So domestic it hurts

Today I was so domestic it hurt  – almost physically as I just about got my pointer finger stuck in the electric beater as I tried to push an undercooked sweet potato through the rotating whisk thingies.  It is Canadian Thanksgiving this weekend and normally we would have planned to mark the occasion with turkey of some sort but we had other plans for this weekend – unfortunately those plans fell through (or crashed ) so we decided last minute to do our own Canadian Thanksgiving.

Thankfully  Sainsbury’s (grocery store) accommodates lazy domestics like me and we found a ’succulent boneless turkey breast basted in butter’ that I just had to stick in the oven.  Add to that some sweet potatoes (and marshmallows as per my mother in law’s famous recipe – although the hubby only wanted them on half as he apparently doesn’t like candy on his veggies!!) , carrots in maple syrup, peas and red wine and you have Thanksgiving (minus the fine china and chaos)

Succulent turkey breast

Happy Thanksgiving

For some reason I also felt inspired to make raspberry muffins so I bought all the ingredients and whipped up a batch while the succulent turkey breast cooked.  I couldn’t find ‘American’ sized muffin wrappers so I improvised and made them out of ‘greaseproof paper’ that belonged to our landlord and has been in our cupboard for 3 years.  I haven’t tried them yet as I am full of turkey but will let you know tomorrow morning – in the meantime Happy Thanksgiving – or Happy Sunday for those of you non Canadian types.

Raspberry muffins in home made muffin papers

….and the loo award goes to

So we had my bother in law, sister in law and nieces for a visit this weekend.  We enjoy having visitors but if they are coming from Canada they are asked to pay for room and board in the form of boxes of Kraft Dinner and marshmallows.  They obliged and arrived with said necessities.

While they were here, we did quite a few touristy things which I always enjoy as I get to find out some neat bits about the city and got to witness first hand the highway robbery that tourism….as you can see by some of these gift shop goodies and other bits and bobs

1) King Henry’s blog….seriously, if they wrote history like this when I was a kid I would understand it much better

See, all the cool people blog...it's a historical fact

2) King Henry/Anne Boleyn pants (or underwear for the Canadians)…nothing says”I’m a history ‘buff’” like the King’s face on your a**.

3) Fancy a drink at Harrods?  It will cost ya.  £3.50 will give you the chance to drink out of a Harrods branded paper cup – it did come with unlimited refills but even still it would take quite a few trips to the machine to get your £3.50’s worth.  A 2L bottle of Coke goes for £1.25 here so you would need about 3 bottles to equal the cost of one Harrods cup.  If each Harrods cup was 250ml (which it was about) then that would be about 24 trips….and about 15 trips larger than my bladder could hold (I love shopping maths… if it was explained to me in terms of cups of Coke, I would have done much better in school).

4) Loo of the year award?  I am obviously happy to use award winning facilities but seriously, a) who came up with the idea of loo of the year awards b) who the hell wants to have a job judging them?  Spa awards, luxury hotel awards, cup cake tasting awards sure, sign me up but loo awards?  no thanks. (Although I do love that they have a website – Loo Awards)

A simple concept made very un-simple

I think I should get a job at the UK Milk board (if one exists) because I have yet another post about milk…that’s okay it is one of the biggest search terms that brings traffic to my wee little blog so milk, milk, milk (yes, I am an SEO specialist, can’t you tell).

Anyhoo remember my story about the milk bags and how Canada has been selling their milk in bags for years and that we put it in a  simple container, cut off the tip then Bob’s your Uncle (I actually DO have an uncle Bob).

While perusing the aisles at our local Sainsbury’s (a grocery chain like Waitrose but not as swanky and slickly marketed)  I noticed they also started offering milk in bags and was promoting the ‘jug it’ contraption to store and pour the milk from.

From the picture,  you can see that the jug has a top and inside some plasticy bits that presumably stick on the outside and whatnot…I am wondering though why they have made such a simple concept of pouring milk from a bag so complicated….there is a 9 step process on the jugit website.

I am seriously thinking of starting my own milk jug company and steal the tried and tested (and glaringly simple) Canadian concept.  I think I will call it Adrienne’s Jugs…that should make for some good PR don’t you think?

WTF? Friday

One of the questions I get when people find out I am Canadian is whether or not I speak French.  I am not sure where the assumption that we are bilingual comes from (other than the fact that every package and sign in Canada has to legally be printed in both languages) but most people do assume we are fluent in both languages. I for one, am not.  I can tell you the French translation for  ‘Fat Free’ or ‘You could win’ but that doesn’t come up much.

We were taught French in school up to grade 8 but the only thing I can remember from those lessons was watching a show called Telefrancais (French for ‘French Television’).  If you are in your late 20’s or early 30’s you will probably have watched it as part of the Canadian French language curriculum.  Most of us can sing the theme song and some are even gifted enough to remember the French translation for pineapple (anana).  Sadly, I have never once had to use the word pineapple in French in a real life scenario.

Stick with it until the 1:30 mark to hear the amazing theme song, you will be thanking me later when it is stuck in your head.

May attract cats

Loved this novelty item. You would figure you would get a few strange looks due to the size of the bags and the appearance of giant goldfish…you might also attract a few of the stray cats in the neighbourhood.

They are a wee bit pricey ($15.99) for something you literally throw away but they are biodegradable so what damage they do to your wallet they wont do to the earth.

They might lift the spirits of the Torontonians whom are in the midst of a month long garbage strike and are having to use local parks as temporary dump sites…yum.

Happy Canada Day!

Unfortunately my plans of donning a bright red shirt with Canada written across it and heading to Trafalgar Square for the Canada Day celebrations are ruined due to an ill timed interview…. I didn’t think citing “Canada Day” was a good reason for putting off the interview to another day.

I will however at some point be sure to sing Oh Canada, drink beer, rye and maple syrup (not together) and brew up some Tim Hortons coffee we smuggled over.

I will leave you with some thoughts on the day from someecards which made me laugh….

Happy Victoria Day

Totally forgot today was a holiday in Canada – today is Victoria Day which is a day to mark Queen Victoria’s birthday.  Her official birthday is May 24th so the holiday falls on the Monday closest to the 24th of May so it makes for a long weekend.

Us clever Canadians however have nicknamed it May two-four weekend which refers not only to the date, but also because we call a case of beer a two four as it contains 24 bottles…and most of the time a few are consumed over this weekend (a few cases that is). It also means that summer is on it’s way so we can pack away our touques and parkas (for the most part).

For the first time in my life I actually am finding the name 'Moosehead Beer' a bit strange, there are no actual moose heads in this beer

As a teenager May 2-4 was the last long weekend before school ended for the year which was often celebrated by a large group heading to a dodgy camp site with recently purchased tents, disposable BBQ’s and 2-4’s of beer.  I can’t tell you what else goes on…mainly cause I can’t remember.  As we got older and had access to better accommodations this weekend was often spent at someone’s cottage which included the same amount of beer, BBQ’ed meat, fewer tents but the same amount of headaches and stories to regale everyone with when back to work/school on Tuesday.

So to all of the Canadians full of beer and BBQ I wish you a Happy May 2-4….

Home for a rest…

We are home from another trip to Canada…this time it was for a wedding that the hubby was in and I was the emcee. Being home made me realise a few things:
1) I can’t eat like I used to…the portions seem huge and I have no idea how I ever got through a full Keg steak in the past
2) Canadians don’t use the word redundant like we do here, there it is only used when being repetitive versus here where it is used to mean that you lost your job ie being made redundant
3) I miss ketchup chips (crisps), rye (and coke or ginger ale), Swedish berries and Caesars
4) Driving on a sunny day while cranking up the radio and singing along is fun however traffic jams and trying to find parking is not
5) It is dumb that you can’t buy alcohol in a grocery store in Canada
6) The Go train is huge – this is our equivalent to the overground and has two levels but I forgot how big it was until I stood beside one and it towered over me (to be fair most things tower over me)

7) Everything is big, the mayonnaise containers, washing machines and grocery stores

8.) Being charged for incoming calls on mobile phones is ridiculous and I have no idea why mobile providers in Canada/US have been getting away with it for this long
9) I love that taxes are included in the prices in the UK – less math for me to do
10) Tim Hortons is the Canadian equivalent to the pub, people go there to relax, read the newspaper or meet friends and it makes them happy (although unlike a pub you can grab a drink and take it in the car)

I am sure there are more but that’s all I can think of for now as I am still tired from the wedding and the flight….

Fancy visiting Canada?

A little Canadian post for you as I seem to be stumbling across snippets from my home land lately….

I think tourism Canada must be pushing tube advertising as one of their main strategies this year as over the past few days I have come across a couple of tube ads.

Its so funny,  I actually thought they stole that photo from my computer as that is exactly how the hubby and I used to spend our holidays, on the waters edge in our tent (please note the sarcasm do you see electricity or an internet connection, yeah… I don’t camp).  The other thing about the photo is that they are in the YUKON .  Yukon is the territory in Canada that borders Alaska and the Arctic circle, it has 30,000 people and enough land mass to give each person 6.2 square miles each (read large and empty).  The average temperature is 14 degrees in July (read bloody cold) and I am willing to bet that over 90% of Canadians have never been (or considered going)….which is why I almost choked when I saw the price in the bottom left….£2216 ($3957 CDN).  Mother nature wasn’t kidding, she has EXPENSIVE taste.

The second one I saw this morning and it is a bit closer to my heart as I was born in New Brunswick….oh the days I spent on my sailboat watching whales I can’t tell you (yes I can…it was zero I have never seen a whale).  Hey, it probably will bring in more tourists than pictures of 6 feet of snow and the fog rolling in over the harbour!  In all seriousness there is a special place in my heart for New Brunswick, it has a bit of a British feel with some lovely old buildings in the city centres and nice sprawling rural areas….how’s that for a sales pitch?

Finally this viral has been doing the rounds and I just can’t resist.  This is our polite national greeter who guards the American border and welcomes you to Canada – you don’t want to get thrown out of Canada though -  we aren’t so polite then, we send the talking grizzly bears to handle that.

A Canadian caffeine kick in jolly old…

For us it was the Canadian version of the Loch Ness monster or bigfoot…someone once told me that there was a Tim Horton’s in London but in 3 years we hadn’t yet run across it. For those of you unfamiliar, Tim Horton’s is a Canadian coffee shop chain (named after a hockey player) that has become a Canadian institution (see my previous post).

A Tim Horton’s coffee is the drink that hockey moms warm their hands around while sitting for hours in the local ice rink, it’s a pick me up for a long drive or help with a hangover. As with the assumption in the US that there is a Starbucks on every corner, in Canada there is a Tim Horton’s on every corner, in every mall and at every rest stop on the highway. So you can see why we were interested to find such a home comfort in London.

After wandering the general vicinity in London we found it. To be fair it is not its own standalone store its merely a section of a SPAR (British equivalent to a 7-11 or Mac’s). Feeling all nostalgic we went in. We were a bit disappointed to see that the coffee came from a vending machine type thing but were happy to see the traditional cups (oooh the little things).  They also had some donut but they just didn’t look the same plus, they didn’t have the walnut crunch that the hubby likes or the one with sprinkles on it that I like.  So we passed on the donut and went straight for coffee – regardless of the fact that it wasn’t being served to us by a friendly person in a tan blouse and a visor.

The coffee looked okay but sadly they only had milk to put in it vs the 18% cream that is in normal Tim Horton’s coffee. Once we were all poured and sugared we took the first official taste test…and sadly it was pretty bad, although it smelled pretty much the same, my coffee was completely watered down and didn’t have that creamy taste, the cappuccino was a surprise hit so the hubby agreed to trade with me as I was clearly not enjoying my coffee water (aawww).

So, we can confirm that Tim Horton’s coffee can be purchased in London. As unimpressed as I was with their actual coffee, you can still buy the grounds there and make your own Tim Horton’s coffee at home which will save us from having to fill our suitcase with tins of it on our next trip to Canada.

I was hoping however, that while walking around London with a Timmie’s cup, we would attract at least one Canadian on holiday or an ex-pat or two but unfortunately no one was ooot and aboot…shame as we could do with a few more friends here as a bunch of ours have repatriated (love that word!).