Chinese chippys get a bad rep health wise, and its not always unfair, but Bella House’s chef’s pile so many vegetables into their fresh, authentic tasting dishes that you can gorge yourself on vitamins without realising. The King Prawn Kung Bo (£4.20) presents an exciting combination of textures, with juicy prawns, crunchy cashew nuts and tender carrots in a modestly hot syrup. The Prawn Toast (£2.30) is what you’d expect and doesn’t disappoint and they’ll happily spice up a Broccoli Chicken (£3.95) on request, invigorating an otherwise gentle stir-fry with fresh chillies, so you know everything is cooked to order.

I think the review may be a little over generous, Bella House isn't really one of the best 5 in Manchester - then again, website reviews are either over generous (written by people who are running the place) or very critical (written by people who own other places nearby and want to squash the competition) - it's hard to find a review that is objective.

The evening was fun and if it wasn't for Olias getting gripy and wanting to go to bed, I'd have happily stayed longer.

So was I contradicting myself - have I failed in my claim of "sitting around a table every day and eating a home cooked meal..."?

That's up to you to decide. I can't imagine anyone would expect somebody to eat dinner at home every night of their life, never going out, never eating take-away food, never seeing their friends. The purpose of this isn't about never doing these things, it's about eating together as a family, avoiding the 21st century disease of sitting the little ones down in front of the TV and feeding them on oven chips and hot dogs, then waiting until they go to bed to eat a separate dinner of oven chips, hot dogs and vodka.

Anyway - yesterday's rant wasn't about never eating food that you haven't cooked yourself. It was about how a company can push something it knows to be sub-standard, while portraying a corporate image of ethical values. I don't mind McDonalds advertising burgers and I don't object to eating them from time to time - I just took offense at the Coop advertising something it knows to be crap, while at the same time as telling you not to buy it and make your own.

Sunday tomorrow - I think a really good roast chiken will be just the ticket.

A third year student on one of my poorly taught courses (Matthew) made some excellent cherry cakes and gave me one yesterday (I think he called them cherry brownies but it was cake to me). It was really moist and juicy. I am cheered to know that even 3rd year university students are baking these days - and if you think this guy looks like he bakes (I'm implying something here), he looks more like he plays drums for Megadeath.



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