We've been getting very excited about autumn. We found a load of fruit in the UK that we've made into a seasonal recipe, available in little bottles and big cartons. And we've made a film about it too...
It's good to get ingredients from harvest to bottle in a matter of days, so we hope you enjoy this recipe. From field to fridge in the blink of an eye.
We decided to start a monthly office gig night, the innocent Madchester music club. Secretly I wanted the opportunity to dig out my Affleck's flares and hoodie from my Wigan college days, so we headed down to The After Show, a night which is the brainwave of Danny McNamara from Embrace.
Who better to meet at the inaugural event than Clint Boon, one time organ player with the Inspiral Carpets (sadly without his magnificent carpet barnet he sported back in the Madchester days).
Clint is our kid Fiona's favourite DJ. You can listen to him on XFM or venture down to South on a Saturday for his Disco Rescue club night where he plays the coolest old and new indie tunes.
Clint's a really friendly, down-to earth guy, as is Romeo from the Magic Numbers, who I bumped into coming out of the loos. I think I'd better point out at this juncture that I wasn't hanging round the Gents trying to track down male rock stars, it just happens that the toilets in Sankey's are unisex.
Romeo told me he drinks our smoothies most days, so he was especially pleased to be given one for an energy boost before going on stage. They played a fantastic gig - it was wicked seeing them in such an intimate venue. After they finished we downed our smoothies and caught the disco bus home.
Congratulations to Danny and all involved as the night was a huge success and we look forward to returning soon.
by our Vic in the Manchester office (pictured with Clint)
Fergus Drennan (Wild Man, Wild Food) is a professional forager whose diet consists of about 50% wild food. His website features such delicacies as a recipe for pan fried squirrels. Mmm.
Fergus and some sloes
Intrigued by Fergus's unique view on where to find fine ingredients, our recipe inventors headed off to the Kent coast to meet him and learn more about the unusual foods that are growing on our doorstep.
hunting for seaweed
It was a long day which consisted of foraging for, among other things, seaweed, samphire, sloes, rosehips and seabuckthorn berries.
seabuckthorn berries
Lucy, samphire and seaweed
The day ended with a squirrel-free bonfire on the beach, cooking up all the food that had been foraged. And we returned to Fruit Towers full of slightly odd ideas about what to put in our next smoothie. We'll let you know if we manage to crack a seaweed recipe.
We've been working on the rest for a while. But today is when we can finally announce that we got to 100%. Our bottles are now made from 100% recycled plastic. It's a world first, and heralds a huge reduction in our carbon footprint. Here are some facts, comparing the new bottle's impact versus the old 50% recycled version:
20% reduction in materials (we've made the bottle lighter)
55% carbon reduction
100% recycled content
100% recyclable
100% food safe
Next up, we're changing our label paper so that it's made from 25% recycled content and 75% FSC certified paper, and we'll be working on getting this better too.
Making our business better involves a series of steps. Sometimes they're small and almost unnoticeable; sometimes they're pretty big and have a large impact on the way we treat the planet. Today is one of the slightly bigger days, but we'll keep doing the small stuff too. We'll keep working on the rest, because we want to build a company that we can be proud of.
We'll be in direct contact with all 3 winners via flickr mail very soon. Congratulations to all of you on your imminent year's supply of smoothies. Don't drink it all at once.
We've tried loads of strawberries over the years and have realised that Senga Sengana is the variety that tastes best. And seeing as we want our drinks to taste the best, that's the variety we use. Senga isn't grown in the UK, so we go to Poland to get ours. We were there a few weeks ago, and made a little film while we were there.
This season's crop has been excellent - you can taste and see the difference - check out the deep red
colour and intense flavour of our strawberries and bananas smoothie at
the moment.
(NB This is a picture of a former innocent legend, Mat A, who left us to roam the world and seek his fortune. He's still sporting a rare plum coloured innocent t-shirt from 2001 and what seems to be a big gun.)
We thought our big knit hatometer needed a bit of a boost so we had a lunchtime knitting lesson from some of the ladies from Age Concern Hounslow. We enjoyed it so much that a tea, biscuit and knitting lunchtime group is sure to follow.
It's been over ten long years since Wicksy first sat down at a piano and tinkled out 'Every Loser Wins' (they had amazing acoustics in the Queen Vic back then). Well this week we learnt the true poignancy of Wicksy's words the hard way.
Do you remember our attempt to break the world record for the longest bunting in the world at our village fete in Regent's Park? Well, we failed. We didn't quite make it. The current record is still held by Wendy Hughes, helped by 6,000 Buckinghamshire school children.
It's taken us a while to measure up all the different bits of bunting but the final total came to 0.455 miles, 771.72 metres short of the record unfortunately.
But as Wicksy sang, every loser does indeed win and we have also won in many ways...
You sent us so much beautifully handmade bunting that we felt truly in awe of your creativity and dedication.
We got to hang out with the Girl Guides for a weekend as they helped us to organise our attempt.
It got us all together for a lunch time of bunting making at Fruit Towers and cheered the office up with the tangles we put up afterwards (I bet the Central Office of Information has never looked like this on a random Wednesday in July).
We're sorry that we failed, but you can't win them all. We feel humble in our failure but would like to thank every single one of you who helped or donated bunting to the attempt.
Just watch this space next year, we're determined to get in that book now.
(Oh and if you fancy getting yourself one of those ghetto blasters that were all the rage in Albert Square in 1986 then have a look here).
Julie Dabasiya on toast anyone?
anna on summer reads (makes me feel fine)
Julie Dabasiya on summer reads (makes me feel fine)
colette on summer reads (makes me feel fine)
micho on summer reads (makes me feel fine)
abi on summer reads (makes me feel fine)
Seppo on the people's label
Holly on summer reads (makes me feel fine)
micho on the people's label