Tuesday 27 December 2016

Serendipity

If you haven't already seen this film, let me enlighten you.

Serendipity is a beautiful romantic comedy about a rare kind of love.

Adventure love

Would you chase through America chasing a girl you had a chance encounter with?

Our hero, John Cusack does.

He meets Sara, Kate Beckinsale, in a fight over some gloves.

Crazy girl

This is where the madness really gets started.

Sara, instead of giving this man his number, as any sane woman does when she sees a man she likes.

Instead the details are divided between a book and a dollar bill.

The rest is an enchanting and rib tickling story, which will hopefully inspire you to love again, no matter how much of a pig you just realised your ex boyfriend/girlfriend was.

10/10 Go rent, trust me.

Tuesday 20 December 2016

Diversity is sexy

So an online journalist poses the question.

Do you find Asian men sexy?

Three American blond white women answer, no.

A conversation is triggered citing media portrayal of Asian men as nerdy or foreign being to blame.

A touch of the sinister

However, I think this problem runs deeper.

Posing a question based on whether a certain race is sexy is a little racist.

It presumes an answer that discards men based on their race.

Thus in asking the question you are perpetuating a reality where it is considered normal to discard a man on something as shallow as skin colour.

Media beige

Agreed it probably does not help that the media landscape favours white men for their heroes, but if the journalists holding it to account do not challenge their subject on their prejudices then little progress is made.

Although in asking the question they have at least illustrated just how far we still need to go.

One race is not more or less sexy, you are just closing down your options to a lot of truly beautiful people.

Come on, if when he was young Bruce Lee propositioned you are you really telling me you would turn down this fit and driven young man.

I am not saying white men are any less sexy than their Asian counterparts, but I am saying they are really no more.

Wednesday 14 December 2016

Bread for your guts

Happy Tummy previously Happy Bread is re-launching with it’s spangly new name. 

Truly I hope this reaches a bigger audience as despite the price this dense bread is really lovely.

The owner claims it is a miracle cure for IBS

Indeed, there is a lot of case study evidence to suggest that she may be right. 

However, at present her success stories stem from sample sizes of the thousands, though the evidence base is growing. Tim Spectre of Kings College has championed this particular bread.

A loaf retails at £10, a lot more than your average, but for the price you get an average week’s shelf life according to the founder and her customers have allegedly assured her the flavour improves after the third day. 

The bread is also hand made and packed full of thirteen ingredients, including three types of fibre and a selection of grains.

Evidenced based eating

Karen Collins the founder of the brand has suffered with IBS as a baby and came up with the bread as an answer to her own problem. 

Having worked effectively in her personal journey she is confident she can make a huge difference to the population at large.

Karen appears to have done significant research into her product. 

She says: “I was hugely passionate about what I was doing… All I want to do in life is cure IBS.” 

She claims it has helped a significant number of her customers. These words of wisdom are coming from a horticulturist's daughter.

Breadlicious

The actual bread tastes delicious. 

It is dense, so if you are expecting a light bread, steer clear. 

In fact the founder says she veers between calling it bread and a loaf, because it is so unique. 

As well as being dense it has a really rich, almost savoury dark-chocolate taste.

Teff

The grain Karen particularly credits with her IBS turn around is Teff.

Teff is Ethiopian love grass, so as well as helping your gut you are also helping to re-dress the balance of inequality by giving Ethiopia a responsible trading partner.

There is scientific proof that our gut requires a great amount of grains and plants. 

The reason she champions Teff is because cup for cup it has more fibre than vegetables and so is an easier way of topping up your fibre levels and she maintains this will clean out your gut even if you don’t cut out other foods.

They are committed to reducing waste, it is the level of waste she claims is the reason they pulled out of Planet Organic.

Recipes

Karen only sells the loaf, but she publishes a selection of exciting and delicious recipes to top off the bread. 

They couple perfectly in being much lighter and more delicate than the bread. Creamy Butterbean hummus with a cinnamon kick and crisp cooled cooked apple with oats.

If you can afford to work this bread into your diet it tastes great and there is growing evidence it will help your overall health loads.