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Might be a little late if anybody wants to have a say but only spotted this today. Anybody wanting to view the plans can do so here... http://econsultation...tion.do?id=5413 and here... http://econsultation...tion.do?id=5415

I`ve made this loads of times and it`s lovely Plus it doesn`t half warm you up and it`s easy to make (No good for vegetarians but you could easily omit the meat and just add some pasta to the sauce and put lashings of strong cheddar on the top) Ingredients Heat oven to Gas Mark 4, Electric (see here) Beef..either Braising steak or Rump Steak (or left over Roast Beef) 1 Large Onion 1 to 2 Cloves of garlic Mixed peppers 2 or 3 Red Chillis 2/3 Teaspoons Paprika 2/3 Teaspoons Smoked Paprika 1 Large Onion 1 Tin of tomatoes 1 pint of beef stock (oxo cubes or knorr stock pot) Tomatoe puree Salt and Pepper to taste If using raw beef, cut into chunks and brown in a splash of olive oil and a bit butter..when the beef is browned, remove it and set aside. Next..add the onion, peppers, chilli and garlic to the pan that the beef had been cooked in (add a bit more butter and oil if needed) Cook the ingredients for about 10/15 minutes (or until soft) then add the Smoked Paprika, paprika, tomatoe puree and mix well.. Next, add the tinned tomatoes and bring to the boil slowly..then add the 1 pint of your chosen stock. Add your browned meat to the pan and add salt and pepper to taste. Put into your pre-heated oven, low heat for at least 1.30/2 hours (if using beef from raw) Stir half-way through and add salt/pepper/extra spices if needed. Voila! Lovely Goulash Serve with rice, maybe a bit of homemade garlic bread.. If cooking with left over roast beef, just follow the same steps but reduce the cooking times by 30 minutes i would say... Enjoy

Mr Hair has been making chutney very similar to the one you described! He did his Hugh Fernley Whittingstall style. Yes the neighbours got 2 jars each! He added a roasted spice mixture containing ginger, chillies and lots of dried spices to half of it, I have to say that is nicer than the plainer stuff. I don't think I can get away wit the stuff meself like. Find the marrow skin too tough. Another tip for a glut of tomatoes, make brushetta. Very popular with my Sunday dinner guests. - Skin and de-seed and chop loads of tomatoes. - put in a colander and sprinkle with salt to get excess water off. - Add finely chopped garlic to taste. Season. Chuck some olive oil in and mix. - Keep mixture in fridge overnight. - drain off excess water and add finely chopped basil and red onion. - serve on toasted nice bread thats been drizzled with olive oil and rubbed with a clove of garlic. Have fun with it!

I dropped a flyer in at the houses at Humford Woods the other day and the guy was absolutely flabbergasted I'd walked down there just to deliver a leaflet. He even offered to give me a lift back up. Just making sure everybody gets one

I'm working my way there at least i'd avoid the rain.

Still need some funding though, I've got 57p to get you started

3 lb. Marrow (or however much has grown in your garden) A little bit of salt 1 lb. brown granulated sugar 1 lb. onions, or basically whatever fits into the plastic bags in the vegetable section before it snaps The same amount of tomatoes as onions… or whatever your greenhouse has to offer A couple of big spoons of ground ginger A jar or 2 of the shredded 'lazy ginger' in a jar A bag of 'stoned dates' (had one or two of them over the years) A couple of big spoons of allspice 1 pint of vinegar… Reet… Chop up the onions, tomatoes and marrow (saving your marrow seeds for next year if they are yarkas) Stick it all in a pan. (Don't use you mate Claire's pan, if you plan on burning things later, or you'll have to hide it from her for the next 2 years) Make the pan hot, by putting on a cooker. Not too hot though or it could burn and Claire will not be happy. When it goes a bit squashy, add the vinegar, spice and chop in the dates. Oh, and the salt. And the ginger too… divvint worry about the different in the jars of chopped stuff… hopefully you should have added enough spice that no-one will ever taste it. If I haven't missed out anything, there should only be sugar left. Add this, stirring slowly. It should mix nice. If everything looks totally watery, have a bit more sugar on hand to thicken it up. Leave on a low heat until 'Holiday Showdown' or other Saturday afternoon entertainment has finished… if making on a Sunday, do not substitute this ingredient with Eastenders omnibus, as it is rubbish and just too long. Have a look at the chutney. Is it ready? Stir the bottom of the pan… BEWARE: it may bubble and burn your skin off. If it doesn't it isn't cooking right. Keep rocking on chutney style until it's a bit thick. (You may need to skim off some watery stuff and have a skin graft as part of this process). Stick it in some jars, and become popular with friends and neighbours until it is gone, and you have none left yourselves. Use the smaller, and mankier jars for the people you don't like. Keep on loving the chutney. The end.

Before (And during the war. Yes, that war, the one with a number on it!) All the kids used to get a bucket from their dad, and go out on Saturdays, or nights, searching for the tracks of passing horses, and scoop it up to take back to the garden, or allotment to add to the pile. The Furnace bank was a particularly good spot for scooping. The side bank road that ran Wast from just below the brow of the hill up to to the road to Bedlington was often used by the carters since it was a little less steep, and it was in the process of straining to pull the wagons up this hill that the smelly but valuable rewards were left for the early risers. You could not sleep in on Saturday if you wanted to stay on Dad's good side. My dad, had a garden just down the Furnace bank, below the housing and on the left on the North side of the river Blyth, below the weir. It was a nice little garden. Good soil, its own spring water. And it was here that we grew a lot of the vegetables for the family. And of course, two small plots, one for my mothers flowers, and the other for dad's show leeks. Nobody would have thought of growing just vegetables. There had to be flowers, and they were something to see, and great to take home. You always knew that mum would have something special. And leeks were often the only outlet for any sort of creative endeavour for the men. Leeks were serious business, and often displaced football as a source of enjoyable crack. Good times, hard times. All gone, and with them the men and women who made us the people we are today. I wonder what they would think of a Bedlington where too many healthy young people would find their recreation in stuffing god knows what drugs down their throats. Or happily accepting welfare instead of work . Thats why so many of us had to leave. We went to find what work we could, to help the family we left behind. Todays Bedlington sounds like a fractured place. Strangers move in to buy houses we could neve have dreamed of. They sleep here, and get in their cars, and ride off to Newcastle or wherever, coming home at night to watch TV, sleep again , and repeat the process. But do they even want to join the community they sleep in. It is not surprising that pride and sense of community is waning. All I seem to hear is whats in it for me, and why doesn't someone do something about it. Well friends, the people who in the past might have tried, (With whatever success!) are old, emigrated, or dead. And you are all that is left. Its your Bedlington now, and you do what you can with what you have got, or continue bemoaning what you want out of life while belittling the efforts of those people in Bedlington, (And there are many of them who still put care and effort ahead of whining ). So, you can continue with puerile postings about how much more beer you want to drink, or questionable and tasteless attempts at humour. Or perhaps, get off your individual and collective butts, and actually do something for your town. You are all that is left of a very strong and proud people. They didn't have much, nor did they expect it. But they were proud of themselves, painfully blunt but honest. The standards of hyigene were abyssmal, and many of them spent their entire life in Bedlington without interior running water or electricity. Ask them about local standards, and they would be appalled to think that perfectly good manure would be left to be collected by the council, when any self respecting kid should be out there helping his family, and his community. But that would probably get in the way of never ending computer games, and TV. It is my deepest regret that I lost all of my friends and family, and more importantly my place in the Geordie community when I left to find a better life for my family and I. I did find that better life, and I am extremely proud of the children and grandchildren who more than met our expectations of a better future. But reading this journal has left me agreeing with the statement posted earlier. People say more, but mean less. (Or something like that!) Bedlington would probably be a great disappointment to me, were I living there now. And that is very sad. It was always a place of community, faith, honesty, and belief in work and sharing. What in the name of god is it now. Do the majority of people believe in this shallow cynical, "Me first and last" attitude. Or do the thoughtful intelligent caring people stay off this site to avoid exposing themselves to anonymous ridicule for daring to think like members of the community that their ancestors made into Bedlington. In the words of one of our more intelligent young women members, "The rant ends here." Regards, Joe Rooney