Total time: 50 minutes

It isn’t always easy to come up with mid-winter salads that are seasonal as well as wholesome and won’t bring on a feeling of being dressed in a T-shirt on a freezing cold winter’s day. Any mixture of green and bitter leaves can be roped in here, including the rather unpopular likes of kale. Serve the greens beside some sharp white cheese such as feta, and some olives. 400g greens – kale, cavolo nero, ruby chard, etc1 garlic clove, peeled and choppedsea salt2 tbsp lemon juice8 tbsp extra virgin olive oilBring a large pan of salted water to the boil, and if you are using different types of cab-bages cook them separately. Discard any tough stalks of kale and ruby chard, and nick off the ends of the stalks, and cut out the central stalks from cavolo nero. Add the cabbage and push it down to submerge it, and once the water comes back to the boil, simmer for approximately eight minutes until tender – this may vary, depending on the greens that you use.
Drain the greens into a sieve, pressing out as much moisture as possible using a spoon Place them on a board and slice into large pieces.

Transfer them to a plate, tossing to combine them if you are using a mixture of types, and leave them to cool.Crush the garlic to a paste with a sprinkling of salt using the flat of a knife, or else pass it through a garlic press into a bowl. Whisk this with the lemon juice, a generous addition of salt and the oil and pour over the greens Gently toss and serve straight away.. Free nicotine patches and anti-smoking packs are to be issued to military recruits with their guns and uniforms in a drive to persuade soldiers and sailors to kick the habit and improve their fitness standards. Free nicotine patches and anti-smoking packs are to be issued to military recruits with their guns and uniforms in a drive to persuade soldiers and sailors to kick the habit and improve their fitness standards.
The Ministry of Defence is concerned that smoking in the ranks is tarnishing Britain’s military image and effectiveness.

New evidence from America shows that the drop-out rate among smokers isfar higher than among non-smoking recruits.In a campaign to be launched next month, soldiers and sailors are to be given instructions on how to quit smoking, accompanied by counselling sessions, a telephone helpline and nicotine replacement therapy.Army doctors are to issue Nicorette patches and nicotine replacement chewing gum to personnel. Anti-smoking counselling sessions will be held throughout the military, as part of basic training and routine physical fitness appraisals.An army spokesman said: “It doesn’t fit in with the image of the smart soldier to have a fag dangling out of your mouth We are encouraging people to quit. We are issuing 2,800 information packs with a big inflatable cigarette stub and loads of leaflets.”The support will be there, the advice will be there. They can get Nicorette patches from army doctors and Nicorette cigarettes We don’t categorically say don’t smoke We want people to try to quit. We say don’t be on duty with a fag dangling out of your mouth.”The military is concerned that smoking not only reduces the fitness of soldiers forced to do long marches and arduous physical training, but could potentially be a hazard in the field.A study published yesterday showed that smokers were more likely than non-smokers to drop out of military training in America, costing the US army $130m (£88m) a year.The US military loses more than 4,000 recruits who smoke each year, according to the study by the University of Memphis and the US Air Force surgeon general’s office.The drop-out rate among Americans was substantially higher among smokers, with 11.8 per cent of non-smokers quitting in their first year of training compared with 19.4 per cent of smokers.

The figure is believed to be mirrored in Britain.The military here intends to declare an army no-smoking day for 14 March to raise awareness among the forces of the health hazards of smoking.Anti-smoking pressure groups praised the military initiative and said that smoking in the forces meant that recruits were not fit enough to meet the demanding physical standards.”When they are training for demanding combat roles, smokers are at a significant physical disadvantage and almost twice as likely to drop out,” said Clive Bates, the director of Action on Smoking and Health.. The variety of music-playing formats is bigger than ever, and in some cases they’ve come and gone before I’ve actually noticed. There were digital compact cassettes for example – they were the next big thing five years ago, I found out last year, just as they were becoming entirely extinct. Mini-discs have never quite gone mainstream although they’re still hanging around, confusing matters But now hip people are tipping DVDs. DVD used to stand for Digital Video Disc but today it stands for Digital Versatile Disc, and audio discs in this format are becoming widely available. Even hipper, and more annoying people, however, are championing Super Audio CDs, which are supposed to far outstrip ordinary CDs in terms of audio quality – if, presumably, you have the ears of a Labrador. The variety of music-playing formats is bigger than ever, and in some cases they’ve come and gone before I’ve actually noticed.