Méthode Sodastreamoise

Heston Blumenthal's Feasts series on Channel 4 makes very entertaining viewing even if 99.9999% of his astonishingly imaginative ideas are beyond the reach of us mere mortals.

As I'm not up to edible wallpaper and food that hovers, I was delighted that one of the items in his 80s Feast could be replicated in seconds.

All we had to do was put some wine into our Sodastream, press the gas button a few times and there it was, miraculously transformed into "champagne".



Heston had got busy with the fizzy on some of that 1980s classic, Blue Nun - and found that the city workers he tried it on tended to prefer it to Champagne! Our attempt involved the remains of a bottle of Aussie Chardonnay and perfectly acceptable it was too - and a lot cheaper than most fizz.

We've long been fans of the Sodastream, preferring our soft drinks (usually high-juice squash) to have bubbles but not wanting to buy bottled fizzy water. However, it's getting harder and harder to buy the traditional gas cylinders as Sodastream is now primarily based on a different system and switching would involve us in considerable investment in new equipment.

For now, we've accumulated about eight of the original cylinders and exchange any empties for full ones whenever either of us visits the dentist. The nearby Robert Dyas at Chancery Lane in London is one of the few places in the known universe that still stocks them and long may they continue.