4 things from yesterday

Yesterday it snowed

it melted

I used my new oven for the first time

I discovered that my bread had not been reaching it's full potential in my old oven

A usual day

I thought I would do a mini day in my life post today. No this won't be that interesting as my day job does not involve anything breathtaking. But I realised that I only ever do these posts when I am on holiday which is not that rounded a view really.

So here we go.

My day started quite well. I got out of bed when the alarm went off for the second time without Spadger having to push me. In fact I got up before him. Got dressed and put my hair in Odango. I headed downstairs, put on my wellies and set the kettle to boil. I then let the chickens out and scattered their scratch grains for the day. On my way back to the kitchen I took a few photos of one of the courgette flowers.

I think gourd flowers of any kind are my favourite vegetable flower. They are just so pretty. By this point the kettle has boiled so I put the coffee on to brew. Next was hanging out the washing. It's been lovely these last 2 days so you can guarantee that it will rain today now I have washing to hang. Ah well, it can't really get any wetter than it is now. I came in and fed/watered the bunnies and then realised I needed to fill one of the chicken water founts. So back outside for me. While I'm doing all this Spadger has got up and is making sandwiches and breakfast. I scoff down a couple of slices of homemade toast and raspberry jam and a lovely mug of coffee. I do love coffee. Usually I read a book while I eat breakfast and currently I'm reading Rama II by Arthur C Clarke. It's been quite a while since I read the first one but I am still enjoying it. Instead of continuing to read after I'd eaten until we leave like I normally do I decided to utilise the time marking seam lines on my costume. I got through 3 out of the 4 pocket pieces so that's a tiny load off tonight's list.

At about 7:45 we set off for work. 8:15 sees me at my desk. This is where all the excitement of the days ends for the moment.

12.25
Right then it's lunch time. My day job is in marketing print. The company I work for produces things like menus and posters, booklets, forms, business cards and letterheads. That sort of thing. I'm an admin bod, was employed for dull data input type things. This is exactly what I wanted as no job is really going to make me happy now that I want my farm. Unfortunately, as is the way these days, I now have a lot more responsibility than I wanted. I do the day to day ordering of all the forms, letterhead, business cards etc for a nationwide chain of care homes. It's not a bad job really. It does have a tendency to be either really quiet or mad busy. This week has been mad busy. It seems I get one email dealt with and I have 4 more, plus faxed orders and a ton of quotes to sort out. Needless to say I'm a bit exhausted from it. Ah well, makes me appreciate the madness of getting my costume done.

2:30
It's moments like this that make me really dislike my job. I've just had to go make a coffee for everyone in the office because I needed a moment on my own to calm down. Grr says I.

Once I got home form work I set too making the evening meal. I made a kind of spicy stew using left over sausages, beans and tomatoes.


I also made tiny dumplings. They were fab! Before I could get started though Spadger hollered me to come take some pics of a spider in the greenhouse. You'll have to forgive me that it is of the back of the spider. There was no way was I crawling under the connecting strand of his web. You know he would have ended up on my head. *shudder*

Then it was time to crack on with the sewing. I managed to get my dress done by about 9 ish. Now the darts are still a little bit, erm, nipply. But I'm going to blame my tools here. Or lack of them. I really need a tailors ham to press darts properly . I'm working with a tightly rolled towel at the moment which isn't great. I think after a wash and a really good press it will be better. But quite frankly I've run out of time to be pickier about it. The red coat will cover the worst of it I think. It is still a wearable dress. The zip went in nicely. I'll try and get some better pictures.

Please ignore my vacant expression

and ignore my hair

also ignore the fact that it needs an iron and the skirt portion is see through. I will be wearing a petticoat.

Once that was done I made a tunic for Spadger and a peasant cap. They're not great but they'll do.

So now it is 00:37 and I'm off to bed. Hope you enjoyed my day. How was yours?

MIllions of peaches

Well actually there is only the one jar but that's not how the song goes :o)

I am canning for the first time this year. I'd love to say it;s my own produce but I am sadly lacking a peach/nectarine/plum/apricot tree. So a trip to the market later I have a kitchen full of fruit. We are in soft fruit season here in Europe which is my favourite. Our policy of not buying stuff from further away than Italy if we can help it means that in winter I miss all my favourite fruits. So I am trying to put some up.

So far I have 4 small jars of strawberries, 3 large jars of nectarines, 1 large & 1 small jar of peaches, 3 large jars of plums and 2 small jars of apricots. Hopefully If I've done it right these babies will see me through til next summer. The only one I am worries about is the peaches as I didn't get as much syrup in there as I would have liked due to them being so darn juicy!

Today I have also made 2 jars of green tomato chutney, 1 jar of picked cucumber, 2 jars of pickled onions, 2 jar of raspberry jam and half a jar (yeah that really bugged me) of strawberry jam. Oh and baked 2 laves of bread. Yeah it's been a busy day in the kitchen for me. I would love to show you a pic of this vast sea of jars but I am bushed. So I'll check back in with a pic tomorrow :o)

I made yoghurt

I'd like to thank Kirsten for her offer of help. I had to go look up what a Crock Pot was :o) I did pretty much the same thing though with a sink full of hot water and a thick towel. Necessity is the mother of invention and all that.



Jackie, I wish I had access to raw goats milk, I love the stuff. I never had yoghurt made from it but I bet it's divine. I believe adding milk powder makes the yoghurt more creamy. I really like greek yoghurt so leaving it to incubate all night seemed to do the trick for me. I might try it with milk powder one day just to see what a difference it makes.

Yoghurt take 3

I have a yoghurt factory in my kitchen sink. This is my 3rd go at yoghurt and I have high hopes for it. I got the milk up to the right temp, cooled to the right temp, mixed with plenty of starter and in a warm environment to incubate.

Fingers crossed!

What can I make with these?

Today is a day of making stuff with leftovers. So far I have made a quiche with some of the (many) eggs we were got from the farm and a leek leftover from last week's share.



With the leftover pastry from that I have made 4 jam tarts. The jam is homemade from blackberries gathered at the canal side.



I am also having a go at sorbet for the first time. I had half a melon which had found it's way to the back of the fridge and 3 black bananas. It was really important to me to use these up as both have had to travel to get her. The melon is from Spain which isn't too far. I refuse to buy them when they are travelling further than Europe. The bananas are from far far away. I can't abide waste and would be horrified with myself if I wasted stuff that has also had to come so far. They are now all blended and in the freezer. We don't have an ice cream maker so I'll be getting it out in a bit and whisking the hell out of it!!! :o)



And now for a totally unrelated pic. Our first pea flower!! I've finally caught up to BrightandNew :o)

baking and more baking

I've been at work since 7:15 today due to use getting rentokill in. Ah the delights of office fleas. Fortunately I've not been bitten, but then again I rarely am. This does mean I get to leave work at 3:15 today. Woot. Spadger is away tonight for work so I'll be walking home. It's about 3 miles and very up and down hill. With my short legs and general lack of stamina it'll be about an hour to an hour and a half walk. I quite enjoy it to be honest as long as it doesn't rain. Same journey tomorrow morning and maybe tomorrow evening as well depending.


As George was taken away to be serviced yesterday I intend to spend this evening baking and trying to tidy my sewing/crafting supplies out. Everything seems to be taking over a bit and it's all rather higgledy piggledy. I hope to be able to sort out projects to do and maybe cut out some patterns as well. My notions really need sorting.

7:26
In the last half hour I have lied to a door to door salesman ( I really wanted to help him but as we're not the homeowners he would need to give his price to the landlord. I agreed to pass it on thinking he would give me the price then. Nope, he needed to take my number and get someone to call me back and a false number rolled off my lips before I was aware of it. I am such a bad person), received a gift of cauliflower leaves for the compost from next door and put the first batch of scallion scones in the oven. I'm not sure how that balances out in the scale of the universe really.

The plan for the rest of the evening mostly consists of baking. I'd really like to sort through my stuff as mentioned above but I can never seem to do other stuff at the same time as baking. My brain gets distracted by the pretties and the next thing you know the baking is burnt. So, baking first, then stash sorting. Plan!

9:14
Scallion scones, done, Chocolate chili cupcakes, done. Rhubarb cake, in the oven.


10:26
Rhubarb cake, on rack. Apple tart thing, in oven. Cookie dough in fridge ready to roll. One they're done I'm off for a shower by which time they should have cooled enough for me to make the ganache stuff to stick them together Oreo style. Man I'm tired. But I need to get it all done before I can go to bed. I've not made the savory pie I wanted to for tea tomorrow but I have cooked the meat ready. So I'll just knock that together when I get home tomorrow. Gonna sign off now folks. Sweet dreams.

The soup has morphed

This evening's dinner was going to be parsnip mulligatawny. However I got home to discover we had only 2 parsnips which were about medium size. So it has morphed into parsnip and jerusalem artichoke mulligatawny (because there were lots of those!) Man I hate peeling those little blighters.

So the soup is done all but adding the coconut milk. It is a sickly grey in colour but tastes quite nice so I might forgive it. I'm just waiting for the pizza dough to rise as I am going to make little garlic breads to go with it. I've mixed the garlic straight into the dough at the beginning so we'll see how well that works.

The only problem with this food is it's not ready now!!!!

So to stave off hunger pangs I'm going to share the recipe for the soup with you guys. I say recipe, it's more a method now. It started life as a very rigid recipe in a book and is now the below. I hope you enjoy and please let me know if you try it.

* Finely chop an onion and mush a few cloves of garlic depending on taste. Cook slowly in some butter or oil, up to you which. * Once translucent add a tsp of turmeric, 2 tsps of garam masala or curry powder and a tsp of cumin. These are all adaptable to your taste. Toast for a few mins to release aroma. This bit is my fav as it smells ace!
* Add peeled chopped parsnips (or whatever you chose to use. About 2Lb of it) an make sure they get covered with the spices.
* Add about 2 liters of stock. Again this is variable to the size of your pan and how thick you want your soup.
* Add a peeled chopped Granny Smith apple. I've tried a Bramley and that really didn't work.
* Cook until veg is soft then blend to preferred consistency. Add coconut milt to taste and bring to the boil. Serve with bread of choice.