shoulder pork special, £2/kg at morrisons

london 1.17pm 13C cloudy/sunny spells tuesday 2019

i was in the library reading the papers, and came across an advert by morrisons, featuring a pulled pork burger, and saying it is £2/kg for the shoulder pork. and it expires today. this is such a good offer, that i left the library and took the bus to the morrisons in camberwell, south london. actually i tried not to get my hopes up too high, because i have been had before, when i went there on the strength of an advert to find there was no such offer on sale. but this time i found they have this offer and what is more, rather too much of it. haha. the packs were all over 4kg , the cheapest costing £8.16 , the other packs ranging £9, to £10. they were huge joints, but i figured that ordinarily, at £3/kg, it would set me back £12 if i buy this £8.16 joint, quite a big saving of about £4. so i bought it and broke it up into 4 pieces, 3 i put into the freezer, and am cooking the 4th one as a soya sauce pork. i had thought of roasting it, but it does use up a lot of electricity and takes a longer time than just making a soya sauce boiled dish. so it is a good bargain this.

but i was thinking it is not advertised widely. i wonder why that is. i only know of it because of just this one advert in one of the national newspapers. and even so, the picture that accompany it is of a pulled pork burger, as if that was what they are selling, and not the whole joint. i forgot which newspaper, but it was the only advert about it in today’s papers.  it was not a tabloid newspaper , and nothing in today’s metro free newspaper either. and when i went to the morrisons website, there was no mention of it, the cheapest shoulder pork they have is £4.20/kg.

now this is the kind of information i would love to have, they are all saying we get too much adverts forced on us, but why they dont force this kind of advert on me is what i want to know. instead i get adverts advertising offers that are not reduced very much, sometimes by only 20p. and they would feature them in their adverts in the papers which would cost them a lot just to put up the adverts in those papers. why they want to spend so much money advertising very low reductions in prices … at first i was puzzled, until i realise that of course they want people to buy them, as the profit margin is so much higher and they can recoup the cost of the adverts easily. i think they are beginning to realise that loss leaders, where very low cost items are offered for sale in the hope that they will entice shoppers there and then they will do their other shopping and buy full priced items is not so reliable now.

i mean take just today for eg, i went there enticed by the low priced pork, and i only bought that. and there must be lots of shoppers like me, i guess , if the ploy did not work for them. here, i am wishing not everyone is like me. haha. 

traffic jams

london 5.37pm 22.2C sunny thursday 2016

yesterday had a high of 28.3C. but that was only for a day, today it got back to normal.

i had first hand experience of what they meant when they said london had a highest amount of traffic jams in europe. at least that was what i read here. i was googling traffic jams yesterday because i got caught up in one in parliament square. it was due to a demonstration of marchers who blocked one carriageway on westminster bridge. it is quite a common occurrence in the centre of london. i think the congestion charge prevents the usual reason for a traffic jam, ie the sheer amount of traffic. at least in central london. but it mightnot be the case in this part of london that i was in today. 

i thought central london’s constant protest marches are the reason for making london the most traffic jammed city in europe.  but today i went to shepherds bush by bus, hoping to buy morrisons’ basic instant coffee. (they were sold out too, earlier i had gone to the morrisons’ in camberwell and they were sold out as well. i saw lots of empty shelves in morrisons’ shepherd bush branch. )

 anyway both going there, via the 148 bus along the north side of hydepark, and coming back on the c1, through knightsbridge, there was very slow moving traffic. i wonder why… perhaps it was just the sheer amount of traffic. so that is the reason for the huge traffic jams in that area.

i am certainly not going to grumble when my bus in the central area congestion zone  is jammed because of a demonstration. at least here in central london, i dont get jammed because of the sheer volume of traffic. so taking the bus within the congestion zone is quite pleasant, with the buses able to move at a good rate at normal times, when there are no marches in protest against something or other, in their dedicated bus lanes. 

heading to shepherds bush, i saw a lorry with a extra long load attached to it, and other heavy goods vehicles in the long line of traffic. dont know if they might have added to the congestion.

i was thinking are the residents regretting not having a congestion charge now? long ago the congestion charge area covered this section of london, but when boris got in , it was abolished. i was thinking it might be good to get it back.

certainly i am glad i dont live in that area, even though it encompassed some of the choicest properties.  it is no fun to have all that money and cannot drive your car or even go anywhere because of those traffic jams. even those poorer people who have to rely on the buses are in trouble, because the buses are caught in the jam too.

u might say let them use the tube, but some parts of that area are bereft of tube stations and are quite a long way from one. it surprised me too, this is supposedly an expensive area to live but there are huge areas where only the buses serve it.  if u look at the map you can see three areas nottinghill area, kensington area, chelsea area are bereft of tubes stations. 

the c1 meandered all round that area and i could see it linked a lot of places that are oasis of isolation from the nearest tube stations. it is quite a hefty walk to the nearest tube station. and if the buses cannot  run smoothly because of the traffic jams, i dont think it is that good a place to live in.

added. i pulled up a link to the c1 route, and there i find a status alert, and it is Buses serving Holland Park Roundabout, W11 are delayed up to forty minutes due to a burst watermain. so that was why my bus 148 got diverted. 

this is what asda’s basic instant coffee looks like. funny why they always make the labels look so unappealing. but the coffee is made from coffee beans, so as far as i am concerned its good enough. haha. 47p for 100mg. and it comes in a glass jar too. i made a cup justnow , cant say i can taste any difference from the tesco, or morrisons basic instant. the morrisons have a more bitter taste, and that i find i like. as i grow older, i like bitter taste now. so once i shall stock up on more of morrisons.  somehow i associate coffee with a slight bitter taste. that tastes like real coffee to me. maybe because i grew up on malaysian coffee, and it has a bitter taste.and we always sweeten it with condensed milk.  it has a strong  aroma because it is ground coffee and filtered through cloth filters. aroma is something that all instants dont have anymore.

in the past nescafe instant has this aroma, but not any more. at least not their classic blend.

i saw a tv cooking program and learnt that there are two beans robusta and arabica. the robusta gives it a bitter taste but not much aroma, whilst the arabica is milder so less bitter, and have more aroma. it looks like i like the robusta then. 

this link gives the difference between robusta and arabica

added. 4.39pm 5.10.16 wednesday. when i went to asda  to buy another , the price has gone up to 59p. morrisons , which comes in a vacuum pack has gone up to 58p from 50p. little did i realise that 47p was a swan song, and not to be seen again maybe forever. 

 

 

tesco raising its basic coffee price by 40%

london 1.29pm  22.7C cloudy but bright. monday 2016

Digital StillCamera

i just filled up the tesco jar with the morrisons coffee. in fact, if tesco would get rid of the glass jar and keep the price at 50p in a sealed bag, i would prefer that than hiking their price by 20p. as it is i have to throw away many of these glass jars in the recycling bins.

i saw i had run out of the tesco basic coffee , but i was really surprised when i went to the tesco this morning and saw that they have increased the price from 50p to 69p. that is a 40% increase. what rotters! just because the £ has dropped. but last time when the £ rose in value they never brought down their prices did they?

so i decided to go to morrisons instead and bought their basic coffee  in a  unadorned package 47p for the same amount.  i  since made a cup and it tastes just as good (or as bad, haha depanding on whether u like strong coffee or not. i like it weak, so that it does not really matter how good the coffee grains are, as i will never get to taste them. i think to get the taste of coffee u have to drink it strong. and since i dont like the taste of strong coffee, that is me out of the running for the which- is- the- best- coffee competition. haha.)

whilst at the morrisons (it is the camberwell branch) i saw a whole pile of basmati rice 10kg, selling for 2 for £13. what!! 10kg of basmati rice for £6.50???!! so how come they can reduce their prices even though the £ has dropped?!!! huh? explain that tesco!

i have lots of basmati rice, but i think this offer is too good to refuse. i have never seen such a low price before. it was too heavy to carry right there and then or i would have bought them.  so i shall go back later today and  bring along my trusty wheeled shopping bag and buy them. 20kg is hell of a heavy weight to carry without a wheeled trolley.

but u can see how some businesses are taking advantage of our brexit vote to pushup their prices. we should name and shame them. starting with tesco. haha.

added. 3.33pm 24.8C sunny . it is really getting hotter, so maybe the forecast of 31C on wednesday and thursday might come true. !

Digital StillCamera

so i got the two big bags of rice. i could not see the expiry date, in front, have to ask one of the shop helpers, and he found it. expires apr 2018, so it is not even near its sell by date. it is all basmati rice, and not a mixture. a single bag costs £7, still very cheap. 

 

 

 

‘Bloodbath in Bradford’ in wake of £792m Morrisons losses – The Star

‘Bloodbath in Bradford’ in wake of £792m Morrisons losses – The Star.

a nice change of a new broom sweeping clean sacking the management instead of the ground floor staff. usually the underlings get the mass sackings when a business loses money. i think i shall shop more often at morrisons.

talking of all kinds of things

london saturday 2015

i got an email from ikea, telling me they are giving all ikea membercard holders a free meal. a free main course and dessert, during this period from mother’s day sunday 15march – friday20march.

well i am looking forward to eating a meal there. my branch of ikea is wembley. and i have never eaten their meals, even though i heard so much about their meat balls. haha. though i am more attracted to having either the fish and chips , or more likely the lambshank. it is not often i eat lambshank. but whatever it will be rather pleasant to decide when i get there.

i will be going there on monday, because i can get free coffee on weekdays with the members’card; but also i am hoping the weekdays esp monday will be quieter. . it would be nice to bring a friend along who is also a member, but i dont know anyone. the plus side to going alone is that i can go whenever i like and dont have to hurry to keep to the arranged time.

mother’s day… simon was telling me is his mum’s birthday too. so i said well isn’t that good, u need only buy one present and make it do for both. but he said not with my mum, she will blow a gasket if i do that. haha.

thankgoodness i dont to bother with it;  not that i have a mother living to buy a present for.

i am rather absentminded about presents, i forgot my father’s 80th birthday too.

that is a rather special birthday with the chinese.

remember?  i sent a email notifying some friends who i lost touch with of my new mobile number; well i got replies from them, and that is nice to keep up with their news. one of them replied and among other news he tells me he is going to malaysia in May for his mum’s 80th birthday.

time really flies, i can remember his mum when she comes to visit him in london, must be a long time ago; she likes to come  on her own as his father dont like travelling. she is a very nice person. so it is a chance for her to enjoy a holiday from being a carer to him.

 and now she is 80… all these signs of time passing which means we are getting old too… i asked him to take note of all the changes that must have happened in malaysia, and to tell me of it. i have not gone back for more than 10yrs.

his father is now suffering dementia. and that must be a big change for a start.

i was at the library and read an advert from morrisons about £1.98/kg shoulder pork. so i went there and found two with no skin. that way of presenting the pork i have not seen before. usually they wrap a skin round it to make crackling when roasted and that means there is a lump of fat below the skin.

but i think they realise there are some of us dont want to roast it, because for the first time i see these two packs with no skin. and i have cut them up to freeze in separate small portions and they are very lean. hardly any fat at all. so i am rather pleased about that…

i  find that area , camberwell, where the morrisons is a very ethnically mixed atmosphere, with a hustle and bustle that i really like to see.

shops crowded with people all doing their own thing, i do like to see that. i dont like places that are deserted and lifeless.it makes me realise i am truly a city person, as i like the crowds. there is a noodle shop there with a sign on the window saying all you can eat for £6. well in chinatown one dish may cost £6. 

there was a large sign advertising lycramobile outside this shop where the bus stop was, and it says 1p/min for calls to nigeria. and free calls and text for all lycramobiles to call each other in uk.

if i like to call my family overseas i would certainly go for these mobiles providers. and make sure all my friends have the same provider so we can all get free calls in uk. maybe that is why they are everywhere being sold in london. lebara does similar cheap overseas calls too. but since i dont call family in malaysia, it is better that i go for the sainsburys sim card instead. though the sainsburys dont do free calls to fellow sainsbury phones. ah well, cant have everything i suppose. haha.

library and newspapers

london sunday

i just feel like writing something. so i shall.

today has been raining all day, usually i dont go out when it rains, but i want to go to the library to read the sunday papers, and i found paddington library has all the main broadsheets and they start at 11am.

most libraries just buy one sunday paper, usually the sunday times, but not this library. and it has a toilet too. just dont take it away (not the toilet, the papers). or else they warned they wont buy that paper anymore.

added.8.12.14 the toilet is closed ‘out of order’ it says. 

i dont understand why anyone would take these papers away. just read them. even then, nowadays the contents are not so good as in the past. i find i just skim through a lot of stuff, the magazines, the home sections, gardening, travel, business, in fact practically every section except the main newspaper.

i dont think the sunday papers are good value for money. not that i buy them of course. haha.

you might ask why i dont read them online, but the times has a paywall, and so u cannot read the times online for free…also you dont get all the articles featured on the print edition online even for those papers that allow u to read them online free.

not to mention if there is any free offers, u wont get that online. not that the free offers are that easy to redeem.

for eg, on saturday, the telegraph gave a voucher for  a free robertson marmalade to pay homage to the opening film of paddington bear, but it can only be redeemed in w.h.smith and when i went to 3 branches they dont have it. and the whole offer is valid only for that day. so that offer is a bit of a bummer really.

it did give me an excuse to wander around london on the buses looking at the crowds thronging the oxford st area and westend from the upper decks of the bus.

so many people about but not many carrying shopping bags, except near primark. it is very popular … primark. so maybe nowadays there is no stigma to getting presents from primark. 

but this is sunday, and i decided after the library to go to the tesco in vauxhall to buy some basic stuff , like milkpowder, basic washingupliquid, and basic porridge oats. it was raining, but i have run out of those basic stuff…and i thought i shall get back straightaway from the rain, but realised today is the last day of the morrison’s chicken offer so decided to go to morrisons in camberwell, to buy their chicken.  i bought 2. and also a shoulder pork £2.45/kg.

one of the chicken is now cooking as a curry. the other joins the other one I bought a few days ago in the freezer.  but when i was in morrisons, i see they have chicken 3 for £10 and they weigh 1.7kg. so not much more than the specialoffer chickens i bought. i think if they are more than 1.9kg it is just as same cost as these chickens i bought.

that is a good thought in the future when i want chicken and there are no £1.75/kg offers. but i have a feeling i wont buy them but buy the sainsburys frozen chicken pieces at £1.60/kg. instead.

 they are £4 for a 2.5kgpack. the only good thing when you buy whole chicken is that u get the breast meat, which weight for weight is better value than thighs and drumsticks which make up the frozen chicken pieces pack sold by sainsburys.

ah well, it is just one of those small details that us savvy frugal shoppers have to weigh up in our deciding which to buy. it is not a difficult exercise.

but i am sure for all vegetarians all this is rather academic as they will not be buying meat.

i just ate the curry chicken and it is delicious, so much so that i went back for a small second helping. simon came back from his mum’s at about the same time and got a helping too.

my life is very nice these days. no big drama which is how i like it. 

living in london pt 20

london 2014 thursday

      

this is the predator used by the housing estate where i live to drive away the seagulls that every year make their nests in the chimney of the block of flats opposite mine.

the keeper had let it loose today, normally he ties it to his hand. it must be quite tame as it flew back to him shortly after I took the pics.

 there were no seagulls about today. i have seen them on another day, swooping and making shrill cries and dive bombing  the keeper when he had the hawk or falcon in his arm.

but today, there were no seagulls about. not sure if the seagulls have finished raising their young and they have all flown off or whether the hawk had really frightened away the seagulls. if u ask me it is the seagulls’ young have grown up and  have flown the nest and so the lot of them have gone elsewhere.

nothing to do with the hawk.

i dont suppose the law allows them to shoot the seagulls. haha.

ah well, i guess we really have to live and let live and allow the seagulls their nesting site. but it does make for a lot of expenses cleaning up the chimneys every few years. luckily they have not used the chimney on my block of flats but the one opposite.  

I had heard of the sun newspaper having a £5 off voucher for morrison if u buy £10 worth of fresh meat or fish. well today i got a copy of the sun and found this voucher inside, so i shall be using it to buy pork. the sun sells for 30p weekdays, so it is quite a good bargain. the offer lasts today till sunday.

hope morrisons still sell shoulder pork at £2.99 a kg. to get it at half price will be  rather  nice. and i have eaten all my pork in the freezer too and it is time to stock up.

Added 4.07pm . i just got back from the trip to morrisons. they have shoulder pork @ £2.49/kg; a price i have not seen for quite a long time. so i bought 3packs about 1.2kg each but  it still did not add up to £10, so i got a small braised steak at £2.08 which brought the total to £10.71. after the discount it all came to £5.71. 

Added. 10.20pm the braised steak was 260mg (£8/kg) and very delicious. once in a while i get to eat steak like now and it always reminds me how lovelym flavorful and delicious steak tastes. i think i would rank eating steak as one of the simple pleasures that makes life worth living. 

i have been eating a lot of salads this summer

london thurs 2014

The reason is the supermarkets giving such good prices for them. today i read an advert by morrisons of 3 for £1.50 offers for celery, tomatoes, courgettes, plums, 4peaches, and pineapple. whilst tesco have a long running offer of 2 for 75p for celery, beetroot, lettuce.

I am waiting for my chromebook to charge up fully before i go off to buy them.

And their cheap prices makes it the reason why i am eating so much salads.

john came to visit me for the naked bike ride and he bought salad dressing for the salads. and i find i like them. usually i make my own french dressing using olive oil, mustard, and vinegar, but this salad dressing is rather nice. so now i am eating my salads with salad dressing but i have finished john’s bottle, and now going to buy my own. however, i am puzzled how they are different from mayonnaise.

 except for the price, mayonnaise is so much cheaper, i dont see or taste the difference.

there is a small amount of egg in mayonnaise, but so small amount it might as well not be there.

so i am settling for mayonnaise as a dressing. it comes in a bottle with a wide neck so easy to spoon every last bit out, whilst the salad dressing comes in a plastic bottle which u can stand upside down but the contents never settle and u are left with bits at the bottom which is impossible to get out. 

I have a weekend magazine that tells me how to make all the different types of salads, using rocket, and such like, but i find i am just happy to eat salads using only lettuce, tomatoes,beetroot, cucumber salads all the time. somehow i never get fed up of them. l wonder why? they are just so easy to make and the ingredients are available everywhere and like now, on special price and so cheaper. 

 Added. morrisons were selling 10kg basmati rice for £10. so i bought a bag. there was a time about 5months ago when rice price rose, to £12 for 10kg, or more. but thank goodness prices seem to revert back to £10.

though sometimes like what happened recently you might get lucky like i did, i got a 4kg bag of basmati rice for £1.95, reduced just because there was a tear in the bag. 

 

 

16 March, 2014 10:57

London Sunday

I am sitting by my kitchen window blogging this. It is not my usual place , as I tend to use the lounge partly because the wifi signal is stronger there, but also simon uses the kitchen to smoke when he is online.

It is a nice sunny day out there, and I can see the blue sky easier from here than from the lounge window. The window sill is also low lying and I can lean out of the window whilst sitting down.

I am writing this in the word processor and then I shall copy and paste it to my email and post that to wordpress. That problem where I cannot log on and access my blog to write in it is still an ongoing one for me. So far I don’t read anyone else having this problem, so I guess it must be local to me. Maybe my connection is so slow that logging in takes such a long time that wordpress automatically kicks me out .

But not to worry, I can still read other people’s blogs on wordpress as long as I read it as a non subscriber to wordpress; and I can post on my blog using the email.

Though I cannot edit it whilst I have posted it.

I just had a snack lunch of English mustard (its 30p for 180mg. Very nice price and as far as I can tell it is just as nice as the branded ones) and fresh tomato sandwich and even though it is a basic Sainsbury English mustard, it is very sharp, like wasabi. On the label it says a new recipe with less heat, but boy, I find it hot enough now. What must it be like in the old recipe I cannot imagine. most times when they make it less hot it tastes of nothing, but not in this case. this amount of heat suits me just fine. i think it is why english mustard is so good, unlike the french mustards. it is so much hotter than any of the french style mustards. it does not surprise me that expats would go out of their way to get hold of english mustard.

I have been shopping in morrisons a llllot lately. They are having trouble with sales and profits going down because of competition from lidl and aldi, and have changed their policy by reducing their prices. so now u can buy 3 veg items usually 69p each for £1.50; and they even reduce their broccoli and iceberg lettuce to 49p each; making it come in line with lidl or aldi, and since it takes only one bus to get there from my place, unlike having to take two buses to get to aldi or lidl, i find myself going to morrisons now.

and there is a new branch opening up near me,in stutton ground, so i can walk there, though it is one of those funny things, it takes longer to walk there and there is no direct buses so it really is easier to go to this further branch than the one nearer me.

I have not used morrisons before but now that they are changing their policy and reducing their prices i shall use them more. And if they have sales promotions like the one recently where they have chicken for £1.75 a kg, that would make me go even more.

oh the sun is really out now and shining strongly. i shall go out and sit in it for a bit.