Categories
ireland life people waterford

Long bullets in Fenor, Christmas 2022

With thanks to Liam, and everyone in Fenor Road Bowling Club.

Categories
comida / food cooking mallorca spain

Making carob powder

I came across these carob trees ona walk in Mallorca (near Deià).
I came across these carob trees ona walk in Mallorca (near Deià). Beautiful day, beautiful walk, beautiful trees!


The carob (Ceratonia siliqua) is a flowering evergreen tree or shrub in the Caesalpinioideae sub-family of the legume family, Fabaceae.

It is widely cultivated for its edible pods, and as an ornamental tree in gardens and landscapes.

The carob tree is native to the Mediterranean region and the Middle East.

The word “carob” comes from Middle French carobe (modern French caroube), which borrowed it from Arabic خَرُّوبٌ (kharrūb, “locust bean pod”), which ultimately borrowed it perhaps from Akkadian language kharubu or Aramaic kharubha, or related to Hebrew haruv.

Ceratonia siliqua, the scientific name of the carob tree, derives from the Greek kerátiοn κεράτιον “fruit of the carob” (from keras κέρας “horn”), and Latin siliqua “pod, carob”.
In English, it is also known as “St. John’s bread” and “locust tree” (not to be confused with African locust bean).

The latter designation also applies to several other trees from the same family.

– extract from Wikipedia page for carob.
Step 0. Raw carob pods.
Step 0. Raw carob pods.

Inspect them and make sure they’ve not got signs of insects, or damage.
Step 1. Remove the seeds and break the pods into pieces.
Step 1. Remove the seeds and break the pods into pieces.

Left-to-right:
– Raw carob picked from the tree
– Remove remove the pod seeds. I used a small knife and cut them open, then removed the seeds.
– Cut/break the pods into small pieces.
– Sieve the carob pod pieces to remove any things that shouldn’t be there.(Bugs, leaves, etc.
Step 2. Boil the carob pod pieces.
Step 2. Boil the carob pod pieces. Put the pieces in a pot, with enough water to cover them. Boil them for 10-15 minutes.
Step 3. Dry the pieces out in the oven.
Step 3. Dry the pieces out in the oven.

Once boiled, remove the pods from the pot, and put them onto a baking tray.
Put them into the oven for 10-12 hours at 50-60 deg C.
Check them regularly, give them a shake to make sure they don’t stick.
Step 4. Blend them in a food processor.
Step 4. Blend them in a food processor.

Once dry, put them into a food processor. Be patient, it’s going to take some time.
Step 5. Stop and see how they look.
Step 5. Stop and see how they look. Grinding will take a long time. See how they look.
Step 6. Try to sieve the grinds.
Step 6. Try to sieve the grinds.

After grinding, try to sieve them. Depending on how powerful your food processor is you might need to keep grinding!

Also, depending on how dry the grinds are you might need to dry them out more.
(The drier the grinds the finer the powder you can get.)

I had to dry them out more.
Step 7. Dry the grinds.
Step 7. Dry the grinds.

I needed to dry the grinds out for a few more hours. I put them back into the oven at 50 deg C for 3 more hours.

I spread them out on a piece of tinfoil to make it easier to pour them later.
Step 8. Use a coffee-grinder to grind more.
Step 8. Use a coffee-grinder to grind more. My food processor wasn’t up to it, so I used my coffee grinder.
Step 9. Powdered carob!
Step 9. Powdered carob! After 2-3 minutes grinding voila! Beautiful carob powder.
Step 10. Store it!
Step 10. Store it!

Carob powder can be stored for up to 1 year in an airtight container, in a dark area. Carob powder doesn’t go off, but it will loose it’s taste.

Categories
england life london nature the canal

Barges and coots ⛴🦆

Categories
mallorca

🛸 Spaceship controls

Categories
comida / food cooking mallorca

🍌🍞😋

🍌🍞😋
First banana bread made with the new equipment.
Categories
mallorca

What happens?

Categories
ireland nature the sea waterford

Guillemeane. Blue.

Categories
life people video

RIP Bishop Desmond Tutu

Y es de verdad, pero no sé que pasa
por la república sudafricana
Nelson Mandela, está entre rejas
y han concedido un Premio Nobel de la paz
A Desmond Tutu.
Y hablan de represión, contra mineros,
contra obreros y estudiantes negros, y es de verdad
la resistencia está entre rejas
Y han concedido un Premio Noble de la paz: (Ja, Ja)
A Desmond Tutu.
Categories
ireland nature the sea waterford

Guillemeane St. Stephen’s Day Swim

Guillemeane St. Stephen's Day Swim

Categories
comida / food family ireland life

🎄🐖 ñom ñom

Ñom, ñom, half of 🎄🎅Christmas dinner

Christmas dinner, part 1.

Categories
life music new york new york united states of america video

An Open Letter to NYC

The story behind the “To the 5 boroughs” album.

Siamesepuppy

Categories
mallorca nature spain

November Twilight

November sunset

Now Winter at the end of day
Along the ridges takes her way,

Upon her twilight round to light
The faithful candles of the night.

November Twilight by Bliss Carman

Categories
corona virus! fiesta de sanfermín life pamplona

San Fermín 2021 🕰️ 🕰️

Ya falta menos.

(Copyright César Oroz Martija – La Tira de Oroz. Si tienes dinero compra unos libros y posters.)

Categories
life professional life video

The Hello Machine

When I worked in telecommunications (late 2000’s) Electronic Switching Systems had been pretty much taken over by software switching systems, but the proprietary hardware, closely coupled to the software, was still very much an important component.

While the call switching and routing was no longer achieved by thousands and thousands of hardware relays switching dedicated connections between each “phone line”, the hardware operated the same. The installation process was pretty much the same as in this video, recorded in 1974.

The thousands and thousands of interconnecting cables connecting each hardware module were still needed. The teams of men (99% of my colleagues were men) were still needed to “dress” the cables. This jobhad been outsourced to “installation” companies who employed teams of men – usually a foreman (“gaffer”) and his team of often young fellas – would travel to each datacentre, stay for 5-6 days and carry out the installation of the hardware, the cables.

It was then the job of the “commissioning” engineer to manually check all the hardware and cables were correctly connected and seated. This was a laborious and tedious job which took days.

Then came the software commissioning – configuring the software manually building-up line-by-line of the logical connections.

Once this was done, then loading the system configuration for the particular client network.

Pretty much everything done in this video was still being done 30+ years later.

Today the hardware is commercial-off-the-shelf computing servers like IBM Bladeservers. They’re essentially no different to a high-capacity webserver, mailserver, or router.

Instead of requiring separate teams of people for the installation, commissioning it’s now reduced to 1, maybe 2 people.

Categories
life music video

Today’s #WorkMusic: Foghorn Stringband – Complete Concert Film

Set One

Set Two

Buy their music, and t-shirts, and stickers and tea-towels.

And when you’re finished that, listen to some Caleb Klauder and his country band music.

Categories
life music video

Trallalero – Mamma dimmi perchè

Categories
life music

Trallalero – Ricetta d’amou

Trallalero singing from Genova.

Categories
life music video

Zangalewa Waka Waka Eh Eh

Categories
comida / food mallorca spain

🍓 ☀️🏠

🍓

Categories
mallorca mountains nature

Mallorca sunset

Mallorca sky