General Chat

Jeremy Clarkson is the car guy, right?

I'll bet we get more of him than you do!

BBC Canada has become a junk channel here. Five years ago, it had dramas and serials; now it's all crap. During the summer, we got the same five episodes of build a dream home in the country (and will they get it done on time??!??!??) over and over and over, ditto for various dream homes by the sea etc. ... and four, yes, four, episodes of Top Gear every day of the week. I think they bought the back catalogue cheap.

Ah, I google and I see: Richard Hammond is the little guy.

Jeremy Clarkson is the alpha male supremo, isn't he just?

We actually watch it very occasionally at midnight if there is just nothing else on and it happens to be their trek across an African country or some such.

We don't seem to get anything else with them in it, though. I imagine I need only wait.


Even I manage to melt chocolate in the microwave w/o mishap, I must say!


And jax -- I see it now, the little nest for boiling eggs, I'd just been so agog at the notion at first I'd missed that bit. ;)

Oh dear Janey they are everywhere, its only a matter of time before you get the rest of their shows.

James Mays Toys,
James and Oz Clake and wine tasting
etc etc etc
James takes us through toys of our childhood, space hoppers etc.
It was ok for a while but tends to go on and on.
A couple of nights ago it was James May night!
My year 9 Son was so happy he extracted himself from the x-box to watch.

Richard Hammond,
Game show host and host to anything else come to think of it..
He was also in a major supermarket Advert which ran last year.
He is on kids TV.
He had a very bad accident on set a few years ago and was in ICU. and lucky to have made such a good recovary

Jeremy Clarkson,
Game shows
Chat shows
DVDs one made its way into our house at Christmas!

Not only did the DVD arrive but along in my sons Christmas pressies were :
Top gear bubble bath, a book, hot chocolate and mug, a pen and game.

We dont even have sky/cable TV, if we did Im sure they would be on there as well.

I live in a household of top gear addicts, even my Daughter watches it, I try to avoid it if I can.

Teresa

So much safer to melt chocolate in a bowl over a pan of hot water, on simmer (on the hob)

I think re the caravan 'crocks', (talking items for cooking food and not the caravan users) there are lots of suitable pans and containers in the Betterwear or Kleeneze brochures, I think it can be bought on line as well.

Lizx

So much safer to melt chocolate in a bowl over a pan of hot water, on simmer (on the hob)

I think re the caravan 'crocks', (talking items for cooking food and not the caravan users) there are lots of suitable pans and containers in the Betterwear or Kleeneze brochures, I think it can be bought on line as well.

Lizx

just heated a can of soup poured into one of the ancient smaller arcopal casserole dishes so off to eat now

"Top gear bubble bath" ??

Er ... kinda spoils the alpha male image, doesn't that? ;)

For caravaning ... I have a couple of old enamelware pieces (the dark coloured with white speckles) I've picked up at second-hand shops that I think are gorgeous. Of course, they're great for campfires, but they don't go in microwaves!

You could dream of the Top Gear team whilst in the bath though Janey!!


Melamine! You mentioned Melamine! I was given some of that by some Canadians if I remember rightly.


Oh....and if you're going to light a campfire.....frying bacon is a MUST.

And I remember -- the brand name was Melmac.

Yes:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melamine_resin

During the late 1950s and 1960s melamine tableware became highly fashionable. Aided crucially by the stylish modern designs of A. H. Woodfull and the Product Design Unit of British Industrial Plastics, it was thought to threaten the dominant position of ceramics in the market. The tendency of melamine cups and plates to stain and scratch led sales to decline in the late 1960s, however, and eventually the material became largely restricted to the camping and nursery market

However ...

Melamine resin is often used in kitchen utensils and plates (such as Melmac). Melamine resin utensils and bowls are not microwave safe, as they absorb the microwave radiation and heat up.

Oh well!



http://www.blackpondfarm.com/melmac_aqua.jpg

http://www.alleewillis.com/awmok/kitschenette/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/AW-Melmac-50s-pieces-550x366.jpg

Now that is stylish stuff!

I packed away my large collection of Petalware a few years ago ... I wonder whether it's time to start amassing Melmac??

Melamine


super stuff!

All our "crockery" at the cabin is melamine




mind you


... wasn't it melamine that the Chinese were putting in baby food to increase the protein level, until caught a couple of years ago

Pet food -- I hope not baby food!

No, that's right -- only the pet food made it to North America, but it was added to baby formula in China and made thousands ill and killed six. It was also going in animal feed and thus into eggs in China, apparently.

Melamine has high nitrogen content (I'm now becoming a melamine expert) which actually makes it fire-retardant. That's why it fools protein-content tests.

you're googling



like I started doing after that last post!



Lots of melamine dinner ware on sale on the internet!



Probably is time to start collecting it!


We have some really nice looking white plates, bowls and mugs with a grapevine pattern on them ......... got them as a present for the cabin soon after we bought the place.

Unfortunately, that pattern no longer seems to be on the market. So I had to buy plain white ones to more fully fill the "china cupboard" up there!

Old van had a great set of melamine, done 23 years of service. Sadly, 1980s retro red and yellow, not what I want for my new "neutral" van (now due for delivery 2nd March). Yes, Janey, pyrex, and it might have to be. Yes Sylvia, something has to go. Could be the OH but for the fact that I need him to tow the thing.

Yes, new car as well, PLUS, silly noddies that we are, didn't realise that with the van on the drive NOBODY will be able to get to our front door, so having to widen the drive. You'd think it was a big van we've gone for, but it's actually quite small compared to many.

http://www.coachman.co.uk/vip-range/overview

Model 460/2

Note no room for grandchildren. Not that we've got any yet.

Plan is to tour UK records offices. How sad is that? OH will be bored stiff, but I might enjoy.

I saw a Pyrosil dish in a charity shop today and immediately thought of this thread.
Is that the material that can be used on the top of the hob or in the oven?
It didn't have handles, but I vaguely think that I saw a similar one once, which had clip-on handles.

Gwyn

very nice!


How long and wide is it?



Mind you, you could always park it on the lawn!

Google now, Gwyn.

I asked google for

pyrosil hob

and it immediately asked me whether I really wanted

Purosil hose

I wonder what that's about??

We don't say "hob" here, so I guess I confused google.ca.

Anyway, yes, can be used on the hob. Pyrosil, whatever it is, but not Pyrex.

My Corningware has the clip-on handles. Is Corningware not known over there?

http://www.corningware.com/

Mine's an old stye, white with blue flowers on it, and thicker.

Madmeg, look at "SimplyLite" -- 50% lighter. Maybe that's what you want!

Janey


Two of my remaining Corningware are white with blue flowers ............... cornflowers. That was the very first pattern, first produced in 1958


from Wikipedia:

Originally manufactured by Corning Glass Works, the CorningWare and Corelle brand names are now owned by World Kitchens Incorporated of Reston, Virginia, which relaunched the brand name in 2001.[

CorningWare is sold worldwide, and it is popular in Canada, United States and Australia.

The original pyroceramic glass version of CorningWare was removed from the US market in the late 1990s. It was re-introduced in 2009[3], due to popular demand. There are various rumors as to why the popular stovetop product was temporarily discontinued. The company's official word is that the product died out due to a lack of customer interest.

The company's 2001 annual report shows that the stovetop and dinnerware product lines were halted at the end of the century "as part of a program designed to reduce costs through the elimination of under-utilized capacity, unprofitable product lines, and increased utilization of the remaining facilities."[1] Facilities in Charleroi, Pennsylvania and Clinton, Illinois were closed.

AND


World Kitchens sells similar looking products under the CorningWare brand name that are common white glazed stoneware. The packaging for these newer CorningWare branded cookware products say specifically that they are not for stovetop use. <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

Did you know that Steuben Crystal was a division of Corning??

Had been since about 1918, but was apparently sold in 2008 to the Schottenstein Stores Corp


OH was over in Upper New York State for a meeting many years ago, went for a drive, and found himself in Corning (the town for which Corning is named!), with the Corning Museum of Glass

He had a tour, then bought 2 whisky tumblers as a present for me.


They're gorgeous!

right.. I say michaelwave because..........

many years ago there was a sitcom, on tv, and the "hero", a rebel,wolfie( power to the people) ,his mother referred to the microwave as michealwave and to my purile? mind the phrase stuck.

richard hammond is/was a presenter on a program called "brainiacs" and the crew did stupid experiments on tv, several of which used microwaves (which invariably blew up and destroyed themselves.........the microwaves, not the experimenters!)or dropping caravans from cranes

as I said earlier, World Kitchen UK sell the brown clear glass cookware very much like the original Corning Vision, stuff...which IS safely microwave-able

but using common sense, it is not adviseable to put cold glassware on a very hot bare flame or hot glassware on a cold surface........too much of a temperature gradient!!

My first item for my bottom drawer (well it was the early sixties) was a blue and white Pyrosil casserole dish with clear glass lid that I won on a bingo stall at a small coastal village where I took my last holiday with my parents and brothers. Had just left school and there was very little to do especially with two younger brothers so resorted to trying the bingo stall and other amusements, and won enough to get the casserole dish.

I actually still have it somewhere, it's old and a bit sorry for itself and the lid got broken but it's useful at time and is of great sentimental value. I think it was made by Corning and I also have several of the white Corning? saucepans with clear lids too.

Lizx

Thank you all for the clarification.
The one I saw was white with blue pattered flowers, - no lid.

No Janey, I wouldn't put Pyrex on the hob, although grandson did one day when making some instant custard ( just add hot water to measured out powder). The instructions said that if the custard wasn't as thick as required one should heat it on the stove, ..so he did, thereby breaking the small jug ( half pint size) which of course has been discontinued by Pyrex.

Gwyn

Sylvia, 24 feet overall, and 9 feet 7 wide. I think you Candians still understand proper measurements.

But stuck on the drive, anyone passing behind it to get to the front door, will have to be no more than a size 6.

Our builder Darren is going to advice.

I somehow think Pyrosil was made by Corning, not Pyrex.