Isolation and Rationing - Cofresh Gathia Yellow (@NLi10)

Work have provided me with a mini laptop so I don't have to go in all 7 days a week and can work a few at home.  This is a relief as its probably at the point where I want to consider not using the busses.

And my home is in a very multicultural area so I can get to many different nationalities and cultures of shop - meaning that while I may not be able to pick up English brands as easily at the supermarkets, the smaller stores that probably require my support more at this time can easily keep me fed.

Long time readers will know that we have a bit of a Cofresh addiction in our house - especially the more 'crisp' based ones.  Going to the proper Indian stores and not just the corner-shop opens up a whole extra side of the brand.  Here we have one of the best parts of the mix bags - the Gathia noodle style crisps.

Not very healthy, but very very nice.

I'm not sure which western crisp comes closest, they are almost like a denser version of the french fry, or similar to the Marks & Spencer hard salt and vinegar chips. The taste is of very mild curry, no heat, just that cumin 'yellow' flavour.  They are really great and this whole bag was a pound and has lasted days.

If you don't want to face the crowds and empty shelves of the supermarkets then check out your local international food shops.  You may not get Walkers Crisps (well thats a lie - they had those too) but you should find everything you need to get by.

Stay safe everyone! 

Schloss Eggenberg Hopfen Konig (Germany) By @SpectreUK

Before I start writing about this lager beer I hope that you don't mind, but I'm just going to say a few words about the scary times we're having at the moment. I say; "we", because we're all in this together; the whole world. I know that many of our readers are from many different countries and we appreciate all of your support in these troubling times. We appreciate every single one of you. When Cinabar told me that she had created a bog with a friend from work all those years ago I remember saying that no-one would ever read it. I was clearly wrong. We have a community of over 3000 readers a day. We always have appreciated you over the last ten or so years since this blog was created and we always will. It can be difficult to admit, but we are all scared. We are scared of catching this terrible bug and equally scared of passing it on to someone else that may lose their lives to it, or pass it on to someone else that does. We are all strong. No matter who you are or where you are from.

We will carry on with daily posts as best we can. Even if we end up writing about a tin of beans - we will carry on… So during this troubling period I'm likely to be switching to blogging about beer a bit more. Much to my chagrin I'm handing over many of the items I have for my own greedy self in the Foodstufffinds's storage cupboard to Cinabar. She can write about those, just as long as I get a nibble… er… on the snacks or whatever, and I will switch over to my beer supply in my cavernous beer fridge. I have plenty to write about in there just as long as I don't get ill in the meantime.

They were keeping my gym open with social distancing guidelines, but they have closed that now. After a lot of consideration I have worked out an exercise regime that I can do in the house. I have free weights I can do upper and lower body exercise three times a week. I have learnt a few yoga moves I can do three times a week, and I have my crazy abdominal burnout sessions that I can do for an hour or so every day. YouTube is very good at showing you all manners of exercises if you want to keep fit indoors. I'll miss the bike and swimming, sauna and steam room at the gym until it reopens, but can jog for several minutes now, so will do that around the estate unless they stop us going out and I'll have to jog around in circle in the back garden.

Anyway, after all that babbling on I'm pretty thirsty… I was brought back this beer and a few others from Germany a few months ago before this scary virus closed all the borders. Google reliably informs me that Eggenberg Castle is a castle located in Vorchdorf, in Northern Austria. The castle is famous for its brewery. The label is almost completely in German or Austrian, depending on how you look at it, so you may have to bare with me…

At 5.1% in volume, Schloss Eggenberg Hopfen Konig is a lager beer, so I'm hoping it's not too bubbly otherwise I'll be burping all night from it. It has an ingenious pull open bottle top that puts my bottle opener out of business for tonight. Made with barley malt there is more of a slight hint of pils to the hoppy smell underneath the sweet malts in the aroma. On pouring this lager beer, there was quite a fizz and the bitter hops hit my tastebuds first, which were then smoothed out by the sweet barley malts. This is a very flavoursome bubbly lager beer and should go well with my fried chicken dinner, which I've just been called for…. So, cheers to all of you and please take care where ever you are in the world over the next few weeks and months.

Choco Matcha Sweets (Japan) By @Cinabar

Today is an exciting day in the gaming world as it is the release of Animal Crossing New Horizons on the Nintendo Switch. As I eagerly await the delivery of my game from Amazon Prime, a delivery I’m more excited about than the overpriced toilet roll which was also on the order, my thoughts turned to Japanese snacks. I have spent many hours of my life playing the original Animal Crossing, and what better way than to celebrate Japanese culture than trying out these Choco Matcha Sweets which a friend brought back from Japan (from a time when it was safer to travel) while I wait.
So the packaging is almost entirely in Japanese, but I know the sweets inside are flavoured with matcha tea, I’m still not that sure what to expect. The cute packaging doesn’t offer many clues for those of us not familiar with the language, my best guess was for some kind of chewy sweets.

Inside the bag were individually wrapped chocolates! They are green in colour because of the matcha tea but were a flavoured white chocolate with a filling that was jelly like but firm and chewy. The flavour was really good, these are creamy sweet chocolates with a nice hint of matcha tea, this is mild so still sweet. I loved the mix of textures, the white chocolate cracks and the jelly centre comes in to its own before melting away. I found these Choco Matcha Sweets rather moreish and they got me through some work teleconferences rather well. I think when the world gets back to rights I would definitely ask for some more of these, they are lovely but very different to anything we have over here.

One last Pre-isolation Nandos - Mozam Style (@NLi10) @NandosUK

I tend to have a few reviews in the tank - mainly because there is a time lag on what I buy and when I eat it - so here we have a restaurant review while the UK is on lock-down.  I suspect it'll be delivery food for a few weeks for us!

We had Nando's points to redeem so pre cinema (those are shut too!) we popped along to our local (clean - big enough for social distancing) and had a look at what we could get.

They had a new wrap on the menu - and as it's a charity one it seemed like a good plan.

Fruity AND spicy? Sounds like the amazing fruit curries I've had.  I'm in!  It's oddly similar to a black-bean sauce, but with the kick in a different place (if that makes sense).

Because of the reward points I got to have two sides - garlic bread and fries - but they were not that interesting.  Should always go for the spicyrice!

The Mozam wrap itself was amazing.  I almost ordered a second.  The sweet and fruity side with the strong garlic and spicy chicken was really something I was a fan of.  I went for my typical medium, but this extra sauce tamed it a little so I think I'd risk a hot (which I often do, but Medium is better for a date I think!).  I want to have this again - but at the moment I don't think that's going to happen.

I hope that the virus doesn't wipe out our spread of fast food places.  As ubiquitous as Nando's (and their queue) can be they do actually try a lot harder than some chains would and continue to innovate their menu.  I suspect though it will be the smaller, less recognisable places that go first, so I guess I'll have to make a special effort to order food (or collect after work).

As a side note - I actually work in a Hospital Labs doing the numbers side of things as my real person job.  This week has been a bit more chaotic and stressful than I'd have liked, and really - it's just going to get harder.  Do try to keep an eye on relatives and friends - both those who are more at risk healthwise, and those who suddenly find themselves working longer weeks (instead of eating carbonaras in Rome). Its going to take a lot of time and energy to get back to what we had before all this, and funny little distractions like spicy chicken are a big help!

Twix Salted Caramel Fingers (Poundland) By @SpectreUK

I don't know whether chocolate snacks flavoured with salted caramel went out of fashion for a while, or if Twix have just caught up? Being a snack food blogger I suppose I probably should know, but I'm pretty lazy and I don't keep on track with everything… I seem to spend much of my days exercising, revising for recertification for my profession at the end of this month, whilst trying to avoid political conversations in the sauna or catching the new terrible bug!

Anyway, Twix Salted Caramel Fingers… I do eat a lot of Twixs. I'm not sure on the plural of Twix. In truth I've not really thought about that either. There are generally two Twix fingers in a packet, and that's not referred to as Twixs, but there you go! Anyway, at just less than 100 calories the odd one or two from a multipack of nine packets of Twix(s) goes down rather well for an afternoon pick-me-up or a low calorie after dinner treat with a white hot chocolate. These Twix Salted Caramel Fingers are slightly more than 100 calories, but I think I can cope with the very slight increase.

On opening the multipack of these Twix Salted Caramel Fingers I found that there are only one Twix finger per pack, rather than the original double ones I'm used to. I noticed through comparison that these salted caramel fingers are slightly longer, but still it doesn't explain how there can be far more calories in a slightly longer single finger than two original slightly shorter ones from a multipack.

On peeling back the wrapper I found that this salted caramel finger looks pretty much the same as the regular flavour. In fact exactly the same, as it is covered in milk chocolate, with the biscuity bit at the bottom and the caramel part at the top. However, on biting into the finger I noticed it was a little more crunchy than usual. The caramel seemed the same but I quickly noticed that there were flecks of salt mixed in with the caramel rather than the salted caramel I've tasted in other bars. These flecks had their own crunch and a few found themselves between my old teeth. I wasn't so keen on this, however Cinabar and her Mom liked these Twix Salted Caramel Fingers. I have to say I rather prefer the original Twix flavour to these flecks of salt, so I reckon I'll stick to what I know!

Information on the packet;
9 x Twix Salted Caramel Fingers at 23g per packet weighs in at 207g, with 113 calories per packet, 5.4g of fat, 11g of sugar, and 0.19g of salt. Please see photograph for the ingredients.