James Hamilton on Culture, Technology and Art
Even with minimum pricing on its way, it’s not out of the question, and anyway, it’s an interesting challenge. Do the lower-priced wines match – can they match – with the kind of food you can put together on a budget on a Baby Belling? And the answer has to be, ultimately, yes. It’s a…
When you’re living in a small space, or share a kitchen, ideas about how to live and eat well using one appliance are always welcome. Here’s another. The price of good slow cookers has been dropping in recent years, and a small slow cooker will now cost you no more than £20. And anyway, it’s…
One of the bigger issues around not owning your own place – or owning your own, very small place – is the difficulty of making it into a real home, getaway and refuge. One of the most alienating features of many cheaper living spaces is the smell: old carpet, stale air, other people’s cigarettes from…
One of the most difficult things an artist on a tight budget experiences is sourcing adequate canvas or watercolour paint to work on. After the essential paints and brushes, canvas – whether canvas paper, canvas board or stretched canvases – is the most expensive item on the kit list. And given that everything that can…
I was taught to cook by Italians. In a clapped-out 1970s kitchen, with little more than a couple of battered saucepans, a colander and a small cutting knife, they’d turn tinned tomatoes, “value†spaghetti, a bag of onions, some mushrooms and a block of cheese into delicious, aromatic meals. It was a lesson in food…
If there’s one advantage to the lingering conservatism of male clothing, especially mens’ clothing for work, it’s that it’s still possible to look extremely well-dressed for a relatively small amount of money. What’s more, that small amount of money is spread over a long period, because this is the kind of clothing that lasts. But…
Not that there’s anything wrong with Bisto, mind: but after a while, getting the lumps out, the excessive saltiness or unsaltedness (depending) of the stuff, the sheer sense of take-out about the whole exercise as your teaspoon circles again around the pyrex jug of brown gloop… No. There is a better way, and it’s a…
Of course, the advent of digital photography, disposing as it did with the endless cost sink of film and film processing, pretty much created Garreteer photography on its own. That, and the new trend to explore the possibilities of cheap, badly-made, often “joke” cameras, but there was always one other option open to the person…
If I was asked to describe how the British saw meditation, I’d reply, “weird relaxation”: the British see it as a suspect means of getting some peace of mind that’s tied up in alien religions and general absurdity. As a result, people go to meditation in search of peace and relaxation, and when they don’t…
Bottled salad dressing is – if we’re honest – pretty horrible stuff, in the main. Often over-vinegared, full of dry, flavourless bits and grotesquely overpriced. You may reserve a place in your heart, if you wish, for Heinz Salad Cream, but otherwise, get yourself a screwtop jar and make your own according to this simple…
Making your own pasta sauce is essential: the most basic gateway to real cooking that there is. At its simplest, you can make a really wonderful meal out of fresh pasta, made shiny with olive oil and dusted with parmesan. If it’s fresh spinach tortellini, the meal even has a vegetable ingredient to it. But…
Compared to the situation only twenty years ago, getting into cycling on a budget is hard. Much harder, and that’s partly down to changes in fashion. Before the arrival of mountain and hybrid bikes, the cyclist was faced with a straightforward choice for town travelling – a traditional derailleur-geared touring cycle, or the smaller, often…
