Thursday, February 09, 2012
Greco di Tufo
Some while ago now we came across an amusing little wine in the Italian restaurant which occupies what used to be the King Billy in Ewell village, something called Greco di Tufo. Entirely new to us and we liked it a lot. So off to Alio's to see whether he could muster one among his large selection of Italian wine and he could. So so far so good. The catch was that he never had any again, despite mentioning it once or twice and I did not like to make a positive order of it. Then yesterday, while purchasing the tea time kippers from Waitrose I happened to notice that they carried the stuff, a brand called Terredora at around £13.50 a pop. Grabbed two bottles to find when I got home that I had got two varieties: one 'Terre degli Angeli' with a red decorative badge and the other 'Loggia della Serra' with a yellow decorative badge. Started with the angels and were entirely satisfied with the product. Kippers, said to be from Craster, also entirely satisfactory (simmered rather than grilled, which last we find a bit strong on the palette).
Which leaves me not buying kippers from fish men on stalls because, generally speaking, their kippers are not very nice at all and not buying this wine from the otherwise very handy Alio's because he does not stock it in a reliable way. While Waitrose scores on both points.
Generally speaking I do not get in a stew about the way that the big stores are smashing the small stores because I believe that the smashing arises from quality. They win because they have a more competitive offering. But I can get in a stew about worthies who moan about the death of the high street while doing their shopping, along with the rest of us, at the big edge of town supermarkets with their big car parks.
However, last week, one of the papers had a new to me argument about the issue. Which was that all the big supermarkets pay their people minimum wage, thus keeping the checkout price of grub down and corporate profits up. But a good proportion of these people are on benefits as the minimum wage is not a living wage for an adult with a family, so the taxpayer, that is to say you and me, are making up the difference while the supermarkets get to keep their profits, less the bit of corporation tax which they have not managed to avoid. It would be interesting to see the results of a survey which tested this theory. Is it dented by the fact that 99% of the workforce are either young or part-time housewives and therefore not deserving of a living wage?
If the theory true, it would all be a bit annoying. But I guess one's annoyance should be tempered by the thought that small independents probably pay their people even less than the big boys and are probably not able to offer anything like the same perks.
Which leaves me not buying kippers from fish men on stalls because, generally speaking, their kippers are not very nice at all and not buying this wine from the otherwise very handy Alio's because he does not stock it in a reliable way. While Waitrose scores on both points.
Generally speaking I do not get in a stew about the way that the big stores are smashing the small stores because I believe that the smashing arises from quality. They win because they have a more competitive offering. But I can get in a stew about worthies who moan about the death of the high street while doing their shopping, along with the rest of us, at the big edge of town supermarkets with their big car parks.
However, last week, one of the papers had a new to me argument about the issue. Which was that all the big supermarkets pay their people minimum wage, thus keeping the checkout price of grub down and corporate profits up. But a good proportion of these people are on benefits as the minimum wage is not a living wage for an adult with a family, so the taxpayer, that is to say you and me, are making up the difference while the supermarkets get to keep their profits, less the bit of corporation tax which they have not managed to avoid. It would be interesting to see the results of a survey which tested this theory. Is it dented by the fact that 99% of the workforce are either young or part-time housewives and therefore not deserving of a living wage?
If the theory true, it would all be a bit annoying. But I guess one's annoyance should be tempered by the thought that small independents probably pay their people even less than the big boys and are probably not able to offer anything like the same perks.
# posted by Jim @ 6:12 AM 
