In Which I Return...

Never fear dear readers, I am back. I nearly stayed in Provence but I was dragged cruelly from my pool side lounger when the wine was dried up, the cheese finished and all the fruit and veg eaten.

Eating has been the theme of my fortnight- it’s so easy to eat constantly when all the food is so absolutely beautiful. Even the most simple dish of pasta becomes a gastronomic delight when you add freshly made sauce, herbs straight from the garden, locally produced cheese and a carafe or two of wine from the vineyard down the road. I was in food heaven.

One particularly beautiful restaurant, where we sat nestled amongst lavender flowers and surrounded by butterflies and hummingbird moths and later bats sticks in my mind as some of the most beautiful food I have ever eaten. Most small French restaurants don’t do so well with the old vegetarian option, the veggie main option on a very limited menu, explained at great length by the owner was- “tomato”- I wasn’t expecting great things. How wrong I was. The starter of summer salad was bejewelled with stunning edible flowers, miniature mushrooms and interesting leaves. Even The Boyf, the ultimate salad dodger was impressed. The “tomato” main blew me away as I was presented with a platter of more types of tomato than I could count, in every colour from black to green to yellow, interlaced with a mixture of fresh and smoked mozzarella. I ate so much I had to be carried back to the house.

The town we stayed in had some stunning markets -it was easy to see where the restaurant got their produce from. Tuesday morning is the big one, the whole of the town is taken over by stall after stall of homemade bread and crafts and home grown fruit and veg. For next to no money you could fill bags full and spend the next few days eating nothing but fruit, veg, bread and cheese. Returning to the tomatoes, I was completely baffled. How can one farm produce so many different types of tomato every week when Sainsbos and Waitrose can only deliver watery red tomatoes whose variety extends to small , medium, large? I think we’re being diddled! (I am, needless to say, already drawing up plans for a greenhouse where I can gow my own!)

There was also a small, more local market on a Saturday morning. Here old farmers from the small holdings and farms around the town bought their weekly wares to sell. There was everything from cut flowers to olive tree saplings- including one very elderly man selling tiny little bunches of Parsley and nothing else. They won’t let you buy anything until you have had a taste so you come away feeling as if you’d eaten dinner. It was absolutely stunning.

I am still in my sunny foody day dream, despite arriving at St Pancras international in the rain last night and being plunged right back into the madness that is London on a Saturday night. To go to work tomorrow seems like a complete travesty! Tomorrow it is back to reality, the post holiday diet must begin and I must venture to the allotment. But for now, I lie back, eat a tomato and dream of Provence.

A creative weekend...

This weekend the sun has been shining and I had four long sunny days off work...bliss. So I decided to get my creative hat on. The last time I dusted down my creative hat the experience ended in a paddy that the ingredients I wanted for my gruyere and asparagus quiche had not magically found their way into the fridge. I was left holding four eggs and a smashed up quiche tin. Bad times.

Taking it easy I decided to go for one of my famous “allotment” prefixed recipes...allotment soup, allotment jam, essentially anything I can get my hands on mixed together. Now I have a new one to add to my list, Allotment Coleslaw. An assortment of raw allotment veg covered in mayo. No quiche tin involved. Despite almost losing a finger tip in the onion cutting process- this came out lovely. A massive bowl of Coleslaw for lunch and dinner yum. I used one of my amazing red cabbages (which have really taken me by surprise this summer), a red onion, some of my lovely little French market carrot (a little tricky to grate- I really am surprised I came away with 10 fingers after this...) and one of my many many courgettes.

During a particularly productive internet recipe porn session I came across and recipe for Rose Petal Jam. The whimsical, Enid Blyton sounding name of it was enough for me to head out with my secateurs, determined to serve it with lashing and lashings of cream and ginger beer.

I think the essential recipe is to match whatever you have in rose petals with sugar and a squeeze of lemon. I kind of blagged it. But a word of warning- 5oz of rose petals is a lot of roses! I ended up going feral and collecting wherever I went- it took me about 3 days to get enough petals. You have to cut off the white bit at the bottom of the petals and then boil the rest with sugar. I did read somewhere that you should only use white, red or pink petals. I haven’t yet got a nice photo of the jam. I think that says quite a lot- it’s not very pretty. The texture is a little strange because I used fairly big petals, next time I think I’ll cut them up and mix with some fruit. It didn’t taste that bad though- just not as good as my lovely raspberry lovely.

With a slightly different creative hat on, The Boyf and I travelled up to Oxfordshire on Sunday morning to build a Princess Fort. Oh yes indeedy. I say we, obviously I was supervising from the sidelines whilst The Boyf and my cousin my lovely baba cousins Tabitha and Scarlett their castle, complete with slide. What talents that boy has!

Tonight I am going blackberry picking- I can’t stand the thought of going on holiday and leaving all that lovely fruit lying around to go off by the time I get back. I will pick as much as I can, with the help of the long suffering Boyf and his massive blackberry picking boots and stick (flip flops will not cut it on this mission!) and freeze them, ready to make jam and compot when I get back from France.

I hope you’re all out enjoying the sunshine!

My fashion pledge...

I feel as though I have let the side down a bit in the fashion stakes. During lent, I managed to avoid buying anything that didn’t have top notch ethical and/or green credentials...this basically meant that I managed to avoid buying anything. This was fine then, I was still in the new chicken love haze and happy to mong about the house in dirty dungarees and old pyjamas covered in feathers and mud. Eco living was easy...

Since then, my ethical conscious has been ignored by the greater need to buy clothes that will allow me to pass for a teacher come September. Admittedly I haven’t tried that hard. A quick wiz round a charity shop here, a browse of People Tree there...ultimately I have ended up relying on asos.com and Zara for their wonderful, cheap, fashionable work clothes. At what cost? I feel bad, but the stress and panic of starting out in a new career and wanting to look professional and maintain my fashion credentials have momentarily outweighed my desire to buy green.

I have come to my senses. I vow to start again. Sales do not count as eco shopping. I must buy better. I am going to start doing a bit of research for good value, fashion led brands which have the same focus on people and the environment as I do. I also intend to find some high end charity shops and finally get my head around E-bay.

I will, of course let you know how my hunt goes and what I end up with...if, that is, I can stop myself posting pictures of the chickens...

Is that it for summer then?

I guess we shouldn't have complained when there was no rain back in May or whenever those glorious sunny days were... As soon as the words "hose pipe ban" or "drought" get banded about you can almost guarantee the entire summer will be a wash out. And here I am, in July, with my raincoat and wellies at the ready. Forget your new summer shade chickens...

Last Friday, on my lovely, well earned (I might add!) day off- the sun came out!I dust down the sun cream and hit the garden. I was not the only one enjoying the brief warm spell...

...my lovely Mildred was also out enjoying the sun. If you have never watched a chicken sunbathing you are missing out- Mildred is a pretty dedicated sun worshipper. She walks around the garden with her wings out, finding the spot with the perfect sunshine to shade ratio before collapsing onto the grass where she lies cooing. Not even the dog can move her on!

Even lovely Maude, who normally dives straight under the hedge and sets up camp, was out in the sun. She likes plonk herself right on top of my wonderful chamomile- She even picks the flowers and places them carefully on her back. She is such a hippy chicken!

Apart from the glorious fortnight in Provence that awaits me at the start of next month, (11 days of sitting at my desk away...) I am pretty much writing this summer off. I am turning my attention to Autumn/ Winter before it's too late. I may not be ready to buy my annual winter coat and boots but I am ready to buy veggies.

I normally lose interest in planting vegetables at this time of year, as I'm too busy trying to eat what I've grown, so once again lovely readers I turn to you for advice. What should I be planting right now? This weekend? That will bring me a full tummy and a bit of sunshine through Autumn and most importantly winter...

Brussels Sprouts are a given, they are my favourite...but what else? What works for you lovely lot?

A Plea from Miserable Maudey...

Hello lovelies-

I have a problem that would love you to help me with...

Maude the Chicken is laying soft eggs. I don't mind her not being productive, she is after all, my pet and I love her whether she's laying me delicious breakfasts or not (obviously I would prefer the egg ended up in my tum rather than the run floor though!)but I just want to be sure it's not something that I am doing wrong. I don’t mind her being useless if she’s just going to be one of those awkward types but she looks like she’s in so much pain when she’s laying a softie...

So here are the clues-

She laid one wonky egg a couple of weeks back, since Sunday she’s been laying eggs with paper thin shells which obviously don’t hold up and the eggs end up being eaten to smushed about. She laid a hard shelled egg last night, in the run, but it was really rough and the colours were very patchy.

Mildred is laying fine, she doesn't like doing it as it interferes with her "pretending to be a human" activities and reminds her of her poultry status, but she's laying good eggs.

We recently moved the run from grass to bark chippings.

I changed their brand of layers pellets a few weeks ago, they haven’t noticed.

My dad has started feeding them bits of bread in an effort to train them to sit on his shoulders, I suspect this is a reaction to his narrowly missing catching an escaped parrot to keep as a pet a few years ago.

She is now laying softies in the evening, out in the run. This is not like her. She loves hanging out in the nest box. She has always been a bit of a funny one for this, when we let them free range she immediately makes herself a little nest under the hedge and stays there cooing.

I know lots of my lovely followers are chook mad too so if you have any ideas as to what’s up with my little Maudey and how I can help her I’d be dead dead chuffed and send Maude round in person to thank you with one of her special cuddles.

In which I become Handy Andy...

It feels like I'm always starting these posts with an apology- but I am, once again, sorry for taking so long to post. Work is taking up more and more of my life and I'm dreading going back to university again next year- no weekends! agh!

Anyway- an update from my weekend:

New Chook House:

Maude and Mildred's rampage of the lawn is over. We can no longer sustain their destructive digging tendencies by moving the eglu every day so we have built them a permanent patch. Normally, this would be a precision engineered, long time planned and expertly carried out Boyf job- not this time. The dad and I took a little trip to Wickes and built the whole thing ourselves- we're feeling pretty pleased with ourselves. The chickens weren't too impressed at first but seem to have settled down now. I'm so impressed with my handiwork, if that Ground Force was still about, I'd no doubt be employed to take over from Tommy Walsh...

We're a little worried about Maude chicken who has generally been looking a little down in the dumps and is laying soft eggs. I'm starting her on a regime of calcium supplements and cuddles so hopefully she will improve- watch this space!

I spent a bit of time at the allotment and came home with the usual bounty. We're pretty over run with chard, but I have no idea what to do with it- any tips? I bought a griddle so I can cook and store some courgettes in oil according to a recipe I found ages ago- again any tips welcome here!

I can't get over how many sweet peas we're bringing home! Once a week I totally strip the bushes and I come home with pots full and then a week later the bushes are full again. They really are the most wonderful flowers- I'm going to try and grown perennial ones next year as well as saving the seeds from these fellas.

I've also been taking cuttings from next doors hydrangea- with permission of course. I absolutely love these plants and the cutting a took a couple of years back is growing well in the garden.

Of course, alongside all this hard work and harvesting there was a bit of time for some rest and relaxation. Although not for my old dad...

...every time he sits down, his little friends appear waiting impatiently for snacks!

I hope you all had a lovely weekend too! Monday comes too soon eh?

Foraging for Jam...

Last night whilst out walking Alf the dog with the Boyf we came across a hedgerow full of raspberries. This particular spot is always overflowing with blackberries in late summer but I've never seen raspberries growing wild like this before. The hedgerow lines an allotment site so I assume that the bushes have escaped from someone’s fruit cage and grown like mad!

The school children had got there before us and munched their way through the easy to reach berries- no worries, I sent the boyf and the dog deep into the nettles in search of bounty.

We came away with a fair few, topped up with some of the strawberries from the garden we had enough for a jar of yummy jam!

I’m very pleased with my free hedgerow bounty! It was yummy on my toast this morning!