Christmas

My countdown to Christmas started on 7th October this year, yes really. I'm obsessed with Christmas and due to various reasons, including the house renovation and move, my family and I have not had a proper Christmas in a couple of years. 

This year, however, we have decided that Christmas is returning with a BANG to the P household.  I've already dug the tree and decorations out of storage, given them a dust down and they are now ready to go up on 1st December.  My Christmas hit list has already been done, I know who I need to buy presents for and have a rough idea what to buy them.  The only people that I'm stuck on is my parents.  After over 30 years of having them as my parents its getting increasingly hard to find the right gift for them.

The Columbo box set I bought Dad a couple of years ago still has the cellopane wrap on it - Dad has said that he is keeping it 'fresh' for is retirement in a few years.  Ditto the perfume that I got Mum, who keeps everything in its packaging just because as with toddlers; its the packaging that Mum gets the most excited about! Perhaps the trick is just to buy another pair of socks for Dad and just wrap an empty box beautifully for Mum. 

Hmm let the search for socks and wrapping paper begin!

Its been a while

So, its been a while since I've had a chance to return to this blog, a lot has happened since my last post including a house renovation, a move and a family wedding.  Life is now slowly getting back to normal and it occured to me that after neglecting my own needs and wants for so long, its now time to concentrate on me!

This blog was intially set up to allow me to rant at the inability to find good restaurants who supply good sustaintable and organic food.  Luckily for me, the last couple of years has seen the introduction of more socially responsible restaurants and the search has gotten a whole lot easier!  I have therefore altered the direction of this blog somewhat and will now use it to basically rant and rave about things that take my fancy.

Hopefully, life won't run away from me again :)

Hx

Ethical Restaurants

Hey, just a quick one, I found this website on a search to find out whether ASK! restaurants serves happy meat, I really fancy chicken today ;)

http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/FreeBuyersGuides/fooddrink/restaurants.aspx

Ultimate Burger

On a shopping trip with 'C' I got the munchies big time, dragged C to the closest restaurant which happened to be Ultimate Burger. As I'd never been to this restaurant before, I thought that serving the ultimate burger would mean that they would use organic or free range chicken - unfortunately, no organic chicken...the lady who served me looked at me like I was off my rocker when I asked about the chicken! Still, the veggie burger was one of the best I've ever tasted and the blue cheese dip was yummy too.

McD's

So, the family decide that as the builders are busy wreaking madness on the kitchen we'd get McD's for dinner, OK, I thought there was no point in trying to get the Chicken Legend meal that I'd taken a fancy to, I would have to just get the veggie option. Which if you don't know, means you either have a Vegetarian Burger or you have a Veggie Deli Meal - there was no way I was leaving McD's without a burger of some kind!

I thought about having the Filet-o-Fish, I'd never had it before but, before I could try it I needed to find out whether McD's got its fish from a sustainable source. So my brother and I drive to McD's and ask the nice lady where McD's get their fish from, the nice lady picks up the phone speaks to someone, and then opens the door to the drive thru hatch and screams "oye, where do we get our fish from?"

At this point my brother is trying to make himself invisble - you would have thought at the age of 22 years he would have worked out by now that this is a frustrating and impossible feat! Anyway, a few minutes later nice lady comes back with another nice lady and utters six words that has my brother and I in fits of laughter "the fish is from the sea". Ah well, Veggie Deli Meal it is then!

The only word I have to describe the Veggie Deli Meal is 'dry', the burger tasted like cardboard and I couldn't see any veg in the veggie patty. This upset me no end, so once home I got on the internet and found to my surprise that McD's use Hoki fish for their Filet-o-Fish which is an ecologically sustainable alternative to cod - well according to the following website anyway:

http://www.makeupyourownmind.co.uk/questions/whats-in-the-food/filet-o-fish/#question9.

So will I have the fish next time? The answer to that question is perhaps...

An Explanation

Before we go any further I want to make sure that there is no confusion. The Search for Happy Meat refers to my search to find free range/organic/sustainable meat everywhere I go to eat or buy food from. This blog is NOT about finding a man...although perhaps it should be!

Throughout my whole life I've had moments of doubt about eating meat. Whether its chicken, pork or fish, every now and again I feel guilty about consuming another living being for what essentially is my enjoyment. I love my vegetables and to be honest its vary rare that we have meat in the house, but when I go out to eat, my eye is automatically drawn to the meatier dishes. I've played at being a vegetarian and unfortunately the lure of KFC has been too much and I've literally followed my nose into the local branch.

For the past year I've been finding it more and more difficult to ignore the fact that my Hot Chicken Wing has come from a bird that has probably never seen day light and has been pumped full of goodness knows what. Like many people I had a look on the web to see what I could find on the chicken farming and found a website that made my tummy turn so, in the hope of being more responsible about what I eat, I decided that I would only eat 'Happy' meat, i.e. from animals that had had a good time running around before being mullered for me to eat! I know that many people would say that I just need to bite the bullet and become a vegetarian and that its all or nothing, but I know what my failings are, and one of them is that there are times when I can't resist a bacon sandwich or a chicken pasta! The way I see it, is that its better to do something than nothing at all!

http://www.kentuckyfriedcruelty.com/

Hx