Our lovely juice carafe's first birthday is coming up, and to celebrate we'd like to dedicate a nice poem to it.
Not being great poets ourselves (see below if you need further proof), we'd love you to have a go at coming up with a fitting tribute. It needs to start with the line "It’s our juice carafe’s first birthday", and it should follow the rhyming pattern ABABCDCD, so you might want to avoid sticking an orange at the end of a line. A little bit like the one below, but much, much better:
It’s our juice carafe’s first birthday, And we’re planning a bit of a do, We’ll probably play some reggae, And dance a little bit too. Someone will bake a big cake, Hopefully with jam and cream, Then we’ll all be too stuffed to stay awake, So we’ll fall asleep and dream.
Leave your poem as a comment to this post and the 3 we like most will each win a case of our finest juice. We'll be picking the winners on Thursday February 2nd so get your entries in by the end of the day on Wednesday.
So turns out that today is actually Blue Monday a.k.a officially the most depressing day of the year (and not last Monday like we read in some other place).
Anyways, if your Monday is turning out less than chipper or you're just a bit fed up and waiting for home time, soak up this Blue Monday instead
We're not really in the habit of plugging new album releases. Actually, we don't ever plug new album releases. Not even stuff by JLS. But we're happy to tell you that two very talented musicians have a new album out. It's called Area 52 by Rodrigo y Gabriela. If you've not listened to them, you should. They make nice music. And we're big fans.
To celebrate their new album they've given us a signed Yamaha guitar to give away. The guitar's worth £500, and looks a bit like the one here, only signed (Rodrigo y Gabriela are currently touring in Mexico but will sign it when they get back to the UK next month).
The winner will get the signed guitar and a pair of tickets to one of Rodrigo y Gabriela's February UK shows (city of your choosing). Ten runners up will get a CD of the new album posted to them.
To enter, just let us know what your favourite song of all time is* (leaving it as a comment to this post). Deadline for entries is 6pm Sunday 29th January. We'll pick a winner and ten runners up at random next week. The lucky winner will find themselves a signed guitar and a pair of gig tickets richer, ten runners up will be one very good album better off and, if nothing else, we'll all have some jolly good song suggestions to make a monster playlist from.
* Please note - the song you choose will not in any way affect your chances of winning, no matter how bad it is.
Fancy something different to an overpriced heart shaped pizza in a restaurant packed to the rafters with shiny balloons this year? Then look no further, because this Valentine's weekend, our friends at food charity FareShare are collaborating with Forgotten Feast and their eco-chef Tom Hunt to produce a unique 3 course banqueting experience – Valentines for Everyone.
For £40 you'll get a fantastic 3 course feast of delicious but unwanted food that might otherwise end up in landfill. Not because there's something wrong with it, but because too much was ordered, it was in the wrong packaging or it was just a bit wonky.
Vegetarians and meat eaters will both be catered for and everyone will sit together for the feast, so even if you don't have a date you won't have to dine alone. The banquet will be held in FareShare’s east London warehouse, and every ticket sold will enable FareShare to provide an additional 80 meals for the hungry and vulnerable people they support, thanks to grant-giving charity StreetSmart who are generously matching the number of meals raised though ticket sales. FareShare rescues surplus food year round and delivers it to local charities all over the country.
Tickets are available for dinner Friday 10th February, Saturday 11th, Sunday 12th (late lunch) and for dinner on Valentine’s Day itself and include 3 courses, a drink and canapés. Get them here.
And to see the work we've been doing recently to prevent perfectly good fruit from going to waste then take a look at our taste not waste project here.
First things first, thank you to everyone who entered. A great man once said that people who suggest messages to be written on the bottom of bottles will go far in life, and great men aren't to be argued with. From nearly 1000 entries we deliberated, procrastinated, pontificated and debated our way to a shortlist. And then we had lunch because we were hungry.
After lunch we deliberated, procrastinated, pontif- you get the gist - again. And our shortlist became a bit shorter. But we couldn't pick an outright winner. So we had a cup of tea and a biscuit and thought, hang about, why don't we just have three winners? And that was that.
Your three winners, who will each see their words on thousands of our bottoms in the not too distant future (as well as winning a fridge full of smoothies) are...
Have you tried looking behind the sofa? (Chris)
G'day from Down Under (Nadine Dawes)
For rescue: Insert note. Throw in sea. (Tony)
Well done to Chris, Nadine and Tony, and thanks again to everyone who entered.
With Waterstones making the shock decision to remove the apostrophe from their name, we were wondering if it might inspire some other fine establishments to do the same with their signs.
Being a group of mature adults we like to write secret messages on the bottom of our smoothie bottles and then giggle like children because we've used the word bottom and no-one has told us off. You might have discovered them for yourself, and had a wee chuckle when you did.
Well, we're thinking about adding some new messages to our bottles, and thought you'd like to have a go at writing one. We did the same thing a few years back, which is how Iain's 'trapped in bottle factory, send help' came to be on millions of our little bottles.
The rules are pretty simple - add your suggestion as a comment to this blog post, using no more than 40 characters (including spaces), and we'll pick our favourite (or favourites if there are lots of good ones) on Tuesday 10th January. Next thing you know, you're a published writer, and people around the country are chuckling at your words, throwing money at you and asking you to be godparent to their child and stuff. Such is the power of the hidden message.
We'll also send our favourite entries a shed load of smoothies, of course. Remember - 40 characters, winners picked on Tuesday, enter as many times as you like, guaranteed fortune and fame awaits.
Or should we say start, as for our first official bit of news for 2012, we are thrilled to announce that our new juice blends are now in the shops.
You can choose from our delicious apple and raspberry recipe or totally tasty tropical (sorry), depending on whether you need to be transported to a dappled orchard or a desert island.
You can find them in ASDA right now and in other shops very soon (we'll keep you posted as to where and when).
Given that at least one person you know will be on some sort of miserable cabbage maple syrup nothing beginning with C diet right now, why not cheer them up with a bit of sunshine in a carafe?
Or better still, give their eyes and ears a treat courtesy of a shady orange grove and the dulcet tones of Captain Jean Luc Picard.
Or even better still, if you fancy winning yourself a case of our new blends, just tell us your top 3 most ridiculous New Year's resolutions below and the 10 that make us laugh the most will each win a case of our new juice.
We'll pick the winners on Friday 20th January, so get your entries in.
This competition is now closed. Thanks to everyone who entered. Congratulations to Katie B, Kieran W, Karen G, Thom B, Yasna, Andi G, Bex, Kerri W, Samantha S and Steven Y. A box 'o' blends winging their way to you very soon.
We've had the bananaphone in Fruit Towers since Day 1 (even though it went walkies for a few years and was taken hostage along the way too). You can call it whenever you like to ask whatever you like and whilst you might not get the authority on Austrian dirndl techniques, you will always get an answer of some sort and someone jovial to chat to.
And interestingly, it turns out that bananas could end up being phones of the future, thanks to some smart folk over in Japan.
A couple of professors at the University of Tokyo have created a clever augmented reality that can make normal household gubbins into communication devices.
Pizza box into laptop. Pack of cards into an iPod.
Feedback Madagascar is one of the non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that we support.The project we support promotes yam farming with training on yam cultivation techniques, the creation of demonstration plots and household plantations. Working with twelve community forest management associations, over 250 people are already producing and yams are taking off.
Famous for providing the fuel for Usain Bolt’s sprinting successes, the yam is commonly confused as a sweet potato (they are un-related), they are similar in properties.
“Anyone for yams?!”
The project is based around the Malagasy rainforest, where people are reliant on inadequate rice and cassava harvests; the cultivation of yams reduces the impact of the annual famine and dramatically ups people’s nutritional intake.
And yams are fun! To raise awareness of yams and their benefits, alongside rainforest conservation, there are now yam festivals! Associations take stands, organise competitions, cook offs, speeches and full-on carnival singing and dancing.
As part of the project, training on culinary techniques is included to make the most of the yam.
Here are 6 of their suggested recipes:
Yam Pudding
Yam Crisps
Yam Pizza
Yam Soup
Yam salad
Baked Yam.
Here in Fruit Towers, we think they all sound delicious and the soup sounds like a great defence against winter.
If you fancy trying your hand at Yam Pudding, here is an embellished Western version:
Ingredients:
800g grated uncooked yams
300g milk
120g golden syrup
3 eggs
2 tablespoons butter or margarine
120g brown sugar
1tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp salt
½ tsp ground nutmeg
Preheat oven to 160˚c
Grease baking dish (approx 8”x8”x2”)
Combine all ingredients
Bake until a knife comes out of mixture clean, approx 1 hour.
Serve warm with cream or ice cream
For more information on Feedback Madagascar, please visit our foundations page: www.innocentfoundation.org/ or their own website: www.feedbackmadagascar.org
A couple of weeks ago we ran a competition for ten lucky schools to win a blender* from us as part of our taste not waste campaign, and we're delighted to announce that the following schools will be receiving their prizes in the new year: Trotts Hill Primary and Nursery School, Stevenage, Littledean C of E School, Gloucestershire, All Saints School, Putney Common, Rudyard Kipling Primary School, Brighton, Belvedere Infant School, Kent, The Acorns Centre Short Stay School, Lancashire, Courtlands School Widey Lane, Plymouth, Emmbrook Junior School, Wokingham, Dorothy Goodman School, Leicestershire and New York Primary School, North Shields.
Thanks to everyone who entered. It really wasn't easy picking the winners at all.
Mariah, Elton and Cliff are firm fixtures on the office playlist, the chocolate tin is steadily filling with empty wrappers and we're eating a lot more cheese. Christmas is most definitely on its way.
'Tis the season to be jolly, but we've got a few tips from our friends at Wrap and the WWF to help you get through the festivities as responsibly as possible.
1. Make friends with your freezer
A defrosted freezer is a happy freezer. It's also a more efficient freezer. And a man (or woman) who doesn't have to pick his way through 6 inches of ice just to get to his emergency pizza after a night on the tiles is a very happy man.
Each year in Britain we throw away around £12 billion worth of perfectly good food from our homes, most of which ends up in landfill. So over Christmas it's worth making full use of your freezer to store any food you won't get to eat in time. It's also handy for keeping bread in if you know you won't get through the whole loaf.
2. Wear your Christmas jumper with pride and turn down that heating
You'll look good, you'll feel good and you'll save money.
3. Embrace the Brussels sprout
Buy local, buy less and enjoy more seasonal fruit and vegetables such as spuds, parsnips and Brussels sprouts. Visit Eat Seasonably for information about what fruit and veg is in season now and visit Wrap for tips on how to reduce food waste.
Marisa became so fond of our little hats during the Big Knit that she decided she wanted to see even more of them. Not content with just popping them on top of the cat ornaments on her mantlepiece or her hard boiled eggs, she made them into a very special advent calendar by embroidering numbers on each one. Apparently her friends are already putting their orders in for next year.
It sure beats the usual cardboard chocolate offerings and is a lovely way to make use of the hats when the drinks they once sat upon are nothing but a distant memory.
Tired of always getting rubbish jokes in festive crackers?
Sick of reading the one about the grape being stepped on?
Wine no more.
Just copy and paste the jokes below, print them out on office stationery before you go home for the holidays and then cut them into little slips to wedge inside the crackers come Christmas Day.
Here's ho-ho-hoping they provide at least 20 seconds of festive fun
Why didn’t the Eskimo need to write down his Christmas shopping list?
Because Inuit
Why does Santa have three gardens?
So he can 'ho ho ho!'
Why did Santa lay off the egg nog?
Because it was bad for his elf
What did one snowman say to the other snowman?
“Can you smell carrots?”
Why should you invite a mushroom to your Christmas party?
Because he's a fun guy to be around
How do snowmen get around?
They ride an icicle
Who hides in the bakery at Christmas?
A mince spy
What does the Christmas weather forecast look like, darling?
Rain, dear
What do angry rodents send each other at Christmas?
Cross-mouse cards
What does Santa do with fat elves?
Sends them to the Elf Farm
What’s red and white and goes ‘Oh oh oh’?
Santa walking backwards
N.B Some of these jokes were written by us. The rest were shamefully pillaged and plagarised from the internet. We're not proud. But we are honest.
Anorak and Ploc are two of our favourite things that are made out of paper. They are happy magazines for kids, full of brilliant writing, beautiful illustrations (Ploc being entirely illustrated by the 60s French legend Alain Gree) and generally ace stuff. And the happy folks there have kindly given us five of their Anorak/Ploc Christmas bundles to give away. To win one (and if you have children or eyes, you'll want to win one) all you have to do is answer the following question:
Thanks to everyone who entered, this competition is now closed, congratulations to the following people: Annie Kent, Melanie Sramek, Darren Maynard, Cherrie Ouerghi and Matthew Butler. Someone from Anorak will be in touch shortly.
innocent foundation
