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Top Articles 06/04/2010 How to host the perfect BBQ BBQ Tips: How to host the perfect BBQ from Giftlab.co.uk
Here in the UK the sun pops out from behind a cloud for five minutes and everyone's changing into their shorts and t-shirts (while the Prof just takes all his clothes off so he's naked under his lab coat – it isn't a pretty sight). It's no surprise then, that after a week of constant sunshine, BBQ season has officially begun. As you know, here at giftlab.co.uk we like to make ourselves useful so with the first whiffs of a BBQ (We smelt the first one on Mother's Day... can anyone beat that? Comment below if you can and you might win a prize!) we were already leafing through cook books, searching the web, and trying out our own styles of cooking so that we could give you our Top Ten Tips on how to host the perfect BBQ and a range of recipes guaranteed to win over your guests. So, without further ado here's how you can impress all your friends and family with your outdoor cooking skills: Cooking:
- Marinate the meat overnight and remember to baste it during the last 5-10 minutes of grilling.
- Season the grill with olive oil and rosemary before you start cooking – it adds a little extra that will leave everyone saying “mmmm... how did you get that flavour?”
- When using wooden skewers always soak well in water before use – obviously we would advise doing away with the wooden skewers and cooking everything on our BBQ sword. http://www.giftlab.co.uk/product_details_34_18_bbq-sword---as-featured-on-the-gadget-show.html
- If you want the meat to cook through quickly, bring it to room temperature before you place it on the grill. Not only does it speed up the cooking time but it will also drain the fat better.
- For a little extra flavour add a powdered spice to your meat (make some without though – remember, not everyone likes spicy food)
- Light the BBQ well in advance (follow manufacturer’s instructions) before you plan to start cooking – make sure you use enough charcoal, and wait until it is glowing red (with a powdery grey surface) before you start cooking.
- Cooking in a windy area could prolong the cooking time so make sure you pick a sheltered spot before you light the BBQ (obviously don't light the BBQ and then decide to move it – this is dangerous.)
- Always keep a bucket of water by you in case of an emergency.
- If your BBQ is a spontaneous one and it's getting dark, make sure you have enough light to see what you're doing. You don't want to end up with burnt sausages and you certainly don't want to start a fire.
- Don't be lazy – a clean grill not only cooks better but it won't leave a disgusting taste on the food.
Food tips: For the veggies (and veggies who eat fish!):
- Monkfish barbecues really well - it is just meaty enough to hold together well. Why not try Monkfish kebabs on rosemary skewers with ciabatta and pancetta – a giftlab favourite!
- Salmon and tuna also go really well on the BBQ, but otherwise you would probably need to look at a whole fish (possibly in foil!) like sea bass or trout if you want to cook fish on your BBQ.
- Try par boiling baby new potatoes then making a bag out of some tin foil add olive oil, seasoning and some fresh rosemary and pop them on the BBQ. You can use the same technique for most veggies but if you are cooking asparagus like that try to make sure to keep them flat so they all cook evenly. With Butternut squash you will need to quarter it and scoop out the seeds then wrap in foil.
- Timing these veggies is really quite difficult; as it will depend on the size of the veg and the temperature of the barbecue but normally they'll take about the same time as they would in an oven.
- Buy a corn on the cob and barbecue it with the husks on. Then when it is about done use some oven gloves and pull the husks off - you will probably need a pair of scissors to make sure you have them completely off otherwise they will catch light. Another giftlab favourite.
For the carnivores:
- To make a good pork chop try this recipe: crush some garlic cloves, mix with some grated stem ginger, some ground cumin, ground coriander seeds and chilli powder. Then add just enough sesame oil and dark soy to make it all sticky and gooey. Brush this onto the chops and throw them on the BBQ. Then use the BBQ Sword to hold them over the BBQ with the fat down so it crisps up nicely like instant crackling!
- To cook the perfect chicken take it off the bone and lie it on a chopping board, cover it with cling film and bash it with a meat mallet or rolling pin until it's half a cm thick all over. (It's important it's the same thickness so it cooks at the same speed throughout). Crush a garlic clove and mix with a teaspoon of paprika, a teaspoon of grainy mustard and a teaspoon of honey. Smother this mix over both sides of the chicken - but not so much that it drips - and chuck it straight on the barbie. With the chicken so thin it will cook quickly and safely. You can make a sauce using the remainder of the paprika/mustard mixture - just heat it gently in a pan with either some plain Greek yoghurt or some double cream. Yummy.
- Steak is one of the best cuts of meat to barbecue. Just score it on one side with some ground black pepper and brushed with olive oil to stop it sticking. It is quite difficult to go wrong with cooking a steak on the BBQ but a common mistake is to turn it too often. Ideally you should only turn the steak once.
- For burgers mix the spices (salt, pepper etc) and add them into the patties making sure they're around ¾ inch thick. Make sure you use ground beef that has at least 20% fat as you need that for the juices. Make an indentation in the centre of the burger to eliminate the “plumping” in the middle then throw them on the BBQ.
A nice side salad:
- Bean salad: Get some cans of mixed beans from the supermarket, rinse them thoroughly and add some canned sweetcorn, chopped spring onions and red peppers along with a jar of salsa. This will go beautifully with the barbecued meats.
- Pasta Salad : Use coloured shapes mixed with peppers, apple, celery, grapes and a low-fat dressing of yogurt, curry powder and mango chutney.
- New Potatoes tossed with fresh mint and chives or jacket potatoes with a cottage cheese topping.
Sauces & Dips:
- Natural yogurt, 45ml(3tbsp), Curry paste, 15ml(1tbsp), Lemon juice, 5ml(1tsp)
- Pineapple, crushed, 432g can Chilli sauce, 30ml(2tbsp) Garlic cloves, 2 crushed
- Wine, 150ml red or white Fresh Herbs, chopped, 30ml(2tbsp) Olive oil, 15ml(1tbsp) Garlic cloves, 2, crushed
Finally - Safety:
- Don't leave the BBQ unattended.
- Ensure that the ‘chef’ wears an apron and washes hands before cooking and in between putting food on and taking it off the BBQ.
- Keep all raw and cooked food separate and keep it “wrapped and refrigerated”.
- Keep meat refrigerated for as long as possible before cooking – and put the oven on to keep them warm after cooking.
- Use separate BBQ utensils when handling raw and cooked food.
- Check sausages and burgers are cooked through, (juices should run clear). Steaks being ‘solid’ meat rather than minced or chopped are quite safe eaten when cooked to rare or medium.
- Make sure frozen meat is thoroughly thawed (unless otherwise stated) before cooking and do not refreeze once thawed.
22/04/2010 Tips to make your meal smooth
- There are basically three kinds of wines; reds, whites and Sparkling. A red wine typically is usually a heavier and more complex wine, where a white wine is typically considered a lighter and sweeter wine. Sparkling wines, called Champagne if they come from a particular region in France, is a wine where the fermentation process causes the wine to bubble. Sparkling wines are unique and I will not go into too much detail with them other to say that they tend to go very well with appetizers or with the opening course in a meal.
- Red wines are normally considered a heartier and heavier wines and tend go well with red meats such as steak, with hearty pastas and with meats in heavier sauces. White wines are lighter and tend to go better with white meat such as chicken and fish and with lighter pastas in a cream sauce. As stated above these are simple guidelines and are not set rules, especially since both white and red wines have many varieties with different characteristics.
- Another determining factor in choosing a wine is what your guests and yourself prefer. Some people like white wines where other people would rather drink red. If a person does not enjoy a red wine it would be foolish to serve them a Cabernet Sauvignon just because you are serving a Lasagne. Luckily because of the many different kinds of red and white wines you can usually find a white or red wine to go with most foods.
- Pairing a wine with a particular food as I have said is often times a personal choice that depends on ones tastes and the one time non-breakable rule that once applied to which wine to drink with which food is disappearing. In an effort to help panicked hosts out there decide upon the right wine for their meal I will suggest certain wines for certain meals. Steaks and other red meats do tend to go better with heartier red wines such as a Cabernet Sauvignon, a Zinfandel, a Syrah, an Australian Shiraz or a Merlot but if your guest doesn’t like red wines then I would suggest serving a dry and well aged Chardonnay that has been aged in oak. Pork tends to go well with a Beaujolais, a Pinot Noir, a Pinot Gris or a Chardonnay. Turkey tends to go well with a Chardonnay, a Chablis, a Pinot Noir, a Syrah, or a Beaujolais. With chicken it tends to depend on how it is made and with what sauce is on it. When chicken is barbequed, heavily marinated or has a heavier sauce on it I would suggest that it be served with a Zinfandel, a Syrah, or a White Burgundy. Chicken that is grilled, baked or broiled goes well with a Chardonnay, a Sauvignon Blanc, a Pinot Grigio, a Pinot Noir or even a Burgundy. Fish normally go well with a Chardonnay, a Sauvignon Blanc, a Pinot Noir or a Beaujolais. The Pinot Noir and the Beaujolais are red wines but will still work with the fish since they are lighter reds. With salmon, which is a heavier and oilier fish, it tends to go well with a Chardonnay, a Riesling, a Pinot Noir or a Beaujolais. Shell fish tend to go well with a Chardonnay, a Chenin Blanc, a Sauvignon Blanc or a Riesling. If you must have a red wine with the shell with I would suggest a Beaujolais. With Pastas it depends on the sauce. When eating Pasta with a red sauce a Cabernet Sauvignon, a Zinfandel, a Syrah, a Chianti, or even a Pinot Blanc go well. When eating a Pasta in a lighter white cream sauce a Chardonnay or a Sauvignon Blanc go well but a Merlot can be drank as well if you prefer a red wine. Lastly, deserts tend to go better with sweeter wines such as a Gewurztraminer, a Port, a Riesling, or a White Zinfandel.
- As you can see most foods can go with either a white or a red wine, depending on how dry or sweet the wine is as well as the complexity of the wine. There is one rule though that I strongly suggest you follow. Many times hosts may have several wines with a meal. If you do that then its normally best to go from lighter to dark. As such, you might start off with a Champagne, which as I said earlier goes well with appetizers or with the opening course in a meal, then go to a lighter white wine if your having a lighter meal such as chicken or fish or red wine with heartier and heavier meal. You can switch back to a sweeter wine for desert but I suggest allowing your guests to cleanse their pallet with some bread or water since a heartier and heavier red wine can change the taste of a sweeter wine and make it taste odd.
30/04/2010 Because you need it So, because we know you can never have enough information at your fingertips when it comes to researching and buying a Holga, Diana or Lomo camera we've been busy doing some more research online. So far, the best rule is this: Whichever camera you choose, remember that the point of lo-fi photography is to have fun and don't sweat the details! Doesn't that just make the whole decision easier?
Also, if you're torn between the Holga and Diana+ then this little fact should help ease the stress: Photographically speaking, they produce very similar photos. One isn't better at making photos than the other. The Diana+ is more expensive, but you get a more flexibility (pinhole aperture, interchangeable lenses)
The real reason why we're posting this though is to encourage all of you to follow the antics at http://goholga.com/ The idea is that one camera is purchased, someone takes photos with one roll of film, gets them developed, uploads them and then passes the camera on to the next person. Not only will it give you some great ideas as to the kind of photos you can take with your own camera but it unites Lomo lovers across the world.
What more could you want?
20/04/2010 Tips from photographer Elliot Muir
Tips on How To Use Your Holga Camera from giftlab.co.uk and Elliot Muir
words by Elliot Muir
Whenever art or culture gets too sophisticated and tidy, you’ll usually find some creative insurgent unpicking it all, urgently trying to find something random and rootsy underneath. The Holga camera is the latest incarnationof lo-fi chic, and is currently ripping up the red carpet of mainstream digital photography. Holga is unashamedly the worst camera ever made. All the flaws that grown-up camera manufacturers have spent decades trying to eradicate are joyriding around her insides. Technically she is classed as a toy camera, but don’t be fooled – in the right hands she’s a serious creative tool with the potential to make your brain glow rainbows.
Part of Holga’s great charm is that her users require hardly any photographic experience to start making quirky images. By far the best approach is to shoot first and ask questions later, but here are a few tips to help start you off.
WHERE TO BUY:
Buy your Holga online at www.giftlab.co.uk or www.lomography.comBe very careful on ebay, most of them come from Hong Kong and include a Free Gift!! but you may have to wait2 Months!! for delivery. If you can’t wait, then try the Photographers Gallery in Covent Garden, but be preparedto pay more. You shouldn’t ever pay more than around £40 or £50 for a brand new Holga.
FILM:
Generally, most pros will agree that pound for pound, film yields more vibe than digital. Holga has been built to work with high grade 120mm film, which is fairly near the top of tree in terms of image quality and resolution. You usually get what you pay for – cheap grade consumer film is a false economy. To find out more, have a good look at www.lomography.com/filmshop – then check out www.ebay.com or www.7dayshop.com for the bestprices.
SHOOTING:
• Always make sure that the little switch on the bottom is set to N – this is the Normal setting. B stands for Bulb and you only use this at night for long exposures. Return it to N after making long exposures or you’ll blur and overexpose all your shots.
• Holga needs a lot of light. You’ll probably find that you have to use flash for most shots that aren’t in bright
sunlight.
• Be careful with the back of the camera, it has a tendency to fall off and wipe your film. Opening the back of the camera very slightly with film inside will give you ‘light leaks’ – magical peachy stains of retro analogue authenticity. They’re great.
• Pimp up your Holga. Go to www.squarefrog.co.uk and www.holgamods.com for detailed advice on modificationsand experimental techniques.
PROCESSING:
Most Holga people get their films processed by mail order. One popular place is www.spectrumimaging.co.uk but also try www.spectrumphotolabs.co.uk – they’re a bit more expensive but the quality of their work is faultlessand they still do proper B&W processing. On the high street, Snappy Snaps and Jessops are good, but pricey.
SHARING:
Show your pics on Flickr and you’ll soon get an idea of what works and what doesn’t. Flickr group forums are thebest place to find answers to any technical difficulties you may have. Check out –
www.flickr.com/groups/86881528@N00/
www.flickr.com/groups/dontforgettotakethelenscapoff
www.flickr.com/groups/holgachic
www.flickr.com/groups/holgaweekly
SUCCESS
Holga is rapidly gaining acceptance as a legitimate tool for both editorial and fine art photographic work, so there are some pretty exciting new opportunities opening up. Just remember not to take it too seriously; Holga works best when you leave space for chaos.
Elliot Muir is a graphic designer, writer and photographer – you can see more of his work at www.flickr.com/photos/elliotmuir
For the full press release and photos go to http://www.giftlab.co.uk/blog/?p=73
30/04/2010 I'm As Big As...? The Hunt for Celebrity Heights Here at www.giftlab.co.uk we love the I'm As Big As Height Chart. It provides hours of entertainment in the office as we grab anyone who walks through our door, pin them up against the wall and then laugh hysterically at them for being the size of a moustache. But... well... no one's been to visit us for a while (except an old lady who wanted to pick up her order in person but we felt bad pinning her against the wall) and there's only so many times we can measure each other while standing on different objects (FYI The Prof is A giant panda sitting down with no shoes on, he's Elvis when standing on a box full of Floating Chain Wine Bottle Holders, an adult Male Gorilla when the box breaks from the weight, and when he stands on his head he's a Giant... work that one out?!) so I've made it my mission to put the chart to good use. I vow that throughout this blog I will track down as many celebrities as I can, hold a tape measure to their head, take a quick picture and then leg it before they work out what's going on. I come up with a plan of action... I'll start off by hunting down the Z-Listers and I'll end up measuring an A-Lister. How hard can it be? They're only people after all. I begin to change the places I hang out. Gone are my night's in with a Chinese takeaway and a bit of EastEnders. Instead I'm dressing up and heading to Hoxton, isn't that where they all hang out? It must be because immediately I'm faced with my first challenge: Agyness Deyn, singing with her band Five O'Clock Heroes (who even knew she could sing?) I'm a bit nervous and approach her timidly but immediately she's friendly and chatty. I hold out the tape measure, take the picture and wander off. It's over in seconds but I've managed it and I've discovered she's really quite small for a supermodel.  According to our I'm As Big As Height Chart Agyness Deyn is the same size as... drum roll please... Péle! What a lucky man he is! (Don't worry about the bloke the other side of me, I'm not even sure who he is?!) Z List celebrity. Check. It's time to make things more exciting. No sooner have I walked away from Agyness but who do I see? It's only Kevin Sacre (he plays Jake in Hollyoaks). Ok so he's another Z-lister but his girlfriend's on Strictly Come Dancing so that improves his status slightly (or does it?)  He's happy to pose for a photo and laughs in delight when I inform him he is in fact the same size as A Chinese Terracotta Army Soldier. Well who knew?! He's slightly happier than the next celebrity I manage to track down.  Adam Garcia seems to take offence to being the same size as Tutankhamun... and there we were thinking it was a compliment. Some people are never satisfied. Except, hold on, here comes Sharleen Spiteri. Surely she's at least C-List. I have a quick chat with her about her music (everyone loves a bit of Texas don't they?) then it's time to take her measurement.  She's pretty impressed to be the same size as the Olympic Standing High Jump Record. I would be too... I could never do high jump. I roll up the tape measure, collect my camera and move on. I don't even pay much attention as I gather up some more C-Listers.  AJ McLean from Backstreet Boys for example – same height as Einstein.  Zac Efron from High School Musical – same height as A supermodel (average).  George Sampson from Britain's Got Talent – The average height for a British woman (but we'll let him off that one because he's still growing). I'm fairly happy with my progress so far. Who'd have thought I'd manage to measure and get photos of so many people of celebrity status. I'd be happy to give up except I'm pretty sure there isn't an A-Lister in sight and that's what I promised. Feeling dejected as my searches across London don't come to fruition I decide to rope in some friends for one last search. We scour the City high and low, covering posh restaurants, exclusive clubs and classy hotels, desperate for someone, anyone to help me with my task. What is it they say about buses? You wait for hours then three come along at once? They're right. I leave you with....  Sarah Jessica Parker – A jockey!  Ashton Kutcher – King Henry V111  Leonardo DiCaprio – A Baby Giraffe Oh... and next time you bump into George Sampson, don't call him a big girl. Even though it is factually correct. I’m off now, but maybe I’ll see some of you in space. Tess - The Height Requirement For a Nasa Astronaut
30/04/2010 Just because To celebrate the launch of bookworm Here are ten books to read before you die: 1) Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte 2) on the Road - Jack Kerouac 3) The Catcher in the Rye - J. D. Salinger 4) Great Expectations - Charles Dickens 5) Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte 6) Nineteen Eighty-Four - George Orwell 7) Charlie & the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl 8) Lord of the Flies - William Golding 9) Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov 10) Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit - J.R.R.Tolkien Other tips from Giftab: Kill Your Friends - John Niven The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho Powder - Kevin Sampson Hell's Angels - Hunter. S. Thompson (Aside: We do not recommend the book in the photograph!)
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