We have moved!

We've said goodbye to Seasonal Matters here on blogger and we've upped sticks and moved over to our brand new shiny blog thing at Very Berry Handmade.

Do join us there if you like, for the usual mix of craft, food, gardening and drinking. If you get your skates on, you can enter our thrilling Housewarming Giveaway!

Garden Labours

We decided not to grow much this year, because we're trying to change the garden round a bit, extending some patio and the vegetable patch, while trying to plant a new bit of lawn. There's a lot to do, especially as all the buildings that were here before our house was built are still mostly lurking beneath the surface. Coming across this kind of thing -



- can certainly slow you down a bit! And here's just one of the piles of bricks and assorted rubble we've dug out of the ground:



As well as trying to get the layout of the garden more how we'd like it to be, July has been a month in which things have started to happen. And finally we've had some wildlife coming back. Stacks of hoverflies this year, which is good and during July, we've seen some bumblebees back again, like this chap:



They love the white & pink oregano & marjoram we've got flowering at the moment. Not as many butterflies as last year, but we've seen a few speckled woods about the place:



There have also been a couple of spectacular peacocks that have resisted the camera's attentions, but hardly any commas or painted ladies that were pretty frequent visitors last summer. We did find this splendid caterpillar though:



Turns out it's the vapourer moth caterpillar - gaudy in its youth, more sober and brown when it grows up.

Plants too have been quite different to last year. Barely any plums at all - just 4 or 5 on the whole tree - when last summer we were worried that the crop was going to break the branches! The loganberry has been ok, but it's the blackberries that we're going to have a glut of:



With the very late cold weather we had, I think it's done for anything early and it's the late crops that will hopefully be ok. We're really hoping for a glut of tomatoes, to which we've dedicated the greenhouse. They started to go orange and red a couple of weeks back:



And there are plenty more potentially:



As I'm writing this, it's absolutely bucketing down outside, but the weather has been better so far for ripening toms - we're hoping for a sunny late summer and autumn so we can turn the tomatoes into sauce for freezing. The variety we went for this year is Amish Paste, a cooker rather than an eater - not much juice at all, mostly flesh and they have the most wonderful flavour when cooked. Very pleased with them.

As we are with our main bean variety this year, the wonderfully-named Cherokee Trail of Tears, which has been putting out lots of beans for the last few weeks:



Both of these come from the excellent Real Seed Catalogue people, who have a wonderful selection of interesting varieties on their website. Highly recommended. The variety of slow-bolting coriander we grew from them (Leaf Selection) has been really good too.

I must do our recipe for Chakchouka here soon, as it's a great way to use up seasonal vegetables. It's a tomato-y, harissa-y vegetable stew which you finish off by cooking eggs in it. We started with the recipe in Annie Bell's excellent Evergreen (abebooks link) and it's very adaptable: so far this summer we've used the beans in it, as well as our first turnips (Purple Top Milan). They are very lovely things:

When you're thinning things like turnips, you can use the leaves for greens, using them like spinach. Great wilted down with some garlic & olive oil. Our onions (Senshyu Yellow) and garlic (Lautrec Wight) too went into the last dish of Chakchouka:

First time we've grown these. The sight of onions sitting on the top of a bed is very satisfying.

Also this year we did our courgettes (Nero di Milano) a bit differently, turning over a whole raised bed to one plant, which is doing really well, far better than last year's, which had to share the space with salad leaves. We got the seeds for these from Wiggly Wigglers.



So, considering this was kind of a non-growing year, we've managed to get a few things on the go. The challenge now is to really push on with all the earth-shifting jobs so we can get planting in Spring next year. Along with everything else, like foraging for sloes for the Christmas sloe gin (great for a fizz or a martini), getting the 'Rumtopf' (using brandy) going with some seasonal fruit and maybe getting back to baking again soon as well!

Gooseberry Fool Recipe

We've finally got something of a harvest from our collection of gooseberry bushes this year.  We have one called Invicta which is a green-skinned variety, and 2 Hinnonmaki Red, which are, unsurprisingly, red-skinned.  We also have another bush picked up cheap from our local diy store, but I'm not sure what it is yet - it's only a baby and hasn't fruited this year.


To celebrate the harvest we had gooseberry fool as our Sunday lunch treat today.  Here's the lovely simple recipe that we used, which is based on the one in Good Things by Jane Grigson.

Gooseberry Fool


350g gooseberries 
50g butter
sugar to taste
300ml double cream


Top and tail the gooseberries (a yawn but it'll be worth it in the end).  Place in a lidded pan with the butter over a low heat and cook until the gooseberries are soft.  Stir and a squish the gooseberries.  DO NOT sieve the gooseberries - the skins are a vital part of the flavour of the fool, and you really don't notice them in the finished dish.  Add sugar a tablespoon at a time until the fruit is sweetened to your taste.  Set aside to cool.


When the gooseberries are at room temperature, lightly whip the cream until it has very soft peaks, then gently stir in the fruit.  Pile the mixture into a dish/dishes and put them in your fridge until you need them - or, if you can't wait, eat straight away.  If you have the time and inclination, some crunchy almond or shortbread biscuits  are delicious with this.


If you are lucky enough to have a good supply of gooseberries this year, and you really hate topping and tailing, then I recommend this delicious recipe for Gooseberry Curd.  Yum..

Our Granola

I had a busy afternoon stocking up on breakfast bits and pieces.  I made a sourdough loaf, some rhubarb and orange compote and a batch of our own-recipe granola.  It's so straightforward to make I have no idea why people eat the shop-bought stuff (which can be so sugary with nasty dried fruit); the other great thing is that you can pretty much choose what you put in it.  Here's our standard recipe - but we often make changes depending on what we have in.  Another great recipe is Andy's Fairfield Granola from Nigella Lawson's Feast - very delicious, but a bit more luxurious than ours.


House Granola
400g rolled oats
50g pumpkin seeds
50g sunflower seeds
30g sesame seeds
150g whole unblanched almonds
75g Freedom Syrup (or any other syrup - rice or maple maybe)
150ml water
150ml cold pressed rape seed oil (or mild oil of your choice) 
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp cinnamon
freshly grated nutmeg (around 1/2 tsp)
250g raisins


Preheat your oven to 190C/Gas Mark 5.  Mix all the ingredients, apart from the raisins, in a large bowl.  Spread the mixture thinly into 2 large shallow baking or roasting tins.  Bake for around 25-30 mins until golden brown, turning everything over after about 15 minutes to make sure everything gets nicely crunchy. Try not to handle the granola too roughly - otherwise it will become a bit crumby.  When it's done, take it out of the oven and leave to cool on the trays.  Divide the raisins between the 2 trays and stir them in.  Transfer your granola to a airtight container - the quantities given above exactly fill a 2 litre clip top Le Parfait jar.  


I can't tell you exactly how long this keeps for - we've never managed to keep a jar for longer than a week, but it still tastes nice and fresh then, so I'd imagine that it would keep for a couple of weeks.  It is delicious served with plain old milk, or with yogurt and fruit compote or sliced banana.  I don't need to tell you how nutritious the ingredients are - it's also really filling too. I hope you give it a try and enjoy it as much as we do.

Sourdough Rhubarb Kuchen

I have a passion for those delicious German cakes that consist of a base of rich bread dough, a lovely layer of fruit, and a sweet crunchy buttery topping.  I've made some delicious versions over the years - Nigella Lawson has a really good Apple and Blackberry Kuchen in Nigella Bites, for instance - but I'm so into making naturally leavened bread these days that I really wanted to create something with a sourdough base.  I was also curious to see if it was possible to make an enriched sourdough, using egg and milk in the dough.  I think it works very well - but here's my recipe - have a go and tell me what you think.


Ingredients
(these are the totals - check the recipe to see how much you need to use at each stage)


100g wheat sourdough starter (mine is made according to the instructions in Bread Matters by Andrew Whitley)
100g plain wholemeal flour
200g strong white flour
1egg
80g milk
3g salt
250g rhubarb
100g plain flour
75g butter
100g granulated sugar


Stage 1
First you need to wake up your sourdough starter.  Put 100g of starter in a bowl and add 50g of strong white flour and 50g of plain wholemeal flour and 60g of lukewarm water.  Cover and leave in a warm place for 3-4 hours.


Stage 2
Mix together 150g strong white flour, 50g wholemeal flour, 3g salt, 1 egg and 80g milk and knead until you have nice soft dough (7-8 minutes, or quicker in a mixer with a dough hook).  Then add all the leaven from the first stage and knead together until soft and elastic.  If the dough is very sticky after a couple of minutes kneading then add an extra spoonful of flour.  Now cover the bowl and leave the dough to rest and relax for an hour.


Stage 3
Whilst your dough is resting prepare your toppings.  Wash and slice 250g of rhubarb thinly (0.5cm slices) on the diagonal, then put aside.  In a small bowl rub together 100g plain white flour (or wholemeal if you prefer) and 75g butter until you have a lovely lumpy crumble-type mixure.  Stir in a generous 100g of sugar - granulated is fine here and gives a nice crunchy texture.  You do need quite a bit of sugar to counteract the sourness of the rhubarb - if you are using a sweeter fruit (dessert plums would be delicious for instance) then use less sugar.  Line a large baking tin or tray with baking parchment.  I use a roasting tin that measures 30x25cm that works really well - I push the dough right up to the edges.


Stage 4
Chuck your dough onto your prepared tray and press it out so you have a rectangular shape that measures around 30x25cm - it really helps to wet your hands first!  Cover the surface with rhubarb and then sprinkle your crumbly topping over the top.  Put the tray into a large carrier bag (making sure the bag is nowhere near your kuchen or you will have a very sticky incident) and leave for about 2 hours to rise and become puffy.  About 90 minutes into the rising time pre-heat your oven to gas mark 5/190C.


Stage 5
Bake for around 40 minutes until the bread base is cooked through and the crumble topping is golden brown.


Leave to cool and then slice into squares & store in an airtight tin.  This is delicious for breakfast and keeps well for 2 or 3 days.

Baking again - Lardy Cake

Goodness me, is that April and May nearly gone already? It's all been a bit quiet on the baking front recently. Not only have we been brought low by a couple of nasty colds, but I've been trying to get back on with brewing - a nice bitter, and a mild to be ready in about 3 weeks - and Ali was working flat out to put together stock for her first craft fair. Read more about that over on the Craft Matters blog.

Then there's our new Facebook shop opening, again more on this over at Craft Matters. Special offers there for a limited time...

In addition to all this activity, having gone through a few of our old cook books to find some interesting recipes, I've had a few un-blogworthy disasters... So finally, it's third time lucky with a great recipe for lardy cake from the Dairy Book of British Food I last dipped into just before Easter.

Lardy cake is not something for those worried about their waistlines, and probably comes under the category of occasional treat rather than everyday staple! It's traditional to the West Country and the version I made did compare quite well to a memory of lardy cake from a holiday in Devon several years back.

So here's the recipe:

450g (1 pound) strong white bread flour
1.5 tsp dried yeast (or fresh yeast: 15g or 1/2 oz)
1 tsp salt
75g (3oz) lard, diced
75g (3oz) butter, diced
180g (6oz) dried fruit: sultanas, currants, raisins, whatever you fancy.
50g (2oz) candied peel, chopped (optional - if not, bung in some more sultanas)
50g (2oz) sugar

Sprinkle dried yeast into 300ml warm water with a pinch of sugar & leave somewhere warm for 10-15 mins until frothy. Or blend fresh yeast with 300ml lukewarm water.

Put flour & salt in a bowl and rub in 15g (1/2 oz) of the lard until all the lumps are incorporated in the flour. Make a well and add the yeast & water mix. Then beat together to make a dough which leaves the bowl clean. You don't want it too sticky: add flour or water to get the right consistency.

Then either turn out onto floured surface & knead for 10 minutes or put in a food processor with a dough hook on the lowest setting for 10 minutes. It needs to be smooth and stretchy.

Put the dough into a bowl, cover with a clean tea towel and leave it somewhere warm for an hour until it has risen to about twice its original size.

Then turn out the risen dough onto a floured surface and roll it out into a rectangle about 1/2 cm thick, a bit like this:



Dot the dough with a third of the butter & lard and then sprinkle it with a third of the dried fruit (and peel if you're using it) and sugar:



Now fold it into thirds: fold the bottom third into the middle and the top third over the bottom third and you end up with something like this:



Turn the dough through 90 degrees and sprinkle it with another third of everything:



And then fold it into thirds again. Rotate once more, repeat the sprinkling and folding and then squish the parcel down gently with the rolling pin until it's the right size for your tin:



Now cover it loosely with a polythene bag and leave it to prove in a warm place for about 30 minutes. Halfway through this period pre-heat your oven to 220C (Gas Mark 7). The cake should puff up like this:



Score the top with a sharp knife in a criss-cross pattern and bake for about 30 minutes until it's golden on top. Check it after 20 minutes and if the top is browning too quickly, cover it with some foil for the rest of the time. Take it out of the oven to cool:



It's especially delicious sliced while still warm, or cool it on a wire rack and wrap it up to last for a couple of days. The book suggests spreading it with butter! That seems a little excessive...

Quick Rye Pancakes

These are a popular breakfast treat here. I like them particularly because they don't use any raising agents like bicarbonate of soda or baking powder - they rely entirely on egg whites to give them their light fluffy texture.

The recipe is taken from John Seymour's classic work The Complete Book of Self-Sufficiency - although he calls them dropscones. I call them pancakes because I am sure that if I called them drop scones my boys wouldn't touch them. They're pancakes in the American sense of the word - small, thick and fluffy.. Seymour's introduction to the recipe always makes me smile, because he sounds like such a nice chap. He says:

These really are mouth watering, and if you, or your lady, can make them when your kids have their friends round, so much the better.

Seymour was a hugely influential figure in the self-sufficiency movement who passed away in 2004. You can read more about his fascinating life on his family's website.

Anyway - to the recipe. Seymour's version specifies using all rye flour, but I use half plain wholemeal because of my fussy fussy children who don't like pancakes 'with bits'... They're equally delicious (to bit eaters!) either way.

Rye Pancakes

100g rye flour (or 50g rye and 50g plain wholemeal flour)

2 eggs

pinch of salt

around 150ml milk

Grease a griddle or large frying pan and put it on to pre-heat.

Separate the eggs with the whites in a small bowl and the yolks in a larger bowl.

Add the other ingredients to the yolks in the bowl and mix together thoroughly.

Beat the egg whites until they form peaks. Then first fold one tablespoon of the egg whites very gently into the main mixture. When this has loosened it a little, very gently fold and stir in the rest of the egg whites.

Add a large tablespoon of this mixture to the griddle pan - you'll probably fit three or four on. Cook for about a minute, then turn and cook the other side for about a minute.

Keep them warm in a little foil parcel & then serve with jam, honey, maple syrup, sliced banana, whatever you like, really.