Barcelonaaaaaaa

One of the funniest bits to going away on a jaunt somewhere foreign and (preferably) hot is being unable to understand what the fuck people are banging on about. Which can be a refreshing if not some times frustrating vibe. I always use my hands in far jazzier ways when I'm in a place where English ain't the core verse. It doesn't get one anywhere but means your dangly limbs are getting a little more exertion than normal. What evs - but when tongues wag in a more mystical manner, instead of being wound up by the shite being spouted by those around you, a lot of verbalage sounds like it's been sprinkled in magic. A least a little bit.

It's also a vibe to pick up a phrasebook and learn how to ask for fags and beers in a strange new place (i.e Kent). Wonderful. When we journeyed to Barcelona, we made the illuminating discovery that the Spanish for a Magnum ice cream is pretty much the same as in English. But the word for cot is very different. That in itself is a total fucking vibe. 

Other highlights apart from the intricacies of language? There were many... seeing buddies old and new, visiting Wetherspoons at the airport on the way out and enjoying a fry up and a pint at a time when most sane folk are still tucked up in their boudoirs. Eating shitloads of fish. Going on a cable car - and surprisingly not totally shitting it. Betting on the Grand National. Eating a cheese only known as 'Number 2'. Playing darts. Fortunas. Getting a culture flex on and seeing some art and that. Having a very minor splish and a splash in the sea. 

The downside - having to come back. And go straight into work. 'Not the one'.

Spoons fry up - get in

Stone turtle on chill pill flex

Fancy fruit drink innit

Yes solider

A familiar and comforting sight

View from the cable car - it's high innit

Our vessel



Really enjoying a paella. Like really enjoying it

Cheesecake fake 'Magnum'

Magnum on the loose on the streets of Barcelona - pedestrians - Watch out!

Every piece of cheese is a hot fantasy. Every morsel.

Conclusive proof that we were in fact where we said we were

How I learned to stop worrying and make scotch eggs (again)

Yowzer - It's April already and circles have been turning through these here pages - Classic long time since last update but here we go with a whole sheaf of business to see you through until the sun starts shining again...

Sooooo... back in March we took it upon ourselves to once again make a sacrifice on the altar of savoury snacks and see if eggs could be scotched in a domestic scenario. Although I'd attempted such an operation back in the '011, this time the process was made slightly trickier with a cooking partner on a lent-based abstinence from certain food stuffs. Excitingly, our collective dietary requirements meant we had to enter Whole Foods in Stoke Newington to source some of the necessaries.

And, perhaps surprisingly, it was a piece of cake to acquire the appropriately concocted sausages and flour - we emerged from the eatery brandishing a paper bag after half an hour feeling pretty fucking victorious. It was only being the target of a scolding from a staff member due to our lust for the free samples of organic chocolate which could detract from our status as a pair of smug twerps. And even then, not by much. Have you ever been in Whole Foods? Even the toilets are to die for...

We hot-footed it back to ours and prepared the scotched mobile - boil yer eggs, mash up your sausage meat, roll them into dock off balls, smother in flour, egg yolk and bread crumbs, then lather up with chilli sauce and whang 'em into a lo-fi deep fat frying implement (aka a pan with a shitload of oil in).

Although the preparation takes a about an hour, cooking is done inside ten minutes - so our scotched ladies were sitting pretty like a batch of gourmet, savoury Ferrero Rocher. Some of the thicker ones were a little underdone (aka raw) so could have probably done with a little more boiling in the hot tub, but some sensible scraping and nibbling meant we could enjoy without risk of food poisoning. I had a dodgy 5 minutes where I though something evil was occurring within my guts, but after that fine. A great success if you will. If only the ambassador's reception was actually like this. Then, and only then, would I give a fig about attending...

Raw as fook

Needy kneading

Hey fuzzball

Encona sauce doth runneth over

Yes ladies

Fried within an inch of their little runny lives

Bit raw innit

Runny yolk chaos

Spring time vibessssss

Yes yes - spring has officially sprung round these parts with the clock's going forward and the evenings turning into pure sunshine. Vibes round here have been big and food-shaped. It's always a fresh look to veer from gourmet extragavance to proper scummy delights. Although combining donner meat with a scotch egg was one of the finest, culinary items to enter me gob for some time. It's all about straddling the line.

Elsewhere we've been sampling the delights of numerous boozers and even went bowling. Yeah check that shit out. It's almost quite grown up. Almost...



A Mexican breakfast



Getting filmed innit



A tart. With figs in it. Lardy fucking dar jah



Bare ribs



Mumsy!



This sea bass got murked



Old time Hackney vibes



Yes



Bowling flex



Still can't stop listening to this all the fucking time



Scotch eggs and donner meat together. At last



Yes mate



It's a tuna ting



Greazzzeh



More delicious fucking meat



Er hello



The family fish keeps getting bigger



Found Mac will travel



The king of the drop



Faggots



Warriorssss - come out to plaayyyy



Posh, free lager innit



Bitch purlease

Kiss the Fist 's March outing to N16...

Earlier in the month our sporadic and inevitably slightly half-cut disco evening Kiss the Fist dusted itself down, popped on some glad-rags and high-tailed it up to Stoke Newington's Church Street for a Saturday night out.

The party was also tied into resident playa Stef's 60th birthday celebrations so you can imagine the larks we had - and, somewhat surprisingly, these were larks shared by many. This ain't astonishment at the popularity of our boy - just that the bar was drunk dry and the disco was indeed jumping at certain stages by folk we didn't actually know. The promotional post blitz the previous week obviously worked really well - In typical Kiss the Fist fashion, I didn't take any snaps of the baying crowd screaming for more - just some camera phone shots of a few more candid moments from different points in the evening and before. Props to everyone who repped the other Saturday...

You can give the latest podcast from our kitchen a whirl here




DJ Quark relaxing before taking down a jager and totally smashing the guts of the Bathhouse...



Early punter posing with plastic rabbit in a cage #decor #vibes



The promotional blitz smashes Church Street



Picking up special guest DJ Quark from the local charity shop before his big night

Monolake gets his geek on...

I had the pleasure of meeting Robert Henke, aka Monolake, down at Fabric at the tail end of February. Monolake is the artist name for this German dude's numerous sonic excursions into the realms of techno and beyond and, while you can lose your marbles to his music, there's obviously a shitload of thinking behind it - interacting with him felt like talking to a particularly chatty yet massive brain.

Despite the intellectual inadequacies on my part, it was a real pleasure to spend an hour in his company - this dude is a gangly self-confessed geek who can talk the proverbial hindlegs offa donkey. And was willing to forgive my rambling on... You can read what we talked about via the link below... And check out photos from Hyponik photographer Jimmy Mould here... Another sweet dudeeeee...

Monolake - Chance elements - Hyponik interview