Flowers from the garden: October 2009
The leaves on the forsythia in the front garden are gradually turning from green to yellow and deep red. I don’t think I’d have noticed if I hadn’t been giving the hedge a very gentle trim. As it flowers on last season’s wood a short back and sides would mean no pretty yellow flowers in the Spring. In the past this was a ‘John job’ so I noticed if the shrub looked shaggy and that was it. Since John retired I’ve become much more deeply acquainted with our hedges and lawns. Danny and I were working together – clearing an...
read moreOther people’s recipes: Diana Henry’s Baked Pork Chops with Pears, Potatoes and Onions
We had two rather thin pork chops earmarked for supper last night. I thought that they might be good baked with pears so drifted onto the internet for inspiration and found this recipe from Diana Henry. I like her recipes and my copy of Crazy Water, Pickled Lemons: Enchanting Dishes from the Middle East, Mediterranean and North Africais a well thumbed tome. Her recipe was just what I wanted – throw everything into a roasting pan for about an hour. I didn’t have Roquefort cheese, substituted a teaspoon of dried fennel for the...
read moreThe slow cooker chef: Venison and shin of beef casserole recipe
This is a really easy recipe that I made last week. I forgot to take a picture of the dish so have put up this photograph as it includes a brass deer that belonged to my mother as a child. I love eating venison but it’s so expensive here in the UK. We buy it when it’s marked down in price and stash it in the freezer for game pies and casseroles. Shin of beef is delicious too – slowly simmered for 8-10 hours the gristly meat transforms into a melt in the mouth treat. Combine the two for a casserole that is deeply satisfying on a...
read moreEssential tools
Tamar from Starving off The Land wrote an amusing article about the things that you need to have to exist in the city and things that are essential for a simple life in the country. I was lucky, I inherited a lot of tools from my aunt. Pickaxes, shovels, brooms and a very handy sledge hammer. Beside that we have two hoes, a spade, a fork, grass rakes, a wide gravel rake, a long border rake, a large headed plough tool, a small headed version of the same, a lawn mower, chain saw, hedge trimmer, a strimmer, a lawn edger, long handled shears...
read moreMake your own rosehip tea
“Those two rose bushes beside the back door are totally out of control and need cutting back.” Danny remarked back in June. I couldn’t oblige as I was planning to make tea. The bushes got more and more flamboyant until they were given a harvesting haircut at the weekend. There are lots of roses growing in the cottage garden so we have a profusion of hips for preserving in the Autumn. I usually make rosehip and apple jelly and sometimes rosehip syrup but this year I’d discovered the huge benefits of drinking rosehip tea. This would...
read moreBrussels sprouts and kale from the garden
Danny adores Brussels sprouts. He’s always buying little packs of them and squirreling them into the fridge. Then I have to eat them. And I don’t like them apart from creamed sprouts which are a bit figure challenging. So I decided to grow some Bedford Fillbasket this year. Surely they’d be better than the commercially grown ones? They look great too, tall and statuesque. Inca walks between them and disappears in the mini forest. I plucked the first sprouts a couple of days ago and they were tasty. Much sweeter and crisper than the...
read moreRabbit mushroom and tarragon casserole recipe
Finding myself with 600g of diced wild rabbit and no pheasant to go into a game casserole, I decided to glide onto the internet for inspiration and found this delicious recipe on We Are Never Full. Unfortunately I didn’t have some essential ingredients such as bacon so I made my own version using the tarragon, mushrooms, white wine and cream as a starting point. The slow cooker was busy cooking the shin of beef disguised as a pheasant so I cooked the rabbit very slowly on the stove top. It took over three hours and was wonderful – the...
read moreCan you solve our eelworm problem?
We realised that we had an eelworm problem in Danny’s potato border when we started to harvest them. The little front doors to the eelworm condominium look pretty insignificant until you venture inside. I reckon that at least half the crop is infected. We can eat the parts of the potatoes where no eelworm has dared to wriggle but so much of the harvest is wasted. The only benefit is that we are well exercised walking back and forth from garden shed to kitchen to find enough spuds to feed us both for a meal. The Min Pins enjoy this hunting...
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