Rock Salt

[Salt domes (hills) and salt glaciers (dark areas) in the Zagros Mountains of southern Iran]

As advertised at the end of reference 1, we made it to Rock Salt just past the start of East Street at the end of last month.

I thought I had visited the previous Plough & Harrow occasionally in the past, but checking this morning, it seems that it was already shut in 2012, so it must have been empty for a while. I don't think there was another occupant between them and Rock Salt, which started up a little before the plague. Certainly, there does not seem to be anything in the archive before reference 3, by which time Rock Salt looks to be up and running.

I wonder this morning where the Turks who run the place got the name from. Perhaps they are more alive to the salt glaciers of Iran of reference 4 that I was until I turned them up this morning. Not completely convinced by the snap above, truncated top and left, but this modest digression has gone far enough.

Down Hook Road to find that the house containing the Atlas Cedar I keep an eye on has been sold. I suppose, sadly, that it is only a matter of time before the cedar is removed to make way for more cars.

I suppose the serious steel work supporting the gate is all part of the package which came with the interesting cars and the interesting plants.

A bit further down, we noticed that the fairly new flats which had been put up at the roundabout, opposite where Alio's Italian grocery had been, were looking a bit shabby. Maybe the developer chose the wrong sort of white paint. Maybe the flats needed a bit more frontal trim to liven them up. A little odd, as the developer in question, Zestan, now defunct, had rather fancied itself. See reference 7 for previous notice of same.

Rock Salt quiet when we turned up, with just one other customer. And no more appeared during our time there, leading one to wonder how they manage to stay open.

Liking to try the local wine (as it were) when available, we got going with a satisfactory red from Anatolia. 'Yakut, the legendary red wine of Turkey, is produced from Öküzgözü, Boğazkere, Alicante and Carignan grapes carefully selected from the best vineyards of Eastern Anatolia and Aegean Regions'. Oddly, a lot cheaper at reference 6 than from more well known outlets turned up by Bing.

Bread and humus for me, something more salad orientated for her.

Followed by something more meaty. 

Winding up with a chunk of ice cream rolled in something nutty. All very good. 

In the margins, we noticed the seventies style chairs and we wondered about this pillar. Unusual to get a naked H-beam, with columns being more the thing in old pubs. We did not find out about the pillar, but we did learn that our pleasant young waiter had a degree in physics from one of the provincial universities in Turkey, that is to say not Istanbul or Ankara, for which one needed money, and not finding more suitable work in Turkey, settled for hospitality over here. He knew all about the enormous street food markets of Istanbul, which I had learned about from a colleague while I was working on a project review in Belfast twenty years ago. I think the story was that she was married to a Turk; I forget what she was herself. But she was a smoker, as I was then, as least in a small way, with small cigars.

Our waiter also explained that unlike, for example, the Saudis, Turks might mostly be Muslims, but they were very relaxed about alcoholic drinks. While the Iranians don't seem to be able to make up their minds - for whom see reference 8.

A good meal, although the place could have done with livening up a bit, and it was a puzzle why the place was so quiet. I suppose being a little way out of town centre was not sufficiently compensated for by the office blocks around. And I don't suppose that either the creationists from the Art College or the dancers from the dancing school are much into eating out at lunch time. But that apart, the Turks do look to be moving into the slot occupied by subcontinental and Chinese restaurants when we were young. A story confirmed by at least two correspondents from the provinces.

From there to pay a visit to the refurbished library, busy with what look liked young people from lower sixths, where we found a good selection of Penguin Maigret in the crime section. 

I treated myself to 'The dancer at the Gai-Moulin'. Apart from anything else, always interesting to compare and contrast the translation with the original and both with television adaptations.

Court Recreation Ground was quiet when we passed though, despite it being a warm afternoon.

But would Google Images crack this one?

Not just me that fusses about the ivy trying to choke trees in public spaces.

An exotic in West Hill Avenue. At the entrance to a small gated community, otherwise a bit of back land development. The sort of thing that people living on estates in Epsom get very aerated about - except when it is them who are cashing in.

And what will Google Images make of this one, a tree he had previously voted to be a Serbian spruce?

Answer, he focuses on the cones, turning up all kinds of images of cones, some of them spruce, but I did not notice a Serbian spruce among them.

I try prompting him, and he turns up this snap of cones on a Serbian spruce from a nursery. More or less consistent but not conclusive. Apart from anything else, my cones are more pointed - but that may just be that they are a bit younger.

Work still to do on this one.

PS 1: not rock salt. Is it rock at all or some kind of resin? Some long gone fashion in cloakroom furniture?

PS 2: checking the cedar this morning, I find that it may well be destined to make way for three desirable apartments.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/05/trolleys-847-and-848.html.

Reference 2: https://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/2012/06/derby-lite.html.

Reference 3: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/06/planning.html.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halite. Rock salt generally.

Reference 5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_glacier. Glaciers of same.

Reference 6: https://vinoturco.uk/product/kavaklidere-yakut-red-75cl/.

Reference 7: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/search?q=zestan.

Reference 8: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/07/boozing-in-iran.html.

Blackberries

We shall probably finish off of the 2022 blackberry harvest today, with the last of them being used to make blackberry and apple, a dessert which suits us well. Not least because it is very cheap: blackberries from a hedge and apples from a neighbour. Will we now manage to spin out the rather thin 2023 crop until the 2024 crop comes on?

Other important matters arising include the rights and duties of jurors, as seen through the letters page of yesterday's Guardian. Contrary to what I had thought, jurors should not act according to their conscience as they have sworn, more or less, to uphold the law. Parts of which they may well conscientiously disagree with. No doubt the law around all this is a bit grey, but jury trial is clearly a good thing and it would be a pity if either side try to push it, try to push the boundaries. Let moderation prevail - or we might wind up with popular support for further restrictions on the right to jury trial.

In which connection I might add that I was never very comfortable with a Norfolk jury acquitting gm-warriors for trashing a field's worth of gm-maize, probably a matter of some thousands of pounds. One might well support the gm-warriors (which I do not), but if they embark on this form of protest, they should be prepared to take the consequences.

Then there is the matter of the (Carolina reaper) pepper eating challenge. A Canadian man has just smashed the world record by downing 50 of them in something under 7 minutes - and then going on to down another 85 of them for good measure. Apparently he has been doing this sort of thing for twenty years, leading one to wonder what sort of a state his stomach is in. He does admit to both oral and abdominal discomfort - not to say pain - in the course of his feats. Presumably the use of performance enhancing analgesics is frowned upon in sporting circles.

I close with the Serbs, who still seem to be bent on causing trouble in the Balkans, more than a hundred years after the Serb-flavoured assassination in Sarajevo sparked off the First World War. Except that, as ever, glib remarks are often economical with the truth - with reference 1 telling me that the actual assassins were Bosnian Serbs who wanted to set up a South Slav state. They were, however, helped in this by Serbian nationalists, some of whom were subsequently tried and executed by the Serbian authorities. All part of the fall-out of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. I wonder if Putin, a chap known to have pan-Slav tendencies, has it in mind to have another go in the Balkans when he has dealt with the Ukrainian problem?

References

Reference 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Archduke_Franz_Ferdinand.

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Pork belly

BH cooks pork belly from Sainsbury's from time to time under potatoes, but on this occasion I fancied a bit of the real thing, as last noticed at reference 2. Hence the visit to Ben the Butcher noticed yesterday.

3kg of pork belly taken off a side. With various other tasty morsels in a nearby tub: head, ears and so forth. Having taken ears once in Paris, I should have taken them, but I did not think of that at the time. Six slices, not very neat, not in the same league as the butcher in Lyme.

One of the slices was used with a variety of vegetables to make stock for gravy. Onion, celery, carrot, leeks and potato. Simmered for a few hours the evening before, then brought the boil again first thing in the morning,m giving it another hour or so, ending up with around 2 litres of stock.

Half of it was turned into soup with a couple of ounces of pearl barley. That is to say a further 45 minutes of simmering to cook the barley. A little white cabbage just before the off.

This time, I decided to cook the slices upright, rather than flat, skin side up, well salted in hope of some crackling. Into the pre-heated oven at 180°C at 11:45. Strained and dished at 12:50, at which point I moved into gravy mode, pouring the stock into the roasting tin to take up the bits and bobs there while I made some roux, I think with the fat taken off the stock earlier. Oven turned off at 13:00.

Parsnips going into the oven at some point, on their own tray, under the meat. Maybe half an hour for them.

Potatoes boiled and mashed at some point.

I had not been able to find any decent looking greens, so had settled for what I remember as Spanish black kale - which went down a lot in the 8 minutes I allowed it, a bit like spinach - and then some more while we took our the soup. Which was quite light and spot on as a starter. 

With the result that the kale was a bit softer than I had intended - but just the way that BH likes it.

On the plate. One slice left by the time we had finished, a cold contribution to the main meal the day following.

The crackling was not terribly crackly, I suppose the relatively short cooking time is to blame for that. But well over half of it went, fillings & so forth notwithstanding.

The gravy was surprisingly dark, and rather good. We only used about half of it, so the other half was frozen against some future occasion.

Taken with some of the fine Racines white noticed at reference 6.

Proceedings rounded out with some stewed apples, this time cooked with some cloves as well as a little sugar. Very good they were too.

Altogether, a very satisfactory meal. Ben does it again, even if his cutting was not that great.

At which point I probably took a siesta, getting out for some trolleys a bit later on, as reported at reference 1.

PS: somewhere along the way, took in half of one of the Peruvian pomegranates previously noticed. Lots of pith, lots of juice and rather messy, with small blobs of pink being generously spread around the kitchen. All good fun, but we shall see if I buy any more.

There was also the matter of the neighbouring Christmas tree, noticed at reference 4. Noticed again on my morning circuit, before getting cracking on the pork. This time, with the clue 'christmas tree tall slender', Google Images says:

The image shows a close-up of a branch from a Picea omorika, commonly known as the Serbian spruce. This type of tree is recognized for its slender, elegant form and is often used as a Christmas tree due to its shape and dense foliage. The needles are typically bi-colored, with a green upper surface and a bluish-white underside, which is noticeable in the image. Serbian spruce trees are also known for their resilience and adaptability to various soil conditions, making them a popular choice for both ornamental and practical use in landscaping. 

So a rather better job than last time, but sticking to its guns. 

By way of evidence it offers the snap above, from the Oregon nursery at reference 5. Plausible, but not really content. I suppose what I really want is a proper botanical identification; number of petals sort of thing. While the nursery is not very good on Wellingtonia, although it is a little stronger on the metasequoia. Maybe they are not popular garden trees in the US, in the way that they once were over here.

In which connection, I might add that the forestry people at reference 7 never bothered to reply to my query about their dubious estimate of the number of Wellingtonia in the UK - with half a million of them now looking well OTT. More than a month ago now, so I don't suppose a reply is coming. 

Then the ornamental trees behind a wall, in the run up to the Kiln Lane turning, on my way to Middle Lane. Just coming into flower and looking rather well. However, reference 8 suggests another muddle, with flowering a month earlier last year, which seems a bit unlikely.

And last up, my favourite whitebeam, in the Screwfix passage. And so home to a spot of pork cookery.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/04/trolley-816-and-817.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/11/pork-belly.html.

Reference 3: https://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/2007/10/paris-15e-continued.html. The grilled ears.

Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/04/trolley-812.html.

Reference 5: https://www.coniferkingdom.com/.

Reference 6: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/03/trolley-782.html.

Reference 7: forestryengland.uk.

Reference 8: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2024/03/trolley-658.html.

Off the air

My last expedition to St. Luke's, a week or so ago now, started rather badly by my realising that I had forgotten my telephone when I got to Meadway. The call was that I did not have time to go back and fetch it: in the event, I probably would have had, but it would have been a bit of a stretch. Reminded how dependant one has become of having one's telephone about one's person at all times in the twenty years or so since they were invented.

[another WEBP file]

While this morning the poster for this piano concert made me think of the east window of St. Martin's in the Fields, the work of a deceased Iraqi artist. A window which I do not care for at all, with my take being that the church bosses had fallen prey to the all-too-common drive to be trendy and to connect to young people. But, to be fair, given their catastrophic loss of customers over the past fifty years, I suppose they are going to thrash about a bit.

However, the window turns out to be the work of a living Iranian flavoured artist, Shirazeh Houshiary. I had confused here with a dead Iraqi flavoured architect, Zaha Hadid. Given the relations between the two countries, almost the two religions, I don't suppose that either of them would take, would have taken, kindly to my confusion. And while the distorted grid is vaguely suggestive of the distorted letters, one could not really put it any stronger than that. But see reference 3 for a fuller story, from which the snap above was lifted.

Back with St. Luke's, get off the train at Waterloo and onto the ramp to have my Bullingdon key red-lighted, as reported earlier at reference 1. Shanks' pony to Whitecross Street to arrive at the Market Restaurant at 12:45 rather than 12:15, so no time for the traditional bacon sandwich.

Push on to a fairly full St. Luke's to hear Chopin from one Christian Ihle Hadland, new to me but to be found at reference 4. Furthermore, this morning I find that he is not new to me at all, having heard him at the Wigmore Hall getting on for ten years ago and noticed at reference 5. Clearly all the business of noticing is not a fool-proof way to lock something down in memory.

The audience struck me of having a rather Islington flavour about it, the new Islington that is, not the slums of old. Including an older lady immediately in front of me whose dress, demeanour and generally intimate behaviour with her accompanying gentleman suggested that she had been a bit of a goes in her time, probably the early 1960's.

The lady from BBC gushed a little about the crystal clarity of the music in the hands of our Norwegian. And for once I found the gushing appropriate: there really was a very attractive clarity about the whole business. All in all, a much better concert than I had been expecting. The absence of both the famous nocturnes and the famous preludes notwithstanding.

Out to stroll down to Old Street tube station, past the branch of Wetherspoon's which we used to use in the past. Back in the days when I brought tuna or sardine sandwiches for lunch, then still made with the fine white bread to be had from the baker in Cheam, now departed in favour of the place snapped above. Which still appears to sell lots of bread, so perhaps I ought to give it a try. Could I still make it up Howell Hill, once part of a near daily trip?

The Old Street roundabout was in the throes of a major refurbishment, but I got down to the Northern Line fast enough, to be carried off to Stockwell. Which turned out to be a much quicker way to the Estrela than the Bullingdon I had intended to take.

Needing to make contact, I tried one of the pay phones outside Stockwell tube station, which manage eat up two fifty pence pieces without providing a dialling tone. Ditto my credit card. Must check that it didn't take any money. Along the way finding that I had forgotten what the London dialling codes were, only rarely having occasion to actually tap them in these days. 01? 0207? 0208? 020? This morning I find that the 0207 and 0208 area codes introduced with some fanfare some years ago have now been dropped in favour of 020, with the 7 and 8 now being considered part of the number proper. All very complicated, all documented at reference 8.

So headed off to the Tate Library opposite the Estrela, from where I was able to use my Lambeth library card to send an email. Perhaps the first time since I acquired the card back in February, as noticed at reference 7.

Traditional menu at the Estrela: bread, olives, pork belly strips (slightly overcooked on this occasion), Portugues tiramisu (rather good), my now usual white wine and brown aguardiente. The white wine - Alvarinho Deu la Deu - possibly taken for the first time on the occasion noticed at reference 9. The days before the Estrela had taken to pork belly strips.

At one point the conversation turned to President Putin's fondness for very large, very traditional churches. Perhaps more a vehicle for projecting Russia all over the Russian empire than for prayer. It seems that rather than repair all the (NATO) bomb damage in Belgrade he thought it better to build a very large church, very large on the clear understanding that it was ecclesiastically subordinate to the Arch Patriarch (Russian for Pope) of Moscow. 

But clearly not a good day for memory, as checking this morning suggests that the church in question is probably the Cathedral of Saint Sava, completed in the 1980's, in the dying days of communism in Serbia. It is indeed a very large church and has been visited by President Putin, but he did not pay for all of it, just some of the finishing touches to the mosaics inside. The church is now the central attraction of a spatial cultural-historical unit, which I suppose to be a bad translation of a bit of Serbian heritage speak.

Not sure if it is better considered as a bit of national showing off or as a bit of religious revivalism. Both being things that we would be better off without - with the communist vision & mission to do away with both having failed miserably.

Very pretty blue sky while all this was going on. Some high cloud, vapour trails and aeroplanes. Like the Chopin, all very clear. 

One pick me up at Raynes Park, a bit of chick-lit for BH, for once in a while. Not her usual fodder at all. But now read and recycled. Small prize offered for the first reader to correctly parse the picture.

A different puzzle at Raynes Park where I was unable to decide whether a light in the sky to the east was a star or an aeroplane. No flashing landing lights for Heathrow, but not quite right for a planet either. My usual source for stuff of this sort, reference 11, suggests that it could have been Jupiter or Saturn, but certainly not Venus as I had thought possible.

[The burning of Saint Sava's relics by the Ottomans after the Banat Uprising, on April 27, 1595. Painting by Stevan Aleksić (1912)]

PS: a little later: I thought to inquire about St. Sava, who turns out to be something like a patron saint for the Serbs. A younger son of a Serbian prince who took to the church rather than to the army, where in the course of a long and successful career he steered the Serbs away from Rome and into the arms of Constantinople. There must have been family money as, according to the Wikipedia article he made lots of gifts during his travels. So a camel who did make it through the eye of a needle (Matthew 19:24). He died in Bulgaria but his remains eventually made it back to Serbia only to be burned by the Turks a few centuries later. A hand which escaped the holocaust (illustrated above) is presently held by the monastery at Mileševa. The present cathedral is said to be near the site of this burning. Perhaps they will ask for the hand back.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/10/access-denied.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/09/st-lukes.html. Last outing to St. Luke's - where the problem was lack of access to the former church itself.

Reference 3: https://mymodernmet.com/shirazeh-houshiary-east-window-st-martin-in-the-fields-london/. The start point of the window story.

Reference 4: https://www.christianihlehadland.com/.

Reference 5: http://psmv2.blogspot.com/2013/01/saucepan-hunt-concluded.html. The day we bought the saucepans which have continued to serve well ever since. The matching frying pan, featured at reference 6 below came a little later.

Reference 6: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/11/new-sausage.html.

Reference 7: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/02/a-real-post.html.

Reference 8: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_dialling_codes_in_the_United_Kingdom.

Reference 9: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/08/battersea-beef.html.

Reference 10: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_Saint_Sava.

Reference 11: https://www.timeanddate.com/.

Trolley 812

An M&S trolley recovered from the ramp leading out of the Kokoro passage, captured a couple of days after trolley No.811 had been taken home for safe keeping.

Much spring action along the Longmead Road stream when I was returning it the next day.

More spring action by the side of Screwfix, the place where the whitebeam of reference 2 is to be found.

What I think is a mature London plane at the entrance to the tunnel proper. I also think it may have been pollarded in its youth. But how did it get there?

Then outside Sainsbury's, I actually caught someone picking up a parcel from the delivery boxes outside, a first. Not that I visit Sainsbury's that often these days, with the East Street creationists having cleaned up their trolley act.

Strolled back to town, to take a pint of Greene King IPA on the Wetherspoon's terrace, only the second time I have done such a thing for more than a decade. For what seemed the very reasonable price of £1.69. Much cheaper than drinking wine, and very much cheaper than drinking wine at the Marquis. Good, because less alcohol. But bad because more fluid.

At first glance, the tables look quite small and it did not cross my mind that the tops were fake. But closer inspection of the corner gave them away. And now, it is clear that you would not get away with slots with real timber - but that did not occur to me at the time.

After which I took the trolley in the passage and stolled home.

Taking in this challenge for Google Images on the way. My thinking is former Christmas tree so some kind of spruce. My idea being that the small cones should give Google Images something to bite on.

So adding the clue 'christmas tree', its AI assistant offers 'The image shows what appears to be a Picea omorika, also known as a Serbian spruce, growing behind a low brick wall. This type of tree is often used as a Christmas tree due to its symmetrical shape and dense foliage. While the image does not explicitly show Christmas decorations, the tree's appearance and the query term "Christmas tree" suggest this identification. The tree is characterized by its short, needle-like leaves, which are green with a silvery-blue underside. It has a narrow, conical shape and is surrounded by other greenery, indicating it is likely growing outdoors'.

Noting that it used just a small segment of the image, just above the bricks, and so missed the decorations.

And this tree does have the tall, slender habit suggested by Wikipedia at reference 3. Of the other suggestions, Nordmann fir looks to be the wrong shape, but Norway spruce at reference 4 looks to be a possibility. Need to snip a bit off when the owner is not looking, or perhaps just talk to him.

PS 1: a couple of stray snaps of the gas works on Clay Hill Green, at the top of West Hill. Not clear where the massive flange bottom right in the snap above comes in. Note the smear of gravel under the top soil, above the brown clay, in the nearest stretch of trench. The brown clay we know all about from our own garden.

The section of trench off snap to the right in the first snap. More gravel. Plus other peoples' pipes cluttering up the trench.

While back home, daffodils from Sainsbury's had done well in their pot from New York. Something over a week old by the time that this snap was taken.

PS 2: I looked up the inpost parcels & locker people, which I don't think I had done before; to be found at reference 5, from where the snap above is taken. All very cuddly. Presumably the trick is to make the offering attractive enough to suck enough people in pay for the investment in lockers. And in the couriers servicing them. An offering which looks to have started out in Poland and to have spread to various other European countries.

PS 3: it turns out that I had looked them up before, more than 300 trolleys ago at reference 6. So they have been around at least three years - and a memory of the locker block in Pound Lane is coming back to me. I shall check if it is still there.

[Brzoska built InPost by capitalising on the ecommerce boom, offering consumers greater delivery flexibility via automated parcel lockers © Bartek Sadowski/Bloomberg]

PS 4: InPost makes it to the FT today. See reference 7.

I liked this snap from reference 8, still life with beer. The chap who did the Polish version of InPost above.

Reference

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/04/trolley-811.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2025/04/whitebeam.html.

Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picea_omorika.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picea_abies.

Reference 5: https://inpost.co.uk/.

Reference 6: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/04/trolley-508.html.

Reference 7: Poland’s ‘Elon Musk’ takes aim at red tape, not politics: InPost chief Rafał Brzoska says he admires US billionaire but denies wanting to slash public administration jobs - Raphael Minder, Finanial Times - 2025.

Reference 8: https://barteksadowski.pl/. 

Group search key: trolleysk.