Reestit Mutton

I'm a big advocate of traditions - sometimes it feels like it's in contrast with my (probably-natural-but-not-overpowering) interest in societies advances. I know my heart sits firmly with tradition though; the lack of complication. I'm not one to look back but rather I appreciate those things that work. I suppose as an example is that my head has never been able to understand travel to other planets when things down here are broke. It's like having a cleaner who lives in squalor, double standards. My interest in space travel couldn't be less.

Hanging raw meat from your ceiling on the other hand, is something that fascinates me. In our technologically advanced (and some may say Nanny) state I enjoy coming across traditions that are so simple that they have been little altered since their conception - Because they are an effective solution.

Laura brought me back from Shetland some Reestit Mutton (rested) as well as some great wooly socks. The salted, hung and smoked section of sheep is fascinating and not purely because it was lathered in salt. The pre-refrigeration old skoolness of it strikes a definite cullinary chord: I've got soup stock in line for mine as well as having some in a piece.

Show your average suburban a piece of preserved animal wrapped up in newspaper in a cupboard and he may curl up in disgust that you are trying to poison his children. Cured meat, as any average man on the street will tell you, is from Parma, you buy from the supermarket and have with asparagus or melon. The fashion since the sixties for Italian food means that Prosciutto and Bolognese have become words almost as British as Biryani or Korma.