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stickyfingers wrote:The new division of people who share the floor he's on at Telstra have a habit of stealing lunches, his stash of frozen bread, his butter, the staff's catering sized cans of tea/coffee/milo and apparently stand on the toilet seats. Go figure? I'm seriously considering sending him to work with an esky in future.

For Mr Stickyfingers (My dad swears by this):
The foundation to preserving anything is to make it appear undesirable. It's all well and good to have tasty leftovers from home, but useless if you don't get to eat them yourself.

Tip #1: Writing on your lunch and office comestibles does not preserve them.
It usually has the opposite effect, providing the roaches with an identifiable target, so writing Mr Stickyfingers on his lunch means the office roaches will be watching him as (a) he arrives and restocks the larder and, (b) he realises he's been roached again.
Similarly "I spat on this" doesn't work as Mr Stickyfingers is most likely to return to his lunch to find "so did I" written on it (true story).

Tip #2: Anything with a brand on it will be taken as a matter of priority.
If you can't stand international roast coffee and take your own stash of branded stuff, it 's going to walk. Even if you keep it in a desk drawer. Even if it's still only instant. People are like that.

Tip #3: Fresh is best - do not underestimate the roach
Office roaches may not worry about quality when it comes to their own financial outlay, however they are able to distinguish between quality free stuff and crappy free stuff.

Tip #4: Reverse Psychology - decoy
All of the above is fairly negative and leaves one thinking why bother? But that's not the point. Once you appreciate the above you will learn how to ensure your lunch isn't roached.

• no identifying marks - no names, brands, and not even using the same position in the fridge/cupboard/freezer
• if you take coffee to work buy yourself a small tin of international roast. empty it. get the tin and bash it about on the work surface - a couple of dints are required. Tear or mess up the label a little as well, maybe even put a coffee stain on for authenticity. Then, place your favourite coffee in the tin and take to work. Guaranteed, this will be the last coffee reached for in the office kitchen.
• no lunchbox - it's too obvious.
• ditto nice brown paper packaging; it means someone has forked out good money, or has a partner at home carefully and lovingly assembling lunches.
• When taking lunch to work apply a similar practice as to the coffee. Buy some no frills sliced white bread. Empty the packet (leave bread for something else). Scrunch the bag up a few times until the print on the bag begins to look scratched. This is what the lunch goes in. Then that goes inside another (shock horror) plastic bag (again this needs to look tired so leave it in the bottom of a back pack for a few weeks before using).
• If you're taking something to be heated do not send your nice plastic containers or thermos. Get to the stupid market and buy a large tub of no-brand margarine or similar. Empty out, put a few dings in it (you know the drill now) and send heatable lunches in this. Do however warn your partner to be gentle on the reheating, otherwise the container may melt.

have i forgotten anything?

OMG that's hilarious Grocer. Your Dad has obviously thought long and hard about this. I'll put it to Mr Sticky tonight.

There is one place where I occasionally freelance, and also suffer from lunch thievery. Those tactics will work a treat on the person who has acquired a taste for my cooking.

I get the hunch that the food thieves at Telstra will take anything no matter how lousy a brand though. Given that they stand on the toilet seats, they most probably have come from somewhere overseas and perhaps poorer circumstances? They obviously have not seen western toilets nor know how to use them so perhaps they are not brand snobs but kleptomaniacs, or may even have come from desperate circumstances? It's a sad dilemma.


Back on thread...last night I ditched the quinoa and had a cauliflower and broccoli cheese bake alongside the venison Scaloppini instead. I did end up using the 'moist meat bat' to flatten the meat.

Tonight it might be Char Kway Teoh...or a rib sticking ham hock and lentil soup....

he started his career off at an abbattoir and finished "semi-retirement phase I" at Australia post - there's plenty of material. I've just concentrated it down to the memorable stories and my own experiences to lay down some guidelines (off the cuff today - not a great deal of premeditation I confess).

I get the hunch that the food thieves at Telstra will take anything no matter how lousy a brand though.

This is true.

The point however, is to make lunch appear less desireable than anything else that can be swiped (refer to tip#3). You want that yellow lunchbox with a peanut butter sandwich and bruised apple to look more enticing than your rare breed roast beef with caramelised onions, hand picked dandelions on home made 24 hour sourdourgh rye barley bread and strawberry and apple salad.

...and if memory serves me correctly there is a toilet story that accompanies the origins of tip #1.

And as for standing on toilet seats - ugh that still gives me a horrid visual from uni that I still haven't managed to shake! (can't they push it into the bowl with a bit of loo paper and flush it?)

Tonight Furry and I will have NO KIDS!!!

I'll pick him up on the way home, and we'll stroll down to Kerrie Road shops (weather permitting) and we'll fuss over what's in store at Michael's Organic Delights (Called "Michael's", owned by Heng, of the infamous Taste dot com episode!)

Depending what takes our fancy we might head next door to Kerrie Road Butchers and see what looks good. or I might get Furry to get out some of the beef I bought here:

/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=139

We'll open a bottle of red, Furry might cook, and I'll prolly fall asleep in my purple throne by 8pm!

Tonight, being tired with sick kids & DH, threw a Mountain Bread quiche together, with fresh organic spinach, diced eco-bacon, slices of organic tomato, crumbled Australian fetta, Vegetarian Edam and organic, free range eggs from local farm. It was really good!!

Did a GF cake with Organic bananas, and also made a Butterscotch Self-saucing pudding, and we had dessert for once! I didn't need to be making any of these things, being sick & tired myself, because I had also made a Chicken Etouffe with organic vege's and FR chicken, in the SC, but Little Miss M (who has been sick) wanted to do cooking (her favourite thing!) though in the end, didn't do too much anyways... oh, well, Etouffe on polenta tomorrow night now!

grocer..

your reply made me snort coffee out of my nose!!!

I think we're going to need an icon for that!

purple goddess wrote:grocer..
your reply made me snort coffee out of my nose!!!

I seem to have that effect on people. I'll take it as a compliment.

I'm the garlic breathing dragon today but it was worth it because last night we had :

Soup - barley, lentils, pork hock & vegies, topped with fresh herbs and fennel leaves

AND

Noisette's Organic Roasted Garlic clove sourdough with Meredith Chevre and pesto - HEAVEN!



Rack of lamb tonight...methinks...

Ooh, sticky, that sounds good...

Tonight we ditched our healthy Lentil, fetta & Roast Potato salad, for comfort food... we are all sick here!

So, Gourmet sausages, mash and fresh corn cobs! Well, at least the vege's are organic!

We've just come back from cruising Gippsland, and Furry's cooking:

LIme Glazed Chicken Wings

1kg Chicken wings or drumettes
4 tablesppons lime juice
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
2 tablespoons brown sugar
2 teaspoons dark soy sauce
4 spring onions
2 limes thinly sliced,
2 lemons thinly sliced
1/2cup water
4 tablespoons castor sugar
1/2 teaspoon white wine vinegar.

place chicken in flat non-metal container. In a bowl combine lime juicxe, venegar, brown sugar and soy. Pour over the wings/drumettes and marinade for a couple of hours.

heat wok (or we use a non-stick griddle plate), remove wings from marinade (set remaining marinade aside) and fry off until cooked (about 15 mins), until brown and tender. Add springonions and fry for a further minute. pop in low overn to keep warm.

Add the sliced lime and lemon to the pan, add reserved marinade. Stir in the castor sugar and extra vinegar and simmer until the slices are coated with a thick syrup. Pour this over wings and serve with rice.