Eels are now endangered in the UK. There's a big tradition of eating them here in the Netherlands too ('paling'), especially smoked, but the flavour is a bit too strong for me. I suppose I'd eat them if I was absolutely starving and there was nothing else.

The Eastenders used to love their jellied eels and mash in the old days. I have eaten it down Petticoat Lane back in the '60s.

My dad loves jellied eels, still eats them. In fact, only last week on the Hairy Bikers show they had jellied eels.

I've had smoked eel, thinly sliced on canapés at a provincial art gallery (which I've just realised sounds a bit like the start of an Alan Bennett monologue). Very nice, IMHO. Also, I seem to remember smoked eel paté, but I can't remember when or where. I don't remember disliking it though.

Never tried 'em

They don't sound appetizing to me (of course, I don't/can't eat seafood - most of it, just the smell of it cooking, makes me sick to my stomach). I think the person who used "Jelly diel" thought it was some sort of pastry come to think of it.

A rabbi, a priest, and a deer walk into a bar, apparently . . .

Had eel for lunch today (in Bruges and in a virulent green sauce), partly prompted by this discussion. I enjoyed it. I also really enjoyed Bruges, which I was visiting for the first time - what a gorgeous town!

Best eel I ever had was in Tokyo, many years ago now, at a dedicated unagi restaurant. Very good indeed. (Also, I fell instantly in love with my server, who looked like a young Susan Sarandon.)

I have not tried eel, as far as I know, but given my general dislike of eating animals aquatic, there is a good chance I would not like it. That said, it would very much depend on how it is done.

I should have said "Ead over eels" rather than "Kicking up my eels".

I am wondering if jellied eels would be "Unagi Zerī" in Japanese, or perhaps they use "Jam" and it'd be "Unagi Jamu." Just don't get in a jam confusing unagi and usagi. Two very different animals!

I didn't get any eels for my birthday, thankfully!

So has anyone got snow yet?

A few flurries in Leeds yesterday - just cold (about -2) & sunny at the moment.

[penelope] Not here, alas.

Snow yesterday evening and thick snow this morning, but not enough to lie.

[Raak] Oh I dunno. I'll lie at the drop of a hat.

Come on pen, you are a girl, you can always wear high heels whether or not there is snow.

It's snowing in Edinburgh! And just in time, as they've just finished building Christmas!

[FGZ] Shedding it down now.

Still below zero, still sunny, still no snow...

(pen) Same as here. The weather newsgroup are absolutely out of their prams because it's cold and there's NO SNOW. I sometime wonder about the company I keep. There's at least another week of this Siberian NW Russian stuff.

We woke up to an inch or so of snow on Friday morning. A lot of it is still around. Our little back roads are like ice rinks :-(

We must have had about 6-8 inches since last night. The buses continue to run (albeit stopping short of some of the further-flung places). I look forward to one flake falling within the M25 later in the week and the end of the universe being declared by the media, again.