Nice ices for a heatwave

It's hard to believe that a few weeks back the gardeners among us were bemoaning the long long long winter and longing for some sun to warm the soil. Then in a flash Spring came and here we are past midsummer and in the hottest of heatwaves for, well, ages!!! I know some of you live in places where 30C is a pleasant warm day, but here in the UK we go through a giddy happy phase, then get pink and sweaty and a tad stressed, then we can't sleep (because we don't have fans and air-con and stuff like that) and then the government issues a health warning and we worry we all might die.

Anyhow, back to the plot . . . the soft fruit plot to be precise;  our currants have loved the soaking they got last year followed by a good old fashioned snowy winter, so that when the warm weather came they blossomed and the recent heat ripened the fruits that hang like strings of pearls, rubies and jet beads in the bushes.

I had protected the White Versailles Currants from the birds with a wire mesh cage . . . there is just one bush - it's fruits are precious.

We have many Red Currant bushes, an unknown variety that was in the garden when we moved here; I planted the prunings and they all grew! This year we didn't net them, the larder is still stacked with jars of red currant jelly from last year, so I was happy to share them with the local Blackbirds.

The Black Currants are another unknown variety that came with the garden and my enthusiastic growing from cuttings! The berries are HUGE! The Blackbirds prefer the Red Currants, so there is no need to net them.

On Saturday afternoon I spent a few happy hours picking currants while listening to TMS on my iPhone headphones via wifi. I had found the perfect recipe for some of our currants on Fenland Lottie's blog – Frozen Fruit Yogurt :-)

First I had to clean and de-stalk the currants, cook and purée them – three times for the three separate colours (this took a lot longer than I thought!). I don't have an ice-cream maker, but neither did Fenland Lottie (her's had broken) so as the three tubs of mixture started to freeze I had to take them out of the freezer and beat them. Then I realized the White and Red Currant ices were way too tart (mouth puckeringly so!) so I tipped them into mixing bowls, added honey and beat them thoroughly before re-freezing.

It all took a long long time.

And a lot of energy . . . my energy – I worked hard for these ices!

Tonight we tasted them – they were worth all the effort!

And when the thermometer soars again tomorrow I know how I can cool off ;-)

Celia

xx

Philosophical gardening and strange fruit

I really feel sorry for anyone who has started to 'grow their own' this year or last; you haven't had it easy, it's either been too dry, too hot, too cold or too darn wet. It's easy to moan about what hasn't grown and get very down and fed up about trying to be self-sufficient in fresh fruit and veg.

The thing is, there never is a year when everything grows and produces a wonderful crop, so it's best to grow a variety of the different crops and there's bound to be a few that do quite well. There will probably be one or two that surpass all expectations. You could call it Biodiversity, I'm going to call it Philosophical Gardening.

Here's an example . . . Gooseberries.

Some years, well actually most years, they are a bit tricky to get to crop well. If it's warm and a little bit humid the bushes get mildew and the fruit get covered in a horrid fungal bloom. Then, as if that isn't bad enough, the leaves suddenly disappear! Munched, seemingly overnight, by a marching army of Gooseberry Sawfly larvae.

This year (while we've all been hiding indoors, keeping warm and sheltering from the storms) our 'Invicta' Gooseberry bush has been flourishing, growing big spiny new shoots, lush shiny green leaves and lots and lots of fruit. Untroubled by mildew and wriggly maggots, the fruit have swelled and the branches hung down under the weight of hundreds of plump green bristly berries.


On Saturday afternoon I decided to pick all the Gooseberries from our single bush, the yield was 2.5 kilos! I sat in the shade and while listened to the Wimbledon commentary on TuneIn Radio on my iPhone, I nubbed the Gooseberries.

Spending all that time looking at Gooseberries, made me realise what strange little fruits they are. What was the flower stalk is that thin olive-green stem ending in a tiny trumpet shape; the fruit bit is like a green balloon, the remains of the dry shriveled petals are still attached to the end opposite the stalk.

I put one half of the Gooseberries in the freezer and with the other I made Gooseberry and Elderflower jam (River Cottage recipe as shown here). It smelled gorgeously flowery as it cooked.

I put a dozen Gooseberries aside to be 'life models' . . . I wanted to record how Gooseberries, which you'd think are as similar as peas in a pod, are actually each unique.  I remembered what one of my art college drawing tutors used to say as he paced behind us during life classes, "first, the strange shapes; the strange shapes".

At the end of the day there were five jars (and a bit over for Sunday breakfast) of beautiful, complex, sharp, sweet, Gooseberry and Elderflower jam. A jam of such distinction really deserves some scones and clotted cream!

And here are the strange fruits . . . each one a little different from the others.

Celia
x

The recipe for a 'Nice Weekend'

"Good weekend?"

"Yes thanks, it was nice."

I hope yours was. Our weekend wasn't spectacular, or exciting, but was definitely 'nice'. Activities included . . .

Gardening – as enthusiastically demonstrated here by Sylvie, one of my senior under-gardeners. We trimmed hedges and pottered around happily all Saturday afternoon.



Crochet - on holiday in Denmark I bought some balls of wool in lovely rich pink/red/terracotta shades from a bargain bin in the lovely yarn shop just opposite Odense Town Hall. I just happened to have my crochet hook with me (best be prepared!) and I spent the cosy evenings in the sommerhus making crochet squares. On Friday evening I started to stitch them together to make a snuggly scarf.



Cake - occasionally Cliff and I devise a walk for the village Sunday afternoon walking group. This is not one of our bracing, striding-out-along-windy-ridges walks, it's a stroll along local paths and lanes while catching up on the village gossip - it is designed to suit all ages and ends with tea and cake. Which is why I made my favourite carrot cake recipe - it's a good thing I snapped a quick picture this morning - there's only a few crumbs left!



Talking of cake - did you get the Saturday newspaper with the voucher for a free chocolate cake from a well known up-market supermarket? We did, and on the way home from a not-so-posh supermarket, we dropped in and claimed our FREE chocolate cup cakes - that made us smile – a lot :-)

Cinema - I love going to the cinema, but we don't seem to go as often as we used to. This weekend I was determined to see Julie and Julia - so we headed into Cambridge and spent Saturday evening happily watching a 'nice' movie about cooking and blogging and nice-patient-kind-husbands and there was even a ginger cat which looked just like my studio assistant! Which meant I hated it . . . hee-hhe nooooo! of course not - it was very, very nice. And we ate lots of chocolate and afterwards I gave the film 8/10 because it made us both smile.

So, what now? A nice glass of red wine . . . a nice bath . . .