Monday 28 September 2009

Tonight’s dinner


Soup


Main


Dessert

55 comments:

  1. I think this is some kind of foodie torture - first they give you a splendid lunch and then - THIS! Those sausages look as though they had been sitting on that plate for some time. And as for the pud - When did that get sliced up - last week?

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  2. What on earth is the flavour of that soup supposed to be?! Hopefully you get at least one good meal again tomorrow.

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  3. is the main course 'Bobbit surprise'?

    I had high hopes after lunch....

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  4. Perhaps I could manage the sausage and mash with 3 baked bean sauce...but that cabbage, NO, NO, NO!
    I'm sure the pud could do serious damage to your teeth...it looks like concrete.
    I hope the soup was passable.

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  5. Hi TM. Oh dear here we go again. Thank goodness for your delicious lunch - no thoughts of stopping you blog yet then? Ok here goes.... Soup - shredded chicken (again) which looks like maggots, not sure what the brown bits are but look like dead flies? Main course - mash (without milk, butter and salt of course), soggy over boiled cabbage which I can smell from here (wretch) - no vitamins left in that then! Cheap overcooked sausages with baked bean sauce, possibly 6.5 baked beans but can`t be sure! Pudding - Super heat dried brown jam rolly polly with green radioactive custard. Or maybe it's what a cricket ball looks like when it is cut in half?
    Near?
    Linda Tenerife x

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  6. That soup is vegetable. The main course is Sausage Hotpot and carries a chef's hat logo next to it on the menu: "These are recipes that the NHS has asked some leading chefs to create especially for hospital patients. These tasty dishes are marked with a chef's hat."

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  7. So that is where my spare wheel went, the NHS are serving it up as a pudding

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  8. My guesses -
    The Soup: semolina and mushroom cream;
    Main Course: potato mash, chopped leaves of swiss chards with white stalks; tomato or paprika sauce; oblong zucchini dumplings;
    Dessert: the lower part of a cinnamon roll, again put into a pool of the ubiquitous vanilla sauce.
    Well, maybe some of it tastes nice. But I don't see proteins. Well, maybe there is half an egg in the zucchini dumplings?
    I got inspired on your lunch for my dinner tonight, I poached a piece of salmon in white wine and olive oil together with spinach leaves and a tomato in pieces, with herbs, and in a smaller pot I steamed basmati rice. I'd like to speed a plateful over to you, as I'm sure you wouldn't get offended by salmon two times a day ... Greetings from Styria! Barbara

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  9. http://www.chefmartin.info/pdf/overview.pdf tells me it is:
    Sausage Hotpot Traditional pre-browned pork sausage with a sauce of baked beans, tomato,
    gravy, garlic, onion and stock.
    NHS Code PC007 Marfo Code 13164053

    You can look up all your little hatted dishes on that site - enjoy!

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  10. "Sausages" that they carried into the butcher's shop for those few moments that they needed to exchange a few remarks with him on the weather, and then they carried them out again, assuming that they would have acquired a slight perfume of meat? Or do they think a sausage is defined by form, not substance? Why do they look green? You won't tell me that these things resemble standard British sausages, will you? And how did they taste? - Best wishes, Barbara

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  11. IfRIg RyanAir made sausages they'd taste like those did.

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  12. Green sausages? Wtf, seriously.... I'd rather crawl from the hospital and die in the desert than eat that.

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  13. Pre-browned sausages?!? Browned before what?!? And isn't a hotpot some sort of casserole or stew? That's just bad sausages with even worse gravy.

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  14. Do they pick leaves off of random hedges in order to give your veggie ration? And if so, is that not a bit daring as I know Yew is rather popular over there. Are they just relying on the fast response of the med staff should you code after ingesting a bit of toxic shrubbery? Rather cavalier, that.

    Paula

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  15. I do think though you have the 'good' kitchen assistant on again tonight. She (I am presuming) has tried hard to make it look no worse than it is.

    No unnecessary slops around the soup bowl from being splashed in, the main is reasonably well layed out and, as for the pudding, it's a revelation.

    Someone has taken the thought and the trouble to set the custard in first then lay the pudding on top, so you can see what it is, unlike the usual 'just been drowned' look.

    May not make it taste any better, but there is one person in that kitchen tonight who is showing some care as one human bean to another.

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  16. The Hairy Bikers are catching up.

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  17. Go the Hairy Bikers! At least they are in to proper food as well as faffy stuff!

    I have seen worse than tonight's offering. Better yes but I have seen worse! Probably tasted as bad as it looks.

    Good luck TM! You know they can produce good stuff! Keep on going as they will eventually get the message. I hope!

    Even the soup my son was being offered over the weekend looked sooooo much nicer than any you have had!

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  18. First of all, I want to tell you that I have been enjoying reading your blog. A few of your posts have been laugh-out-loud-so-that-my-family-looks-at-me-like-I'm-crazy funny. Second, get better soon and get out of the hospital! And third, what on earth is that yellow goop that all of your desserts seem to be floating in????

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  19. Here on planet earth that yellow gloop is called custard. Unfortunately, instead of being delicious creamy vanilla sauce, the NHS accidentally swapped it's custard for ectoplasm with a yellowy green tinge. Be afraid! Be very afraid!

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  20. That is not Sausage. That is Carnage. x

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  21. I'm actually waiting for my Tesco shopping/food to arrive, so that looks pretty delicious to me.

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  22. Let's hope for the Hairy Bikers to enroll Spiderman then, and a few ghostbusters.

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  23. How much longer do you have to remain in traction? I hope you get better and outta there! Good luck I hope your days in hospital are full of much more tasty dinners like the salman dill and potato!

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  24. Hi Sara... I'll know more tomorrow but at least another four weeks. It's been five weeks so far.

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  25. I had a look at the Chef Martin site - any idea what this means?

    "Vegetables are cooled in their own water"

    This apparently is a selling point of their catering service.

    Here's what in your sausage:

    pork meat, water [bulking agent], rusk [bulking agent], salt, wheat starch [bulking agent], wheat protein [bulking agent], dextrose [bulking agent], spices, monosodium glutamate [nasty chemical]

    only the pork, salt and spices have got any right to be in a sausage. The rest is junk.

    That dish also contains the delightfully named 'tomato product', as well as modified starch, hydrolysed soy protein, chicken fat, potato starch, more MSG and yeast extract.

    Suffice to say I don't think Chef Martin will be getting a job at Gordon Ramsay's any time soon....

    You might think the curry would be better, but that also contains MSG, along with glucose syrup, milk protein and modified starch.

    And no, the braised lamb is not likely to be an improvement either - check this:

    Water, lamb meat (lamb meat, salt, glucose sirup, saccharose), butter beans, brown sauce (wheat flour, modified starch, vegetable fat, sugar, salt, onion, taste enhancer (E621, E627, E631), maltodextrine, colourant (E150c, E160a), aroma (contains celery, egg, nuts, peanuts, sesame), milksugar, acid (E330, E262), milk protein, herbs and spices)), tomato puree, modified starch, buttermilk, vegetable oil and fat, water, onion, salt, hydrolized soy protein, chicken meat, chicken fat, potato starch, sugar, yeast extract, aroma, butter, taste enhancer (E621, E631)), herbs and spices


    The good news about your ready meals is that:

    "The Dishes are all in 1/3 rd gastronorm foil trays what make them suitable for ovens and regeneration trolleys. The Chef Martin trays have a special handle feature to help remove the lid. This allows the food handler to remove the lid safely.

    The label on each Chef Martin dish contains regeneration instructions, plus ingredient and nutritional information"


    mmmmmmm, regeneration

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  26. I spent three weeks in hospital in May / June I found the food was not so bad... the soups where homemade and very tasty, the main courses well I’ll be honest I had mostly salads or sandwiches but they were fresh. Often I’d go for the main meal but I didn’t mind roast dinners maybe Bolton NHS Hospital serve up better food, ask for a transfer! ;)

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  27. In regards to that post up there ^^^^ just looking back at all your pictures from your post brings back an awful lot of familiar memories that I seem to have blanked out from three weeks in hospital... now I remember why I kept choosing salads & sandwiches! I so remember not getting potions of butter with the jacket potatoes, in fact I remember one patient having a tub of sunflower margarine in her bag in the middle of summer, especially for her jacket potato because the staff wouldn’t give her any! You can guess what happened... it melted and caused a right mess!

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  28. I experienced something like this during one of my long stays. You begin to imagine that the food's not too bad. I became very fond of the apple crumble and custard, something I wouldn't normally like that much. You can become institutionalised where the three meals of your day are the high points. When you're being pricked, drugged and poked, food becomes an oasis of comfort and without any decent food to compare it against you begin to get used to it. That would be fine if the nutrition was there, but in practice it isn't. On paper it's got everything it's supposed to have, but I wonder how often random samples are taken and tested for protein content. Hardly ever, I'd say.

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  29. Water, broccoli, pasta (durum wheat flour, cauliflower, cheddar cheese, low-fat milkpowder, salt, white
    sauce (wheat flour, vegetable fat, modified starch, salt, taste enhancer (E621, E627, E631), milk
    sugar, milk protein, aroma (contains celery and soybeans), acid (E330), white pepper, curcuma,
    mace), margarine, vegetable oil
    Can contain peanuts and nuts due cross contamination


    Oh my god Im glad you are not eating this shit

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  30. Chef Martin is clearly taking the pee with that "casserole". Although, my suspicion is that Chef Martin is actually a committee of faceless NHS managers who think that by giving their committee such a name it will persuade patients and families that the food dished out under its name is decent nosh. In fact, the food will be the usual scrapings from tins and whatever is lying around in the larder, plus whatever cheap meat they can get their hooks into slung into the resulting sauce.

    Ha!!

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  31. ... and is it me or does that cabbage look like curtain remnants ..

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  32. "The Dishes are all in 1/3 rd gastronorm foil trays what make them suitable for ovens and regeneration trolleys..."

    I don't know about you, but I think they might be better off using those regeneration trolleys for the patients. I mean no matter how many times you zap the old soup and taters the things are gonna stay dead. At least I hope so, the thought of Zombie cabbage shuffling off to eat the brains of the living is a bit alarming.

    Paula

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  33. I used to look forward to my meals every day even though I knew they'd look like Traction mans. I think the human spirit always has 'hope'. When I found out I was getting discharged and moaned to my mum that I'd miss the macaroni that night and I was only half joking. Nobody can explain to me why bread and butter pudding is 'high protein' and 'healthy eating'. Yes, healthy eatin has colums all to itself to assist you in maing your daily choice. Now, your lunch. That looked like NOTHING I've ever seen in hospital. Is it modern art?

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  34. sorry about the typos. I also meant to say that getting a meal was a high point as the boredom was amazing

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  35. That reminds me - time to go out and clear the dog droppings off the lawn.

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  36. My meal came from the private patients' menu. I didn't choose it; it was chosen for me. It was delicious and the fist time I have enjoyed eating in my entire stay. Nice small glass of chilled white wine would have finished it off a treat. I was greatful but hesitant at the same time. I got special treatment for being here so long and suffering menu fatigue. Or it may have been also to curb my pen (laptop).

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  37. The lady in the bed opposite from me was Bengali. She got some marvellous looking food, totally different from the rest of us. She had a vegetarian diet and used to get nans with veg and salds. I was so jealous.

    I'm really glad you got a break from the horror. Every patient ever must be glad for you. You've had a long stay so maybe this is standard just to lift your spirits occasionally. It might be no more sinister than that. I have everything crossed that it won't be long before you get something tasty again. Chin up.

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  38. nothing looks wrong with this, get stuck in :D

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  39. I forgot to add I got out often during the day and ate at home so skipped hospital meals frequently!

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  40. Traction Man!
    I discovered your blog today after a friend put a link on her facebook and I've sat and read it from the beginning!

    Where are you?? I feel like I need to provide you with sustinence! Perhaps you could set up a PO Box address and bribe a porter to go and collect offerings once a day? Things may not be hot but at least contain some nutritional value!
    I have recently completed a history of medicine in early modern europe from 1500-1750 and even the earliest of what could be likened to modern hospitals knew the importance of good nutrition for its patients. They may have let your blood and cast your horoscope to diagnose you but at least their patients were well fed whilst in the early modern hospitals! You'd have thought that this basic knowledge may have lasted the 500 or so years since first employed but judging by your blog it is sadly not so!

    Good luck and thanks for brightening my day!

    Laura, Leeds :)

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  41. Im amazed at the filth the NHS serve & class as healthy food! there too absorbed in costs to provide decent meals for patients. The cheap food boiled till devoid of all flavor or mineral content is not good for you. I have been a chef cooking 200 meals a day for over 10 yrs. mabie celebrity chefs are a gimic. the NHS should look for people who know what they are doing!!!! I feel so sorry for you having to eat this for any period of time, I may deliver you a bagel my self

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  42. You could occupy your time playing Enumber bingo. Write down 10 three-digit numbers randomly. Check numbers off against those contained in your meals. Cross of all ten - scream BINGO. A game all inmates can play.

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  43. The private patients menu.....
    Not chosen by you????
    Well TM I think the lunch staff,in the kitchen or on the ward, know what you are doing.They are wise to you and now want to be the unknowns who help you along to good health so that when your movie is made they can sit and point out to the kids "that was the lunch I gave him".
    I seem to recall the panini that came at lunch as well.It wasnt chosen by you either.....
    So now you it is essential to be super nice to those staff on that particular shift so they continue to provide you with health and energy giving offerings.Maybe it will rub off onto other meals staff and you will get meals of a better standard at each sitting.
    I'm glad you got a good meal.
    Light and Love to you

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  44. Speaking of sausages, here's the sinfest of today: http://www.sinfest.net/ (Obs, contains dark humor!)

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  45. If they let you have something from the private patients' menu again and you can chose it go for anything lamb based - in my experience it is always good. About 8 years ago I had surgery in a private UK hospital, I was returned to my room after 8 hours of surgery to find my husband tucking into lamb chops with redcurrant jus (I kid you not!),

    Let's hope they at least alternate your meals with shite and less shite. I am off to a Danish hospital to have my baby by c section in a couple of week, I'll let you know what kind of food is served up here!

    Can't wait to see today's offering x

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  46. The results of the analysis of your last 2 custards have been received from the lab.

    URGENT !!!!
    Shoot both horses immediatly.

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  47. That meal looks fine. And again, to all the crtics, there are some very dedicated people in the NHS who ALL know about what constitutes a diet thank you very much,. But, and I will spell it out for you all....
    TRUSTS do NOT recognise FOOD as treatment. Until they do this will not change! I am fed up with all the self righteous ( not you TM) remarks on here. The factuous comments, the "well I coul do better" digs.
    Well do better then. Start lobbying the Dof H for recognition that good food is as important as good medication.
    Heaven knows, there are enough of us in the organisation that are trying - but what do we know, we are only 'profssionls'
    I could provide you with figure after figure, stat after stat that proves that we need to improve the nutrition of patients in hospitals.
    Bloody gimmicks like Jamie Oliver or now that Heston Blumenthal character will not do!
    We need the government to invest in a major programme of redeveloping hospital kitchens and giving caterers a proper budget to do the job properly, instead of having to rely on food that is shipped in frozen.

    Look at the Royal Brompton, Look at the Royal Hampshire in Winchester. They have their own in house caterers and consequently foos is better.
    Take meal service out of "hotel services" hand it back to people that give a toss and then see where it gets you.
    And THAT is what you people who whinge on here should be doing . TM you could do a lot from your hospital bed.
    All this is doing is getting te Daily Mail readers wound up - BUT nothing will change!

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  48. I can't do much from my bed but I am trying to use humour to raise awareness of the importance of nutrition... my life and limb depends upon it! I know you must be frustrated. I would be, but please try to understand what I'm doing here. We know that if kitchens are put back in charge and really good food is introduced (Trellisk hospital for instance) the NHS will save money but don't get your blood pressure too high. I'll do all I can within the one metre radius of movement I have at the moment.

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  49. I have to say, I have been in a lot of hospitals for quitle a long time, and that looks like a good NHS meal Your doing qwll if thats as bad as its getting. Try speaking to the diatition as they can order any food under the sun if they think it would help you in any way. When I was in, I got take away pizza once a week and other stuff. well worth a chat!
    Good Luck

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  50. that green stuff looks like an old shirt of mine that i gave to my cat to play with. go the hairy bikers.

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