February Days

February weather has been grey and damp so far.  Local walks have lifted spirits a little even if we have to zig-zag and slalom around the rain filled pot holes and continual roadworks to get there.

Some encouraging signs of Spring at Trentham this week.

Witch hazel  

Daphne - the scent was wonderful, soft and sweet.  

Snowdrops, flowering on either side of the pathways, glowing in the dull air like little nightlights.

Little Egret - we hadn't seen one for a while but two were spotted on this visit.  Lots of Herons too.

Cooking in a warm kitchen.  Paul made Leek and Potato Soup and I made cheese scones to go with it.

Just the thing to liven up dull, grey days.  Not the most attractive scones I've ever made but tasty nonetheless.

Evening visitor to the garden.  I could just about snap this photo with the outside lights on, he or she wasn't at all bothered as it tucked into the fox's food.

Books from the library and one loaned from a friend.  Lots of interesting reading to write about possibly in a later post.

It's raining again today we managed a walk before the heavy rain started.  Now it's time for lunch and some of the soup left over from yesterday.

All for now.

Blogtober - Day Thirteen

It's that time of year when things become a bit of a seasonal jumble.  Where in shops, window displays and other places various celebrations become entangled.  Today as we shopped little felt pumpkins, bats and ghouls vied for attention with felted santas, robins and reindeer.  Around the corner mince pies and stollen could be found next to batty cupcakes and ghostly biscuits.  Treats also for Halloween and bonfires including 'trick or treat' bags of sweets, toffee and marshmallows.  

Pumpkins at Trentham where this year they will have a 'pick your own' pumpkin patch.  When we were children we used to carve swedes or beet from the farmer's fields and on bonfire night we would cook jacket potatoes in foil in the embers of the bonfire.

All these things together seems to lessen their impact especially if they start too early.  I like to deal with one event at a time. Having said that I have on the larder cupbord shelves two sachets of chestnut puree, one sachet of bread sauce and a very small Christmas pudding left over from last year all still with good dates on them.  I also have two packs of cards in the stationery drawer and a calendar for next year bought recently.  Do you start early or take each event as it comes along?

Talking of recently I saw on Ragged Robin's blog a week or so ago a reference to Dorset Apple cake.  We had apples that needed using and I remembered I always used a recipe from our old Cranks recipe book for Devon Apple cake which I thought must be similar so it was made.  Very tasty served with thick greek yoghurt as a pudding.

Yesterday Paul made bread but it was packed away into the freezer before I thought of taking photos so below is a photo of some he made a couple of weeks ago.

All for now.  Take care.

Into August

 The calendar tells me that it's August.  How time flies.  Where did June and July go?  

A couple of days ago the pond was cleared of some of the weed and fallen leaves.

The weed is sorted through to take out any creatures and then left at the side of the pond for anything missed to crawl out and find their way back into the shelter of the water.  A large frog was spotted and lots of young newts.

Here is one of them.  At least twenty were counted.  Just a quick photo and then it was put back into the water. We have to move the pond weed left at the side of the pond before nightfall.  If we leave it there in the morning the foxes have spread it everywhere.  I think they like to play with it.

Leaves have been falling from the Tulip tree.  

The hot weather and the strong warm breezes have started an early Autumn.

We've raked up and filled a few bags full of leaves and still they fall.

Small mushrooms, or are they toadstools? have appeared on the lawn amongst the fallen leaves.
 

We've had a lot of courgettes so some baking and cooking was done.

Courgette and Goat's Cheese pizza - very tasty with salad leaves from the garden.

Also small quiches for the freezer with courgettes, tomatoes and broccoli from the garden.  Paul was the baker, I did make the pastry for the quiches though.

A lovey gift through the post from our friend Robert.  Send me six photos from your garden he said and I'll make you a cube.  He loves making cubes and has been making them on and off for quite a few years covering many different topics.  His favourites are maps and buses.  It arrived flat pack and was easily assembled. They are great for popping little gifts inside.

 

Thank you Robert.

It's a very pretty cube

From every side.

All for now.

At Home

In the garden the trees and shrubs are taking on their autumnal hue.

 The Tulip Tree (Liriodendron)  has gone from bright green to yellow in one week.

 The Amelanchier has reached its final colouration for the year.  Snowy white flowers in Spring were replaced by bright ruby coloured berries in Summer and now its leaves have turned russet and are gently falling of the branches.  It is a favourite with all the small birds especially blue tits, sparrows and robins as they use it to perch in before they swoop to snatch buggy nibbles from the window feeder.  Only the robin takes the time to look through the window at us.

 The Hydrangea has travelled from bright blue to light blue to lilac to pink before reaching green again.

 The sedums which are so popular with butterflies have darkened.

 

A Red Admiral visited in the afternoon sunshine.

The Japanese Anemones are holding out as long as they can.

Meanwhile in the kitchen new recipes have been tried and tested

Chickpea Fritters delicious on a bed of Wild Rocket. Recipe by Jamie Oliver from the September Food Magazine from Waitrose.

Fox shaped biscuit with a little cutter I received as part of a birthday present near the end of August.  It was the first chance I had of using it.

The recipe used was from the BeRo book for gingerbread men. 

I've been reading the latest Stephen Booth 'Cooper and Fry' novel.  I love these books as they are set in around the Peak District and actually other parts of Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire too. Many places I know and love have been used in these novels. This story is set around Hayfield and Kinder Scout with references to the Mass Trespass which took place there in 1932 and which finally led to the creation of the first National Park.

Most of my ancestors come from Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire with a few from Leicestershire and Lincolnshire.  Plus one from Fife in Scotland who moved to live in Loughborough, Leicestershire in the 1820s.

I've been sorting through some old family photographs.  Most are of family on my mother's side, some came to me from my mother's cousin who lived in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. She was one of the little twin girls you can see in the bottom photo. The family left Nottinghamshire for Canada in 1913.
 The girls were called Violet and Olive.  Violet lived into this century and she is the one who sent me many photos. I met her twice when she came back to England for visits.  Unfortunately she lost her twin sister during an outbreak of diphtheria just a few years after they arrived in Canada.

The formidable lady above is my great great grandmother Martha who was born in the village of Welby near Grantham in Lincolnshire.  When she married she moved to Long Clawson near Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire.  

The lady above with the little girl is Martha's daughter and my grandmother Florence Mary who was born in Long Clawson, the little girl is my mother's older sister Gladys Emily.

Above my grandfather Alexander Joseph with my mother's brother William Edward.  Another sad tale of infant mortality I'm afraid.  Meningitis took him in 1911.

I can spend hours looking through old photos often wondering who some of the people are as many aren't labelled in any way.  

Garden Produce

There are lots of good things growing in the garden at the moment.   Some of them are ripe for picking others are ready for cutting.

 In the basket are tomatoes from the green house, courgettes and potatoes from the raised beds and plums from the tree at the top of the garden.  From the herb bed there are sprigs of sage, parsley and basil.

The herbs make a lovely, fragrant display in a jam jar on the kitchen windowsill until we need to use them.

There is much more lavender to harvest and dry.  I don't like to take too many flowers off as the bees love buzzing around its fragrant flower stalks.

Add a red pepper, an onion and an aubergine to the courgettes and tomatoes and you can make a simple ratatouille.  A clove of garlic with some tomato puree, olive oil and black pepper complete the dish.

There are beans, more plums and more courgettes to come in the next week or two. It's so satisfying to bring into the kitchen fruit and vegetables you have grown in your garden even if just from a pot outside the back door or a even just pots of herbs in the kitchen window.

If Neighbours give you Parsnips.......

........ Make soup!  Yesterday there was a knock at the door which, when opened, revealed one of my neighbours clutching two huge parsnips.  'A present', she said!  We had bought a few parsnips the day before but I didn't like to say we didn't need them so, of course,  I accepted them.

 Adding three of the smaller parsnips we had bought as well as an onion, Paul made a lovely soup  for lunch.

 

 It was warm and tasty on such a cold, wet and sleety day.  There is enough soup in the fridge for another day too.

 After lunch we made biscuits and cut them into heart shapes ready for Tuesday.

 They are cooling on the rack as I type this post

 A baker's dozen! They might need a bit of decoration, perhaps?  I'm sure a few of them will find their way next door to say thank you for the parsnips.

Monday Miscellany

With the rest of the windfall apples that I mentioned in my last post we made jam.

 

I peeled, cored and chopped the apples and washed, stoned and chopped some plums we had bought very cheaply at the local supermarket.  They were Italian plums and I couldn't help but wish that we had had more plums on our own tree this year.  A couple of years ago we had so many we had several bags in the freezer and it would have been nice to have had some this year to take out of the freezer and put with the apples.  The fruit was cooked in water and then sugar added.  The mixture was brought to a rolling boil until setting point was reached - this caused a few  anxious moments with dripping spoons and testing with plates and spoons taken cold from the fridge.

 Jars were sterilised in the oven and Paul spooned the mixture into them whilst I sterilised the lids with boiling water from the kettle. It was satisfying to hear the popping of the seals as the jars cooled down throughout the evening.

 Overnight the jam had set quite well so we chose a jar to open and test.

 The jam was sweet and refreshing with the scones I made yesterday afternoon.

Two of the jars have been set aside as a thank you to the friends who gave us the apples from their garden. 

 Whilst I was making scones Paul was mixing bread dough and leaving it to rise.  A couple of hours later we had two lovely crusty cobs.
We did seem to have quite a productive time in the kitchen over the weekend.