We have just had a health & hygiene re inspection from the local health department, the last one was in 2009, and we should have had another in 2011, but being classed as a low risk business, and the council being short on resources, they have only just managed to get around to us.
Glad to report that we have kept our prestigious 5 star rating. In fact the inspector remarked that the controls we had in place beat many of the hotels he inspected.
I didn’t realise how the system they use worked. I thought 4 stars and above sounds quite good. In reality if you only have 4 stars it means that you have a number of problems with your food hygiene systems. Which doesn’t sound very reassuring, so really anything less than 5 is unacceptable.
We’ve just taken a booking for some popcorn carts for a job this month. Turns out its for national popcorn day ! That’s a new one on us, though a quick look on tinternet shows its a pukka thing, the National Popcorn Board (American of course) has the following on its website;
National Popcorn Day is celebrated at the end of January, although its exact date is a matter of debate. Various sources report it as January 19; others claim it takes place on whatever day the Super Bowl falls on. The Popcorn Board is often asked about the origins of this day; unfortunately, we do not know how or when this celebration began. Some other individual or organization (with obvious good taste) began this tradition.
The connection to the Super Bowl seems natural enough. It’s a highly regarded annual sporting competition pitting the top two national football teams against each other. Millions of viewers from around the globe hunker down with bowls of their favorite snack—popcorn—in heated anticipation of who will win the battle.
If you know of the origins of National Popcorn Day, please email us at: edu@popcorn.org.
Popcorn Day Activities
Thank you to Leslie F, a teacher from Concord, Illinois, who sent the following suggestions for Popcorn Day Activities:
Stringing popcorn (these could be hung outside for birds to eat)
Need: sewing needles, string, popcorn
Guess the amount (fill container with kernels and have students guess)
Need: popcorn kernels, container
Popcorn air hockey—can you “volley” the kernel back and forth 20 times without letting it fall?
Need: flat surface (table), straw (to blow), coffee stirrers (as paddles) or hands (as paddles)
Popcorn relay race
Need: popcorn, spoons
Popcorn basketball: can you flick a piece of popcorn into the basket?
Need: popcorn, baskets (i.e. muffin tins, small cups), backboards (wall, cardboard)
Last winter we did a large number of jobs at a mobile telephone companies call centre’s. The last job before Christmas was supplying Hot Roast Chestnuts. This particular company is always hot on safety documentation, so we always ensure its up to date, and plentiful.
On this particular occasions we had their H&S guy come back with a small problem, our chestnut carts were not displaying signs to warn that our nuts might have nuts in them, there is no might about it, I can guarantee that each one does contain a nut, otherwise we would be contravening the trade descriptions act by charging for chestnuts without nuts in them.
This didn’t cut the mustard with him, their policy was that the signage was required. So that’s what we supplied.
I was happy to see then that in the new food safety laws that came into force on 13 December, the rules regarding the labelling of items containing food that people are allergic to states that obvious food such as peanuts and milk don’t need labelling to say they contain milk or peanuts.
