The George Lite Zone

Fire up the Audi Quatro, slap a cartridge in your 8-track, slap a couple of nonces for good luck, then hit it.

Alternatively buy Ashes To Ashes on Amazon, groove to the groove in the comfort of your own home and invite bonnie nickers round to dance the horizontal tango to the strains of that old Father Benny Cake classic - Vienna.

The lineup for this tasty bit of 80’s nostalgia includes: -

1. Introduction - Dialogue: Alex Drake
2. David Bowie - Ashes To Ashes
3. Visage - Fade To Grey
4. The Human League- Love Action
5. Duran Duran - Girls On Film
6. Dexys Midnight Runners - Geno
7. OMD - Souvenir
8. The Stranglers - No More Heroes
9. The Clash - I Fought The Law
10. Heaven 17 - (We Don’t Need This) Fascist Groove Thing
11. Interlude - Dialogue: You’re Nicked
12. Edmund Butt - Gene Genie (Gene Hunt’s theme from `Ashes To Ashes’)
13. The Passions - In Love With A German Film Star
14. Altered Images - Happy Birthday
15. Joe Jackson - It’s Different For Girls
16. Flying Lizards - Money
17. The Beat - Doors Of Your Heart
18. The Ruts - Staring At The Rude Boys
19. The Teardrop Explodes - Reward
20. Tenpole Tudor - Swords Of A Thousand Men
21. Bryan Ferry - Let’s Stick Together
22. Ultravox - Vienna
23. Edmund Butt - Title Music from `Ashes To Ashes’
24. Epilogue: Dialogue: Fandabydozy

Shame there’s no Motörhead in the lineup, Ace of Spades or Bomber would have been great additions. Still there’s always the possibility for a Season 2 OST if the next series gets the green light. Ace Of Spades in particular was pretty iconic of the early 80’s and is the ultimate background music for a bit of on-screen violence.

Still, it’s nice to see The Stranglers in the mix, especially as my cousin Peter Phipps drummed with them at one point. How he found the time whilst dating Tessa Wyatt I’ll never know, though that was back in the 70’s mind. As an aside, a young Tessa popped up in an episode of UFO before joining Richard O’Sullivan in that really alien TV series Robin’s Nest.

Like a scene from Don Sieggel’s classic Invasion Of The Body Snatchers, a Doppelgänger of “The George Lite Zone” has emerged from its pod onto the world wide web. Resplendent with the features of the original but given an alien twist, it originated on the planet Wordpress and may one day go on to replace its host should it fall asleep.

Watch this space and keep watching the skies.

This is the greatest and best beer in the world’s. . . tribute.

Earlier this week I was in Cafe Bizon, when the barman asked “What do you want?”, “What beers have you got?”, I replied, “Any beer you want.”, said the bar keep. As a joke I asked for a glass of Westvleteren.

Belgium has a total of 6 Trappist breweries, Westmalle, Westvleteren, Chimay, Rochefort, Orval and Achel. On drinking my way through this distinguished list I found that by far and away my favourite was Westvleteren. Unfortunately, this beer is as rare as Pixie Poo and took an awful lot of tracking down for my first encounter. The reason for this rarity is that a couple of years back it was voted the best beer in the world. Subsequently, demand was enormous, stocks depleted and cases of this beery nectar sold for large sums of money on e-bay. Eventually the monks at St Barnabus monastery, formerly St Sixtus, said enough is enough and stopped sales of the beer outside of the abbey. Today to get hold of this heavenly brew you need to make the pilgrimage to the monastery in Flanders where you are limited to a maximum of one case.

Meanwhile, back in the Bizun, the barkeep looked around furtively and said yes they have a small number of bottles left, the remnants of a case but this must be kept secret (you wont tell anyone will you?). A few minutes later I had a distinctive bottle of the Trappist nectar sitting in front of me, distinguished by its lack of a label with just the bottle top to identify it. Moments later the beer was poured and I had a glass of it cradled in my hand on the road to beery Nirvana. Slightly sweet in a woody sort of way, with a taste redolent of strawberries on a Summers day, I could almost hear the monastery bells tolling in my ears. No wait, that was just a blues riff from Tommy Bolin ringing out from the Bizon bar speaker system.

My thanks go out to Rob Campell for purchasing this rarest of the rare in his round. Greatest beer in the world? Oh hell yes, I feel a road trip coming on.

I fondly remember reading such Clarke classics as “A Fall of Moondust“, “Rendezvous With Rama” and “Childhoods End“, in the 70’s so it was with great sadness that I learned of his death from Heart failure aged 90.

Author of over 100 books, Clarke was a visionary, in the 40’s he predicted the communications satellite and mobile phone. In 1965 he wrote 2001 a Space Odyssey, based on his short story “The Sentinel” and was nominated for an Oscar for the screenplay of the film in 1968 with Stanley Kubrick with whom he co-wrote the screenplay.

On his 90th birthday Arthur listed three wishes for the world: -

• To embrace cleaner energy resources
• For a lasting peace in his homeland of Sri Lanka
• For evidence of extraterrestrial beings.

Rest in peace Arthur, child of the stars.

When I was over in Hyderabad last year. I was disappointed with the quality of the much touted Biryanis, which, being a specialty of the region I had high expectations for. My faith in the humble Biryani was restored last night however by a carryout from the newly opened Kushi’s in Dunfermline, which was superb. The last time I had a Biryani this good was in the UK’s former number 1 Indian restaurant Quilon in London, where the cost was considerably more.

In fact everything about Kushi’s is superb from the food, the decor, the service to the rather cool name. I’d eaten in Kushi’s over the bridge in Edinburgh so was anticipating great things from their new sibling. Butter Chicken, Lamb Karahi, Chicken Tkka Masala and Chicken Jalfrezi are all cooked with style and aplomb and the deserts, including a most excellent Kulfi Faluda, all make a satisfying end to a great meal.

Bravo Kushi’s, Dunfermline’s new king of curries. Long live the king.

No Brussels for me tonight, after a concrete mixer decided to give the Forth Road Bridge a concrete overcoat and left me in a giant motorway shaped car park.

Police haven’t yet ruled out sabotage due to a lack of any concrete evidence. Boom, boom…

But still, badda-bing badda-bang, at least I’m home with the family for an extra night this week. An offer I can’t refuse.

This week I once again became entangled in the Spinnekopke’s web of fine food. One of my favorite eating houses and conveniently close to Cafe Bizon, In’t Spinnekopke specialises in Belgian beer and food cooked in Belgian Beer. A winning combination in anybody’s book (if that book in question was The Good Beer Guide” that is). Unfortunately their legendary Carbonade wasn’t up to the mark, with the beef having a texture reminiscent of the bison hung on the wall of the aforementioned Cafe Bizon. The accompanying gravy made with Lambic beer was still, as usual, superb though.

The visit was however worth it for the desert, a holy trinity of beer Sorbet’s. Sorbet à la Kriek, Sorbet à la Blanche and Sorbet à la Maredsous accompanied by fresh strawberries. When the waiter recommended it, the idea of beer sorbet’s didn’t initially appeal to me, but I thought what the hell lets give it a try. I’m glad that I did as it is now a worthy addition to my exclusive list of top 3 deserts I’ve eaten out. Now if I can only get the recipe for this, the finest sorbet I’ve ever eaten, of them I’ll post on Greasy Truckers. Somehow though I think they may be reluctant to part with it.

In Brussels, the Durum kebab sits atop the pantheon of the gods of fast food. A veritable leviathon of luscious lettuce, damned fine donner meat and chilli sauce, it certainly fills the gap.

Throw in some fresh chillis, Belgian fries and pili-pili chilli dip and it’s the food of the gods.

Speaking of beermats, the one under this cascade doesn’t look like it’s going to cope with the beery deluge, even with Keri’s attempted rescue mission. Nice pouring Phil.