Judy’s recipe for elderflower and lime jellies
My sister has just come back from France. She was visiting friends who have retired and moved there. She came back bursting with sun and stories and this recipe. I halved the amount. It filled three 100ml glasses. I used two small limes as I reckoned that the limes in France would be bigger than those that I found in Waitrose this evening. Our flowering elderflower heads are small – clearly young, first of the season. So I used what I thought would be the equivalent of 2.5 large French heads. This was the final course of a snacky lunch...
read moreLast minute Christmas cake recipe
Over the years we have tried various Christmas cake recipes but the best by far was the one that we made last year, a week before Christmas. We wanted a cake packed with fruit but not a dark heavy traditional type of Christmas cake. We’d had to force down too many slices of these in the past. My Mother used to make us these and bring one each Christmas. Then she decided to buy them. These were worse and not disguised by being fed with lashings of brandy. We’d cut a few slices at Christmas, give her half the cake to take home at the...
read moreBest mincemeat recipe for mince pies and puddings
Mince pies are the quintessential Christmas treat. But every year loads of us bite into a proffered mince pie and resolve never to accept one again. it’s a shame as nothing beats a homemade one, bursting with mincemeat and a slug of brandy. I always make a few on Christmas Eve. I was pretty smug about them until Anne Mary mentioned that she always made her own mincemeat. I’m embarrassed to admit this but five years ago I didn’t know that you could make your own. I rushed home and thumbed through our cookbooks, convinced that...
read moreChristmas Pudding Recipe
Everyone wants to make the perfect Christmas pudding. The pressure is on from November 1st. Even if you make yours then, you are bound to hear of someone’s cousin’s friend who makes the pudding to die for, just after Easter. Don’t worry. We have the recipe for a perfect pud. We’ve made this the week before Christmas and it still tasted great. It is better if it has a few weeks to mature. Our recipe was initially inspired by Myrtle Allen’s recipe from The Ballymaloe Cookbook and we have tweaked it for the last...
read moreBottled Fruit: Belgian Pears recipe
I breezed onto the internet just now to see entries for Belgian Pears. I thought that they could be a traditional dessert. Well, in Belgium, they are not. Which is a shame, as anyone, from the Belgians to the Bengalese would love this dessert. Forget any memory of dull bottled fruit. This wonderful concoction just happens to be preserved in a jar. We tend to include this for dinner parties when we’re feeling under pressure. Many jars of this superb non-alcoholic scrumptiousness are patiently sitting in our barn, waiting to be opened and...
read moreOverwhelmed by fruit flies. Time for ‘Baked Bananas in Rum’ recipe
When I got back this evening, Danny was muttering about the fruit flies in the kitchen. Unfortunately one had taken a nosedive into his whisky. He paced the room looking for the source of the invasion. Could it be the tomarillos, the wild plums, the carrier bags of grapes, the tiny greengages that Jocelyn and I had picked on Wednesday that were ripening on the side? I nervously pointed to a bag of elderly bananas that were sitting on the wood-burning stove, just behind his chair. Danny just laughed and asked, gently, “Why do you keep on...
read moreDamson granita with kirsch recipe
The Tesco Basics range includes a pack of twelve champagne glasses. These are really tough, made to last. I’m sure that they’d survive being flung across a room. We haven’t tried this yet with these particular glasses. We just use them for parties and occasionally we bung them in the freezer to hold granita. Granita is a massive, seven league step away from a traditional sorbet. Danny describes a good granita as spoonfuls of iced heaven. It’s a cinch to make. You don’t need an ice cream making machine to shine...
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Recent Comments
{ I was thinking the same as Magic Cochin but then like you I don't have my phone attached by an umbilical cord wherever I go.... } – Wed 8 :47 pm
{ Good point but I don't tend to take it about with me everywhere 
} – Wed 7 :25 pm
{ Doesn't your mobile phone have an alarm setting? C x } – Wed 6 :32 pm
{ I would put it towards a bbq, it's just a shame you can't purchase some sunshine from b&q } – Wed 12 :04 am- { Hi Lesley The clucking means that she is brrody also plucking her own feathers is a sign too. } – Tue 11 :58 pm
- { Hi Lesley They have to stay in the broody coop 24/7. Could you put in a garden shed or garage? } – Tue 11 :57 pm
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