Tag Archives: BBC Scotland

english, Ordinary, Scones

Roasted Bean Café

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Triangles and all that

Okay, okay, the Crystal Palace Triangle is not so much a ‘scone desert’ as we first thought. We found another one! picture of garden area of Roasted Bean café in Crystal PalaceThis time it’s at the Roasted Bean café. Like the LWS café in our previous post, it is situated on the outer extremity of the Triangle where the influence is weakest. The Roasted Bean Café had plain and fruit scones. Some sort of normality after our gruyère and chive experience.

Normality at the Roasted Bean Cafe

Normality, however, is sometimes not all that it is cracked up to be. The girl who brought our fruit scone, semi-apologetically explained that the scraping of jam on offer was all they had left. Not a great start. On the plus side, we were able to sit outside in the ‘garden’ on what was a very hot day. picture of a Roasted Bean café sconeThe scone itself, although nicely toasted and tasted okay, the meagre jam and the strange synthetic butter missed the topscone marker by quite a long way. We have concluded that the Crystal Palace Triangle, though not a complete scone desert, is not the sort of place that sconeys should be frequenting. Unless, of course, they have a peripheral interest in broadcasting??

The BBC and Scotland

Picture of the Crystal Palace TV transmitter

Crystal Palace may not cut the mustard for scones but it does have the famous Crystal Palace TV transmitter. With a coverage of more than 12 million people, it is the most important in the UK . Broadcasting aficionados will know that the first ever TV broadcast took place in our own home town of Falkirk. John Logie Baird demonstrated the new fandangled thing in what is now Johnston’s bistro in the Lint Riggs.
 
You are probably also aware that the whole ‘TV thingy’ caught on in quite a big way when the BBC was formed. The rest, as they say, is history. The BBC is about to get it’s new charter and whereas this transmitter probably does a good job for London it remains to be seen whether the BBC can adapt to the new politics of the UK. Can it reflect a Scotland where all but three MPs support independence? So far it has failed miserably. For instance, reporting a big independence rally in Catalonia whilst completely ignoring a similar rally in Glasgow on the same day. That is not a service, it is a disservice.

With Scotland raising more than £300m in BBC licence fees and only getting £83m back, an urgent revision is required. RTE, the Irish broadcaster, buys all BBC channels for £21m a year. It doesn’t need a brain surgeon to work it out. An independent Scotland would be much better off simply paying for the BBC in the same way as RTE. If it wants to.

Do you think this transmitter could have anything to do with the mysterious lack of scones in the Crystal Palace Triangle?

SE19 3RY     tel: 07515 126190     Roasted Bean FB

self-service, Uncategorized

Dobbies unvisited

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Hope you all had a great time over the holidays and are looking forward to another year of sconology. In fact we thought that the symptoms of scone withdrawal might be reaching fever pitch so have opted for a slightly unusual but quick fix for you. Not based on a visit to some cafe deep in the nether regions of the Scottish countryside but rather on some scones we received as a gift over the festive season. Such are the fringe benefits of being sconeys. Boyle 03

Morello cherry and Port jam

Our benefactors had purchased them at Dobbies Garden Centre in Stirling complete with a range of jams. Don’t worry, we realise that for a full and proper report we actually have to go there. And since we take our responsibilities seriously, we promise to do that before 2016 is out. In the meantime, hopefully this will suffice. I elected to try the cherry scone (family size) and Pat dutifully warmed it in the oven and whipped up some cream to go with it.

With cherry scones however there is that ever-present problem ..  a suitable jam. Strawberry just does not seem right, but, as luck would have it, we had also been gifted a pot of Morello Cherry and Port jam, the perfect accompaniment. In spite of these scones having been in the freezer for several days everything was absolutely delicious. A topscone award however will be reserved until we have actually visited Dobbies.

Awards

Ah yes, awards. We know that many of you will have been shocked, after scouring the New Year Honours lists for our names only to find them absent! This came as a bit of a shock to us as well. The last time we spoke to the Queen (not that long ago) we convinced ourselves that there was a slight nod which seemed to indicated that she was going to see uBoyle 04s alright. If you know what we mean, wink, wink, nudge, nudge! Obviously we mistook the body language. For all we know, even though we did our best to put her at her ease, it might have been a slightly clumsy attempt at a curtsy.

Anyway, as it turns out, it saved us the anguish of deciding whether or not to accept. Given that we would find an OBE or anything else with ’empire’ in it a tad difficult to take. An OGE; Order of the Glasgow Empire is more our style. We did notice that the list consisted of the usual worthy and unworthy individuals. Always good to see people who give selflessly of their own time to helping others less fortunate getting some recognition. However, it also seems slightly galling that people such as politicians and civil servants should get these awards as well. Simply for doing their jobs. Equally so for sports personalities and the usual catalogue of luvvies and thespians. Surely they get enough gongs and awards already?

At least Jon Snow, one of the few principled journalists left in the media had the good judgement to turn his OBE down saying he could not accept awards from those he was paid to investigate. At least he realises that stultifying criticism is what it is all about. Surprised though that BBC Scotland were not in line for some sort of award. They have taken on the mantle of the only effective opposition to the SNP led government at Holyrood.

Now if this all sounds a bit like sour grapes let us assure you that it is exactly that, The benefits of making, presenting and eating scones and the role scones have played in creating this wonderful country needs to be recognised sooner or later. Sooner would be good .. before we both turn into humpty dumpty lookalikes. Many thanks to the wonderful people who gifted these scones … you know who you are. We will be  back on the scone trail very soon, Happy New Year to you all.

ps for those who were unable to find the Buckhaven scone in the last post. It is 4 down and 4 across from the left on the header image.