Search results for:

I've enjoyed the ones I've had but I seem to have lost the love a bit this year if I'm honest :/

Had this today, chocolate and cherry roulade from Warwick Street Kitchen in Warwick (not the one in Leamington, which confusingly is the original one). The chocolate had gingerbread in, was banging.

I know but they're clearly mince pie adjacent. Often literally.

What I will say is that I note the 'Good Housekeeping Approved' logo on the dreadful puff pastry pies @mespilus posted, which also appears on the Aldi yule log, but I found the icing far too sugary. Lidl is much better and a pound cheaper too.

Are we allowed to talk yule logs in this thread? I have sampled the Lidl and Aldi efforts so far which both have merit but I don't want to offend sensibilities...

Just realised I could fit Wild Grains into a run and do a literal mince pie run but no more time for runs before we leave for Christmas. Dammit.

If you do like thick pastry, Wild Grains (on the industrial estate off Blackhorse Lane) is good. I had this on the 8th so can't remember enough for a proper review, but IIRC the mincemeat was very good and the pastry speaks for itself. Can't remember what they cost but prices are normally very good there too.

I didn't have any problems with the DK lids, maybe it was a bad batch?

They were good - nice chunky mincemeat - but I would agree that the filling is better than the pastry which is quite thin. I'm not sure that's bad in itself though, it would be boring if all pies had thick pastry.

I wonder if it varies from branch to branch, because while my experience of them isn't extensive from what I've experienced/heard the more typical experience is they pick a price out of the air, then if it's high you need to negotiate it down. But if you use a builder who's used to dealing with them they'll know what they should be paying.

the days of trademans saving fortunes over the customer price is gone from experience

It's definitely gone with Howdens as it's trade only :P

it seems like Howdens' is set up to allow builders to choose how much they can rip off customers by

Yep exactly that. But in their defence if you do the admittedly annoying negotiation dance they can be very good for the money.

I do hope your answer to his initial question was 'as little as possible'.

According to one of the BBC weather folk the red alert is partly based on a very high degree of certainty at the Met Office. So they could of course be wrong but they don't think they will be.

It's almost like we should move on from burning dinosaur remains in our caves because there's better technology available now!

Lidl are doing a Daewoo 2000w single induction for £24.99 at the moment, just saying.

Our gas oven will be going next week and when we've built a kitchen to put it in we'll have induction.

If you look into the research done on gas hobs and indoor air pollution it's pretty scary stuff, the risk of explosions aside.

I did a lot of research on this and the answer was the MacAllister 1200W they sell in B&Q
https://www.diy.com/departments/mac-allister-1200w-220-240v-165mm-corded-plunge-saw-msps1200/3663602797579_BQ.prd

I got one from eBay for £77. The thing with plunge saws is however great they are, there's not much point if they don't run on decent track, and the MacAllister is Makita/Makita-style compatible. Whereas DeWalt (for example) make good saws but only fit their own weird track.

I've heard good things about the Rutland ones (and IIRC they're Makita compatible) but they are £180 and I wasn't convinced they were much better. If you want to watch some YouTube reviews Peter Millard is the man.

Freud blade pls or you'll make @dbr cry.

Well I had thought of that but thought I'd try emailing them first. Got a reply straight away this time to be fair apologising and saying they'll try to get it to me next week, but as @frank9755 suspects they've been swamped...

Has anyone had a design consulation with a Heat Geek? If so how long did it take?

Had our 'geek' round on the 2nd of August, but I still don't have a design proposal/quote. Followed up on the 3rd September, then 30th October - didn't even get a reply to my email from the 30th. It's almost been four months and their website suggests after three you should have your heat pump fitted. lol.

It wasn't that urgent before, it is more urgent now as we have builders due to start the second week of December.

I've emailed them again today and will chase on the phone if necessary but even if I get the proposal soon I feel like I've now lost faith that they'll actually fit the heat pump within a reasonable timescale.

Energy companies are like HR - however warm and cuddly they may seem they are not your friend.

🐙

I was in a Gregg's today too (Walthamstow) and I wasn't looking but I'm pretty sure there weren't any.

Their coffee however. Not if I can help it again.

Black Americano is the only drinkable option. We get free Gregg's drinks from Octopus, first time I went I thought I'd try a flat white - how bad could it be? I poured it down the drain, that's how bad.

I'd be keen to hear more about this, especially once you've had it a bit longer.

Edit: Just saw your last post and sounds like the install/design process wasn't that smooth!

What brand of heat pump is it and what's your property like (in terms of age/size/amount of insulation etc.)?

It's one of these:
https://amzn.eu/d/1hwjXYn

Quality is decent as you'd expect for a German company and it works well, although isn't totally oblivious to direct hot sun (I think you'd need a much bigger one for that).

I got it from Amazon Warehouse which looks like it's still an option and was a lot cheaper.

With apologies for gender stereotyping, would I be right in guessing you have a teenage daughter?

Teenage boys tend to self-heat because the warmth exhausted from their gaming PC running Fortnite/Roblox/Animal Crossing/whatever tends to take the chill off.

Slow to the temperature sensor chat, but I bought one of these and it kept dropping the connection then stopped sending data at all. I returned it so maybe I just got a bad one.

I'm currently using an Aqara temperature and humidity sensor connected to Home Assistant with ZigBee via a ConBee II with an IKEA Trådfri signal booster, because the sensor is in a Stevenson screen on our shed and my Raspberry Pi is under the eaves at the front of our house.

I've used the Aqara sensor for ages (it was under the eaves before, so no booster required) and highly recommend this setup, I'm got an Aqara switch too and will add more sensors when I get round to it.

We ended up paying ~£3.7K (exc rads/UFH) in total for this, obvs including the £7.5K BUS grant free money which the installer dealt with entirely on our behalf.

So in our specific case, at least £2K cheaper than an equivalent gas system.

Wasn't that mate's rates though?!

Your installer's quote to us for pretty much the same deal was £17,258, which after the grant would have left us £9,758 to pay. I'm pretty sure I could get a new gas boiler system for less than that.

I wish I could find someone to install a Vaillant ASHP for £3.7k!

Nice. On the size - it's a statement doorbell haha

This was testing the transformer a while back in 'warble' mode if anyone wants to hear it in action! I think we'll go for the standard ding dong...