Reading Roars!

I love food markets. They are utterly fantastic. So when I discovered last Saturday that there was a Farmer’s Market on that morning in Reading (it takes place every first and third Saturday of the month), I thought “screw Tesco, I will get my eggs from the farmers instead” (ok, it wasn’t quite like that, but I was very eager or even eggcited to go).

The market, based at the Cattle Market, revealed itself to be quite small. I suppose it’s because I had London’s famous Borough Market fixed in my mind. It didn’t take me long to complete a circuit. There were eggs, cheese, bacon, sausages, chicken, bread, curry sauces, crabs, fish, lobsters, pies and a few other things. It all looked deliciously natural. I was given a mission to buy vegetables (celery, broccoli and yam - whatever a yam was), so I got myself some sticks of celery to begin with. Then a jar of spicy sauce with a coconut base. And a nice bit of organic chicken. Of course, I couldn’t resist the bacon and sausage roll, prepared in front of me.

I wandered next door, away from the market. It was like walking through a wormhole. There were ancient advertising hoardings. One had the Berkshire Mercury on it, a paper whose circulation ended in 1979. This was like Life on Mars, I thought. I felt very calm. It was a cosy vacuum, away from the crazy bustle of 21st century life.

Then - like Scott Bakula in Quantum Leap - I was shunted forward in time, back to 2007. Actually, I had another market to visit, the one by the Civic Centre.

There was, I saw, a very welcome addition to this market. The Taste of Malaysia people were there, cooking something scrumptious outside Pavlov’s Dog: satay, noodles and vegetables. I had to eat - again (to drink, I had mango juice). It smelt great, it tasted great. I lingered a bit, then left to complete my food-buying mission.

You do see strange (sorry, creative) things at The Oracle in Reading sometimes.

Yesterday, I saw a bunny wabbit upstairs with hundreds of scrawlings on it. “Alyssa loves Alex” read one witty item (greedy, too, as it took up a large chunk of space). The bunny was a prop to promote a marker pen. Take a pen, write what you like. Simple.

I eagerly took the opportunity to leave something behind. I’m not saying what. It certainly wasn’t a poem!

The recent announcement that First Great Western have appointed a poet to perform at certain stations (including Reading) made me squirm.  Sally Crabtree is known by other artists as “the pink-wigged pocket Venus from Cornwall”.  I expect that commuters would rather have improvements made to the operator’s Reading-Paddington services. A company spokesman said

It’s part of our annual engagement with our public, and it’s meant to be fun

I could quite happily rant about this, but I won’t.  Instead, I will delight you with my own train-related poem, penned about 5 minutes ago:

Why take the train?
You can take the road instead
or better still
stay at home, in bed
drink a coffee
(or a cup of tea),
think about shopping
- or Sonko’s knee.

Why take the train?
You can cycle or fly
or better still
watch the world go by
from Costa
or the pub…

Sorry.  I’m not very good at this sort of thing.

I received an interesting email this week from someone named Ann MacDonald in Canada. In the email, Ann wrote the following:

I have only seen a few pictures of Reading, but it looks like a very beautiful place, and someday I hope to visit your city, since my roots go back to Reading. My great-great grandfather was from Reading and I dare say that I may have relatives still living there, although I have not been able to make contact with any, but I will continue my search.

Ann’s great-great grandfather was none other than George Palmer of Reading biscuit giant Huntley & Palmer’s (Joseph Huntley was Palmer’s cousin). Her great grandmother, Ann Palmer, married Catholic John McConville. The couple moved to Ireland and Scotland before finally settling in Canada.

Huntley & Palmer’s started life as a London St bakery, J. Huntley & Son, in 1822. Ambitious George Palmer joined in 1841. According to Wikipedia (and this may or may not be accurate), they

became biscuit makers to the British Royal Family and in 1865 expanded into the European continent, and received Royal Warrants from Napoleon III and Léopold II of Belgium. At their height they employed over 5,000 people and in 1900 were the world’s largest biscuit firm.

A website named The Huntley & Palmer’s Connection states that the company also supplied biscuits to Scott’s ill-fated British Antarctic Expedition in 1911 and made Army biscuits during both World Wars. Reading biscuit production sadly ended in 1976 and the enterprise, now known as Associated Biscuits Ltd, was sold to Nabisco in 1982. In 1989, they were sold again, this time to French multinational Danone.

The Huntley & Palmer’s brand was resurrected in 2004 when the company was acquired by two families.

Crumbs! What a story! Can anyone help locate Ann’s relatives, so that she can make contact with them? If so, please get in touch!