Tag: Glastonbury Tor

The Uther Henge guide to perfect toast
Traditional single Insertion method
The traditional method of toasting. You simply adjust the toaster setting so that it pops up cooked to perfection. At least, that’s the idea. The reality is that several factors usually result in very uneven toasting.
Advantages:
- Speed
- Simplicity
- Basic toaster settings
- No special training required
Disadvantages:
- Uneven toasting (unless you use the Breville Toastmatic 4000)
Double insertion method (mid-stage horizontal rotation)
The first level of advanced toast-making. The toaster is set to half the standard setting, and when it pops out midway you rotate the bread horizontally before reinserting for the second stage.
Advantages:
- Consistent toasting on both sides
Disadvantages:
- Top of bread often toasted more than bottom
- Inexperienced users can burn their fingers at the midway stage
- Basic training required
The Uther Henge Flip (mid-stage vertical rotation)
The pinnacle of practical toast-making. This is a simple improvement over the horizontal double insertion method. The introduction of a vertical flip creates fantastic toast.
Advantages:
- Consistent toasting top to bottom on both sides
Disadvantages:
- Resetting toaster to half the single insertion value confuses other toaster users who have to be forcefully inducted into the ways of the Uther Henge Flip.
Horizontal rotation followed by vertical flip followed by second vertical flip
This over-elaborate method of toasting results in the most consistent browning but is so complex that most people get worse results than the traditional single insertion method.
Advantages:
- Incredibly even toasting
Disadvantages:
- Requires quadruple insertion
- Many novices fail to observe the rule that bread should be inserted either once, or an even number of times, but never an odd number, unless of course you introduce a final finishing off phase to remedy any inconsistencies
- Setting the toaster becomes very complex
- Toaster needs to be reset for subsequent slices to prevent over-cooking
- Constant monitoring necessary to avoid burning
- Many people forget how many toast rotations they have performed because they are distracted by other events in the kitchen
Factors to consider
Is your bread sliced by hand or machine?
Hand-slicing is less consistent than machine-slicing and the raised areas can become especially burnt. But you may be able to spread more Hobgoblin Marmalade on hand-sliced bread because it has a greater surface area. Experts call this the Goblin Ratio.
Is the bread thicker at one end than the other?
This can have a massive impact on the flow of hot air through your toaster, disrupting your calculations. You may be wise to set some time aside for wind-tunnel testing if your slices of bread are particularly wedge-shaped.
Who is Uther Henge?
Uther Henge is the chief mystics consultant for the National Trust stationed permanently at their gift shop at Glastonbury Tor. If you visit St. Michael’s Tower on top of Glastonbury Tor you can experience the Making Toast Through The Ages display at which Uther Henge gives a twice-daily lecture Toast, the Tor, Past Present and Future. Henge invented the Uther Henge Flip during one of his lectures when he realised that this unintuitive method of rotating bread resulted in a better and more consistent slice of toast.
Infographic
This information is available as an Making Toast Through The Ages
April 6, 2011
England’s longest escape tunnel discovered at Glastonbury Tor
Officials at the Prison Service are counting their lucky stars today following the discovery of a massive escape tunnel built by inmates at St. Michael’s prison.
The prison that occupied the basement of St. Michael’s Tower was finally closed in January 2011. Had it remained open for just a few more weeks it is likely that most of the eighty prisoners would have escaped.
Officials from the Prison Service were able to take a couple of brave journalists on a guided tour of the tunnel, that runs all the way to the bottom of the tor, follows the path of the nearby A361, branches east under nearby fields, passing under the A37 near Lower Wraxall and finally stops a hundred yards short of Castle Cary train station.
In a statement to the press, Prison Service spokesman Gerald Manquez said; “It seems that prisoners were planning to join their tunnel to the underground pedestrian walkway at Castle Cary train station, where they would then mingle with passengers. But as the tunnel grew ever longer the job of transporting and disposing of the hundreds of tonnes of waste material took its toll on the prisoners. It explains why Glastonbury Tor grew by 30 metres in the last decade. It also explains why the prisoners were so happy when we announced the closure of the prison. They were now able to enjoy a virtual holiday in one of Britain’s less mystical prisons – free of the responsibility of running an industrial scale mining operation.”
March 30, 2011
Inquest into death of Councillor Watkins reaches open verdict
Following the mysterious death of Councillor Watkins by being impaled on a realistic scale model of Glastonbury Tor in February, an inquest has reached an open verdict. This has shocked many people, not least Chief Inspector Wilkinson who was convinced of foul play.
The inquest heard details about the events that resulted in Councillor Watkins’ untimely demise, and saw the instruction leaflet that the Chief Inspector believed had been altered to turn the mystical model into an instrument of death.
But in the absence of any other solid evidence, the instructions were not deemed to be sufficient evidence of a crime, and lacking a perpetrator, the police investigation brought forth no useful evidence and fizzled out.
Outside the court Chief Inspector Wilkinson made a statement to the press; “In our work the Glastonbury constabulary regularly have to confront the unpleasant side of life. Only last week we had to deal with a savage attack on some shoppers by a pack of Somerset Stranglers that had made their way onto Glastonbury High Street in search of cotton wool for their nests. But the death of Councillor Watkins has shocked everyone on the force. Forensics tell me that when the scale model of St. Michael’s Tower impaled Councillor Watkins it was traveling at such a speed that they still haven’t found all his teeth. But the thing is, despite the initial clue of the amended instructions, we haven’t been able to gather any other substantive evidence. There was a noticeable closing of ranks in both Town Council A and Town Council B.”
The Chief Inspector continued; “The only good that’s come of this is that we have been able to return the model of Glastonbury Tor to Watkins’ widow and she now has the correct version of the instructions. This means she is unlikely to type in the same deadly combination of dates that cause the model to become dangerous, so she should enjoy many years of enjoyment from it.”
March 24, 2011
Don’t be tempted by the hamsters at Glastonbury Tor say vets
Local vets have advised visitors to stop stuffing their pockets with the hamsters that are swarming over Glastonbury Tor this year.
The huge population of hamsters, known by local breeders as Somerset Stranglers because of the tendency of females to kill their babies when food runs out, has swelled since they were granted protected species status in 1974.
Hamster experts say that Somerset Stranglers were introduced to the area by Dutch tulip dealers in the seventeenth century when they found them to be a breed that could be trusted to guard valuable tulip bulbs. Because they don’t have any natural predators on Glastonbury Tor they have bred like wildfire and it was only the Somerset potato famine of 1924 that caused their numbers to dwindle.
Titania Bonham-Smythe, the Chief Gatekeeper at Glastonbury Tor explains; “When visitors walk up Glastonbury Tor and see the hamsters frolicking on the grass it is very tempting to put a couple in their pockets. But people need to remember that these are not the same friendly hamsters you find in a pet shop. They live in the wild and are not tame. They are ruthless scavengers that will quickly become savage with any human that denies them food or cotton wool for their nest.”
A leaflet is available at the National Trust gift shop explaining the dangers of Somerset Stranglers.
March 8, 2011
Perky pensioner Percival Angstrom returns to Tor for prestigious Vortex Award
Today OAP Percival Angstrom was welcomed back to Glastonbury Tor at a reception arranged by Chief Gatekeeper Titania Bonham-Smythe. This followed his dramatic airlift in January when he was discovered unconscious in St. Michael’s Tower.
Angstrom was presented with a basket of new age products from the National Trust gift shop at the tor, including a delightful selection of lentil tea and Hobgoblin Marmalade.
But the highlight of the event was when the plucky pensioner was given the Vortex Award – a special cut-glass trophy in the shape of St. Michael’s Tower inscribed with his name. It means he joins a very prestigious club that only has eight other members.
Bonham-Smythe explained; “We have now deployed each of the thousand hand-painted signs we received as part of the annual shipment from head office. When Mr. Angstrom visited the tor last month there were still some signs that were not in their correct place, and the particular No Entry sign he encountered on the wrong side of the main door to the tower almost caused him to come a cropper. The St. Michael’s vortex is something that members of the public shouldn’t be too concerned about though. It is very rare, and usually there is a member of staff on hand to step in and help using the special anti-vortex equipment.”
Before leaving the Tor, Mr. Angstrom was shown the display Making Toast Through The Ages that was installed in St. Michael’s Tower as part of the cleanup operation following his vortex. Unfortunately the event was cut short when a slice of toast became wedged in a Toastmatic 4000, setting off the smoke alarm.
February 17, 2011