28 FOOD/LEAFS/CRESS

On the third of February 1965, Norfolk turnip farmer Gregory Batter, sick of the complexities of root vegetable production, sat down at 6:34pm to help his 6 year old son with his school science project consisting of growing some cress in a small Tupperware box. By 6:43pm he had produced 35 hectares of perfectly formed leaf. Batter was amazed and full with ideas of new directions in farming, but thoughts of a switch in produce was cut short when he tasted the crop and realised it tasted of absolutely nothing. However, in a bizarre twist of fate, Batters wife Maureen, a woman of dubious marital commitment, was in the bed of Marks and Spencer’s chief buyer, Paul Hut at precisely the same time as her husbands discovery. Within a month Hut had pulled in some favours at the environment agency and had managed to pass a bill making it illegal to sell any egg-based sandwich, sub, bun, wrap or roll without the presence of cress. Batter, it seemed was set up for life.
Gregory Batter, however, never made his millions. The first British cress farming millionaire was neighbour and renowned pumpkin farmer Frank Parker, whose son and local bully Barnie 'the bastard' Parker came up with a plan to jeopardise the Batters success, finding the only substance in the world that could stop the growth of cress. On one stormy night in April of the same year, Batters entire crop was destroyed by a surprise downpour of lemon juice, instantly bankrupting him. Parker lately revealed in his autobiography, 'A Crop of Crap', that he had in fact been responsible for this and that he didn't feel guilty due to Batter 'being a c*nt'. The legal battle still rages on.