Caterer and Hotelkeeper – 31635
DISPUTED MERITS OF GOING VEGGIE
Vegetarians still tend to be regarded as cranks in some quarters of the hospitality industry - and in the medical community, too. Now author Peter Cox has come up with a provocative hypothesis in his new Realeat Encyclopaedia of Vegetarian Living: up to 134,000 deaths a year - mostly from cancer or heart disease - could be prevented by change to a vegetarian diet, compared with 111,000 deaths from smoking-related diseases.
In his "V-Day" press release, Cox berates the Imperial Cancer Research Fund and the Cancer Research Campaign for insisting they need more evidence in the case of meat-eating versus vegetarian; he attacks both the British Heart Foundation and the Health Education Authority for agreeing vegetarians can be healthier but refusing to nail their colours to the vegetarian mast; and he quotes the British Dietetic Association on scientific evidence that vegetarians tend to be healthier.
Cox makes a good case for his campaign, but Table Talk thinks, for the good of his own health, he should take the Red Queen's advice to Alice: "Keep your temper."
beyond the realm of normal service
Passers-by often stop at Choirs Restaurant, in Cheltenham, to admire its appropriate "shop window" display - a four-foot figure of a choirboy, dressed in traditional cassock and surplice. But co-owner Jill Mitchell was surprised by one recent reaction: "What do they want Jesus in a café for?" Ms Mitchell comments: "We try hard, but we can't do miracles."
THOSE CHOCOLATE MYTHS DEBUNKED
The newsletter of the Chocolate Society (you can join a club for almost anything these days) reports that psychologists at the University of Pennsylvania studied the chocolate cravings of 45 students. It asked if they found the main motivation behind eating chocolate was: (a) exam pressure; (b) compensating for an unhappy childhood; or (c) something else?
Yes, it's now official: people like eating chocolate because it tastes good.
ethnic humour in lanzarote
Table Talk was amused by a picture sent in by a reader to the Glasgow Herald diary, which puts a new angle on so-called "ethnic" cuisine.
Spotted in Lanzarote was an Indian restaurant with the name Mahatma Cote.
No, sir, it's the food you take away
Closer to home, in Gloucester, an impatient diner has given a new meaning to the Indian takeaway. Former foreign legionnaire Laurence King was so fed up with waiting for his dinner at the Taste of India restaurant that he picked up the Indian waiter and walked out with him.
This style of takeaway is expensive, however, and not recommended: King was ordered to pay £200 compensation and £200 costs. Table Talk suspects he didn't leave a tip.
IF THAT'S ALL RIGHT WITH THE REST OF YOU
Mr King should obviously have gone to Norwich for the weekend, where he could have taken some lessons in good manners from the folk in that city.
Peter Rudd, general manager at the Hotel Norwich, reports that the Rev Ian Gregory, secretary of the Polite Society (yet another club to join), on a recent visit to Norwich, found it "a friendlier city than most".
Now Rudd is promoting two-day Polite Breaks at the hotel, with three £10 gift vouchers, to be presented to particularly courteous Norwich people, included in the package.
