Cheesy cultural appropriation

I saw this for sale recently when I was looking for cheese to add to burgers. I was intrigued so I thought I would give it a go.

I'm pleased to report it worked really well as burger cheese in a cheeseburger. But there is a little nagging feeling that this is cultural appropriation of some kind - especially since this "Welsh rarebit" cheese was made in Leicestershire!

Rarebit has been a Welsh staple dish for so long that a joke about Welsh people eating toasted cheese is in an Elizabethan era joke book that Shakespeare seems to have used as one of the many sources he borrowed from. 

The joke is that at a Welsh wedding there were ten cooks because each guest toasted their own cheese. Those hilarious Elizabethans!

Anyway, Tesco has brought Welsh rarebit into the modern era of packaged sliced cheese. I liked it. I'll probably buy it again despite my misgivings about this culinary cultural appropriation.

Some of the Christmas Cards from the 2021 ACCA

I've picked ten Christmas cards we received this year that stood out and have scanned them to share on here. First though, a couple of cards that literally stood out as 3D cards, that wouldn't scan. 

The card with Charlie Brown, Snoopy and the Peanuts gang on lights up and plays music if you press where it says "Press Here". Lights on the tree come on!

One of the first cards we received this year came from the rock band Terrorvision along with a copy of their Christmas single.

What makes it special is that the band have signed it.

I was a bit disappointed that the multilingual greetings didn't include Welsh.

I try to include at least one religious card in these showcases. This one ticked a number of categories on the ACCA, including the 'cartoon religious' theme.

It also has a line from a Christmas carol on the front. As did this next card. Sort of.

As a heads up, cards featuring puns feature strongly in this post. Despite having a carol-based pun on the front, this didn't get counted as a religious card.

Technically I suppose Saint Nicholas, also known as Santa Claus, could be counted as a religous figure. I really liked several of the depictions of Santa that arrived this year.

I sometimes feel like this juggling Santa, trying to get all the right presents to people.

This next one really appealed to me. Cathy pointed out that the artist, Karen Fjord Kjærsgaard, sounded Scandinavian. I looked her up and she was Danish. So that might be why this appeals so much.

And then there was this card from my Ozzie cousin, Trefor, featuring a surfer dude Santa.

The expression on the kangaroo's face made me chuckle. He looks like a mischief maker. 

A couple of years ago, Stewart caused me to redo my audit with a late entry and a note about being late. His card this year gets a place in this post because a) it has a dinosaur on, b) it has a pun on, and c) he made me laugh with the post script message after wishing us a happy Christmas.

Here's the P.S.

"PS - Isn't it funny that my whole family now have to suffer weird Christmas cards because of your blog!!"

Yes, it is funny. Also, I think this means that I am officially an influencer! (Now if only I could monetise this.)

We had a few Snoopy cards this year. I asked Cathy which one she wanted me to scan and she picked this one.

See, that could have been listed in the 'Dogs in Santa Hats' category. But it wasn't.

And so on to my final two cards of this post. Both were strong contenders for favourite card of the year. Both were puns and both featured... cheese. (Which seems punningly apt - after all cheeses is the reason for the season!)

Kitchen implements in Santa hats has never been a category. It might become one in future.

And here is my absolute favourite card this year!

It was sent to us by our friends Matt and Nikki, and is just brilliant. A posh cheese pun. What could be better?

2016-17 football season review

As we are now into the 2017-18 European competition qualifiers I felt I should probably get round to publishing my season review for the 2016-17 season. Seduced by the success of the Wales team at Euro 2016 I bought a "season ticket" for the 2018 World Cup qualifying  campaign that hasn't exactly reached the heights of expectation but means I have started watching international football again after a break of several years.

As per previous seasons, here are the overall stats:
Season: 2016-17
Total games: 14
Most goals in a game: 4
Fewest goals in a game: 0
Total goals seen: 26
Number of football grounds visited: 6 (3 of which I’d never visited before)

This year I saw 8 games at Cardiff City Stadium - 4 Cardiff City, 3 Wales and the UEFA Women's Champions League Final.

The games:

Cardiff City 0 v 2 Queen's Park Rangers

The mopey mascot just about sums it up for Cardiff at this point, as they were desperately poor. I was in the away end with Steve, my QPR-superfan friend. Two second half goals did for City

Weston-Super-Mare 0 v 0 Poole Town
Steve is also a Poole Town fan and persuaded me to go with him to Weston on a Tuesday evening to see the Mighty Dolphins take on the Seagull Army. (I didn't take much persuading.)

In case there was any doubt about the Seagull Army, they have a banner.

Second half we were right behind the Weston goal and I saw the keeper pull off probably the best ever save I've seen live, from point blank range. He was a nice guy too, having a chat to the fans about the various grounds in the league and who we thought were the best teams.

Cardiff 0 v 1 Reading
This game was notable for two reasons. Firstly, both sides were shambolically bad. Secondly, Reading were in a high viz yellow kit which meant the away end looked like it was packed with safety stewards.

Wales 4 v 0 Moldova
The first home game for Wales after the Euros and a trouncing for the weakest team in the group. Gareth Bale won a penalty at the death to make it more flattering than Wales really deserved. When Moldova decided to actually play they made life a bit more difficult for Wales, but they were trailing by then anyway. This game was my third of the season at Cardiff City Stadium and I was in the third different stand.

Cardiff 0 v 2 Derby
Derby's manager, Nigel Pearson, was relieved of his duties the day before this game, while City boss Paul Trollope was grimly hanging on. Grim was the operative word. I said to my friend Sara, who I was standing with at the back of the Canton Stand that they would get relegated.

Wales 1 v 1 Georgia
This was a massive let down. Wales took the lead, then lost momentum and let Georgia back in to throw away two much needed points.

Wales 1 v 1 Serbia
For the second match in a row Wales let a lead slip and this time against some of their main rivals in the group.

Poole Town 0 v 2 Ebbsfleet United
This was a long road trip with Steve, but I got to see Poole at home for the first time. I particularly liked the idea of the fundraising cheese that was on sale, although I didn't buy any.

The Poole mascot is Danny Dolphin. Amusingly he joined in the team handshakes at the start of the game.

Cardiff v Ipswich 3-1
Another Cardiff game, and another viewing angle. This time I was in the family stand with a friend who wanted to take his daughter to a football match but had never been to one himself. She loved it. He conceded at the end that it was much more enjoyable than he thought it would be.

She particularly liked it when Cardiff scored (naturally) but also when Cardiff missed and the whole crowd went 'OOOOHH' at the same time. It made me remember how much I enjoyed being part of the crowd when I was a kid at football matches. You're this tiny part of this huge organic thing and as much a part of it as anyone else.

Cardiff were much improved, having ditched Paul Trollope shortly after the Derby game and appointing veteran manager Neil Warnock. He's a bit of a marmite manager, with most people detesting him, but the turnaround at Cardiff in terms of team shape, tactics and spirit was very evident.

Shrewsbury 0 v 2 Bolton
I finally got to a Shrewsbury game for the season. Bolton were a horrible team of whinging cloggers. The game wasn't much better. There was supposed to be a minute's silence at the start but it turned into a minute's applause. The mascots joined in. I'm not sure how I feel about mascots at minute silences. It seems a bit frivolous.

Bristol Rovers 2 v 0 Shrewsbury
A game ruined by a referee who sent off a Shrewsbury forward for nothing and gave the home team a duff penalty. The rumour afterwards was that the ref went into the changing room after the game and apologised. Rovers have half a ground and we were sat under a tarpaulin roof.

Shrewsbury 1 v 0 Southend
Three points that meant Shrewsbury were almost guaranteed to stay up, which was a minor miracle given they were bottom in October when Paul Hurst took over as manager. The players did a lap of honour after the game as it was the last home game of the season - although technically they hadn't won anything, so it should probably have been called a lap of survival.

Ton Pentre 1 v 1 Port Talbot Town
Another new ground for me, this time in the Welsh League. The view around this ground, of blue grey mountains and hills is spectacular. The ground is basic, but fun. Tea served in proper mugs, and boy did we need it despite it being May. The pitch was the bounciest pitch I've ever seen. At one point a ball bounced into the stands and I swear it bounced higher off the pitch than it did off the concrete. I don't think player needed to wear studs.

I went at the invitation of my friend Ben who was playing for Port Talbot. Here's a picture of him in action.

Olympique Lyonnais 0 v 0 Paris Saint-Germain (aet) - Lyon won 7-6 on penalties
My eighth match of the season at Cardiff City Stadium. My full review of the game is here. It was the first ever women's football game I'd been to. There was a lot less diving and rolling around than in the men's final a couple of nights later.

It also contained the most amazing conclusion to a penalty shoot out, with one goalie missing and the other scoring to win the trophy. Not a bad way to end the season.

Territorial cheese

We went on a late night shoppping trip to Tesco last night (not recommended three days before Christmas), because we needed a few staples like milk, cheese and, er, gherkins.

Anyhoo, I got some Double Gloucester cheese. Two lots because it was on linksave.

After we paid I was checking the receipt to make sure the special offers had come off and there it was: "Territorial cheese - 2 for £x". Now I've heard it called 'Regional cheese' before now when it's lumped in with the Cheshire, Red Leicester and Wensleydale, but 'territorial' sounds so much worse.

I can imagine the scene in the fridge right now - the cheese is kicking the other perishable produce. "Get away from my cheese box, you! This is my territory! You're not allowed near it!"

"Ooh, go on then, just a gnurt"

I saw this letter in the Times yesterday and it made me smile:

Hard cheese
Sir, My father, being of Orcadian stock, would use the word “gnurt” (silent G) to describe a small piece of food . To be precise, a gnurt was the exact quantity of cheese required to cover a buttered oatcake.
MAGNUS K. MOODIE
Edinburgh

Definitely a word to drop into conversation...