Issue 10

Beestonian

The

Famous Last Words…

Get in touch on Facebook, Twitter, Beestonia’s blog or via email. We’ll publish your rants, raves, rebuttals and kind words here for all to see...

This is a really interesting piece but I’m afraid that I still don’t like the “Water Head.” An elderly former councillor told me a year or two back that Mason himself had expressed his displeasure at it’s setting. Perhaps if it came off the plinth and had the water running through it then it might look better, but I’m not necessarily persuaded of that.

Councillor David Watts (on Beestonia) I admit to a fondness for The Stump.

I like the smoothness and texture and would like the water back. It’s a shame that there’s such an enthusiastic arthating approach. As for the question of where to site it, perhaps Professor Manley would be able to discuss a suitable site.

Meanwhile, I think the councillors who are keen to get rid of it should reflect on the contempt in which those who attack works of art are often held. Lewes Town Council got rid of Rodin’s The Kiss and the Tower Hamlets Council failed to understand Rachel Whiteread’s House, so that people who have later come to love her work can see only the video of it before it was destroyed.

The haters and destroyers of art tend to seem foolish in retrospect, if they’re lucky. I reckon it can often take me twenty or more years to find I “get” a piece of art. But it often seems worth waiting for – and surely enough is being destroyed just now.

So please, save the Stump. Kathz (on Beestonia ) If nobody else wants it, can I have it please? Rick Hamilton (on Beestonia) It cost a significant amount of money.

It is art and will create for and against views as a modern piece. It was

MRS

significantly more interesting when it was a water sculpture. It should be reinstated as intended in a good setting.

Beeston needs all the interest we can get. If the councillors wish to can things they commissioned in the past, there are may more targets, even some under construction… David (on Beestonia) Hurray! What a great article. I love the stump. It’s probably one of the only things all Beestonians seem to have an opinion on. Just for that reason alone, it should stay. Claire Lawrence (on Beestonia) Great article.

Broxtowe BC should be really proud that they invested such a significant sum in commissioning a piece of original art from a local artist back in the '80s.

It’s a piece of history that should be celebrated. Whether Cllr Watts and others like it is pretty irrelevant. Its original art, created by a local artist for Beeston and that makes it important.

Let’s hope that the plans for the square and the rest of Beeston are not all to be decided based on the basis of the Cllrs personal taste… Save the stump!

Beth (on Beestonia) I’m so glad to see this piece. We’ve already sent a request for it to be moved into our local park if it does have to move. But on balance I think it should be retained more or less in situ, and made a centrepiece of whatever redevelopment happens. It’s at that awkward age for a piece of public art or architecture – too old to be fashionable, not quite old enough to be heritage. Not that long ago the '70s were naff, but now they are “period”, suggesting that it will take 10 more years for Beeston to come round to loving Water Head, and 15-20 before someone raises the

funds to restore it to full working order. I really hope that misplaced populism doesn’t see the sculpture either destroyed or shunted somewhere dingy in the meantime. Note for David Watts and other councillors – a mature town centre full of variety, character and interest is worth twenty “fresh exciting new” developments. I’m already expecting the redeveloped square to be yet another depressing pile of coloured glass slabs that look like every other development up and down the country for the past ten years. That’s probably inescapable, but please don’t be conned into losing what character there already is. 'G' (on Beestonia) The Beestonian Responds: I agree with your bit about the situ, Dave. In fact, it was kind of my main point…

And it’s OK that you *still* don’t like it. We all, in Beeston, have to deal with something we don’t like still being in a prime position...

I was told that the commissioning of ‘Water Head’ *was* based on personal taste of Councillors. Barry Protheroe and his boss, John Haslam, were very much taken with Mason’s work. ‘Leafstem’ was bought after another similar piece was shown to them. ‘Water Head’ was commissioned specifically for Beeston. They were pretty progressive, them fellas – relatively speaking.

All modern art leaves something to be desired for someone. But you can’t form an arty opinion on something if it isn’t there…

– Tamar

Life's too short to stuff a mushroom.

– Shirley Conran

Horace’s Half Hour

Y

Traditional beeston blackbird pudding.

Ingredients

Method

8 Blackbirds ½ lb of bacon ½ lb of liver (lamb or pig's) 1 medium size onion Handful of chopped field mushrooms Pepper and salt ¼ pint (1 gill) of gravy Suet paste

clean the Blackbirds, stuff each one with liver (of a paste-like consistency).

Grease and line a 1½ pint size pudding basin with good suet paste. Bone and Wrap each blackbird in a strip of bacon, season each with pepper and salt.

Put some strips of bacon in the bottom of the basin, put the rolled up birds in neatly, sprinkle over the chopped onion and mushroom, pour over the gravy, fill in with bits of bacon left over. Dampen around the edges of the paste, put on the top crust. Tie it up tightly in a cloth, plunge into boiling water and boil gently for two hours.

(If Blackbirds are not available, Thrushes will suffice.) [or preferably chicken? – Ed.]

Get In Touch:

ISSUE 10 / July 2012: Born of brown ale and squeaky cheese.

thebeestonian@gmail.com beestonia.wordpress.com facebook.com/thebeestonian @TheBeestonian

_Page 2 University of Beestonia: Summer Scientist Week BESTonians: Hallam's

Beeston-a-nom-nom

_Page 3 Professor Poliakoff _Page 4

The Dreamy Team

Beeston's big mouth Beeston-a-nom-nom contd

Editor, writing, sobbing, production, control-freakery, puns and Statesmen-like Ambassadorial duties: Lord Beestonia.

Gentle Yorkshire burrs and Dean of University of Beestonia: Prof J. Assistant Editor; Design n’ Tings: Tamar.

IT support and gentle encouragement: Queen Weasel / Luke / Ian M. Illustrations and General Feline Matters: Lottie.

Top-Notch Scribes: Nora Dimitrova, Tamar Feast, Jimmy Wiggins and James Brown.

Quiz by Horace.

Printing by Nottingham Offset Printers - a Beeston Company.

Huge thanks to our contributors, sponsors, stockists, regular readers and anyone who has picked this up and resisted the temptation to fold it into a paper aeroplane.

Scan QR code & subscribe to Beestonia’s blog:

Grow your own _Page 5 Independents is king Enough to go 'round? _Page 6 Au Contraire V Family meals _Page 7 Beeston Beats: Emma Bladon Jones _Page 8 Famous Last Words Next Issue About Us: We are a locally run, locally based, regular, free paper for Beeston and its environs.

We are independent in all ways and not-for-profit, so if we say we like it, we really mean it.

You’ll find us in good Beeston coffee shops, pubs and other places we love.

Something Not By Lottie (she is on Holiday)

piggy noses and go sniffing out the truffle of fact.

Where to eat though? On Beestonia’s extreme eastern flank we have the dual Michelin Stars of Sat Bains restaurant, but that’s quite a walk and some (wrong) people think this is not true Beeston. So lets go closer to home, and You might shop at Out of This look into the first wonder: the Chinese World or rummage for vittles in Beck’s Bargains. I might be being read explosion of the last few years.

Driven by the volume of East right now by someone who only eats Asian students visiting us to study, a their tomatoes sundried on a Tuscan terrace; equally you might be someone profusion of restaurants and shops has who eats them only as part of ketchup given us our own little China corner, with flashy restaurant bars like the squirted over oven chips. newly reopened Bamboo (y’know, Whatever. We are all eating and the one that used to be Terracotta/ loving doing so. To celebrate this unanimous wonderfulness, we at The Republic) to the basic formica tables Beestonian decided to devote an issue of the wondrous Nosh: which once advertised the Best Thing On a to food, which has had us don our

Food, glorious food. It’s the great leveller in Beestonia...

Menu, EVER: ‘Fish in the Shape of A Squirrel’. South East Asia is serviced with the highly regarded Sukho Thai, and the chintzy but nice Yod Siam.

Moving further West into Indian snap, we say hello to Beeston’s Oldest Restaurant. Beeston Tandoori House.

It’s resolutely routed in the eighties: a menu that happily shuns the avant garde in favour of huge, ghee drenched wonders and mountains of cardamom. Which is a very good thing, as is the red flock wallpaper and the subtle, omnipresent sitar music.

There's also Cottage Balti and Nimboo to test your chilli tolerance in, the latter occupying the shell of what was formally Beeston’s Worst Boozer: The Royal Oak, a flavourstuffed silk purse from a very drunk, very ugly sow’s ear.

A strange side effect of the Second World War is the high quality of Italian food in the county: Italian POWs were kept in Wollaton Park during the forties, and some opted to stay after VE Day: who wouldn’t forsake Capri and Venice for Chilwell and Beeston? Thus consistently high standards of pasta, pizza and extravagant hand-gestures; all best experienced in Latinos. Try the snails.

Really.

Contd. Page 4 Lord Beestonia

UNIVERSITY of Beestonia

This year is the 6th annual Summer Scientist week, with many children returning year upon year. Summer Scientist week is a University organised event in which Children can come and take part in fun research at the University and help researchers learn more about children’s development. Researchers in the School of Psychology are looking for children aged 4-11 years to take part in studies about child development and learning. During Summer Scientist Week, which runs from the 15-17 and 20-22 August, up to 500 children and their parents will visit the University for half a day to take part in games that help researchers

understand how we learn and how our brains develop. As well as taking part in fun studies, children can enjoy a range of funfair themed activities such as face painting and hook a duck and parents can find out more about the University’s current research.

This year, research includes ‘SHAPE SHIFTERS’ which will explore how children’s knowledge influences their drawings and whether those who are better at noticing small details are more accurate in their depiction of shapes and ‘CATCH ME IF YOU CAN’ which requires children to shift their attention in order to ‘catch’ a cartoon bunny. This game examines whether there is a difference between social (i.e. another person) and non-social clues to the bunny’s location. All of the studies will be run by experienced researchers and have been approved by the University’s ethics committee.

Dr Lucy Cragg, from the School of Psychology, said: “Summer Scientist Week is getting bigger and better

every year. It is great fun for all the families involved and is definitely the most enjoyable way to carry out our research. We’re looking forward to an action-packed event this year, with more fun and games than ever.”

Research gathered in previous years has led to furthering our knowledge about a variety of ways in which children develop, including the way in which they display food preferences, how they see things from different points of view and how their hearing works.

The activities, at the Exchange Building on Jubilee Campus will run from 9 am – 12 pm, and 1 pm – 4 pm each day. Parents/guardians must accompany the children to the session. Advance booking is required.

Amy Pearson For more information, a description of the research studies or to book a half day place contact the Summer Scientist teams: Telephone: 0115 951 5316 or visit summerscientist.org

BESTonian - Beeston’s Finest: Fred Hallam's For well over a century, Fred Hallam's has been supplying Beestonians with fresh fruit and veggies, keeping generations of us rosy-cheeked and healthy.

Family-ran to this day, it’s one of those shops everyone seems to know and have a real fondness for.

Despite being flanked by those two Satanic Mills of Mammon – or as they prefer to be known, supermarkets – plucky Hallam's has defied expectations and survived the arrival of Tesco, in what many thought would be a knockout blow.

But how? Is it the staff, who are both friendly and superknowledgeable: the fish counter have forgotten more about filleting, poaching and other fish stuff than most people have ever learnt? Is it the feeling that you’re in a country farm shop, rather than

a unit on the high street? Maybe it’s the focus on conservation: the fish

“the fish counter have forgotten more about fish stuff than most people have ever learnt” is part of the International ‘Fish Fight’ campaign, which strives to raise awareness of maintaining a responsible and sustainable way of catching fish. Ask them how, where and when any fish was caught and they’ll fill you in.

Food miles are kept to a minimum too, as a conscious effort is made

to locally source fruit and veg, as well as a decent stock of chutneys, pickles and honey.

All these reasons are likely, but to many Beestonians its strongest charms lie in its continuity.

While shops in Beeston appear and disappear on a ever accelerating cycle, Hallam's is an anchor, a constant, a reassuring presence that calms the mind when the anxiety of frenetic redevelopment rises. I always loved the fact that it’s likely my great grandparents once would have got their greens from there; after cycling down on a penny-farthing, or in a car that you had to crank to use.

Let’s keep it here; shun Sainsbury's, ignore Tesco and get your perishables from our aged gem. Use it or lose it. Cherish the cherries. Admire the apples. Viva le Victoria Plums.

Beeston Beats…

In an attempt to be 'down with the kids', this issue of Beeston Beats is looking at a CD release by a young Beestonian musician. Now I know this is a bit out of the ordinary but there is only so much beer and whisky a man can drink in the pursuit of unpaid journalistic endeavour. However the background to this story was a booze sodden event…

To get into this story properly, we need to travel back in time four years or so, to the first Hop Pole song-writing competition. Due to an immense lack of foresight – or perhaps preplanned comedy value – none other than country legend Brian Golbey, my good self and my small father, Derek, were asked to sit on the judging panel.

Golbey will only ever tell you the truth about your musical ability, I have no control over my mouth when drunk, and small Derek could have a

tome written dedicated to some of his insults (one of them dedicated to me, his favourite son: “you are so fucking useless I would rather have a turnip

“Life Is Self Taught is entirely acoustic and comprises all original songs." for a son, at least I could cook it and eat it"). As one can imagine, much booze was consumed (none of it free, somewhat disappointingly) and many people were torn to strips never to perform again (could have been the booze). During the event, one of the surprising elements for me was the young entrants to the contest, holding their own against open-mic stalwarts

three times their age. One of these was Emma Bladon Jones, who at the time could have only been around 16.

Fast forward to the here and now, and Emma is still writing, performing and recording her music. According to her proud father, Steve Jones (sometime Crown and Hop Pole drinker) one of her early guitar 'lessons' was given to her by none other than family friend… come on, guess… Brian Golbey. Steve Jones also once roadied for Brian Golbey’s infamous tour of Ireland and has one of the best, but sadly unprintable Golbey stories. Back to Emma…

Her EP, Life Is Self Taught, was recorded completely off her own back.

Entirely acoustic, it also comprises all original songs. As you can imagine, owning a guitar shop I get to hear quite a few demo CDs (people assume you are interested, or something)

I have to say the recording quality and mix on Emma’s EP is excellent.

Not often something you can say about home recordings. So if you want to hear a young up and coming Beestonian singer songwriter (good guitarist as well!) you could do no better than checking out Emma Bladon Jones – her EP is available online (emmabladonjones.co.uk) it also comes on a snazzy looking vinyleffect CD, what’s not to like?

Right. I’m off to drink whiskey till I can’t see, please feel free to give any demo CDs you may like to have considered for review or potential coaster use.

JW Jimmy Wiggins can be found selling guitars and all things guitar-based at The Guitar Spot, Chilwell High Road, Beeston (and most pubs of an evening...).

The Crown Inn Soap Box - Save the Great British Pub! By James Brown I am a CAMRA member and very proud of all the work that has been done by it to help preserve and save the Great British Pint of Real Ale. Although the war will never be won completely, the range and availability of so many different beers has increased no end in our pubs, with more and more customers choosing it as their preferred drink. This is all great news. Sadly, however, the current rate of pub closures mean there may be few places to drink God’s nectar soon.

There are many arguments bandied about as to why the pub trade has

been in such decline over the years: the smoking ban; PubCos ripping off their tenants with huge rent increases and forced ties; the current recession, and, simply, incompetent landlords. These all 'hold water' in the pub closure debates. For me though, the single biggest reason is simply the price of a pint (especially when compared to any alcohol sold in a supermarket). Over a third of a pint goes to the Chancellor, add in VAT, business rates, premises license, personal license, TV licence, machine license, music license, lighting, water, phone, heating and not to mention

the enforced Beeston BID, insurance, banking charges, accountants' fees, rent, etc. etc., oh and I nearly forgot: the cost of the products to buy in the first place and the wages of the staff paid to serve the drinks, this does not leave a great deal left to the proprietor.

So, I ask why are the billion pound profit-making supermarkets not penalised more in tax for selling alcohol? After all, any checkout girl/ boy can sell 24 cans of premium lager for less than £20 and are never responsible for that buyer getting wasted and making all the binge

drinking headlines in the newspapers we so often see. It is the poor old landlord getting the blame again, even though they are responsibly selling alcohol in their premises.

Just for the record, the poor British pub customer pays the second highest rate of tax in Europe, it has been hiked by 42% since 2008, since then we have lost 4500 pubs. Beer and pubs support over 1million jobs in the UK, so with more planned duty escalators planned until 2014 I ask you all to help save the Great British pub by signing CAMRA’s epetiition http://saveyourpint.co.uk.

JB

Follow us on Twitter @TheBeestonian to give us your views or email us at thebeestonian@gmail.com

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Beeston's big mouth.

What would life be like without the late-night takeaway? Where would a night of liquid over-consumption be mitigated by pizzas, kebabs and chips, glorious chips?

Takeaways are jewels disguised as dung.

The evolution of the post-pub meal has seen a staggering acceleration over the last twenty years. Forget Heston Blumenthal, the real progress has been the embrace of spiced international food in a bit of bread. To me, this move is more culturally significant than the transition from Mighty White to bruchetta, Sarsons to Balsamic, beef dripping to hummus. Humbug. Chip cob to Persian spiced meats: that's real culinary progress.

So behold! Local Beestonian Kevin Smith, who is attempting to munch his way round every nocturnal eaterie in Beeston and recording his exploits (as well as his own creations) on his blog

'Food is for Winners'. I met him for some Indian roadside savoury snacks, and a chaat (that's is a food joke, not a typo. Please keep up).

LB: Beeston is going through a food renaissance: what is your best discovery of the year?

KS: Has to be Sukho Thai on Regent Street. It is actually like being holiday when you go in there. It's also cheaper than most other Thai restaurants around.

LB: The humble kebab has gone from wet meat in a bun to a thing of pure post-pub art, all in the space of my lifetime. What makes the perfect kebab?

KS: For me, the most important part of a good kebab is the bread, it has to be on a freshly made naan bread rather than a pitta, also has to have crispy white cabbage. Not one for chilli sauce though (ring of fire).

LB: Food before booze; food after booze: can a meal not be improved by being a bit drunk?

KS: Hmm, food before booze never works, as it puts you off boozing 'cos you get too full. Food after booze

“I've probably had a meal from every single chinese in Beeston at one point or another" however, is a work of the gods - even the worst chippies are enticing when you're hammered.

LB: Your death row meal?

KS: Lobster........10 lobsters.

LB: The Ten Billion dollar question: What's Beeston's best eaterie?

If you've seen my website, you'll know I am quite fond of Happy Phoenix in Rylands. They're not on any websites so it's a traditional 'look at the paper menu and pick up the phone' jobby. I've probably had a meal from every single chinese in Beeston at one point or another but, Happy Phoenix wins hands down every time. I have to mention Pizza Zone on Queens Road though, lately I've been drawn to pizzas and got sick of paying 20 quid or so for you usual 'high street brands' so thought I'd give an independent pizzeria a go.....and I was impressed. They do a half decent kebab too.

Subscribe to Kevin's blog online at foodisforwinners.yolasite.com there's a section for Takeaways and Restaurants as well the seriously worrying Food Challenge (enter at your own risk) LB

Beeston-a-nom-nom (Continued from Page 1)

Your eyes and senses may say no, but after the first bite of their garlic butter-soaked goodness, your belly will override these lesser senses and demand you wolf them down with such intent you may forget to remove the shells. I best mention Amores too, but I haven’t as yet got round to having a meal there so can’t bang on about it.

When writing this piece, I was frequently told that Cafe Roya, which takes over The Flying Goose in the evenings, is a palace of veggie-delight.

Is also licensed, has a fantastic setting and is small enough to be intimate as you tuck into dishes free of stuff that once had faces. Good veggie food should have the power to make the most vociferous carnivore suddenly reconsider their options: go and see if you too can be persuaded away from the pleasures of the fleisch.

For those who fancy something a little more esoteric, you can’t go wrong by popping into The Library, who offer a wide selection of small, tapas-stylee dishes and some of the best red wine in Beeston (trust me on this one. It’s a thoroughly researched fact). It’s decor: huge blow up overs of Penguin Classics (the books, not the biscuit). I like this 4 a lot, and feel I’m being a

bit more high-brow on a night out if, on those rare occasions I look up between shovelling chinks of delicious Moroccan chicken into my gob, I have Moby Dick stare back at me. Oh, it also wins points for once having a menu that was half scandanavian finger food (roll-mops; herring, more roll-mops), half Spanish bar food : the greatest melding of Scandinavian/ Iberian greatness since ABBA recorded ‘Fernando’.

Pub food is something i have mixed feelings about: on one extreme you have the nightmarish spectre of Hungry Horse Pubs (The Beekeeper, on Queens Road is one of these: if you don’t have kids and visit, you won’t be having kids. Really. It’s the greateset antidote to broodiness since Rosemary’s Baby); on the other the much vaunted Vic menu. It’s won a few awards in it’s time, and is good wholesome food, but since we gave it a bit of a ribbing in our last-but-one issue we at The Beestonian decided to give it a wide berth for a few months...

As it probably feeds more Beestonians on a daily basis than anywhere else, it would be churlish to leave out The Last Post, Beeston’s cavernous Wetherspoons. Yep, it gets a bad rap, but if it’s cheap quick eats you’re after, with a pint of bargain ale, you know

what you’re getting in there.

Just never order the Sunday Lunch ten minutes before the kitchen shuts, unless you’re a fan of food that looks like it’s been left on a plinth in the Sahara for a month before plating up.

Honorable mentions also to Belle & Jerome for a refined take on cafe culture, The Bean’s cracking paninis, Metro’s generously stuffed sarnies and The Flying Goose’s Welsh Rarebit: cheese on toast’s grownup, much more tasty older brother.

Relish and The Deli also do the trick when you fancy an elderflower presse with your lunch. There's also a new Japanese grill near Broadgate Park that we’ll be testing soon, and rumour is we have a Greek restuarant setting up shop on Wollaton Road. We really are spoilt.

Throw into the mix a feast of independent butchers, the market, the ever-greengrocers Hallam's and the incredible wonders found in Fresh Asia (go in there. Pick something random you’ve never heard of. It’ll either be utterly repellant or the Best Thing You’ve Ever Tasted. It will never be dull), and we have all the ingredients for a life of utter culinary nirvana. Come and eat Beeston. It’s utterly nom.

LB

Grow a pear.

A free, community event celebrating growing your own food.

Have an allotment in Beeston or enjoy growing your own fruit and veg at home (even if it's a window box full of chives)? Well, there's a FREE event celebrating allotments, community gardens and backyard food growing on Sunday 16 September between 10am and 3pm at Woodthorpe Nursery,Woodthorpe Park. There'll be stalls, activities, plant advice and heritage displays.

Plus refreshments, and a competition (kids only, I'm afraid) for the best animal created with fruit and veg – just bring it along before 2pm on the day!

For further information go to: mynottingham.gov.uk/allotments

or phone 0115 9152733

Independents is king.

Walking down Beeston High Road counting the independent shops is a tough job – and one that calls for many more fingers and toes than I have to hand (sorry).

For, excluding a few (small) chain stores, a couple of large but muchloved chain stores (Wilko’s sends it apologies) and one gargantuan superstore I won’t even bring myself to name, it’s pretty much wall-to-wall independents. If we wanted to, we could live quite happily as selfsufficient independent shoppers and eaters; we could flip the bird to that massive corporate monster that is, unfortunately, sucking the lifeblood out of local towns less fortunate than ourselves.

Since that gargantuan store came along and showed us ‘Every Little Hurts’, the footfall along our High street fell quite shockingly – so shockingly it was even mentioned in The Big Paper. However, since that little blip, our local independent retailers have squirrelled away record numbers of feet milling about town.

Which, considering our Square looks rather Soviet at the moment; Wilko’s have done a runner and you can’t drive through Beeston without a rug,

few. But we also have a knuckle of butchers, a dose of chemists and... er three supermarkets – which is one more than we need. And we all know

which one. But, if I want to ask the person selling it where my Topside’s from without them responding “a cow”, I go to Hogg’s butcher. If I want to order a Christmas goose, I go to Barnsdale’s. If I want local potatoes, carrots still with soil on them and enough of a strangely-named, unfrozen fish for ONE I’m not going to run the gauntlet of mothers with prams who stop stock-still in front of me in the aisle in Sainbury’s, I’m going to go to Hallam’s [all banter free of charge]. Similarly, if you have a light bulb that looks like it’s from the future and you have NO IDEA what the hell it’s called, you toddle to Applebee’s (tip: DON’T ask for four candles), and ANYTHING you might need for your authentic Thai/Chinese/Japanese/Persian/ Indian/French ….actually, maybe not French.. dinner party can be found in our fragrantly local delis of the East… district of Beeston, I.e. Broadgate.

You want a gift for someone and can’t find something on Chilwell Road?

You are clearly ill, my friend. If, like me, you top-up your greeting card collection on a weekly basis but you haven’t bypassed Clinton cards in the direction of The Treasury, then…

well, you’re plain stupid. It’s as simple as that. There really is no need to set foot in a large chain-store in Beeston – EVERYTHING you need is being offered to you by an independent supplier. I know the argument against independent shopping usually centres around the issue of convenience (and I’m guilty of having a fortnightly main shop delivered to my door).

But I haven’t set foot in a certain gargantuan chain of supermarkets in more than seven years. Living in Beeston makes it easier and easier to not have to.

A large part of the haven of Beeston is its eateries. We have independent cafes aplenty and a variety of cuisine more akin to London’s Charlotte Street. If so inclined, you could eat food from of a different type every day for a week – nay, longer. Let’s think about this – what do we have: Italian, Indian (Punjabi), Indian (contemporary), Thai, Cantonese, Japanese, British, tapas, Caribbean, vegetarian… not to mention fish & chips (jewish), kebabs (Greek) and all manner of cross-regional take aways and deli food. Which is not bad when you consider that not one of those is a McDonald’s.

TF

the entire globe. The Committee on World Food Security (CFS), part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, state that “People are food secure if they can produce or buy the food they need and always have enough food for a healthy balanced diet” Looking at the 5 diverse research strands in the UoN research priority area it is evident that there are multiple, and complex, controls on ensuring that any given group of people has “enough” food. Research into, waste, societal impact,

governance and policy, distribution and production and climate change and environmental impact is all coming together at the UoN to answer the questions around Food Security.

The CFS state more than 15% of the world’s population are hungry.

Ensuring food security for those people will involve global scale planning and understanding of multiple factors; from the production of food in a world with changing climates and environments, to transporting that food during times of increased energy costs and finite

energy resources to its distribution to the families or individuals that need it, often in politically unstable parts of the world.

It appears like a truly global problem for the 21st century and one that should be being investigated by academics, industry and policy makers in Beeston, Nottingham and beyond.

ProfJ

flask and chocolate provision suitable enough for a potential night’s kip in the car for the traffic situation, is quite a coup. And what are these feet doing in Beeston? Well, they’re not just looking about themselves and then buggering off. They like what they see. At the beginning of the year, The Evening Post asked 100 people what they liked about Beeston. More than a third said, specifically, that the shops along High Road – and right out to Chilwell Road – were “great for shopping”. Hopefully, they also meant that the cafes are good for coffee and caking and, had they had stayed into the evening, that the restaurants are good for scoffing and drinking. Some think Beeston has too many charity shops for its own good – and we do have a fair

" We could flip the bird to that massive corporate monster."

Enough to go around?

Image courtesy of nottingham.ac.uk

Food security is one of the University of Nottingham’s (UoN’s) research priorities and seems to cover a lot of research areas. Not knowing exactly what Food Security was all about; our foody issue seemed a good opportunity to find out.

Per Pinstrup-Anderson, in the first issue of the journal Food Security (must be a serious issue if it has its own journal) states that, in its narrowest definition, “food security means that enough food is available”, but this can be at scales from the individual home to

To read more on global food security go to: nottingham.ac.uk/globalfoodsecurity

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Au Contraire: Family Meals Having a

noble gas...

with Beeston-beloved, Professor Martyn Poliakoff.

NORA: Most of the time I consider family meals equivalent to a package holiday to Somalia.

As I’ve mentioned before, I lack extended family in this country, so we usually have friends at big meals which is somewhat OK as I can just ignore them. Although there isn’t a rule that states you can’t ignore your own family during a meal, except the ‘common decency’ I suppose.

Let’s get onto me complaining about having to consume food with my family though. First, here’s some advice from me to you: NEVER talk about controversial issues such as euthanasia, abortion or vegetarianism while at the dinner table. You’ll be fooled as, at first, it will start off OK, there’ll be lots of chewing and the casual word or two on the issue.

However, you will soon find that as the creatures you are related to grow more opinionated as their bellies fill with food. Then before you know it, somebody’s telling your granddad he needs serious help with his alcohol problem and your distant cousin proudly wears the face of a bloke who’s trying to pass a kidney stone with dignity. I can already imagine you thinking “Close up the shop, Nora, and shine all those crazy diamonds because it isn’t getting any better than this!” but that’s where you'll stand corrected. The only thing worse than a family meal with your own family is, you guessed it, a family meal with somebody else’s family.

Have you ever been to a friend’s birthday where, instead of the usual shizzle, you’ve actually been dragged to a ‘classy’ family meal? Or maybe your boyfriend/ girlfriend has invited you around for Sunday dinner? So you go

along and meet the whole family and then just sit there like some sort of potato because at the end of the day, all these people know each other and bare similar facial features, while you stick out like a turd in a punch bowl.

But for the REALLY lucky ones of you the following situation will occur, as told by my friends: Them: "This is my cousin X. He’s from Liverpool.”

You: "Oh yeah, girlfriend, but that’s X from Oceana last month.

You know, the bloke you went home with?" It’s like introducing, oh I don’t know, sea water to New Orleans. That’s what I’m talking about. Try having a smidgeon of fun now, why don’t you. There is always the alternative, that of your own family: a grumpy greataunt of somebody’s, continuously hinting mild racism at you, all the while being informative on why and how being a vegetarian will actually be what kills you, and probably in less than ten year's time. At this point you may start to feel the need to considerably up your alcohol intake but trust me, it will do nothing to help the comparisons you want to make between her face and that of a pug.

So, the moral of the story is: you will be faced with family meals, even if you are an orphan, and they will be painful. Why you and I keep going to those things is beyond comprehension though.

But the best advice I’ve got for you is this: If you’re ever at a dinner table with someone and their pie hole keeps spewing foolishness, you’ll just have to grin and bear it. Because if you don’t want to hear it, you’re better off sticking a drawstring bag on your head and pulling on the cords until you see the face of God. ND

TAMAR: Elbows off the table please, Nora; pass the salt and stop talking with your mouth full. I do sympathise. But to not have had family meals is to have missed a whole hostess trolley of exchange de famillia. For many, mealtimes were the only time they actually got to see their parents in the same room, or were actually asked about something by their dad.

There's an absence of that sort of bittersweet interaction for the rest of your life. So enjoy it while it lasts. Besides, the best kind of talking, be it with those you know and love or those you've just met and loathe, is done while gainfully employed in something with your hands that involves coordination.

So what better time to ask all those meaty questions you've been meaning to ask, than when your cousin has a fork in her hand and can't get away? The worst kind of family gatherings are those that involve buffet-on-your-knee type eating and wotnot. My family do quite a lot of these, but this is usually OK because we all assume our childhood roles upon crossing the threshold of my mum's house; one of us in the kitchen constantly with her hands in water washing up, one of us leaning somewhere drinking expensive lager, one of us playing footie on some console or other, one of us instructing someone else How Best To Do It... and me, sat somewhere trying to encourage my nephew to poke the cat with a stick. Thanks to Religion, we don't talk about stuff we really don't see eye to eye on as it might end in Actual Wrath.

And nobody wants that on a Sunday before they've had their roast beef and yorkshires. Rarely have I been involved in someone

else's family meal, as it happens.

But the odd occasion when I have, I find it fascinating to sit back and revel in the ensuing debacle - safe in the knowledge that, whatever happens, it will not be My Fault.

I also like to make a mental note of all the ways my family - as disfunctional as it may or may not be - are 'not as bad as this lot'. I choose to ignore things that make me wish 'my family were more like this', as experience has taught me that this is about as useful, healthy and likely as my convincing my nephew to poke the cat with a stick.

You'll be pleased to know, that very soon kids won't ever have to suffer the gut-wrenching horror that is a Family Meal anyhoo.

As, give many families a dining table and they don't know what to do with it - preferring to use it as receptacle for a year's worth of paperwork, the Laptop and a bowl of dying fruit. What with the invention of shift work, convenience food and knee-trays most families don't have the time, inclination or memories to think that sitting down at a table with your nearest and dearest might be a thing of joy worth pushing the dead fruit aside for. My own bredren live all over the place, and although there are chasms as wide as very wide chasms between us with regard to... well, just about anything, we're good at this one thing. And when I get my sister out the kitchen; brothers off their respective beer-perch and footie match; sister to shut up and sit down, and my mum puts the poor, long-suffering cat out in the garden we all sit and fill our faces, chatting and laughing. Though not with our mouths full. That would be rude.

TF

It is oft cited that a person’s true fame is measurable by their popularity on Youtube. So at 23,000,000 hits and counting, we have a bona fide celeb in our midst, in the form of Professor Martyn Poliakoff (if I list the letters have to his name, I’ll bust my wordcount allowance, trust me it’s lots).

His Periodic Videos, wonderful snippets of chemical science filmed just up the road at The University of Nottingham campus have proven so popular since they first hit the web only kittens falling off furniture provide more clickability.

We raved about Professor Poliakoff, who lives with his family in Beeston, in our academic-inclined Issue 9, and quite fantastically, he agreed to an interview. This is something of a coup: Poliakoff is super-busy, not just with his Bieber-esque online fame, but with being a major figure in The Royal

“I am passionate about Chemistry and want to communicate [that] enthusiasm" Society, and one of Britain’s most important exponents of scientific outreach. Oh yeah, he also does lecturing too - lots of it, to his students as well as the public. I attended one last year. It was 735 times more fascinating than the whole output of ITV since 1982. Not once did I even think 'This would be better if there was a bar’, and that's really not like me.

So I’m delighted to present our chat with Prof P. You could say I was in my element. Or that you feel there really was chemistry between us. But I’d rather you didn’t.

The Beestonian: You’re now getting a profile as one of Britain’s better known scientific communicators with the Periodic

Videos, as well as your work with the Royal Society. What do you see as the benefits of science/chemistry’s greater communication with the public?

Professor Poliakoff: I am, and my colleagues on Periodic Videos are, passionate about chemistry and we want to communicate our enthusiasm.

That is not only because we feel that science is interesting but also because science plays such an important role in people’s lives it is important that they understand as much as they can about it. Chemistry is the basis of so much

our mother trained as an actress. So both science and arts are in the family.

One sister is a museum curator, the other is a doctor. So as children we just split in one direction or the other.

TB: There's a distinct possibility that you are better informed than anyone in Britain about each element’s unique properties. But which is your favourite?

PP: There are chemists who know far more than me! My favourite is probably Sodium because its symbol is Na, and that is what my mother called herself as a young girl; her full name was Ina. of modern life, our fertilisers; our TB: We regularly report on the plastics, our clothes, our medicines more interesting research going on and so much more. Physics underpins modern computers, phones, iPods, etc. The real surprise is how many people seem really keen to learn about science through our videos.

TB: I once read an article that described you as ‘The Most Professor Looking Professor in The World’, and must concur.

Is there an element of intent with this?

PP: Yes, it’s my misfortune to look like a scientist. We’ve even made a video called ‘Hullo Einstein’.. at the University. What research do I really don’t try to make myself you see changing the world soon? look like this. It’s just how I am. PP: No one can predict the future.

TB: What do you see as some As you say, there is a lot of interesting of the joys of living in Beeston? research at the university. Some PP: It’s my home. I’ve lived here of it is being exploited in spin-out 33 years, longer than anyone else. companies that are bringing jobs to I know a lot of people here, and the area. I am excited by the prospects everyone is friendly. All the shops for my own area: Green Chemistry. are within walking distance and Discovering cleaner ways of the public transport is brilliant. making chemicals should bring TB: Your brother, Stephen, has also real benefits to people across the became massively famous in his chosen world. And the University has just field (Stephen Poliakoff is a award received a big donation to enable winning, highly regarded film writer and it to build a new, environmentally director). As a scientist, would you see this sustainable chemistry laboratory on as nature or nurture? Would he agree? the Jubilee Campus: a world-first.

PP: Our father was a physicist and TB: Einstein visited the University

“Yes, it's my misfortune to look like a scientist"

“I'm excited by the prospects in for my own area: Green Chemistry"

many years ago (see our last Issue for our take on this event), and his blackboard is still preserved in the Physics department. Which would be the lecture you’d most like to witness?

PP: The Einstein lecture was apparently a disaster! It was in German. So it was attended by students studying either German or Physics. The German students couldn’t understand the Physics nor the Physics students the German!

Undoubtedly, I would have liked to have heard a lecturer by Mendelev, originator of the Periodic Table – and because my father was Russian, I could probably have understand him if he didn’t lecture in English.

TB: We at Beestonian Towers are always looking for ways to unite ‘Town and Gown’. As someone with a healthy interest in outreach, how can we get Beestonians to the University... and students to Beeston?

PP: The University has a great Open Day each May and I hope more and more Beestonians will come each year [we had a stall/great time this year: pics on our Facebook page - LB]. We need to get students to visit Beeston to ask how great a place it is. The Beestonian should ask to be interviewed on the University Radio Channel.

[Yes we should. And will tell you when - LB].

Our sincere thanks to Professor Poliakoff for his time and support.

Watch all of the Periodic Videos at: periodicvideos.com Better than a kitten falling off Justin Bieber, and educational to boot.

Lord Beestonia

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