aye, tf

Sauerkraut is an essential part of Czech cuisine, and one that's nigh impossible to substitute for. It's a pro-biotic, but perhaps more important historically, very rich in vitamin C, and it keeps for very long time without refrigeration. I had a first go a making sauerkraut some 25 years ago in my early days in Scotland, without understanding the process (and before one could readily find information on the internet), and it didn't work. I have had another go last September, and we have eaten over 40kg of the stuff since. Turns out, it's really simple to make if you know how. »

My father was a bibliophile. His passion for books started in his childhood, and I recall some of the early books he kept on his bookshelf: nearly complete works of Julius Verne, books by Jack London. Each of them neatly wrapped in either cream or blue packing paper, a handwritten label on the front, positioned with a millimetre precision, and inside an ex libris stamp in the shape of a pocket watch. »

Let’s be clear on one thing: in the good old USSR decent people didn’t rise through the Communist Party ranks to the Politburo, they were sent to the Siberian gulags. The Politburo was the cesspit of the Soviet system — this is the basic lens through which the Gorbachev legacy must be viewed. To remove it, as the various UK commentators are invariably doing just now, is to engage in gross revisionism of history. »

This piece in the Atlantic is well worth a read, cutting right through the cosy myth of the 19th century conservationism. There are lessons there for