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Since the early 2000s panic rooms have garnered a renewed interest in homes around the world. This interest can be put down to increased media exposure, including the 2002 movie, directed by David Fincher and starring Jodie Foster. It can also be put down to the current world we live in, with people seemingly more afraid than ever of intrusion and theft.

However, while Panic Rooms are often mentioned in the media, most people still view them as exclusively for the rich and famous. It is true that the bullet-proof fortresses we see on television cost a huge sum of money, but more realistic safe rooms are a valid option for all of us. In a real world situation, the primary function of a panic room is to buy you enough time to call for help. This can be achieved without a full command centre at your disposal, instead a simple room that can slow an intruder down longer enough should be enough.

As stated, the most important aspect at play is time. Your panic room needs to gift you enough time to successfully call for help, be it from the police, neighbours or elsewhere. Unless you do have the vast amount of money required to construct an impenetrable safe room, chances are anybody with enough patience, tools and knowledge can gain access to your room given enough time. The point is to make the time it takes to gain entry longer than the time it takes to summon help.

Choose a room with a single entry point and then fortify the door with a series of locking mechanisms like strike plates and deadbolts. There are many locks on the market and it is important to make this entry point as secure as possible, as this will be the only thing separating you from a potentially dangerous intruder.

Truffles are one of the most revered and mysterious of all cuisines. To look at one freshly rooted from the earth is not the most appetizing sight, but this little fungi from the mushroom family is actually one of the most delicious and internationally esteemed delicacies ever known. The finest truffles are grown in European countryside near the Mediterranean, particularly in Italy and southern France. Finding truffles buried deep within the earth is not an easy task, so farmers have long resorted to training dogs and pigs to seek out the prized fungus due to these animals’ superior sense of smell.

Although the first recorded cooking of truffles dates back as far as 20 BC, these delicacies did not become a sought after culinary commodity until during the 15th century French renaissance when they gained in popularity, helped by their being a favourite dish of King Francis 1st of France. Over the preceding years, truffles became an increasingly popular part of French cooking, as chefs began relying less on spices, and more on natural tasting ingredients for their recipes. The French Gastronome, Brillat-Savarin, declared the truffle to be the ‘diamond of the kitchen’, a nod to both its rarity and its appeal to the higher classes of French society. Before long, truffles were the number one food of the European elite.

Throughout the years, many efforts have been made to cultivate truffle production to increase their availability to the general public. Such expansion of truffle growth began as a success that allowed people of all classes and backgrounds to begin enjoy them. However, a number of setbacks began effecting truffle manufacture in the late 19th century. Severe infestations of Phylloxera occurred throughout Europe, and the industrial revolution shortly afterwards wiped out a large amount of the truffle producing fields across the continent.

Furthermore, the First and Second world wars wholly devastated entire areas of countryside throughout Europe, making truffle production in nations like France, Italy, and Yugoslavia ever more scarce. Unsurprisingly this lead to truffle value going through the roof, as the esteemed fungi returned to the dinner plates of the wealthy, rather than the working man.