The Boomboom CV19 Survival Guide

A couple of folk have asked if I am going to publish some virus happy recipes in this trying time of Covid Bastard 19 and my response to that is although I am at least five types of idiot, I’m not that type of idiot.

Unless you’re one of those shelf stripping scumbags hoarding all the pasta, baby milk and eight hundred rolls of andrex for you and your pet cat (who hates you) then you have probably noticed that your grocery haul aint looking like it did a fortnight ago. This kind of lunacy is unprecedented and we really do have to rely on each other, which is a frankly terrifying prospect when you look at how a lot of ‘us’ are behaving at the moment. So no, no recipes from me, instead, the Boomboom CV19 Survival Guide. Stay strong, brothers and sisters, and try to smile.

Boomboom’s Serious and Scientific CV19 Survival Guide

1-DON’T FUCKING STOCKPILE YOU MORONS!!!!! Do you even know what a serving of pasta is? Fun fact, no one does! Everyone always cooks too much spaghetti and that is the little known twenty eighth law of thermo dynamics. You don’t need as much pasta as you usually have so no, you don’t need eight bags of fusilli for a household of three for a week. Just stop it.

2-Get celebrating!!!! Have a good go through the cupboards for all that ‘for special’ stuff and weird beans you bought on a health kick but don’t know how to cook. My fine wine stash is about to take a serious inspection and culling schedule for sure.
Hit your spice rack and google what to do with juniper berries, fenugreek and Zaltar mix. Make some flatbreads. Try that weird tea your hippie aunt gave you for Christmas.
Never has there been a better time for a glass of champagne and beans on toast for tea followed by one or two of those fancy Belgian truffles. Chill that champers properly though, we are not yet savages.

3-Make a health boosting, alkalising drink of distilled water, black pepper, fresh lemon juice, paprika and the most expensive maple syrup you can find, mix it 2:1 with bleach and use this to spray anyone who comes closer than 2m to you as a deterrent. Tinned produce, mouldy apples and windchimes also make good projectiles to keep those plague ridden mofos at a safe distance.

4-Tinned and frozen fruit and veg do retain vitamins, fibre and health benefits as do fruit juices with bits in. Leave fresh produce for people who have to shop day to day, like front line care staff and other key workers who will be looking after your sorry butt when C-day comes.

5-Keep an eye on your elderly neighbours and loved ones, they almost always have biscuits and are often slow on their feet first thing in the morning if it comes to you needing to make a raid for custard creams and other working from home essentials.

6-Many items in your garden are entirely edible so build yourself a camo tent with dirty sheets, bamboo canes and foraged raspberry netting and get to hunting those squirrels. Blackbirds make a particularly fine pie filling and next door’s cat would eat you without a second thought, it’s just nature’s way to get to him first. This is what we evolved for.

7-You can happily replant a lot of veggie ends like celery roots, lettuce and cabbage stalks and carrot tops. You won’t grow usable veg any time soon but it might be a nice project for the kids while they are off school and driving you to mix up a jug of Manhattans before breakfast every day. Click here for ideas https://about.spud.com/blog-regrowing-vegetables-from-scrap/

8-If you have a local café, pub or restaurant looking to close see if you can buy gift vouchers or a take out service from them to aid their cash flow. Many places will now deliver their dishes or even the stock they won’t be using. They can leave it on the door step for zero contact. Get on the phone or social media and see how you can support them and maybe even get some cake.

9-Speaking of cake, you don’t need butter! Grab yourself some veg or coconut oil or even a jar of apple sauce to sub and get baking to cheer up those store cupboard staples. I will personally send a fiver and a tin of aldi baked beans to the first person who comes up with a decent goose fat Victoria sponge.

10-Remember that God, Allah and Captain Picard have confirmed unequivocally this week that letting any fresh produce rot will get you sent straight to hell. So if you do have too much, either give it away or cook it so it keeps. Make some jam or a stew or a pasta sauce and freeze it. Then eat it, you idiot, don’t go and buy more fresh stuff!!!!

11-Stop making up allergies. Are you really gluten intolerant??? Some people have coeliac disease. Leave them the rice flour and free from products and get over your fad diet, Karen. Same goes for almond milk and vegan products. You’ve been laughing at the plant based eaters for years, stick to your spam and let them have the lentils.

12-If you live with someone who is newly working from home they may well have relocated their office snack drawer into the domestic environment. Under absolutely no circumstance is it acceptable for you to eat from this stash. They have not been hiding those hob nobs from Andy in accounts for the last three months only to lose them to you, you selfish bastard.

13-Stay in touch with your friends and loved ones by phone and social media and go out of your way to talk to them on subjects you violently disagree on. You won’t miss them so much when reminded what small minded/intolerant/crazy bastards they are.

Stay at home and save a life. Seriously.