nos, which is where Gaudete is from:

A cover which definitely fits with the medieval theme of their music. Their next album then features the artists themselves:

Apparently slowly dissolving into the curtains. Then their publicity guy went "Hey they're all women, let's put them in nicer dresses":

Which was followed by the noughties hitting them suddenly:

Where they look like an extended cast of Charmed. Then the publicity guy clearly came back with "We need sexy dresses and lighting!":

Then they went all out on the photoshoot:

Explosions!

While it would be cool to think that the new marketing is due to them being assured women I expect it was a male advertising exec who came up with the idea. Maybe men just don't like medieval songs in general and the need to push into the market?

Tom Out!

1st December 2012

In which I present Christmas Wrapping...

The elfs* here at Tinker Tailor Soldier Sponge have suggested this song today. It's not the rarest (as it definitely features on at least one version of The Best Christmas Album In The World ... Ever!) , however, it isn't as popular as say A Fairytale of New York is. I really like this song as it tells a story and is pretty festive :)

*No elfs† were harmed in the making of this blogpost

†Elfs as in the short Christmas kind, not Elves the tall Tolkienian kind

Tom Out!

Advent 2012

In which I detail blog posts in the run up to Christmas...

So I thought this year I would put up an advent calendar of less well known Christmas songs. Some will be good but you just haven't heard them while others will be quirky and interesting. I hope you all enjoy :)

The advent calendar below will update daily with links to the posts so you can bookmark this post or just keep checking back :)

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8 9 10

11 12 13 14 15

16 17 18 19 20

21 22 23 24 25

Tom Out!

P.S. The usual blog will continue alongside this, Great British Tea Test 2012 results are being analysed as we speak.

Vanilla & Chocolate Cheesecake

In which a vanilla and chocolate cheesecake is made ahead of tea testing...

Obviously tea testing requires suitable cake (someone else was already making scones for it) so a decadent cheesecake was required :)

Ingredients

• 175g caster sugar
• 450g cream cheese
• vanilla pod
• 75ml lemon juice
• 175ml crème fraiche
• 625ml double cream
• 150g dark chocolate
• 25g butter
• 12 dark chocolate HobNobs

Recipe

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1. Crush your biscuits of choice (HobNobs :D ) with a rolling pin.
2. Melt butter.
3. Mix.
4. Press into the bottom of a 9-inch cake tin.
5. Chill in fridge while preparing filling.
6. Cut the vanilla pod open and scrape out the seeds.
7. Mix the sugar, cream cheese and vanilla seeds together.
8. Whisk lemon juice, 475 ml cream and crème fraiche until they form soft peaks.
9. Fold the mixtures together.
10. Melt dark chocolate into remaining cream.
11. Cool until you can make a trail with it.
12. Put a third of the cheese mix into the base.
13. Swirl chocolate mix on top.
14. Repeat until all the filling has been used.
15. Use a sharp knife/long cocktail stick to swirl the mixtures together.
16. Chill for approx 5 hours (I did overnight).
17. Enjoy!

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Cheesecake

Tom Out!

P.S. http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/11296/gordons-cheesecake

Project 0

In which I detail my next Halloween project, kind of ...

So following the success of Project Thor you might be wondering what my next project will be. While I'm certain I'll have other opportunities for smaller scale fancy dress throughout the year (there has already been talk of Game of Thrones amongst my housemates*) I am already planning for next Halloween :)

*I can grow the beard for Ned Stark, so shotgun!

The Details I Will Give You

So this Project will be shrouded in mystery **dramatic music**. I will tell you that it involves an extended fitness program again (starting today!), the acquisition of a particular set of skills† and of course the purchase/creation of a costume.

Each of these things represents a goal. Whenever I reach one of these goals I will post a new blog post and increment the title of the post and this category.‡ There will also be hints as to what the costume is (see below).

†Not those ones though

‡Not necessarily numerically

The Game is Afoot!

So every time I post about 'Project 0'  I will post a part of a picture freely available on the internet. If you track this down you will find the full size picture which will be a clue as to the costume. Once you've worked it out feel free to email me at: tom@tinkertailorsoldiersponge.com for prizes!§

§No actual prizes, but the first correct answer (with working as opposed to blind guessing) will get mentioned on the blog when I do the big reveal :)

Example

Here is a small blurry image (I'll find better quality ones for the actual game).

Game example

If you correctly searched for this image you would find it linked to Pimp That Snack.com.

Armed with this image you would see that they are crushing Hobnobs into bits. This would give you the clue that the costume was linked to The Hobbit.

This is a new idea of mine so I hope you all enjoy it!

Tom Out!

Afternoon Infusion

In which I get a free tea with my pumpkin and ginger cake from Graze...

I recently got a few free Graze boxes and they send you a small piece of cake with complimentary tea :)

Brewing

"A blend of assam and kenyan leaves."

There were no instructions so I used my usual 5 minutes brewing time and added a little milk.

Colour

Lighter than my standard teas but still a light brown, tea colour.

Aroma

There is a hint of bergamot but the predominant aroma is that of black tea.

Taste

This is a very pleasant blend. Perhaps it's a gateway tea to those who don't currently like Earl Grey as it tastes like normal tea with a hint of bergamot. It is very refreshing and a great way to start the afternoon. The fact that it comes packaged with cake doesn't harm it either!

BII Showcase

This week I attended the 4th annual Biomedical Imaging Institute Showcase. It was very interesting to see new MR applications and to see a study that I was a subject in being presented. Also I managed to get the annual free mug, which of course I can now use to drink tea!

Conclusion

A refreshing afternoon blend which comes with a cake :) Lovely.

I know I've said this before but I think I may soon change the layout of my tea reviews as they are getting a little repetitive :S

Web-Link

http://www.graze.com/products/browse/1184/guilt-free-high-tea

Tom Out!

Bonus: M&S Turkey Feast

M&S sandwich

This week it is time for the king of the Christmas sandwiches IMHO - the M&S sandwich! Will it retain it's crown?

Price: £3.00

Taste: The stuffing is very tasty, you can taste the sage & onion. A small amount of mayonnaise makes the sandwich moist enough without overpowering. It could do with a bit more cranberry sauce but when you get a whole cranberry it is splendid. The turkey has a lot of flavour as opposed to in the others to date where it was indistinguishable from chicken.

Conclusion: Still excellent and the best so far. Will another sandwich topple it in the following weeks?

Pudding Party!

Those puddings in full...

Enjoy the glorious pudding party pictures!

See my earlier post for the recipe for Bruce Bogtrotter's Cake :)

Tom Out!

Bruce Bogtrotter's Cake

In which I make a ridonculously chocolaty cake from a possibly recognisable children's book...

I'm sure many of you will have read/seen Matilda by Roald Dahl. There is a famous scene in which Bruce Bogtrotter having stolen some of the Trunchbull's personal cake is forced to eat an entire chocolate cake.

Luckily Gary Rhodes (you know that TV chef you haven't seen in a while) wrote a recipe book called Roald Dahl's Revolting Recipes which tells you how to bake a slightly smaller version of the cake.*

*The cake in the book is "fully eighteen inches in diameter". The original recipe makes a 9" cake so I doubled the ingredients and made it twice as high!

Ingredients

• 450g plain dark chocolate
• 350g butter
• 450g caster sugar
• 120g self raising flour
• 12 eggs (separated)

Icing

• 450g plain dark chocolate
• 450ml double cream

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Chocolate!

Recipe

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Mixing choc and butter

• Melt the chocolate and butter together.
• Allow to cool (so it doesn't cook the eggs).
• Mix in sugar, flour and egg yolks.

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Stiff peaks in the egg whites

• Whisk the egg whites until stiff peaks are formed.

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Mixing the eggs into the chocolate

• Fold half of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture.
• Fold in the other half until just combined.
• Grease two 9-inch (21 cm) cake tins.
• Bake at 150°C for 35-45 minutes (keep checking with a knife and don't burn it!)
• Leave to cool on a rack while you make the icing.
• To make the icing simply melt the chocolate into the cream over a low heat.
• Leave the icing to cool (~2 hours unless you speed it up in a fridge)
• Ice the cake (you should have around half an inch of coverage all over)
• Serve

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Bruce Bogtrotter's Cake

Tom Out!

P.S. Pudding party pics to follow!

Blend of Both

In which I try a tea donated by Katy and put Sainsbury's to the test!

This tea was donated to me for the express purpose of reviewing on my blog so here it is :)

Brewing

"It has been expertly created to deliver the delicious full-flavoured taste of original Tetley, but with the natural refreshing benefits of green tea. So you can have it with milk and still enjoy green tea goodness."

There are no brewing instructions so I assumed standard Tetley brewing of a minute or two and then added milk.

Colour

Tea coloured though it came out a slightly darker hue than the normal blend does.

Aroma

Realistically it just smells like tea.

Taste

This is a very refreshing blend. Usually I find Tetley very strong but the addition of green tea lightens the blend while still tasting like the standard blend. I'd say it tastes like Tetley light and there is a bit of a green tea aftertaste.

Data Entry

This week I 'ave mostly been typing on a computer. Manual data entry is annoying, if only my handwriting wasn't so terrible and I could use OCR.

Web-link

http://www.tetley.co.uk/our-teas/products?id=3

Conclusion

Like Tetley, but lighter!

Tom Out!

Bonus: Sainsbury's Turkey Feast

Sainsbury's turkey feast

This week it is time for Sainsbury's Christmas offering.

Price: £2.70 (although it is in the £3 meal deal too)

Taste: A bit different from last time this is turkey, bacon, stuffing, cranberry sauce and salad. The stuffing is lovely and moist and there's no overpowering mayonnaise flavour. The cranberry sauce adds a pleasant aftertaste but is a little subdued. I think the weird thing about this sandwich is that it doesn't seem particularly Christmassy just a glorified chicken and bacon sandwich really. It's still better tasting than the Tesco one but it is still disappointing.

Christmas Puddings

In which stir-up Sunday comes early and on the wrong day of the week...

Although I realise stir-up Sunday is later than this week (and that I made these on a Monday night), it is always good to make your puddings early so that you can top them up with lots of of brandy (feeding the pudding.) Also I always used to make Christmas puddings on Remembrance Day with my school choir.

My mum has always made the best Christmas pudding (as far as i'm concerned) and here is the recipe. This recipe is designed for a Slow cooker.

Apologies to members of CAOS expecting a recipe for tonight's cake but the recipe for mincemeat tart is:

1. Obtain mincemeat and pastry.

2. Place pastry in dish.

3. Fill with mincemeat.

4. Bake.

UPDATE: Mincemeat tarts came out like this :)

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Mincemeat Tart

Ingredients

• 50g plain flour

• pinch of salt

• 2 teaspoons mixed spice

• 100g currants

• 100g sultanas

• 100g raisins

• 100g mixed peel

• 100g shredded suet

• 100g soft brown sugar

• 100g fine white breadcrumbs

• 50g chopped blanched almonds*

• grated rind of 1 lemon

• 2 eggs, beaten

• 2x15ml spoons black treacle

• 1x15ml spoon brandy

• a little stout/ale or milk for mixing†

*The nuts are really important, it's what makes this pudding that bit better than anyone elses :P

†I change the stout every year, this year I went for Marston's Oyster Stout

How-To

1. Sieve together flour, salt and spice, add all dry ingredients and mix well.

2. Add eggs, brandy and treacle with enough liquid to make a soft clinging mixture.

3. Divide between 2 greased basins, leaving about 1 cm headspace.

4. Cover with a double thickness of greased greaseproof paper or tinfoil.

5. Put basins in a slow cooker and pour 1 pint of hot water around them.

6. Heat on high for 1 hour then low for 12 hours or alternatively on high for 7 hours.

7. To reheat: heat on high for 3 hours.

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In the slowcooker

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Almost done!

It's double recipe week this week as on Thursday there is the World Famous ManSSAGO Pudding Party!* Stay tuned on Thursday for the desserts and the recipe!

*May not be actually famous worldwide!

Tom Out!

Project Thor: Aftermath

In which I assess the results of Project Thor using graphs...

Weight Loss

So the weight loss wasn't as much as I expected but I did gain a fair amount of muscle. I'm pretty certain I look like I've lost some weight which is probably due to the shift of some fat to muscle :)

Weight (KG) over the course of Project Thor

Fig 1: There was no weight loss over the course of Project Thor.

Muscle Gain

I gained a few inches on all of the muscles I measured while also reducing my waist and hip measurements. Again I expected greater gains but I think there was a visible difference by the time I donned my armour :)

Muscle size (inches) over the course of project thor

Fig 2: Muscle gains (and fat losses) in inches over the course of Project Thor.

Strength

The most noticeable change during Project Thor were my strength gains at the gym:

Strength gains

Stay tuned for details of future projects (Project 0 - coming soon to a blog near you!) and any other small Tailor costumes. Here endeth Project Thor.

Tom Out!

P.S. Before mine, there was another Project Thor

Review: A Game of Thrones the Board Game

GoT board game

In which I review the Game of Thrones Board Game (2nd Ed)...Wade bought the GoT board game  so we had to play it!

*SPOILER WARNING: The game and this review contain no spoilers (unless you consider the names of houses as such), however the game description on Amazon etc. mentions details from the end of Book 1: A Game of Thrones*

Game Details

Cost: £50

Players: 3-6

Play time: >3 hours (took us around 5 the first time)

The Players

We played a 4 player game so we were the houses Baratheon (Mikey), Greyjoy (Rob), Lannister (Me) & Stark (Wade). I got to be house Lannister (by random chance) so my personal goals for the game were to have all the gold and make the Starks  bend the knee.* The other 2 players are represented by defense cards on the lower section of the board.

*Disappointingly there was absolutely no gold :(

Game Play

The game is about deceit, alliances and military might. Also wildlings occasionally appear to mess up your sh*t.

Remember in the game of thrones you either win or you die!

Set-up

Every player has a set starting location and army/navy size. It's very easy to follow. I was at Casterley Rock below the Greyjoys at Pike and to the west of the Baratheons at Dragonstone. The Starks were too far north to really bother me.

Before the game starts you work out your location on the victory track (number of strongholds/castles, 7 needed to win) and determine the location on the three other tracks:

1. Iron Throne.

2. Fiefdoms.

3. King's Court.

The top of each track gets the special item associated with it affording you a special bonus. The track order also affects whether you win combat draws and other mechanics:

1. The Iron Throne - allows you to determine the winner of all non-combat draws.

2. Valyrian Steel Blade - allows you to add +1 to any single combat in a turn (either side), win combat draws.

3. The Messenger Raven - allows you to peek at the top wilding card or change an order after deployment.

Early turns

The game has three phases:

1. Westeros phase - turn over three cards which represent events occuring throughout Westeros†.

2. Planning phase - plan your various actions and place them face down on the table.

3. Action phase - play your orders in order!

Due to a slight misunderstanding on my part I used all of my 5 starting power points on the first track betting and only got control of the Raven for it. Luckily after a few turns we were attacked by wildlings wiping out everyone else's power points and leaving me in the perfect position to seize both the Iron Throne and Raven for the next seven turns!

Game_of_Thrones_Board_Game_detail

While the rest of us captured fairly pointless territories (except Rob who kept building more ships!) Mikey slowly captured several strongholds in the south including Harrenhal.

†Warning - may cause wilding attacks!

Mid-game

By the time we got to mid-game Mikey had managed to get into a strong lead without us really noticing. I forged an unspoken alliance with Rob and started building my army to send against Mikey. Wade started to threaten Rob's fleet and land army drawing his forces north. I had some small successes against Mikey turning the tide and taking the lead along with several strongholds.

On turn 7 I was poised to strike Mikey's nearest stronghold which would win me the game. I foolishly pointed this out during the planning phase and he committed more troops to the cause. I should really learn to keep my mout shut when my 'obvious' plan could be threatened :S

Final turns

As we entered the last few turns two wildling attacks reduced my power points and then we once again bet on the tracks. I lost all of my advantages as Rob took the Iron Throne and Mikey took the Valyrian Sword (which I had for about a turn).

With a few turns left I tried to attack as many castles and strongholds as I could but couldn't get through Mikey's defense. Then I stupidly pointed out to Rob that he 'was totally going to attack me' and so he promptly did *facepalm*. Next time I'll keep my secret plans and thoughts to myself and I might actually win. Rob's late game treachery secured Mikey's victory for House Baratheon.

Also I didn't get a chance to make the Starks bend the knee - there's always next time.

Conclusion

I'd compare this game to Risk as it is the obvious corollary. This is much more tactical than Risk as your combat chances are not swayed by random chance with dice rolls. If you're cold and calculating (and keep your mouth shut) you can win the battles you expect to. There's also a lot more bluffing and forging/breaking of alliances. A lot of fun if enjoy stabbing your friends in the back.

I thoroughly enjoyed the game and would definitely recommend it. It may cost a fair bit but you get a lot of game, definitely worth setting aside a whole afternoon for!

Tom Out!

P.S. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Game-Thrones-Board-2nd-Edition/dp/1589947207

P.P.S http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/103343/a-game-of-thrones-the-board-game-second-edition