At school we had a little room sandwiched by the corridor to the side entrance and the downstairs toilets (very nice).
In the room was a counter, a sink, and, most importantly, an enormous bread bin and toaster.
Of a weekend, 50 adolescent boys with appetites the size of Texas would descend on this source of vital food. Vital as you couldn't be expected to last a whole weekend without several in-between meal snacks.
To be fair, the room was heavily patronised during the week also. However the key difference at weekends was that nobody cleaned the room from mid-Friday to Monday morning.
By the end of Sunday, all the available surfaces were a riot of breadcrumbs, spilt tea, blobs of condiment and, frequently, completely unidentifiable substances. The edges of the counters were of course the #1 convenient place to remove margarine, peanut butter and other leftovers from your knife.
Why not use the sink, I hear you ask? Because that was invariably filled with what can best be described as brown slurry. Also, I don't even want to start discussing the state of the dish towels.
There really is no point to this little story except to suggest that hygiene and a shared sense of responsibility for the state of the kitchen does not come naturally to males. This should come as no surprise to any woman who has had a male flatmate (husbands are different as they can be bullied into being a bit cleaner).
On a passing note, the fiance of my flatmate came to visit us once and commented that my bath towel did not appear to have been washed since her last visit a month previously. I posited my "towel theory" that, as I was clean when I used the towel, it would not become dirty and thus didn't need washing.
Logic is a wonderful thing
Showing posts with label Toast. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Toast. Show all posts
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
The importance of being toasty
I have decided that toast is incredibly important.
You can have it dry white (a la Blues Brothers). You can have it just with butter deliciously spread and melted to the four corners of the toast. You can have it with an endless number of toppings, including what has to be the absolute pinnacle of British Cooking, chips! Whoever invented the Chip Buttie was having a very very good day indeed.
Toast is good for chicken sandwiches, hotdogs, steak and you can even eat toast raw (errr, that would seem to be bread).
Toast is fantastic and a man's best friend is obviously his toaster. One wouldn't want a talking toaster like Talkie Toaster from Red Dwarf. There are limits as to how into toast you can be before it becomes unhealthy. But a good toaster is a joy to all and deserves pride of place in anyone's kitchen. Someone I know doesn't really like toast. How do I know? Simple! He keeps his toaster hidden in a cupboard. When you want to use it, you have to take it out of the cupboard, plug it in, use it, clean all the crumbs up and then unplug it and put it back in the cupboard of shame. It almost takes all the fun out of eating toast. And what if there was a toast emergency? Having the toaster in the cupboard could very well endanger somebody's life.
No discussion of toast would be complete without a mention of peanut butter. Just as many people have firm views on which is the tastiest fast food burger, individuals often have a deeply held belief on the issue of crunchy vs smooth peanut butter. Is there a supreme being? Who cares! Which idiot flatmate bought the smooth peanut butter ? An issue worth spending a lifetime on. Peanut butter is the universal food. It goes with everything. Well, maybe not mint sauce or, come to think of it, chewing gum. But apart from that, oh, and brussel sprouts, it's all good.
Coming soon.... an in-depth examination of why crunchy peanut butter was called "whanger" at school. (As in "Which of you pikey b'stards has had the last of the whanger? There's nothing to put on my toast now except brussel sprouts!"
You can have it dry white (a la Blues Brothers). You can have it just with butter deliciously spread and melted to the four corners of the toast. You can have it with an endless number of toppings, including what has to be the absolute pinnacle of British Cooking, chips! Whoever invented the Chip Buttie was having a very very good day indeed.
Toast is good for chicken sandwiches, hotdogs, steak and you can even eat toast raw (errr, that would seem to be bread).
Toast is fantastic and a man's best friend is obviously his toaster. One wouldn't want a talking toaster like Talkie Toaster from Red Dwarf. There are limits as to how into toast you can be before it becomes unhealthy. But a good toaster is a joy to all and deserves pride of place in anyone's kitchen. Someone I know doesn't really like toast. How do I know? Simple! He keeps his toaster hidden in a cupboard. When you want to use it, you have to take it out of the cupboard, plug it in, use it, clean all the crumbs up and then unplug it and put it back in the cupboard of shame. It almost takes all the fun out of eating toast. And what if there was a toast emergency? Having the toaster in the cupboard could very well endanger somebody's life.
No discussion of toast would be complete without a mention of peanut butter. Just as many people have firm views on which is the tastiest fast food burger, individuals often have a deeply held belief on the issue of crunchy vs smooth peanut butter. Is there a supreme being? Who cares! Which idiot flatmate bought the smooth peanut butter ? An issue worth spending a lifetime on. Peanut butter is the universal food. It goes with everything. Well, maybe not mint sauce or, come to think of it, chewing gum. But apart from that, oh, and brussel sprouts, it's all good.
Coming soon.... an in-depth examination of why crunchy peanut butter was called "whanger" at school. (As in "Which of you pikey b'stards has had the last of the whanger? There's nothing to put on my toast now except brussel sprouts!"
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