Back to Oats

I've come back to oats.

Well it's the time of year for a tummy warming bowl of porridgy goodness to start the day.  I recently gotten into the habit of leaving a couple of scoops of oats soaking in water in the fridge overnight, this makes the oats creamy rich in their own right without the need for lots of milk. As you can see in this photo they swell nicely and absorb all the water, meaning they are all soft and ready for a quick cook.

Which means every morning all I have to do, is to get it out of the fridge so it can come to room temperature while I sip bleary eyed at my first coffee of the day.  Add a splash of my favourite almond mylk, give it all a good stir and breakfast is a four minute blast in the microwave away.

It keeps me full until lunchtime and stops me getting the nibbles mid morning which my previous couple of slices of toast were doing.

What's your favourite Winter breakfast warmer?   Alan's is still two poached eggs on toast.

Sue xx

The Garlic Harvest Is In ... and Strung

Last weekend I pulled up all the garlic that I have grown this year in the net tunnel, I left it overnight with some of the soil still attached to dry slightly, then the next day I cleaned it up properly and left it nicely spread out on the workbench to dry in the warmth of the polytunnel.

A couple of days later and it is now lovely and dry, so I've just trimmed it ready for stringing .... now I just have to get on with the stringing.

Edited to add  ....

It's a bit messy while you're doing it ....

... but a lot of stringing and a few snips and it looks quite good, even if I do say so myself.

And it's now hanging on the back of the kitchen door with the tail end of last years crop.  

This seems to be a good place for it looking at last years which is still perfectly fine.

Vampires be warned .... we are now fully stocked with garlic ;-)

Sue xx

Keeping Warm, Odd Jobs, Simple Foods

This weekend we were both full of colds, so we spent our time having leisurely breakfasts, with lots of hot drinks.

We fetched wood into the house to keep the log burner going.  Using wood from our woodland means that we have a continual source of free fuel, we just have to do a bit more woodland management later on this year.  Now that the building work is completed on the house we will have much more time to gradually work our way through the woods, clearing space around new saplings and making sure that a new generation of trees will be available to keep us in this lovely free fuel.

 Some jobs were done but they were only bits and bobs of things and the everyday chores such as cleaning out the henhouse and filling feeders etc.

But mostly we ate simple foods and curled up in front of the television when we weren't at the cinema.  We went twice this weekend, using our already purchased year long passes means the more we go, the better value they will be.  All in all a very lazy weekend for us ... we should have more of them it did us both the world of good!!

Sue xx

Polytunnel Progress - November

It's now late November and in the frost free cocoon of the polytunnel there is still life, and more importantly food for us to eat.  If I needed to I could go out and pick at any time the makings of a good vegetable soup, without depleting any of the plants of too many of their leaves.

To walk you through the plants available to us at the moment.

In the central bed there are :

Radish

Lettuce

Spring Onions

Borage

A single Spinach plant

Fennel

Carrots

A single Cabbage plant

A pot of potatoes that are refusing to grow.

.

On the right hand side are :

Curly Kale

Spinach

Radish

Leeks

Celery

On the bench are some overwintering herbs in the big green tray, and an unheated propagator of seedlings that I was experimenting with ... and yes, they all came up, so more tiny Spinach, Radish, Mixed Leaves and Lettuce.  And also my very sad Lemon plant.  I think I may bring it in the house to live with the Chilli plant for the Winter and see if there is anything I can do to bring it back to life.

Funnily enough I've always been unlucky with citrus plants even when we lived down south and it was much milder.  I think a bit of research is called for instead of my usual instinctive gardening ... we're obviously not on the same wavelength me and citrus!!

On the left hand side are :

Beetroot

Cabbage

Kohlrabi

Chilli Pepper

Lettuce

Carrots

Potatoes that are refusing to grow.

Mixed Salad Leaves

and right at the far end my Sweet Potato plant which I should be able to finally pull out of it's pot next week.  I was told to wait until the leaves went yellow and seemed to be dying off before risking tipping them out of the pot.

In the terracotta coloured plastic pot are yet more potatoes refusing to show themselves.   'Grow your own delicious New Potatoes, in pots in time for Christmas Day' said their packet .... nope it's not worked.  So I'll just save a few of our own outside grown and stored big spuds to eat with our Christmas dinner and try again next year with a different variety.  The plant at the back behind the sweet potato is a self seeded Nasturtium.  I left it there to see if can over-winter in the tunnel, but I suspect it might get too cold for it.  In the meantime I can pick one or two of it's peppery leaves whenever we are having a salad.

In the foreground of the left hand side photo are the two pots of Oca given to me by Dawn of 'Doing it for Ourselves in Wales', and she posts about harvesting some of hers HERE,  The pots were only in the tunnel briefly to avoid a really heavy downpour while I was over there, they were already saturated and I though a couple of hours grace from the deluge might be appreciated.  They are back outside now awaiting a good frost ... we were promised one last week and almost got it ... but not quite.  How ironic that in South Wales, where you would expect it to be a tad warmer, Dawn has had a good frost and here on our North Wales hillside we haven't.  Hopefully we'll get to taste them soon.

So that's this month's round up of Polytunnel Progress.

I'm pleasantly surprised that in this year of experimentation there is still so much life and potential food in there, it bodes well for next year.

Sue xx

Using the Celery Leaves

I harvested our stunted growth garlic back in August of this year,  

The rabbits had feasted on the greenery leaving the bulbs with nothing to draw goodness from, so it had to come up as it was.  As you can see I've still got some of the best bulbs left.  I have been trying to use it up in the order that the best would be last as this can be stored for longer because of its full covering of papery skin.

The back of the kitchen door seems to be a good place for it to hang, out of the way but visible often enough to remind me it's there so it doesn't get forgotten about.

I used a good few cloves in with the celery leaves, the last of the Pine Nuts from the jar in the fridge, the last of the grated Parmesan style cheese from the freezer and a sprinkle of freshly ground sea salt and black pepper.  I tipped it all into the food processor whizzed it up and then drizzled in enough Olive Oil to get it to the consistency I like it.

Then it was decanted into a storage jar .....

... my favourite shade of green in a mash of garlicky goodness.

It now lives in the fridge making me smile with it's cheery fresh colour every time I open the door, and will provide us with lots of tasty helpings, on pasta, in quiches and stirred into soups and smeared on toast before being topped with grated cheese and toasted.

It's so garlicky the vampires will be giving this house a miss for sure  :-)

Sue xx

Veg Hash

The onions in the fridge drawer needed using up, so the other day when I pulled the celery from the polytunnel and gathered in some of my wonky carrots I set to and made a batch of veg hash.

It's something I nearly always have in the freezer and is brilliant for any recipe that starts 'chop and fry one onion'.  It's simply a mixture of finely chopped onions, celery and carrots, you could also add some garlic, but I tend to stick to the main three just in case I have to cater for someone who doesn't like garlic quite as much as we do.  I use this as the base for soup, stews, pie fillings and curries, it means that the chopping and messing about process is already out of the way and the meal can be put together in less time.

My food processor is just a small one, an attachment to my Kenwood mixer, so I do this in batches and then mix it all together in my big mixing bowl.  It's best to do it in like with like batches as the carrots take more chopping than the onions or celery.

Normally I freeze it in some of my little plastic storage boxes but they are all in use at the moment and I thought that with the freezer being so chock a block freezing it in zip lock bags (which I seem to have lots of) would mean that I can flatten and stack them to take up less space, and of course being flat they will also thaw out extremely quickly.  I use my hash straight from frozen if I forgotten to take it out of the freezer to thaw before I need it.

From my two bunches of homegrown celery, the wonky carrots and the last of the onions I managed to make six 350g bags of Veg Hash, and one portion that went straight into the soup that I made yesterday,which I will be eating for lunch today .... as long as Mavis holds on to her breakfast  ;-)

The only thing left over from my harvesting and chopping were the celery leaves, I bet you can guess what I made with them.

Sue xx

Spot the Difference

After clearing the shelves in the kitchen yesterday this was how my living room window sill ended up looking, I must admit I quite liked it :-)

But this morning I decided to put everything back.  I don't know how long it will be until the electricity meter is moved to it's new position outside the house but I couldn't live with ....

... the barrenness of the shelves for even another day.

I take everything down and give the jars and shelves a good clean every few weeks, either when I'm in the mood to do it or if I'm completely honest when moving a jar discloses a little bit too much dust for healthy living :-/

Then while reading my Kitchen Garden magazine this morning while drinking that all important first cup of coffee, you know the one before the dogs wake up properly and the workers arrive, and well before the day really starts to get going, I came to the page with the Spot the Difference competition.  I don't know about you but these always hook me in.  I don't like doing them ... but I always get hooked and have to find every last difference.

So today a little game for you ...  first an easy one ....

 

Yep .... jars and then no jars  :-)

Then a slightly harder one ....

The kitchen shelves in July ......

... the kitchen shelves just filled up again this morning.

I'm quite pleased ..... I almost got everything back in the right places.  

Meanwhile outside the house ...... the main difference is that the garage roof is full of equipment and men.  We currently have seven (I think) workers, including two painters working inside the workshop, and four transit vans blocking my escape.

Sue xx

Preserving the Seasons

This month, and indeed most of last month has been all about preserving.  Taking what grew this Summer preserving it during Autumn, to be eaten in Winter .... and hopefully if successful and tasty it will be grown again next Summer.

Fed up with jams I turned my attention to Bread and Butter Pickle last week just before the onions ran out, indeed this was why the onions ran out.  I've never made this before but it was so simple, I'll definitely be making it again.

Here's the recipe I used from the same Preserves book I've used for lots of my jams etc  (it's proving to be worth every penny this book).  If you click on the photo to enlarge it you will see it says '6 cucumbers (about 800g) thinly sliced',  my homegrown cucumbers were pretty big so I just got three out of the fridge, and got the other ingredients ready, then I weighed the cucumbers, the first one I put on the scales weighed just over 1kg all by itself .... it seems I'm growing whoppers this year ;-)

So I decided to double up on all the other ingredients and make a bigger batch of pickle.

It was such an easy recipe and well worth doing, there's not many ways I can think of to preserve cucumbers for eating long after the growing season is over.  These six jars have added nicely to the store cupboard for the Winter days ahead.  I believe from reading around that it's called Bread and Butter Pickle because that's what it is traditionally eaten with.  Just the pickle on it's own with some good bread and butter.  Nice simple food ... my favourite sort.

Forging on .....

... next I took one 'courgette' and decided to make a batch of Marrow and Ginger Jam.

Making this highlights the amount of sugar used in jam making nicely, as the only ingredients are marrow, sugar, ginger and lemon juice ..... only I forgot the lemon juice!!

You simply peel and then chop the marrow,  mix it with the sugar and then leave it covered with a teatowel in the fridge overnight, by morning the sugar has brought out the moisture in the marrow and covered each piece with lots of little glistening crystals, it looks beautiful ... maybe it was admiring this beauty that made me totally forget to add the lemon juice.

All you do next is add the roughly chopped ginger in a muslin bag and heat slowly until the sugar all dissolves, then bring to the boil and keep at a rolling boil until you reach and stay at jam temperature.

Anyway I didn't even realise there was no lemon in there until I gave the bit in the bowl a taste ..... yep ... it's sweet.

But I soon found a way to enjoy it .... as a fruit corner, the tartness of the yogurt balances it out nicely ..... phew!!

Labelled and ready for the cupboard.

It's been a busy couple of weeks, but opening the cupboard door and standing and admiring all my handiwork makes it all worthwhile.

Sue xx

Astonishing .....

When it came down to it I couldn't be arsed bothered going to the shops the other day for onions so I could make the Fig, Onion and Date Chutney, but when I looked at the figs in the fridge one of them was showing distinct signs of developing a furry overcoat.  Quickly separating him from his friends I checked them all over.  They were mostly pretty ripe and looked fine to use ... if I used them straight away.  So I gave the offending chilly fig a good trim and set to to make a small batch of Fig Jam.

And ...... astonishingly I love the taste of it!!  

Which goes to prove that it's the texture of fresh figs that I really can't tolerate, I must try some alternative mushroomy things to see if I can get over my dislike of them too.  I hate being a fussy eater, and when you don't eat meat, are limited on anything containing milk, cream or wheat and also hate mushrooms it's starting to sound like I am.

Anyway, I got two big jars and a half jar, from my kilo of figs, the half jar will obviously have to be eaten straight away as you shouldn't have  jars with any air in them or even space for air, it allows mould to develop much quicker.  No hardship ..... this one can live in the fridge along with all the other half jars and bowls that have been produced recently.

Then although I said I wouldn't pick anymore blackberries after the last lot, I picked one more bowlful last week.  The sun had been out all day and walking the dogs round the paddock just after tea I saw that the bush that has given us the biggest and juiciest blackberries was once again dripping with a fresh crop.  I quickly got a plant pot from the polytunnel and set too picking the biggest and the best.  As you can see I managed another half a kilo.  They were washed, open frozen and then bagged and put back into the freezer.

Yesterday I decided the last of the windfall apples had been clogging up the fridge space for too long and decided to make up another batch of Crumble/Pie/Cobbler base for the freezer with them ... we have more than enough jam in the cupboard now so this wasn't an option.  So once the apples had cooked down to a chunky mush I tipped the frozen berries into the pan and stirred it all together.

Et voila ..... another five trays of fruity goodness preserved for the cold, dark days of Winter.  Now all I have to do is somehow shoehorn them into the freezer and we are sorted :-)

Sue xx

Chilli Peppers

This single Chilli Pepper plant that I confess to buying ready grown from the garden centre back in May of this year has been worth every penny of it's £5.99 price tag.  It has given us such a huge crop of chillies both to eat over the summer finely sliced in lots of dishes, and also to freeze and have in store over the Winter.

I pick them off every time I see that at least half of the chillies on the plant have turned red.  I usually get a mix of teeny tiny ones and some real whoppers.

To freeze I simply wash and dry them and then put them in a single layer to open freeze, once frozen they are simply tipped into a ziplock bag and placed back in the freezer.  When you want to use one they thaw in minutes or can be sliced while still frozen or just thrown whole into any dish that you might want to fish it out of before serving.

This is how the bush looks this morning, once again ready for another harvest .... but if the truth were told I always leave them a little too long on the plant just because they just look so wonderful.  I don't like chilli that much but a few little red flecks in many a dish bring a warmth and a treat for the eye, so I am learning to ... bit by bit.

I've looked after the plant and it has been fed along with the tomatoes all through the growing season, now I'm wondering if I can slow it's growth and nurture it through the Winter months by bringing it into the house.  Has anyone else successfully done this with a bought in plant?  My chilli seed packets seem to think that a homegrown plant could be nurtured this way, so I'm hoping unless they brought it on too quickly and too early I should be able to do it with this little goldmine of a plant.

Sue xx

Rhubarb and Ginger Jam

Now all the building work is finished we are taking time to make our land look a bit softer, neater and hopefully eventually, take away some of the hard lines and industrial look that has been created thanks to the planning department in their wisdom specifying that in order to do as we wanted to make our entrance safer for all users, we had to have a huge turning area within our gates.  

While we do this this we are repairing the damage that has been done to various parts of the place by large numbers of big booted workmen and big machinery in wet weather.  So a lot of this has involved sowing grass seed.  It would have been horrendously expensive and time consuming to turf everywhere so we bought half a dozen big boxes of grass seed, and Lovely Hubby has made it his mission over the last couple of weekends to make new grass beds where only rubble once lay, to fill in gaps  and dips with sifted soil, raking it smooth and into the contours of the hillside and then scattering the seeds. Some of which took on a green tinge within days, thanks to this wonderful early Autumn sunshine and the rainy Welsh nights.

Just before he started on the area in the photo he cleared around the Rhubarb patch with his strimmer and decided to bring me all the remaining rhubarb.  In total there was just over two kilos, so out came the recipe books and I quickly found a recipe for Rhubarb and Ginger Jam.

As it called for 1kg of Rhubarb I just doubled everything up and used up all the rhubarb in one fell swoop.  I got eight full sized jars and a handy little taster in my mini enamel mug.  Which gave us enough for a crackerful each to test the jam .....

... and a lovely dollop with some natural yogurt for my breakfast the next day.

Once cooled and labelled .....

... they neatly slotted into the 'Preserves' shelf of the tall cupboard in the kitchen which is filling up nicely with all this jam-making and pickling.

I've got a little list in the cupboard so I can see exactly what we have in store ready for a big food stocktake in a couple of months before the Challenge starts.

I'll put the Rhubarb and Ginger Jam recipe on my recipe page for anyone interested, but I found it in this book if you already have it.  I'm currently making another recipe from the book also using ginger but this time it is cooked with Marrow as I still have a few of my enormous courgettes to use up  :-)

Sue xx