I am Marmite - love me or loath me...then ask me if I care.
I am Marmite - love me or loath me...then ask me if I care.
Member since:04.05.2001
Reviews:110
Members who trust:135
There’s no two ways about it, when it comes to so many of life’s little pleasures, doing it on your own isn’t as much fun as doing it with other people.
Drinking, one of life’s little pleasures, (and I’m perfectly aware of where your dirty little minds were taking you with that opening sentence, by the way…see me after class for appropriate punishment) is best done in company, if for no better reason than, if you fall over in a smelly wee heap, there’s someone to throw a blanket over you. (This sometimes works, and sometimes doesn’t…sometimes the ‘throw’ part is there, and the ‘over you’ but now and then the ‘up’ word gets in there instead of ‘a blanket’…this is to be discouraged at all costs)
Where is this all leading? Frankly, my dear, I haven’t much of a clue. (So no change there then)
Regular visitors to my end of the spectrum may recall my good friend Duncan, with whom I am oft to be found supping a bottle or two of foaming ale. Duncan it is who encourages me to write about fine beers, and Duncan it is who has thrown…the blanket…over my prostrate self on many an occasion. AND…AND…he’s never once substituted the ‘up’ word for the blanket! That’s what I call a good mate!
Duncan is currently engaged in paying work in far Switzerland,
and therefore not available for drinkies on anything like a regular basis, so I have been faced with a fairly simple choice; Drink alone, or drink not.
I have decided that my best policy is not to make my mind up too quickly, so I’ve been sipping a contemplative brew (as an aid to the thought process, you understand) while working out such complexities as ‘If I drink six bottles of foaming ale, will I be able to recall the finer points of their flavour and bouquet afterwards?’ and ‘If I don’t drink ANY beer for a while, will I be doing untold damage to my body through denying it its normal calorific and vitamin packed intake?’
The upshot of all this was that I decided to take a short sabbatical from alcohol and substitute other drinkables.
The first and finest of these, for me, has proven to be something going by the natty and memorable name of V8.
V8 has been around for a very long time. I even recall it being on the shelves of the local grocery store when I was a child…so…a VERY long time.
Back in the old days, it was clear from the packaging that V8 was a Campbells product (mainly known for supplying Andy Warhol with source material for one of his screen prints…and the soup isn’t bad either).
Nowadays, while the stuff is still made by Campbell Grocery Products Ltd in Kings Lynn, Norfolk, you have to look pretty hard to find that name on the pack. It’s produced in the USA too, but at the risk of offending some of our American visitors, and at the SERIOUS risk of being bombarded with e-mailed diatribes by Jim (29th Candidate) Scileppi, I will concentrate on the UK version. My decision was quite easy to reach, as some of the natty products which sport the V8 name are not available in dear old blighty just yet. If this tickles your interest glands, why not pop over to www.v8juice.com, where all will be revealed!
So. Back to the suitably studious and sober study of the product at hand.
V8 tends to be a ‘top shelf’ kind of drink. Not, as you might imagine, of a pornographic or ‘adult’ nature, it just seems to be that way. Supermarkets tend to plonk it on shelves the vertically challenged can barely see, let alone reach. This can do no good at all for the sales of the product, and I suspect it all stems from a lack of backhanders from reps to store managers. However it comes about, scan the upper reaches of a reputable supermarket near you, somewhere near tomato juice and such, and you’ll very likely meet up with the product in cans, bottles or cartons, all sporting piccies of tomatoes and carrots on the label.
OK, the game’s up. It’s a vegetable juice. There…out in the open…it’s…it’s…GOOD for you!
It’s actually a blend of the juices of 8 vegetables (and it’s called V8! The irony!) the principle one being tomato. Also making guest appearances are celery, beetroot, lettuce, carrot, parsley, watercress and spinach, and while you might well get the tang of celery, and the sweetness of carrot, I’d challenge anyone to discern any of the others by taste. A touch of salt and a pinch of un-named spices make up the blend.
The less keen of palate will chug a glass of this and in all probability think it’s just tomato juice. (It looks like tomato juice, it tastes a near relative of tomato juice and there are tomatoes on the label, so not a bad shout really) but it really is more than that! Honest!
For one thing, a can of V8 (330ml) will give you your recommended daily dose of veggie stuff; the government’s dreaded 5 portions.
For another, that same 330ml is a skimpy 70 kCals or so.
It also comes in a variety of packaging, so if your preference is for longlife cartons (500ml) smooth and rounded glass bottles (also 500 ml and fully recyclable) or those handy cans (330ml, aluminium, recyclable) you can satisfy your every whim. I like the cans for being an appropriate size for a single serving, and the bottles for having a screw-top, should you want to save some for later. Expect to pay about 55p for a can. £1.00 for a bottle.
And another thing: It’s quite filling, so you can have it instead of a meal if you’re intent on getting skinny.
And finally…if you put a good slug of that Worcester Sauce in a glass, along with a similar amount of lime juice and a dash of pepper sauce, then top the glass up with V8, before stirring in a decent shot of chilled Absolut, you have something like the perfect Bloody Mary, except it’s not a Bloody Mary at all…it’s called a Bloody Nora!
You didn’t really think I was going to give up drinking did you?
Find out more at: www.campbellsoup.co.uk and if you care to plug ‘V8’ into the appropriate box of your favourite search engine, you’ll find out more than you cared to know about fast cars.
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