Chatterbox

[scullion Profile]

i've sucked a liquorice rizla paper - does that count‽

[Sakkarin Profile]

I used to smoke roll-ups with liquorice paper at one stage. Disgusting in every way.

[Meganthemog Profile]

My mother used to smoke Balkan Sobrani cocktail cigarettes at Christmas time - I thought she was the height of sophistication!

[dennispc Profile]

A question on acidic fruit. Oranges are acidic, but is marmalade? OH is hoping that all the sugar changes things. Same question for strawberry jam and lemon curd, please.

[jeral Profile]

It seems jam is still acidic. In fact with lower acidic fruits extra acid needs to be added to make the gel set. According to this article, acid is essential as it kills off botulism bugs during storage.
http://www.pickyourown.org/food_acidity.htm

I checked honey on the offchance, No luck as that is also acidic

[scullion Profile]

you could always try making some pH or litmus paper to check it.

[Rainbow Profile]

you could always try making some pH or litmus paper to check it.

I'm curious to know how you make your own, Scullion? I've only ever used it in a laboratory - a long time ago, I must say

[Stokey Sue Profile]

Cooked fruit, including in jam in and marmalade, will still be acidic.
Sugar modifies the sharp taste of the acid but doesn’t neutralise it
In fact you tend to add lemon juice to help the pectin set, don’t you?
I did just checked some Oxford marmalade and some apricot jam; both were quite acidic according to pH paper

When sugar was rationed people used to put a little bicarbonate of soda into cooked fruit to make it less sharp by neutralising the acid so they could add less sweetener.

[Sakkarin Profile]

The strange colours that red cabbage goes when you add different things made me think that it might have some use as an acid/alkali indicator.

I had a quick Google of "red cabbage as chemical indicator", amd this was the first one I came across, looks very litmussy to me!

https://www.webinnate.co.uk/science/week1.htm

Next week's episode: "Nuclear fission using naga chillies...".

[Rainbow Profile]

The strange colours that red cabbage goes when you add different things made me think that it might have some use as an acid/alkali indicator.

I had a quick Google of "red cabbage as chemical indicator", amd this was the first one I came across, looks very litmussy to me!

https://www.webinnate.co.uk/science/week1.htm

Next week's episode: "Nuclear fission using naga chillies...".

I'm looking forward to that one

[dennispc Profile]

Thank you all - thought I replied yesterday, but no doubt post probably decided not to go out in the rain!

Honey’s interesting, because acidity varies according to the flower source, or so our bee keeping friends tell us.

Yesterday’s post asked how do you make your own litmus paper but now we’re on to nuclear physics I’ll change topic as well. The joys of Chatterbox, eh?

Gill, our son and family go to Greece every year so asked them about places with lots of Tavernas. They’re not foodies, but felt Stoupa on the mainland would be a good bet for a wider choice.

We had stuffed vine leaves on Symi, we were not impressed.

[Stokey Sue Profile]

I remember making our own pH indicators using plants as part of the Nuffield chemistry syllabus at school, dahlias gave the most sensitive colour iirc

Everything crossed for Amy today

[jeral Profile]

Dahlias make good magnets too - for earwigs

[dennispc Profile]

We're thinking of Amyw.

[Wic Profile]

Has anyone else tried updating their iPad to the new 13.1.2? I did at the weekend and really wish I hadn’t. It’s moved all sorts of things around and now my Email is sending me two copies of everything into my sent box. I have tried the fixes that I found for this on the internet, but it hasn’t helped, and now the email is sometimes refusing to connect to WiFi. It is more than irritating.

Sorry. Definitely NoF, but I just needed to vent!

[Stokey Sue Profile]

I've not had any major problems with it till now

The advantage is they've added a dark colour scheme, which is much better for my dodgy eyesight

However the search in email now selects all flagged messages anywhere in my account, and not as it used to only those in the inbox. Searching for unread messages has always returned all unread anywhere, even in Trash and still does

It did shrink my icons from large to standard for some reason, but I could put that back easily enough, and I see no sign so far of making better use of the large screen, as promised. I was hoping I would be able to see Calendar in full screen but no - it's still clearer on my phone

[dennispc Profile]

Apple's updates are a pain, even the geeks feel the same.

I subscribe (it’s free) to mac4mac.co.uk. Always helpful much like this site.

[Amyw Profile]

Hi everyone,

Thanks for all your good wishes . Apparently I don’t have endometriosis, just a very large inflamed dermoid cyst on my right ovary . Had to stay in overnight as on morphine and tramadol for the pain but home today

[dennispc Profile]

That’s so good to know AmyW, so pleased for you.

[Stokey Sue Profile]

That’s good news, take it easy until you feel better Amy