London - British Museum and 'The Heretic' by Richard Bean

Although I have been in the British Museum on several occasions, they diligently rearrange their exhibitions, so it is always a joy to discover items new on display and re-discover old friends.
Therefore, to not bother you with too much archaeology, just a couple of photos from this year's most delectable objects on display.

First some old friends which might be new to you. First the Franks Casket:

It has nothing to do with the Germanic tribe of the Franks but rather got its name from Sir Augustus Wollaston Franks, an English antiquarian who from a mere assistent in the British Museum soon became responsible for acquiring for the British Museum. Since the Eton student was not very poor himself he donated a lot of objects to the British Museum. One of them is the whale bone casket from Northumbria. On its left hand side, which you can see here, a scene from the discovering of Romulus and Remus is depicted, which stands as a symbol for the Roman Catholic church since the twin brothers were founders of the city of Rome.

The next old friend is a detail from the Sutton Hoo helmet.

The Sutton Hoo helmet comes from the early 7th century ship burial in Sutton Hoo, Suffolk. Now if you think 'I knew it, the Vikings did have horned helmets' I must dissappoint you. Sutton Hoo, although being a ship burial is Anglo-Saxon and definitely 150 to 200 years prior to the first Vikings in Britain (which is officially 793, starting with the raid on Lindisfarne).

A third well known object is the Ringlemere cup, a gold cup found on Ringlemere farm in Kent. In comparison with the other five existing cups in Europe we can assume a date of 1700 to 1500 BC whereas the burial in the barrow itself is dated to approximately to 2300 BC suggesting that the cup was either a later votive offering or from a burial which was made into the old barrow which was pretty much ploughed down.

Of course I can't miss the opportunity to show you this rock carving. It's from the Val Fontalba, France and just shows how consistent in their topics rock art of the alpine arc is. A couple looking at it couldn't see the depicted cattle without a bit of help, can you?

How different in style is in contrast the depiction of a long-horned cattle from Sudan. The rock boulder was rescued from inundation due to the new dam at the fourth Nile cataract by the Meroe Dam Salvage Project.

The most impressive object however was the antler mask from Star Carr. Star Carr is an early Mesolithic site in North Yorkshire. The site was located at the former lake Flixton and the peat building preserved a lot of bone and organic artefacts. The lake was used for extensive deposits which is not uncommon in prehistory (nor is it in recent times, just think of the coins that are thrown into wells and fountains). Among these deposits was the famous antlermask from Star Carr.

We believe that it belonged to a kind of shaman and was worn similar to the head gear of this Siberian shaman, well that is if you turn the antler mask upside down *hehe* even museum curators are not perfect.

This statue was called 'Pan riding a panther' although I can't see him ride this little panther. It is from the 2nd century and was made in Thapsus, Tunisia (modern Ras Dimas). You may know the place from the Battle of Thapsus where Cato and Scipio fought against Cesar.

And to add a further Roman statue I give you the marble statue from the great court of the British Museum, a first century statue from Rome itself, the youth on horseback (which actually makes sense this time, but riding a horse is disproportionally easier than riding a panther)



Since you get very hungry from watching all these objects I went to Mildreds, a small vegetarian restaurant near Piccadilly Circus. I had borlotti bean and sunblushed tomato sausages served with pumpkin and sweet potato mash, broccoli and apple cider jus together with a apple-beet-and-ginger juice. It was awesome which you can't see because I've got only one of my infamous mobile pics:

I finished the day with 'The Heretic', a play at the Royal Court Theatre. The woman next to me didn't like the play at all, but I think it had a very important message that will stay topical for some time. It might even be promising in becoming a classic despite the fact that the second half of the play was a bit weird and chaotic.

The play is about a climate researcher who published an obviously not politically correct article about the Maldives where she couldn't find a sea level rising. Ill-reputed as a climate-change-denier she gets bullied and eventually suspended because she refuses to follow her superior and ex-lover's university's policies.

'I'm a scientist. I don't believe in anything' is her motto and she stays with it unwavering. In the end she discovers together with him that a collegue at a different university abused statistics to produce the desired results.

Most reviews think it's a play about climate change but actually it isn't or rather climate change was just used as one example to show the inability of whole nations to rationalise. Instead people find it much easier and socially rewarding to 'believe'. Therefore we can find this in politics, religion, prejudices, racism, and and and. The list can go on. Instead of looking at the facts and making up our minds ourselves, we just 'believe' anybody. It's easy, doesn't need a lot of courage or backbone. The play ended hopeful and jovial, whether it will end this way with the rising number of fundamentalistic believers is doubtful. In my opinion a deep play. Deeper than most critics look into, but then, most of them are believers anyway.



The Heretic (Royal Court Theatre): the discovery



A culinary tour around the world - seventh and last stop: Nigeria

A German saying describes mixed feelings as 'one eye smiling and one eye crying'. That's exactly how Joan's culinary tour around the world is going to end. One eye is crying because I tremendously enjoyed wandering around in different cultures and trying out different spices, ways of preparation and so on. The other eye is smiling since, as Joan put it so appropriately

"...my tastebuds are longing to return to my more familiar FOODalogue fare."

Especially M will be glad that he will be having a bit more tradtional food again. He was hit hardest, or at least he believes he had to suffer most. He isn't very fond of Asian food nor does he like vey spicy dishes. But I did enjoy it from the first to the last second.

But for now let us turn to our last stop on this tour: Nigeria. I have never been to sub-saharan Africa and so it was difficult to imagine how traditional food would be in these countries. Do African people have easily access to a variety of dishes? Do they have fast food? I read that Nigeria is so productive that they export a large amount of vegetables, fruits and processed food to other countries. So this is probably not a really adequate picture of Nigerian food production.

http://naijaman.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/pounding-yam.jpg

Although the Portuguese arrived in Nigeria in the 15th century there seems to be not too much influence on the traditonal cuisine. So the internet became a huge asset again. Bypassing ox heart, tripe, and goat's heads I decided on something not too time consuming, since I just returned from England and are already packing suitcases again to attend a conference in Halle, Germany.

In the end I decided on bean patties with peanut sauce, accompanied by a cauliflower salad with Nigerian curry sauce.

The bean patties (recipe from http://www.theofel.de/plog-archives/2010/06/bohnenbaellchen-mit-chilisauce-rezept-aus-nigeria.html)  were very tasty, I would use more chili next time though. Although I have never been very fond of peanuts, this sauce was really lovely (even if it looked a bit like puke; Richard Hammond from Bitish 'Top Gear' calls something like this 'refried sick' but he would certainly love to eat it, since he doesn't like goat's head either).

It is from Chefkoch.de (http://www.chefkoch.de/rezepte/658951167725747/Erdnuss-Suppe-aus-Nigeria.html). Here is a translation with my adaptions to make it a proper and vegan sauce (the original recipe was meant to be a soup):

Peanut Sauce

1tablespoon olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
2 tomatoes, choppped
1 tablespoon flour
1 cup vegetable stock
1 cup unsalted peanuts (husked), finely chopped (the finer you chop, the less it looks like p*** )
1 cup almond milk or unsweetened soy milk
salt and pepper

Heat oil in a pot, fry onions until translucent, add tomatoes and stir until coverd in oil. Add flour and stir for a roux. Pour stock and bring to boil while stirring until mixture start to thiken. Add peanuts and let simmer for about 10-15 minutes. Add almond or soy milk. Heat up the sauce but don't let it cook anymore. Especially soy milk will curdle if cooked.

This was my favourite: a very spicy currysauce that harmonised beautifully with the blanched cauliflower (http://www.kochmeister.com/r/31111-currysauce-aus-nigeria.html).

Nigerian Currysauce

1 small onion

1 garlic clove

1 tablespoon vegan Worcestershire sauce

1 cup vegan mayonnaise

2 tablespoons curry powder

1 tablespoon hot pepper sauce (adjust to taste; you can use more, the original added 3 tbs)

salt and pepper to taste

Chop the onion finely, add pressed garlic clove, mix wll with the rest of the ingredients. Drizzle over blanched cauliflower.

It was a splendid virtual tour. Thank you so much Joan for taking us on this trip. But we should never forget

Dream-dinners aren't any good; and we can't share them (from Tolkien's 'The Hobbit')

the most important thing about cooking delicious food is sharing it with others. So, friends, cook good food from your comfort zone or from any country you fancy. Just remember, sharing it is the most important thing about it.

London - Little Japan and the Phantom of the Opera

Originally I wanted to go to the Natural History Museum but I didn't expect the incredible queue in front of it. It is half term school holidays in England and obviously everybody took their kids to the Museum. I was told it would take up to 60 minutes to get in and so I decided to do some sightseeing and shopping instead and postponed the museum trip  for the time being.

It was a beautiful day and so I walked towards the Thames and Buckingham Palace (with the London Eye in the background). And this is the so-called cenotaph, a WW I memorial:

After enjoying St. James Park, I returned to Piccadilly Circus

39 Steps is still running...I watched it a couple of years ago with P and C. We enjoyed it a lot.

I also wanted to visit the Japan Centre which moved from Piccadilly Street to Regent Street, just around the corner. My favourite place to have a look for japanese books and magazines. There is now a Mitsukoshi (a Japanese department store) on top of it.




Amatou from Wagashi Maniac also told me about Minamoto Kitchoan, a wagashi shop in London. So it was on my must-see list :)

Wagashi are Japanese sweets or 'sunkissed goodness' as they are called on Minamoto's website, and are traditionally served with green tea. Made from natural ingrediences and with a much lower calorie intake you can indulge without guilt :)

Here some photos of some of their wagashi; first a seasonal one, Sakuranbo, Japanese cherries in a jelly, unfortunately it is jelly made from gelatine, so I couldn't buy those. But they do look pretty.

Of course I couldn't resist and bought a selection :) but you will have to wait till I'm back home to see photos of the wagashi I bought. If you meanwhile want to try your hands on them and make them yourself, you should visit Wagashi Maniac's webpage with loads of recipes and instructions.

For the evening I got tickets for the Phantom of the Opera.

I've loved this musical for long, but never had the oportunity to see it on stage. Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber's music was great, but I already knew this since I have an excellent recording at home. Maybe that was the reason I was a tiny bit disappointed. The character of Christine was brilliant, with very nice voice, but the male leading actors were not really that good or just not at their best on this evening.

The special effects were ridiculous, maybe they should go and watch a performance at the Royal National Theatre to know what can be done on a stage. When the phantom threatened the lovers he threw flashes of light towards them .... they looked like duds of a firework, just some pityful yellow blobs that fell down right where the phantom stood. As Raoul I would have laughed my a... off.



http://www.thephantomoftheopera.com/video_images/





London - Petrie Museum and a Tower twilight tour

The Petrie Museum was a must on my list, after all, I spent so much time in it when I was studying at the UCL. Back then I didn't have a digital camera to take photos in the badly illuminated Petrie Museum. So I hoped I could get my hands on some pieces I really liked back then, like the magic wands. Of course the exhibition had changed since then and the magic wands were not on display. No reason to despair, since it was filled with beautiful artefacts from all time periods to compensate for. Here are some objects I thought to be very interesting.

Since I especially like the Amarna period, here a limestone piece from the central palace in Tell el-Amarna showing Akhenaton, Nefertiti and one of their daughters:

This painted wooden stela is exceptionally well preserved. It belonged to Neskhons, the wife of the high priest Pinedjem II (21. Dynasty). Note the high tech in the Petrie Museum, if you have a reader for this bar code you can get all the information on your blackberry or i-phone or whatever.

This figurine appears very modern but this red pottery figurine with tattoo from Qua cemetery 100, is dated to 5020-2835 BC:

Naqada I pottery is always enjoyble because of their beautiful motifs especially the boat scenes:

But also late Period faience hedgehogs do have their charm as you can see with this globular perfume bottle (aryballos):

Although there were no magic wands, they at least had a lot of other ivory objects on display like this jackal headed clappr from Diospolis (6th or 7th Dynasty):

A most fascinating object was this serpent tripod (Naqada II) from a predynastic tomb:



It was also a highlight to see a fragment of the pyramid texts of Pepy I from his pyramid in Saqara (6th Dynasty). You can see the name of Pepy in the cartouches; his name appears quite often:

This bead-net dress made of faience beads is one of the finest objects in the Petrie Museum. Whether it was actually made for a dancing girl or not, it is at least the earliest surviving example of a bead-net dress at all. It is from the 5th Dynasty and was found in Qau.

I had a quick linner (too late for lunch, too early for dinner) at the Carnevale, a vegetarian restaurant with mediterranean cuisine. Their tomato-fennel soup was delicious and I will try to re-create it at home. The potato cakes with vegetables provencales weren't bad either.

Thus invigorated, I was ready for a twilight Tower tour. A Yeoman Warder, a beefeater, guided us through the nightly Tower of London.

Of course he told us all about murder, treason, and torture at the Tower. However, he refused to tell us about the ghosts of the tower, since he personally hasn't seen a single ghost although he has been living on the Tower premises for quite some time. But then, Arbella Stuarts ghost (Arabella was murdered at the Tower in 1615) seems to concentrate on haunting women anyway.

After we made it safely through the Tower and without encountering a ghost I went to the tube station to get back to my B&B. So here a last photo from the art at Tower Hill station, the Tower ravens:

London - Hunterian Museum and Roald Dahl's Twisted Tales in the Lyric

Although I spent quite a lot of time in London, I've never been to the Hunterian Museum before.

I should have gone there, it was an astonishingly interesting museum and overall a very positive experience. William and John Hunter were both Scottish medical men, one (William) an anatomist and obstetritian and the other (John) a surgeon and a scientist. Not only did John Hunter collect rare animal species and dissected them, he was also keen to collect pathological samples which he also prepared for his scientific studies. For this, he had a copper pot in an underground house where he cooked animals an men alike if he wanted their bones or whole skeletons. It was here where he cooked the body of Charles Byrne, the Irish Giant.

Knowing that in the 18th century bodies were sold to surgeons, Byrne, the nearly 8 foot tall young man paid a lot in his life for a funeral on sea but Hunter obviously outbid the undertaker and obtained the body of the 'giant' since you can see his impressive skeleton on display in the museum:

http://static.panoramio.com/photos/original/5577277.jpg

The Hunter brothers collected everything from Tasmanian Tigers to Dodo Skeletons



from H.E. Strickland, The Dodo and its Kindred, 1848

 from American mastodon fossils to fossilized shark teeth of the Megalodon shark, who was 60 feet in length

flmnh.ufl.edu

from gall and bladder stones to skulls with Paget's disease or syphillitic skulls


http://blogs.discovery.com/.a/6a00d8341bf67c53ef0134887c7e00970c-300wi

You can also see Newton's death mask, the so-called Hey's saw for trephanations of skulls



http://www.antiquescientifica.com/saw_Heys_Still_small.jpg

but one of the most impressive objects were the Evelyn tables, the oldest European anatomical preparations from 17th century Padua. Here the artery system:


http://surgicat.rcseng.ac.uk/(znw1vaajy5awtrr3x4axxo45)/detail.aspx?parentpriref

After all these grim stories about death and body snatching an evening with 'Twisted Tales' from Roald Dahl seemed a fitting end for this day. The Lyric theatre in Hammersmith adapted some tales (mostly known from a tv series called 'Tales of the Unexpected') for the stage and it was a very enjoyable performance even though a bit short. You would have wished for an additional story or some of them a bit more detailed. In this scene here, a young American bet his little finger against a cadillac.



http://www.lyric.co.uk/images/productions/main/Main-page-3.jpg



A culinary tour around the world - sixth stop: Egypt

Sadly I missed last week's stop Thailand. What a great opportunity for veggie curries I missed :( ....

But well, life goes on and after fighting a really bad cold and a pyelitis I'm nearly fit to go anywhere. Well, nearly.

But let us have a look where Joan from foodalogue is taking us this week for our culinary tour around the world:

Can you guess? Right, it's Egypt!

I was twice in Cairo, and although this might not be reflecting any knowledge about the rest of the country, I at least did eat some original Egyptian food in my life. Strangely not a lot kept in my memory. We still remember Umm Ali, a sweet and heavy desert which the boys devoured in great quantities. But I'm still working on my own veganised version, so this takes a little bit more time.

I know that I loved Karkadeh a lovely hibiscus tea which you can drink hot or cold. And I of course remember ful nabed, the Egyptian fava bean stew. I couldn't get either hibiscus or fava beans, and I still wasn't well enough to drive to the next greater town to look for the ingredients, so I decided on something simple. A soup, since soups seem to help in all matters of bad health.

I decided on a cauliflower soup with cumin and fennel from EgyptianFood.org.

North African Cauliflower Soup with Cumin, Chives and Fennel (source: EgyptianFood.org)


 

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups chopped onions

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

2 cups diced potatoes

5 cups chopped cauliflower

2 teaspoons ground cumin

1 1/2 teaspoons ground fennel

4 cups hot water

2 vegetable bouillon cube

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

salt & freshly ground black pepper

chopped tomatoes and chives



Directions

In a large Dutch oven or saucepan, saute onions in vegetable oil for 5 to 10 minutes, or until translucent.

Add the potatoes, cumin, and fennel; cook for 1 minute.

Add the hot water; cover, turn up the heat and bring to a boil.

Add the cauliflower and bouillon cubes and return to a boil.

Lower the heat and simmer, covered, for 10 minutes or until the vetetables are tender.

In a blender, puree and vegetable/broth mixture until smooth.

Add lemon juice, salt, and pepper to taste.

Reheat the soup, being careful not to scorch it.

Serve warm; garnish with chopped tomatoes and chives.


It was a good soup, but to say it reflects the spirits of Egypt is going too far. So in the end I was a bit dissappointed. For a little bit of comfort, here some photos of Cairo I took two years ago (obviously with an awful camera):



Overview over Cairo



Homes for the poor along the Nile (I can only hope that this will now change for the better)




Pyramid of Khufu, but have a look at the sign for the perfumery 'Ramses'

on the right-hand side, it is written in Russian!

 





A new fashion trend seems to be emerging: the beard-hat!

You can't ignore it anymore, if you want to be fashionable, you have to wear a beard-hat this season.

It is suitable for all ages:

It doesn't bow to sexism, not even speciesm:

you can wear it irrespective of your nature:

It will be a hip trend in sports, I can already see other kinds of sports enter the movement

even the toughest Viking must yield to this temptation

When will you have your beard-hat? Don't wait too long, it could be scratchy in warmer weather.

PS. Photos from various sources from the Internet.

You are what you eat

What do these things have in common?

http://www.abirdinthekitchen.com/home/2010/12/21/the-meat-you-eat-whats-the-right-decision-for-you.html

Euthanized cats and dogs, road kill, Styrofoam, chicken manure, animal hooves, and feathers.

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists1, all of these things are legally allowed in conventional livestock feed.

Photo and text from: http://www.abirdinthekitchen.com/