Cajun Squirrel?!

Hubby and I are flying out to Hubby's Homeland tonight. I should probably explain that we go there at least twice a year, as he grew up there, and he still has family and friends there, which we make a point of visiting as much as possible. Fo him it's a catch up session with everyone he loves, and for me it's a cheap holiday in the sun.


Now, ordinarily this would be a really exciting day, but we're not visiting for the usual reasons; we're going to see Hubby's grandfather, who was diagnosed with having the late stages of cancer last month. We're going to visit him for the last time before the wedding; but maybe even the last time ever.

So while Hubby is working the Sunday lunch service, I am at home packing the suitcase and making sure all the housework is done before we go. We get back on Wednesday afternoon, and I'm back to work on Thursday. I hope we get to have some free time too, not because I want it, but because I want Hubby to have time to digest what's happening during our visit. Neither of us know what to expect, so it's difficult to know what to prepare for.

Now onto a more mundane subject; but I can't leave you on a sad note...

Billions of people around the world are fans of crisps (AKA chips). One of the major brands in the UK is Walkers (AKA Lays). They wanted to come up with an exciting new flavour, but thought, why not ask the Great British public for their ideas? They'll be the ones buying them.

So they rallied the help of gastronomic marvel Heston Blumenthal; owner of the Fat Duck in Bray; voted the best restaurant in the world. If you haven't heard of Heston, he's famous for his rather peculiar concoctions, such as snail porridge and egg & bacon ice cream; so who better to try to match the flavours suggested by the now rather weird British public?

They had thousands of suggestions, and they shortlisted them to the final six:

* Duck & Hoi Sin
* Fish & Chips
* Builders Breakfast
* Chili & Chocolate
* Cajun Squirrel
* Onion Bhaji


- which are currently available to buy (though admittedly, quite hard to track down) across the UK. Once you try the six flavours, you can cast your vote. Once the votes have been cast, only one will stay! But they're all so gooooood! It's like dangling a carrot in front of a donkey, only to take it away again. It reminds me when they brought out Vanilla Coke for a year, and suddenly it was gone. I was lucky enough to find it in Hong Kong when I went out there in December 2008. Honestly, once I found it, I was trying to invent ways I could smuggle a ton of it back to the UK.

But I don't know if I'll ever be able to decide on my favourite crisp flavour. Perhaps I should leave it up to everyone else to decide. But then again, if you consider their suggestions, we might end up with something worse; like dustbin favour...

EDIT: The winning flavour was "Builders Breakfast", which is a little disappointing, because it just tasted like eggs and tomato ketchup. Bring back the Cajun Squirrel!!