Dollsing 2: Expiry Date

Shortbread 2003
Matzah meal 2003
Scampi + Prawns 2007
Custard 2007
Spinach, Asparagus, Ricotta Pasta Sauce 2008

These were some of the things we are considering keeping. Keep - you read that right.

This house has a personality of its own - a pathological personality, some might say, but one I am affectionate toward.

Today, Emily and I waged war on the kitchen. The trigger for this conflict was the discovery, by our cleaning lady, of some maggots residing in the doormats by our backdoors. The cause of the maggots? A dead green mouse. The cause of the dead green mouse? Poison - but when living, he ate a sizable chunk of matzah. Here: http://yfrog.com/nw21qtj .

We began with the freezer - beef bourgignon from 2005? chuck it; lamb so old the label can no longer be read? chuck it. Plastic bag with little dribble of ice cream???!!! Why is that still there? I think my elder brother Max made it. Nostalgia purposes? Who has nostalgia over frozen ice cream? Jam jars maybe. All we can say is goodbye to our over full freezer.

Then we went through the canned goods, the bottled sauces and jars of spreads/jams. Our findings were farcical, and yet nostalgic. The oldest find was lemon juice from 1990. Some real classics included sun lollies, yellow food colouring and jelly packets from 2001. The most curious was mushroom ketchup. http://yfrog.com/mg95qmj . On the way, we also discovered Swiss vegetable bouillon from 1997, beef stock from Jackson's of Piccadilly and emulsified cranberry sauce. There were many other interesting things.

This is what happens when consumerists forget to be consumerists, and fail to get rid of stuff that has a consume-by date. By our reckoning, we got rid of over £200 worth of goods. Although its value now is probably less than £20, or possibly even £10.

These products of our contemporary wasteland are the equivalent of the dolls from the Isle of Wight house, shocking and hidden but with less charm. They take us back to an era of innocence, when freezing lollies was SO exciting and making cakes with food colouring was radical. I wonder what our digestive systems would have been like in the age these foods were created. If only I'd been advanced enough to see this happening and prevented it...oh the waste that piles up through our modern lives!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyfLER3Z0-Q&ob=av2n (not that we think much of this song, but scrubbing up afterwards, it feels right)