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Looking At You – daily life in the 21st century
Easter Story Biscuits Mars Bar Cake What are those pests in your house? New Traidcraft Fair Trade Fruit Snacks Chocolate at Easter What does your child have in the bedroom? Getting married this year? Can you afford to?! Is beauty or breakfast your priority each morning? Why you crave that cup of coffee
Easter Story Biscuits Prep. Time: 20 minutes Total Time: 1 day Ingredients: * 1 cup pecan nuts * 1 tsp. vinegar * 3 egg whites * 1 pinch salt * 1 cup sugar * large plastic bag * wooden spoon * tape * Bible
Instructions: 1. Preheat oven to 300°F. 2. Place pecans in the plastic bag and let the children beat them with the wooden spoon to break into small pieces. Explain that after Jesus was arrested he was beaten by the Roman soldiers. Read John 19:1-3. 3. Let each child smell the vinegar. Put 1 tsp. vinegar into mixing bowl. Explain that when Jesus was thirsty on the cross he was given vinegar to drink. Read John 19:28-30. 4. Add egg whites to vinegar. Eggs represent life. Explain that Jesus gave his life to give us life. Read John 10:10-11. 5. Sprinkle a little salt into each child's hand. Let them taste it and brush the rest into the bowl. Explain that this represents the salty tears shed by Jesus' followers, and the bitterness of our own sin. Read Luke 23:27. So far the ingredients are not very appetizing... 6. Add 1 cup sugar. Explain that the sweetest part of the story is that Jesus died because he loves us. He wants us to know and belong to him. Read Ps. 34:8 and John 3:16. 7. Beat with a mixer on high speed until stiff peaks are formed. Explain that the colour white represents the purity in God's eyes of those whose sins have been cleansed by Jesus. Read Isaiah 1:18 and John 3:1-3. 8. Fold in broken nuts. 9. Drop by teaspoons onto non-stick baking parchment-covered baking sheet. Explain that each mound represents the rocky tomb where Jesus' body was laid. Read Matthew 27:57-60. 10. Put the baking sheet in the oven, close the door and turn the oven OFF. 11. Give each child a piece of tape and seal the oven door. Explain that Jesus' tomb was sealed. Read Matthew 27:65-66. 12. GO TO BED! Explain that they may feel sad to leave them in the oven overnight. Jesus' followers felt despair when the tomb was sealed. Read John 16:20 and 22. 13. On Easter morning, open the oven and give everyone a cookie. Notice the cracked surface and take a bite. The cookies are hollow! On the first Easter Jesus' followers were amazed to find the tomb open and empty. Read Matthew 28:1-9.
Mars Bar Cake This quick and easy cake is a favourite in many families. Ingredients: 3 Mars bars; 150g butter;150g rice crispies; 150g chocolate Method: In a pan, slowly melt the Mars bars and butter together. Remove from the heat and add the rice crispies, a little at a time, until they are covered with the mixture. Spread mixture onto a baking sheet and place in the fridge until hard. Melt the chocolate and cover the mixture with it. Return to the fridge for a further half an hour. Cut into pieces
What are those pests in your house?
Spring is here, and soon you may find the odd insect wandering into your house. That’s okay, because you can easily send it back outside again.
But what happens if you come upon a colony of unwanted guests in the kitchen cupboard or loft? How do you know if they are easy to eradicate, or something that requires the services of a professional?
The British Pest Control Association has republished its ‘A-Z of Pests in Your Home’, which helps householders identify over 100 of the most common pests, from flies to moths, lice, ants, wasps, mice, rats and beetles.
The booklet will warn you of the damage your pests may do (which could give you a sleepless night!), but even better, offers advice on the best means of controlling the problem.
Copies of ‘An A-Z of Pests in Your Home’, are available for £4.95 including postage and packaging from the BPCA, 1 Gleneagles House, Vernon Gate, Derby DE1 1UP. Tel: 0870 609 2687 Fax: 01332 295904 Email: enquiry@bpca.org.uk
New Traidcraft Fair Trade Fruit Snacks
Now you can enjoy the delicious taste of South African, sun-dried fruit in a convenient snack pack, with the launch of Traidcraft Fair Trade Fruit Snacks.
Each 40g pack contains strips of 100% pure, dried pear, peach and nectarine from the Cape area of South Africa. With no added sugar, the snacks are a healthy and convenient way of enjoying dried fruit. Just half a pack provides one fruit portion towards the recommended 5 A DAY target for fruit and vegetables.
The fruit is packaged near Robertson, South Africa, providing valuable employment for the local workforce. Wages are above average for the region and country, and the well-being of employees is very important to the owners, who meet regularly with a committee appointed by the workers.
Working with Traidcraft is also bringing new hope for the future to young people in the area. Plans to develop the project include providing work for unemployed people from the town or nearby farms.
Traidcraft Fair Trade Fruit Snacks are available from Traidcraft by mail order (0870 443 1017) and online at www.traidcraftshop.co.uk, price £5 for 10 x 40g packs. They are also available as individual packs from selected stockists.
Chocolate at Easter
Chocolate. Just a mention of the word can trigger off all kinds of emotions: craving, greed, passion. Few foods have the ability to get such a hold on people. As you buy your Easter eggs and bunnies and whatever else this month, here are some of the facts of chocolate:
Where does chocolate come from? Chocolate is made from the seeds of the tropical cacao tree, theobroma cacao. The Greek word ‘theobroma’ means literally ‘food of the gods’. The Cacao Tree is found in Latin America, where temperatures are between 25 and 28 degrees.
Who first discovered it? The Aztecs. The cacao beans were used to prepare a hot, frothy beverage with stimulant and restorative properties, something like hot chocolate.
Who was (probably) the first chocoholic? The Emperor Montezuma. He drank 50 goblets a day of the frothy drink.
Who used chocolate as currency? The Aztecs. 100 cacao beans would buy a slave; 12 cacao beans bought the services of a courtesan, etc.
When did chocolate as we know it today begin? Surprisingly, not until 1879. That year Rodolphe Lindt had the inspired idea of triglyceride cocoa butter. The cocoa butter in chocolate contains saturated fat, but a normal level of consumption doesn’t have any bad effects.
At what point does a chocolate lover become a chocoholic? It is generally considered to be when a person feels impelled to consume 12 or more 60 gram bars of chocolate per week. Chocolate contains its own cannabinoid (a chemical that prolongs pleasurable sensations) and when you eat chocolate, there is an increased blood flow in areas of the brain which are also activated by addictive drugs such as cocaine.
But scientists agree that occasional over-indulging will cause no long-term problems… except perhaps around your waistline!
Get the best from your chocolate:
1 Keep your chocolate cool (16 – 18 degrees Centigrade) and in a dry, airtight place. 2 Never put your chocolate in the fridge (if you already have, let it warm to room temperature for a couple of hours before you eat it). 3 Bring out the full flavour of chocolate by drinking water with it. 4 If you are drinking tea or coffee, don’t bother with expensive chocolates – you won’t be able to appreciate them properly!
Counting the cost: Snickers: one 61g bar: 311 calories Crunchie: one 41g bar: 193 calories Mars: one 42g bar: 190 calories Twix: one single 29g bar: 144 calories. Bounty one funsize 29g bar: 141 calories Milky Way one 26g bar: 118 calories Kit Kat: one 12g finger: 61 cal
Calories in chocolate per 100 grams:
Milk chocolate: 588 Dark chocolate: 544 Cocoa powder: 452 Cocoa: 417
What does your child have in the bedroom?
Seven out of 10 children in Britain have a television in the bedroom, and five out of ten have their own DVD player. A third have their own computer. A third also have an Ipod or MP3 digital music player.
All it all, there is an estimated £28 billion worth of electronic equipment in our children’s rooms across the country – and sadly it is encouraging the disintegration of communal family life. For these sort of ‘toys’ are keeping children so engrossed that they are spending less and less time with their parents and siblings.
These are just some of the findings of a recent survey done for Lloyds TSB Insurance. The results of the survey have disturbed some psychologists, who believe that children are missing out on the more social outdoor activities enjoyed by previous generations. Previous studies have found that children tend to spend more time on their own if they have such electronic equipment in their bedrooms.
Many psychologists argue that family time is essential for parents to help children to develop into fully functional and happy adults.
You might ring round some recently married couples and ask them if they spent more than they had intended. How did they keep costs down? Or perhaps they were happy to spend, spend, spend!
Or you might invite older folk to tell you how little they had to spend on their wedding. Or you might want to run the article as is, and invite readers to ring you with their tips on how to keep costs down on a wedding. You could then print these next month.
Getting married this year? Can you afford to?!
The cost of marriage is soaring: the average price of a wedding has now reached a staggering £17,370. That is a five per cent national increase on last year’s figure, and more than twice the rate of inflation.
The research, done for insurers Weddingplan, was done on a regional basis. It was based on the costs of wedding attire, the church, flowers, transport, reception, stationery, photography, video, rings and honeymoon.
One glaring omission in the survey was the cost of a stag ‘do’ or a hen party. These are increasingly weekend-long affairs and have been known to cause extensive damage to bank accounts, never mind people’s livers!
The research has found that Northern Ireland and East Anglia were the two least expensive places to hold a wedding this year. London prices have gone up 13 per cent on last year, and a wedding there now will set you back an average of £22,906.
In 1999 the average cost of a wedding was £9,380. So the cost of a wedding has gone up by an astonishing 75 per cent to reach its current 2006 level of £17,370.
Regional costs: London: £22, 906 Scotland: £18,227 South-West: £17,971 West Midlands: £17,899 East Midlands: £17, 483 North: £16,945 North-East: £16,944 North-West: £16,793 South-East: £16,383 Wales: £16,293 East Anglia: £15,302 Northern Ireland: £15,296
Is beauty or breakfast your priority each morning?
When did you last sit down to have breakfast with your family? It seems that nowadays less than a third of parents eat with their children in the mornings. Nearly one in two adults breakfast alone, while one in five skips breakfast completely.
The survey, based on more than 2,300 people and carried out on behalf of British cereal growers, also found that women put beauty before food. Women value up to an hour each morning on their own, spending it in the shower, fixing their hair, putting on make-up and getting dressed.
This worries psychologists. Prof Geoffrey Beattie, of Manchester University, says: “The findings reveal a worrying obsession with oneself, rather than interacting with one’s partner or family. Women would feel much better about themselves by sharing their plans or thoughts for the day with their family. Grabbing a quick bite whilst dashing out the door isn’t the best way to start the day.”
40 per cent of men, on the other hand, admit that they get up and out of the house within 30 minutes of getting out of bed. So perhaps not much time for caring/sharing there, either!
Why you crave that cup of coffee
How many cups of coffee a day do you drink? The average for British adults is three cups a day. According to Nestle, which produces Nescafe and Gold Blend, our total coffee consumption has increased by 17 per cent over the last 10 years.
So why does coffee give you that extra buzz? Because it contains caffeine, which belongs to the same group of chemicals as morphine, cocaine and strychnine. The caffeine blocks an enzyme in the cells which dampens down the effects of the fight-or-flight hormone, adrenaline. This means that adrenaline continues to act on the cells for hours, instead of minutes.
Too much coffee drinking is not good for you. Major organs and muscles can go into overdrive. Coffee can also interfere with the absorption of certain nutrients, and prolonged use of coffee can damage the liver.
Caffeine is mildly addictive and you can expect withdrawal symptoms if you quit suddenly. Cutting down gradually is probably the best thing. There are no ‘safe’ recommended levels of coffee, because individual tolerance varies. |