Category: review

Shimla Curry house (Shipley) review

Posted on by primaryt
One word review summary:
Starters = Yum.
Bhuna = Slop
Korma = Jar
Chicken/Keema = Nothing

Overview: Average and overpriced
Full review:
We started with veg pakora, meat samosas and masala fish. All 3 were very good yet verysmall portions for the price paid. The restaurant was a bit cold and suffers from over modernistic interior, it kinda feels like a poor man’s Akbars.
Our mains arrived in true Akbar’s style with a naan on a tree and our dishes on a trolley but this was easily overlooked by the elegance of the japati wrapped in a tea towel which is by far my favourite way of recieving japati as it keeps them fresh and yumalicious..
The first dish I tried was the Chicken Bhuna (pictured above), my benchmark test. I was shocked by the sloppy appearance and how white the chicken was when split open, also I was disappointed in the lack of chicken in the dish. I wasn’t impressed overly with the taste, a massive sugary sweetness from onions just didn’t seem right.
Next I tried a korma (pictured above) , I could of been served this in any house, in any restaurant or at home by just cracking open some Sharwood sauce and adding cream, it wasn’t a restaurant ready curry in my opinion.
Next was time for my favourite curry (of 2009) which is the Chicken and Keema mix, as the first 2 curries didn’t compeltely insult me I had high expectations here. They were soon shattered :(… It tasted like meat bolognese, Maybe it was because I’d been so overwhelmed by the flavour of the previous 2 curries? I’m not sure, it just lacked balls which is a shame because it looked the part.
Price: 3 main dishes, 3 starters, 4 japati, 1 naan. £33.65 – Equivalent food at a very good local curry house (£26)…
To summarize: An average curry house that is trying to be like too many other curry houses. Food isn’t offensive and it may be right up your street if you like a wetter curry. The service was average to good.

2009 review

Posted on by primaryt

#Win

Completed sexual predator detection system
Avatar in 3D at Imax – Proof 3D is the future of films.
People realized Wave was over hyped
Etherpad went open source and Primary Pad went live
Realized PS3 and Xbox could get onto the internet, dissapointed in Wii.
Got a new mattress – Mmmm so comfy. But pricey.
Microsoft released Security Essentials
Dark restaraunt – Eating mysterious food in the pitch black
Discovered the world of twitter & hootsuite
Anrdoid V2 firmware update
Discovered Miro – Ted, Fora, GBTV and Diggnation
My School Closures found a practical use from the UK to Nepal
Battle for Terra
Nephew was born
Windows 7 got released
All of our learning sites had consistantly increased traffic all year

# fail
Microsoft released SESP licensing to insult us all
UK still way behind US in online school engagement
E-Ink didn’t happen 🙁 yet
Didnt get my wind turbine up
Blood and Bones [Film]
Name fail
Jaldi Jaldi destroyed curry
Window frames failed
Bradford Council destroyed Bradford city centre
Conservatives had no clarity on technology in education
800×600 is re-born due to netbooks

Project Natal demo video way to premature

Jaldi Jaldi – Mumtaz fast food – Curry on the go review

Posted on by primaryt


Random piece of information: Jaldi translated to English = Soon
Jaldi Jaldi is Mumtaz‘ latest brain child. After Mumtaz‘ success in the supermarket chains and their huge revenue growth the Mumtaz chain have made a brave decision to weather to current social climate.
The branding is very well done.

Mumtaz is not the most popular curry house in Bradford,
the curry house serves mostly visitors to the City with local people tending to opt for less commercial curry houses such as the Sweet Centre or Akbars.

The Starters were too hot & Curry was too cold. The chicken curry was not thoroughly reheated.
Should chicken be reheated? Subway do it.. Short answer is yes.

Has this devalued the Mumtaz brand?
The curry tasted fine but it was disappointing that you couldn’t get a chipatti or roti version and that rice was compulsory.

You would struggle to actually eat it “on the go” in the same way you could a sandwich or burger and the cardboard container absorbed quite a lot of the grease and moisture leaving a rather unpleasant appearance.

Jaldi Jaldi is a great idea, and the concept is fantastic, the execution is lacking a bit of refinement. The prices were too high and at some point laughable especially by the majority of the Asian community in Bradford who are used to much better value for money when purchasing curry.

The staff at the Bradford Forster Square shop were very polite and helpful. The whole experience was very easy and hastle free. I think that Jaldi Jaldi will do a good job catering for local shoppers and workers in the Forster Square area.
Would I take a friend to Jaldi Jaldi to eat?

Nah, Bradford has far too many good curry houses to rush a good curry. Curry as fast food to me and my friends is not a popular concept. Why would you want to rush something so beautiful and pleasant?

Review of Fizzbook – Fizzbook spin by zoomstorm (Netbook)

Posted on by primaryt

The Fizzbook is designed for schools, so we’re going to check it out then throw it into a few schools and see what the kids think. First things first though, we need to check the hardware and software to make sure its ready to be abused in a classroom!

Hardware
The touch screen is difficult to use with a finger, it requires a sharp point, I’m usually too lazy to get the stylus out but I do prefer a touch screen over a mouse pad.
As you can see in this video, the stylus / writing recognition doesn’t work well enough..
I did a skype test and the camera and audio quality was fine but the screen decided to develop a bug and wouldn’t “Flip” the screen to its foreign alignment.. See video:

Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor passed all 4 system requirements so this device should be Windows 7 ready however I’m not sure that the placement of the OEM sticker (hidden under the battery on the inside of the device) is the smartest idea ever. Especially if you begin an install without mains connected…..
The speakers are crisp and clear and it has a separate input for a mic and output for external speakers/headphones.
Battery life is 4.5 hours which is less than a EEE (Sorry if I keep comparing!).
The keys are usual netbook size, no big surprised there, they are tricky for adults to use but I think the kids should get on great..
The wireless on the device picks up points fine and connection is easy and sensible. One thing however that is important to note is that the device has 802.11 b/g and N support which is great and is incorrectly documented on most sites stating that is only has b/g!
The device can be dropped from 50cm although I’m not sure that telling the kids that is a good idea…. The attitude of providing a device that “can” be dropped will only lead to tears later in life when they receive a device they can’t be dropped..
Finally, there is a rattling noise that comes from the tab on the handle, this tab is a great idea because it means you will know who’s or what class this device belongs to!! Genius!
Software / Operating system
I’m guessing no one made the decision to include the Windows Live bar in IE but it’s there and it takes up far too many pixels on a very small screen. Removing the Windows Live bar and favourites is a must just so you can see the actual content you want to see!
Bullguard is installed by default and proves to be a real pain in the wazoobi.. Uninstalling this will make your life easier and your experience happier.
I did a skype video call test and the audio and video quality were average to good, the camera seems to rotate sturdily on its pivot points which is always nice when small fingers are about!
The start up time to desktop was 90 seconds, 15 of these seconds just gave me a black screen before the BIOS logo even popped up.
Below is video of me using it on the net, accessing flash games and beginning an internet session as a pupil would.

Now its time for kids to tell me what they think!

More pictures of the device can be found here

It’s a London thing

Posted on by primaryt
I set off to London on Friday at 4am after getting no sleep at all, I landed at the FOTE09 (future of technology in education 2009) conference and really enjoyed it (see my blog posts). Although I was really tired I then headed to my friends house in Acton and had a great Friday night eating pizza and crashing watching the TV. 40 hours after getting up I finally got to sleep…
Saturday was slow to bring to the boil but we got up and went to watch Surrogates (See review) then headed to Mr Jerks for Jerk Chicken rice and peas. So good, so full, but never the less I battled on to head to Clapham to meet a friend we call “STI“ for a quick drink. After being hit on by a girl of Brazilian decent we decided it was probably best for everyone if we headed back home to get a reasonably early night.
I woke up on Sunday to the piercing tones of an Auzzy or NZ skype conference call in the room next to me. Safe to say I didn’t want to stick around too long so I walked around to the bus station with my mate P whilst discussing how eager we are for the release of Diablo 3….
Leaving my friend “P” behind after a few great days I headed on bus to Wilesden Green to hang out with my aunt for the day. The bus was great and I got from Acton to Wilesden Green in 40 minutes or so. We had a great lunch then headed to see my cousin, her husband and their two children who I have barely even met! Seeing them was great, the kids are great and we had a great time. I wish I remember to get some pictures of me with the kids, especially Charlie who has similar hair to what I had when I was his age. I didn’t want to outstay my welcome so we left at about 9:30 and headed home for more food and tea. I rang my friend Fuxtonius at 10pm and told him I was crashing at his house, an idea he was not opposed to which was good because I didn’t have anywhere to stay on Monday night! Last thing I did was prepare for Hand held learning 2009 (See review) which I had to be at by 10:30..
Monday came and I was eager to get to HHL to meet some of the twitter folks and to see what people had to say, especially about the wilsden project and also to see if I could persuade anyone to get behind my “Not a VLE project”. Met a lot of people and really enjoyed the first presentation of the day. Met some friends and family for lunch then headed back to HHL, unfortunately some of the presentations were repeats from Friday and the exhibition didn’t have any interesting companies showing anything new. I think with the stands costing £3000 this year a lot of smaller innovative companies weren’t interested. Anyway, read my review if you are interested in HHL.. After the do I headed out drinking with some friends till about 11 at which point I walked up to Angel to stop at Fuxtonius‘ flat.
Woke up on Monday morning and tried to persuade a train guy to not be a douche bag and to let me get an earlier train but he wasn’t having it so I jumped onto Macdonalds wireless network and enjoyed a cup of tea while slowly authoring some blog posts and thinking about where to eat breakfast and how to kill 3 hours…
Thanks to my aunt, my cousins and their kids, P, STI and Fuxtonius for everything, I had a great time and I will be back in January probably. 🙂
Also thanks to the Bradford massive (EB) for the entertainment factor 😉 You do realize the pub we were in was completely empty? Was that something to do with us cause everyone left when we went in! Do I smell?