NCB Tea and Bacon Rolls!

[John]

Tea worse than BR tea, but the best bacon rolls found anywhere...mmmmmm, even after all these years I can still taste 'em!

Remember those meal tickets we used to get after overtime on nights??? Sausage, bacon, eggs and tomatoes in canteen, then spend the next four hours fermenting it, then guts ache then two hours on the bog!! We never learn't did we!

[John]

Does that mean "no comment" by the lack of replies ;D

[Ragger]

Grassmoor Training Centre.

The most vile cup of tea on the planet, probably the Universe, or even beyond that.

Year after year they tried to improve it; new urns, different tea brand etc., nothing made any difference.

I remember those canteen breakfasts very well, even enjoyed most of them.

Often used my snap ticket on a couple of cartons of milk.

[dazb]

Oh a trepanner's a wonderfull thing, a thing, a trepanner's a wonderfull thing.............and so say all of us.
Trepanner (Trepanned)
It is a medical term that describes the removal of a circle of skull bone in order to relieve pressure on the brain, apparently this is an ancient practice performed by primitive tribes in Africa some thousand years before the advent of Anderson Boyes 70HP floor mounted version that in classic fashion seemed to have been designed to increase the pressure on the brains of later versions of the Homo Sapien Erectus, the coalmining version Homo Sapian Tooling Kneelicus. (Only joking I thought the 70HP trepanner was a fantasic piece of applied coal getting pitmatics and engineering). Whilst it was a leap forward from conventional principles of Power Loaders of the time it was in fact based on coal mining machine designs much, much earlier than the 1960’s, I think I am right in saying that there is a description and either drawing or photograph of a compressed air driven, twin headed, contra rotating Trepanner coal heading machine in one of the volumes of Practical Coalmining (anybody with a copy please post a scanned copy, failing that, wait until I have saved up enough to buy an Ebay set of PCM, and then I will).
Anderson (in various company organisational formats produced quite a few variants of the Trepanner, 70hp Floor Mounted, Trepan-shearer, 120HP Heavy Duty Floor Mounted Trepanner, Double Ended Conveyor Mounted and the last was the 270HP Floor Mounted version in the late 1980’s or early 1990’s (a real technical animal).
There were Trepanners designed to cut coal sections as low as 32 inches and up 6 foot (these larger section machines being the “Piggy Back Gearhead versions of the DECMT, where two further trepan wheels were mounted above the original standard ogres.).
Anderson Boyes or the later titled companies of Anderson Mavor, Anderson Strathclyde were not the only ones to manufacture the trepanner, I seem to recollect that the “opposition” in the form of British Jeffrey Diamond made a t least a Trepan-Shearer version.

[John]

Whats that got to do with bacon butties and canteen tea Daz

[Clive]

Old Boston Training center Haydock Had brill cheese on toast for morning bait

That was where the good bit ended. The chips for dinner were revolting. If you dropped them on the floor they would bounce back up again and as for the toast minus cheese! I think they stamped on the bread in a mucky puddle before they steamed the bread warm and coloured it burnt with boot polish

[ejb]

Old Boston !!!,I can't remember the food though.

"Right,now we're going to show you how to remove wooden props by using this device called a Gablock or Sylvester.You put the chain ............."

I can remember the 2 trainers though,Lou Ludlow and Bob Hunter.Lou was a bit of an old woman,Bob was more relaxed.

[Clive]

Cant remember those trainers. Val and Albert Ross come to mind. this was 1980. What I remember was most of instructers had various bits of them missing and they showed us these horor films of loco drivers heads going pop when they got fast between air doors and mine cars when not going correct way round train to open doors and nor applying hand brake.

Also vivid was bloke riding AFC (Daz!!) comming to face end and realising his foot was stuck. Next news there's half a leg stump in a welly going up stage loader. I wondered if they actualy wanted us to stick or jack out of abject terror.

You remember the Johnny Cash song San Quentin? we just substituted the words for Old Boston....Boardum was law!

[aardvark]

never been a tea drinker but the coffee at Barrow was ok , until they changed the water boiler then it was crap, in the old boiler they found the remains of an old sausage,it must have been that that gave it flavour. I remember once going in and getting a cup of milk while I waited for the bus , when I took a swig i felt something hit my top lip I looked in the cup and there was a round black knob I took it back to the counter the lass behind the counter was stood there twirling her chewing gum round her finger,when I showed her she fished it out with the same finger and said "we've been looking for that it's off the milk machine" and then tried giving it me back I had a right argument trying to get a replacement.

[limey]

I visited the NCM Museum last time I was over there and can vouch for the tea and bacon rolls in the canteen - very good!

Best laugh there was the underground guide who managed to talk a young lad (about 19) into trying a pinch of snuff - nearly blew the poor lads brains out! Me (and the guide) had tears down our cheeks we were lauging so hard!

If you haven't been, it is worth the visit!

[shropshirebloke]

Ahhhh, Hedges L260! Used to be able to buy it in my local, but it's a bit "lahdy da" these days (mind you, the beer's a bloody sight better and the middle classes don't seem to want to kill each other on an industrial scale after a few pints...).

Still, I'd love a pinch or two now and then, especially when me sinuses are playing up.

[philipford734]

I used to have tea and bacon rolls for my breakfast at the pit when I was on days. The one thing that I was could never work out was why the tea was a different colour for each cup! the sludge must have been layering.

[dazbt]

Feb 2, 2005 16:24:51 GMT -5 John said:

Whats that got to do with bacon butties and canteen tea Daz

Only just read this J, I can't imagine why I stuck all that trepanner garbage under the Bacon Butty thread ............. my only excuse is to say that I used to drink in those days!!

[John]

Jun 8, 2010 2:10:02 GMT -5 dazbt said:

Feb 2, 2005 16:24:51 GMT -5 John said:

Whats that got to do with bacon butties and canteen tea Daz

Only just read this J, I can't imagine why I stuck all that trepanner garbage under the Bacon Butty thread ............. my only excuse is to say that I used to drink in those days!!

That's the excuse I use for why I married my first wife. ;D

[aardvark]

always used to have a breakfast in the canteen off nights and then try and get home before it worked it's way through pushed it close a couple of times when the level crossing barrier was down and ended up trying to undo my trousers while trying to unlock the door

[dazbt]

And you think NCB canteens were risky? here's one in India;







Could you eat a breakfast cooked and served by this lad?



made Barrow canteen seem 5 star plus !!

[John]

He looks a happy little fellow..

[dazbt]

Jun 15, 2010 7:16:16 GMT -5 John said:

He looks a happy little fellow..

His name was Gobedhan ................. he answered to Woebegone !!

[pitsparky]

I never ate in the pit canteen after I was sent to have a look at the Non functioning potato peeling machine in the Canteen at Seaton Delaval pit canteen!!.

It was Minging.

Malcolm.

[erichall]

Feb 2, 2008 9:01:13 GMT -5 aardvark said:

never been a tea drinker but the coffee at Barrow was ok , until they changed the water boiler then it was crap, in the old boiler they found the remains of an old sausage,it must have been that that gave it flavour. I remember once going in and getting a cup of milk while I waited for the bus , when I took a swig i felt something hit my top lip I looked in the cup and there was a round black knob I took it back to the counter the lass behind the counter was stood there twirling her chewing gum round her finger,when I showed her she fished it out with the same finger and said "we've been looking for that it's off the milk machine" and then tried giving it me back I had a right argument trying to get a replacement.

The only thing I remember about Barrow canteen were the superb hot pork pies, which, when eaten hot, used to dribble liquid grease. Superb on a nice day sat on the grass bank above the canteen.
Funny how most pit canteens were remembered for one particulat item. At High Moor it was the cornish pasties.

[boaz]

Manvers canteen tea always tasted of the nearby coke ovens.
In Cadeby canteen some of the nightshift used to "wind up" the manageress, Madge, by asking for "cock" eggs with their breakfast.

[dazbt]

Anything within a two mile radius of Manvers tasted or smelled of the coke works.
Manvers Main was one of the best canteens I've ever experienced, everything was homemade even the bread was baked on site and perhaps uniquely, there were two seperate canteens, a main meals canteen and at the other side of the baths a smaller version that served tea, sandwiches, pies, cigs, bacca etc.

[fortythreesflyer]

The canteen at Wheldale was superb, they made every thing on site. Homemade scufflers (bread cakes) dripping, pasties, cakes,fish and chips on fridays. People came from miles around to use our canteen, if you got your timing wrong you could not get in. They used to bring out the fresh baked scufflers just before 10.00am for the surface snap time double decker bacon and egg on warm bread fresh homemade jam, and beef dripping. I do not know what the tea or coffee was like i only had a pint of milk with my food. Like yourself John coming off the night shift I would indulge in two home made pasties with lashings of Daddies brown sauce, home to bed and then all hell would break loose in the guts region, but still would do it the next shift. Then in the late 70s early 80s area mmade the canteen use bought in produce never the same after that. Kev

[Mick]

Aug 26, 2013 10:35:38 GMT -5 fortythreesflyer said:

The canteen at Wheldale was superb, they made every thing on site. Homemade scufflers (bread cakes) dripping, pasties, cakes,fish and chips on fridays. People came from miles around to use our canteen, if you got your timing wrong you could not get in. They used to bring out the fresh baked scufflers just before 10.00am for the surface snap time double decker bacon and egg on warm bread fresh homemade jam, and beef dripping. I do not know what the tea or coffee was like i only had a pint of milk with my food. Like yourself John coming off the night shift I would indulge in two home made pasties with lashings of Daddies brown sauce, home to bed and then all hell would break loose in the guts region, but still would do it the next shift. Then in the late 70s early 80s area mmade the canteen use bought in produce never the same after that. Kev

I remember the bloke that came he cut all the meals down in size it was fish & chip day friday and one of the lads from are team went in and asked for 6 course meal the bloke looked at him and said we don't do that here so my mate said ok can i have my usual please 1 fish and 5 chips.

[fortythreesflyer]

Hi Mick, i remember when my office was located in the main block i saw the fish that was for the manager (Ivor Williams) it hung over the plate it was that big, and did not have to pay for it. One rule eh?