Seville Orange marmalade and liqueur recipes
I picked up The Contessa from the vet’s this morning. She’d been staying with them for a day and a night as they carried out a blood sugar curve test. She was diagnosed with diabetes last year and is doing pretty well but recently she has lost a lot of weight and her diabetes needs to be stabilised. The daily injections are not the gruelling trial that I thought they would be. In fact, a kind reader suggested that we give her a tiny treat after the injection and that has worked well. Immediately she spots the syringe she starts to dance...
read moreIt’s that time of year again! Seeds and dreams
“How many seed catalogues have you received this month? It must be at least eight!” Danny gets a bit panicky when the catalogues arrive as he knows that I love buying seeds and can be tempted to splash out in a trice. I do like the catalogues but actually tend to choose my seeds online. The Real Seed Company is always a first stop – the seeds are always good quality, postage is cheap and the site is fun to browse. This year we are going to try growing yacon. This is a plant from South America and it’s the tubers that you eat....
read moreGardening Which? compost trials
I was fascinated to read and see the results of Gardening Which? compost trials in this month’s magazine. The results are extraordinary and in many ways disappointing. The peat free compost just doesn’t cut the mustard – at best achieving 54% compared to the best buy 88% for seed sowing. Young plants did even worse 46% compared to 92%. Up until now I’ve tended not to buy the cheaper compost and was under the misapprehension that more expensive compost was better and would give my seedlings a better chance. Last year I noted that...
read moreSalt Pig
“What on earth is this?” Danny was unwrapping his Christmas stocking. “It looks like some sort of portable urinal for invalids.” “No. You’re holding it sideways. It should stand upright with the hole on one side.” He waved it about for a bit looking perplexed. Finally I put an end to his misery. “It’s a Salt Pig. It’s supposed to keep the salt dry. It’s called a salt pig because it has a protruding ‘snout’ of sorts.” This autumn our kitchen was so damp that an ordinary cardboard pack of salt was unusable within...
read moreDelicious crispy potatoes transformed from cold left over spuds
We are going through a craze of eating Rooster potatoes at the moment. These are red skinned and extremely floury. The trick with Roosters is to wash them but not to peel them. The skin stops the spuds breaking up in the saucepan and can be easily peeled off before serving if you have time on your hands. Even the skin of a Rooster potato is tasty so there’s no prinky peeling here at the cottage. Last weekend I discovered that D had a lot of cold, boiled leftover Rooster potatoes. The perfect excuse for making these fried potatoes. They are...
read moreThe cheese that led me astray
I never thought that I would be seduced by a cheese. But I’ve had to come upstairs as sitting in the kitchen is driving me nuts. Our friends Jocelyn and Miles have just come back from France and dropped off a large slab of Brie de Meaux at the cottage. Brie de Meaux doesn’t travel very well and has to be eaten quickly before the flavour neutralises. I’ve searched for Brie de Meaux in England but when I’ve found one it’s not a patch on the fresh stuff, chauffeured lovingly straight from France in a private car. In the knowledge...
read moreEat your greens
“If you eat your greens your hair will curl,” my mother would say. “But I’ve already got curly hair.” As a child I longed for straight long blonde hair, like my friend Twink. I also didn’t like greens. If I’d had my way it would have been toast or Wall’s Chocolate Carnival ice cream for every meal. Until I started growing my own veg I didn’t really enjoy eating them. Salad, broccoli, frozen peas and the occasional carrot were vegetables at the more appealing end of the ‘horrid veg” spectrum. One of the few...
read moreHappy New Year
To me, New Year is a fresh start that is more official than a birthday. D tends to look back whilst my focus is usually forward. I reckon that I’m very lucky to have an optimistic outlook although sometimes my expectations are unrealistic – causing frustration and woe. D’s a realist and I’m a dreamer. He practices expectation management – I’d not even heard of the term until I met D. I don’t make New Years resolutions. I generally have ongoing plans in place throughout the year. These are made to stop me drifting about in a...
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