Nowt So Dumb As Nationalist Gourmets

A fraudster who tricked luxury hotels and stores into buying "Scottish-grown tea" that was grown abroad has been found guilty of a £550,000 scam.

Where did he say the plantations were, right next to the haggis ranches? 

Thomas Robinson supplied high-end customers such as Edinburgh's Balmoral Hotel and the Dorchester in London with varieties with names like Dalreoch White, Highland Green, Silver Needles and Scottish Antlers Tea. Trading as The Wee Tea Plantation, he claimed they had been grown on farmland in Perthshire.

What sort of buyers are these places employing? Perhaps they'd all visited the Eden Project, where you can indeed be served locally grown tea, but even a child can understand there's a vast difference in climate between Cornwall and Scotland.

Instead, the tea had been imported, repackaged and then resold at hugely-inflated prices, Falkirk Sheriff Court was told. Robinson also defrauded genuine aspiring Scottish tea growers by selling them plants he claimed were grown in Scotland.

Mad dreamers are so susceptible to conmen...

The 55-year-old, who is also known as Thomas O'Brien or Tam O' Braan, rented a former sheep farm near Loch Tay and began spinning "elaborate lies" to customers. Prosecutors said he created the "CV of a fantasist" (Ed: Good thing for Rachel Reeves that isn't illrgal in and of itself)- claiming among other things that he was a multi-millionaire, a polymer scientist, a former bomb disposal expert and had invented the "bag for life".

He also claimed to have developed a "special biodegradable polymer" that would make the tea plants grow in half the usual time. The court was told it looked like a black bin liner.

Because it's probably exactly what it was.... 

The scam began to unravel in 2017 after Perth and Kinross Council started to check if he had a food processing licence.

Took them long enough!

After a three-week trial jurors took six hours to find him guilty of defrauding tea growers, hotels and tea companies of nearly £553,000 in total. He will be sentenced at a later date, and also faces proceedings under the Proceeds of Crime Act.

They should serve him his own tea when he's doing porridge! 

But It's For Gaia!

So why wouldn't you risk your child's health? Ah, if only there had been some warning it was a big scam...

Oh, wait! 

The bamboo “eco-cups” are promoted as helping to protect the planet, but are usually non-recyclable.

See, anyone with their head screwed on would smell a rat at this, surely? 

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) said it had advised retailers to withdraw products in June and any further sales would be unlawful. Despite the ban, the bamboo and plastic products are still widely available online, including children’s cups and plates.

What sort of rapacious capitalist businesses would rather harm the kiddiewinks than forgo that filthy lucre, then? 

WWF-UK, the wildlife charity, was last week selling a reusable bamboo cup for £7.50, which it says “helps protect our planet”.

Ooops!

Not Heeding The Warning Signs...

Donna Southby, who was dining with her husband, Mark, and friends at the two-Michelin-starred restaurant on the edge of Snowdonia or Eryri national park, claims she was subject to a tirade of “verbal abuse” from the head chef, Gareth Ward, a feted cook from County Durham known for his uncompromising approach and 30-course menus.

Hmmm, 'uncompromising approach', eh? Were there any other clues that it might not be a pleasant experience..? 

£375-a-head menus at Ynyshir – which describes itself as “ingredient led, flavour driven, fat fuelled, protein obsessed” – consist of a parade of mostly meat and fish courses, from wagyu beef to black cod and caviar. With a DJ “curating” music that cranks up as the night proceeds to a level that one reviewer compared to a “Rotterdam techno dungeon” and atmospheric effects such as birch smoke, dinner takes up to five hours. A couple’s bill can easily pass £1,000 with wine. The restaurant warns: “we do not cater for any dietary requirements and do not offer substitutions for any of the dishes”.

I'm sure the food is good, but Reader, nothing is so good I'd want to put up with that... 

In 2018, Ward told Restaurant magazine: “People say you should cook for your customers. I say fuck that. You should cook for yourself.”

Then why the hell are you running a restaurant?  

A Fool And Their Money...

The boom in home bartending means more and more of us happily sip cocktails in our sitting rooms. But getting them right takes expertise.

Well, yes, or opening a can of the delicious pre-mixed cocktails from Moth. 

So, would you entrust the drinks at your Coronation party to a device that claims to make perfect cocktails at the push of a button?

Not for £300, I wouldn't! 

The 'Bartesian', created by Canadian bartender Ryan Close, looks like a coffee machine, but uses capsules containing the ingredients for your favourite cocktails such as bitters, extracts and juice concentrates (but not the spirits).

So you've got to mess around buying capsules for the damned thing and then adding your own spirits too? What, exactly, does the thing do?  

I pop the capsule in and the display tells me to place a shaker with ice under the dispenser.

...

The machine buzzes for about 15 seconds. Then the display tells me to shake and pour.

It doesn't even shake for you! Who on earth would buy this? 

I'm Not Sure That's The Right Word...

'Misery'..? Really..? I mean, yes, it's an inconvenience, but...this is something you can already do when you buy stuff online.

It is hoped the software, by British firm Anthropics Technology, will reduce the environmental impact and £7billion cost of returning online orders in the UK.

The catch? The subscription service charges around £15 per outfit tried, or £135 a month.

Ha ha ha ha ha! A fool and her money are soon parted, eh?