The Garden Fence - help and support in tough times

fuddle

Are you thinking with your appetite again Monna dear?

monnagran

Do I ever think with anything else, sweetness?

westcoastscot

Floss my neighbour has two cats and a rabbit, all living together in the house. They get on fine - although the rabbit is bigger than the cats!

Softstuff

It might just have been a spare bit that was cut off and fell in a gap Ivyleaf.... in any case, if nothing else drops off, it'll probably be ok

I did a very un-mse thing yesterday. After more than 3 months of phone calls, trips to the repairers and multiple problems, we got the microwave back yesterday. And we drove it straight from the repairers to the pawn shop and sold it I was so sick of dealing with the bloody thing I didn't want it in the house. And after more than 3 months without, can go a bit longer still. I'll never buy another breville appliance. I can't remember if I mentioned, but last week my breville stick blender died in a puff of smoke too, out of warranty.

I'm having one of those "everything breaks" times. Odd they don't coincide with "pot of gold" time :rotfl:

monnagran

Softstuff: when our all-singing, all-dancing microwave expired just out of warranty I very crossly went to T*sc**s and bought the cheapest one I could find. It was brilliant and is still going 6 years on.

Er............ This pot of gold time...............I seem to have blinked and missed it. Could you give me the heads up when it is due again please? I would hate to blink at the wrong time again.

nursemaggie

Try a Braun stick blender I have had mine over 20 years. I think it may be called more than a stick blender model "vario" does a bit more than a stick blender. It has a whisk and I think it will grind coffee too. It more or less does most of what a food processor does.

I could manage without a microwave for a while in fact I have but DS could not go 24 hours he does everything in the microwave.

My microwave was less than £20 a Tricity have had that about 8 years. What ever you do just buy a cheap one they do less, that you won't use, Its the fancy stuff that goes wrong.

nursemaggie

Monna she means they always go when you have no money. They just spent it all on the house.

monnagran

Nursemaggie: you are so right about the fancy stuff causing things to go wrong. I will spend my life looking for a washing machine with 2 programmes. Warm and Hot.
My first automatic was an English Electric, built like a tank and went for 16 years without ever letting me down.

Eventually it needed a new part but EE had gone out of business and the firm that had taken it over had a fire in the warehouse which destroyed all the EE spare parts.
A bit suspicious if you ask me.

I still think fondly of that old warhorse and its two programmes.

Softstuff

Monnagran, if I see the pot of gold, I'll let you know.

I'm debating if a microwave is an essential appliance or a silly gadget in our house, 3 months without and I've been fine. The stick blender however is essential. Funny enough it was a braun I was looking at Nursemaggie. I'm amazed how few things I need in a kitchen, compared to how many things I end up with.

It'd be nice if there was more simple stuff made. I'd have liked the microwave to be "heat" and "stop", nothing else. Same with the washing machine, I use 3 settings, 40 degree daily wash, 30 degree daily wash and cottons at 40. That's less than 10 percent of the available options. Some buttons I have no idea what they do. Maybe nobody does and they don't do anything.

moneyistooshorttomention

I've managed fine without a microwave for donkeys years now Softstuff. I had one many years back now and it basically got used for heating up milk, cooking the occasional ready meal (I didn't eat as healthily then as now:o) and defrosting things. That was about it - and it had been a pretty dear one.

Then I read a bit more about them and started worrying it might "leak" in my direction and am inclined to wonder just what they do to food/drink done in them (feeling pretty sure they must be destroying some of the nutrients in the food and going on from there to more esoteric - what about the Life Force in the food?) and I binned it.

It was so long ago that I read the info. about "leakages" and nutrient destruction that I can't recall the detail of it now I'm afraid.

Then there is the matter that my last kitchen was small (so finding space for it was a problem). Current kitchen is bigger, but still badly-planned at present (as I've not yet been able to afford to replace the kitchen the house came with).

I think the only time I ever think it might be handy is if a recipe author blithely says "Do x in the microwave" and it's not possible. However, as the cookbooks I buy these days are only healthy ones that very rarely happens.

On different tack - to any vegans reading = one of the new range of cookbooks coming out is "The Homemade Vegan Pantry" by Miyoko Schinner. My copy just turned up from Amazon yesterday and I've been reading through it and it contains details of making all sorts of vegan basics - including "cheese" that she says is tasty and even non-vegans like it. One of the reasons I've felt I couldnt go vegan is all those horrible "substitute foods" that are there in the vegan food ranges:p. I've tried a few and basically found them revolting. But the recipes she gives to make all these things from scratch look much "more the ticket" and most of the recipes are very easy.

PS; Any pots of gold going and put my name on the list for one please - my current house swallowed up large chunks of money on renovation work and still needs further large chunks....