Rhubarb is one of my favourite crops from the garden. It takes virtually no maintenance, comes up every year without any fuss and provides food from early spring to summer, for a one off payment for the plant.
To be honest, my rhubarb plant didn’t cost a penny. It was a division from my father-in-law’s garden. I’ve had it for at least 10 years, and he grew it in his garden from the moment he bought the house in the late 1950s. I love money-saving crops and ones that are easy to grow.
My rhubarb is growing in a semi-shaded spot under a hawthorn hedge. The secret to its success is the compost bins sited right next to it. All the nutrient-rich liquid feed seeps out from the bottom of the compost bins straight into my rhubarb patch. Rhubarb is a hungry plant and usually growers plant it on top of a pile of manure. I’ve not used manure here for many years as it brings in so many weed seeds. But my plants are healthy and thriving thanks to my home-made compost and liquid feed.
Let me know if you try out my recipe. The granola is especially useful as it can be used as a breakfast cereal, or sprinkled over fruit and cream or yoghurt, or even ice cream to add crunch, flavour and nutrition. The idea for the rhubarb cream came from Jill Fish, as mentioned in the magazine. Jill’s recipe used only rhubarb, but I had used most of my available crop and just had a small amount, so added an apple, and it worked perfectly!
Many thanks for reading my blog. Have a great gardening weekend!
I like these multi-packs of seeds as they save money. As well as growing the chives and parsley, I can highly recommend the cinnamon basil which smells and tastes divine. Are you growing herbs from seed this spring? It’s an economical way to grow them and you don’t have to sow the whole packet at once. I often save half a packet for the next year.
These windowsill seed and box kits are recommended. I wrote about them here:
Let me know if you have a go at making these bread rolls. They are such a lovely accompaniment to spring vegetable soup. I’m making cream of celery soup today, using celery grown over winter in the unheated poly tunnel. Tastes nothing like the bland celery you buy from the shops. It’s so sweet and crunchy!
This week’s Garden News Magazine recipe using fruit grown in my garden. Strawberries don’t thaw out well after freezing. They tend to go soft. But frozen fruit is perfect for adding to pies, cakes and puddings. In this instance, I’ve added strawberries to some jam and filled a light sponge cake. Then I’ve added lashings of whipped double cream. I must admit, I had no complaints from the family! 😃
I slice and freeze strawberries in flat plastic trays before bagging them up and using them over the winter. Shop-bought strawberries seem to have no taste, but sun-ripened home-grown fruit is delicious- and free!
You can buy strawberry plants now from the garden centres or online. You can also buy bare-rooted stock which has been cold-treated to produce fruit this year. Strawberries need winter cold to prompt them to flower and fruit, so don’t put them in a greenhouse or other protected space indoors over winter. But you can bring them indoors now to get an earlier crop, if you grow them in containers.
I’ve had the best success growing them in window boxes and lifting them into the greenhouse in early spring. Growing in containers helps defeat the slugs which tend to be a nuisance in wet weather. And also it’s easier to cover them in fine netting to protect from birds. Take care not to use coarse netting, which catches birds’ feet. It can be difficult and distressing trying to untangle a delicate bird from netting. I tend to use fleece now, or micro mesh insect proof netting which has no holes to trap feet.
You’ll notice I mention David Hurrion’s new book. A review is to follow. Very highly recommended. It’s the only guide you’ll ever need for growing anything in raised beds. A very well-written and comprehensive book. Another Dorling Kindersley success story. DK spots all the best writers and is giving us a field day with new titles this year. And David Hurrion is a very well respected horticulturists, teacher and writer. Someone I have no hesitation in recommending for his book and also courses. I note he will be coming to Barnsdale Gardens this year to teach pruning techniques and caring for fruit trees and soft fruit (16 November) and gardening for beginners and plant propagation (3rd August).
Thank you for reading my blog. You are amongst 1,000 readers a week! I’m very grateful for all your support. Come back and read more reviews, and for recipes, and photos of what I’m growing here at bramblegarden. Please also sign up for notifications for future posts.
This delicious recipe came from a friend. I’ve been making this dish for 30 years. It’s a family favourite because it’s so quick and easy to make. No messing about rolling out pastry. The biscuit mix gives a lovely crunchy base to the fresh raspberries. The topping is the usual ground almond cake mix. And it freezes well too! So I always have a few slices to give to friends and family when they visit. Happy Gardening- and cooking everyone!
Plenty of raspberries filling the freezer this autumn.
Freeze in portions so you only have to defrost what you need. Autumn Bliss
If you were listening to BBC Radio Leicester’s Ben Jackson on Tuesday at 3.10pm, here’s the recipe I mention, using windfall apples, autumn raspberries and blackberries foraged from the hedgerows around my garden. It’s this week’s recipe for Garden News Magazine.
It’s lovely to use fresh fruit from the garden which has cost nothing. I’m also trying to save energy by using the microwave more often. This sponge pudding only takes about 5-6 minutes to cook. You can brown the top by adding flaked almonds and briefly placing the pudding under a hot grill.
Autumn raspberries have produced a bumper crop this year. I have Autumn Bliss and Polka growing in the shade next to my compost bins. They appreciate rich soil, so must get some good liquid feed from the compost bins along side.
I’ve never known a year when the blackberries were so plump and juicy. The cooler, wet weather in July suited them. There’s a good reason my plot is called Bramble Garden; the boundary hedges are full of high, arching blackberry stems. Berries were exceptionally sweet and tasty this year. I’m going to weave some culinary varieties in amongst them to extend the season. You can grow early, mid-season and late blackberries and this summer has whetted my appetite for more!
Apples have been more of a problem this autumn. The high winds caused them to fall from the trees before I had a chance to pick them. I have a huge amount of windfalls which need to be processed quite quickly as bruises cause rotting. The ‘good’ apples are not keeping as long as they usually do because we had a heatwave for the whole of October. Climate change is causing all sorts of challenges in growing, harvesting and storing fruit and vegetables. We will probably all have to have a re-think how we manage home food production.
I’ll leave you with the peaceful image of bantam hens Daphne and Daisy foraging for windfall apples in the small orchard. They don’t mind the bonanza of apples available for them to peck at! And on a positive note, their egg production went up in October due to the hot weather. So we’ve had a lot of cakes, pancakes and home-made custard to accompany all that fruit!
If you were listening in to BBC Radio Leicester this afternoon, here’s the recipe I mentioned for Apple and Rosehip Jelly. My mother-in-law Joan used to make a crab apple jelly similar to this one. Bags of fruit would be tied to the kitchen cupboard doors to drip overnight. Fruit jams and jellies would make a very tasty winter treat, spread on warm buttered toast, or on cakes and scones. This recipe is adapted from a Women’s Institute recipe dating back to 1943. The WI members became famous for making jams and jellies as part of their war effort. Rosehip syrup was a particularly valuable source of vitamin C for children. When my brothers and I were young in the 1960s and 70s, we had a spoon of syrup and a spoon of malt before setting off for school. We also had a spoon of caster oil, which wasn’t quite as welcome!
Ingredients:
makes about 6 jam jars
2kg eating apples
1 kg rosehips
Approx 2.3kg caster sugar -depending on amount of liquid produced.
1 sachet of pectin
Method:
Put a tea plate in the freezer for checking the setting point later.
Wash and core the apples. No need to peel them.
Place apples in a preserving pan and add enough cold water to just cover them.
Simmer until soft.
Roughly chop the rosehips. I used a food processor.
Add rosehips to the apples and cook for a further 15 minutes.
Spoon the pulp into a muslin or jelly bag suspended over a bowl. Don’t allow the bag to touch the bowl.
Start to spoon out the juice straight away so that the bowl doesn’t overspill. Leave the bag overnight to drip.
Measure out the liquid.
For every 600ml add 500g sugar. Return the liquid to the preserving pan.
Heat gently to dissolve the sugar.
Bring to the boil and boil rapidly until the setting point has been reached.
Check using the tea plate and a teaspoon of the jelly. A setting point is reached when the jelly wrinkles when pushed by your finger.
Ladle into clean sterilised jam jars and add labels.
Rosehips should be gathered at the end of October when ripe, but before being damaged by frosts. They are classed as a ‘superfood’ due to their antioxidant properties.
I whizzed the rosehips in a food processor, or you could roughly chop them by hand.
This is the jam and jelly straining kit I bought from Dunelm. The metal frame unscrews for winter storage. The bag is adequate for this amount of pulp. I set it up over a Pyrex pudding bowl, but I did start to scoop out the juice as soon as it started filtering through as I was worried the bowl might overflow overnight. The netting bag is washable and reusable, but you can also buy replacements.
And this is the finished apple and rosehip jelly. It doesn’t taste much of apples, but does taste of roses and summer! Absolutely delicious!
You can listen in to gardening on the radio at 3.10pm every Wednesday. Just ask your smart speaker to tune in to BBC radio Leicester. Or you can listen again on the i-player.
Today we also talked about starting paperwhite narcissi for Christmas.
Here’s some I grew for a January flower wreath using a jam jar covered in moss attached to a willow heart frame. We are having to find all sort of ways to get round not using plastic florists’ foam. My hidden jam jar works really well.
We also talked about growing amaryllis for Christmas presents.
Here’s some I grew last winter. I can highly recommend Taylors Bulbs as the size and quality is first class. Bulbs should flower within 6-8 weeks from planting and make a lovely home-grown present.
Ben Jackson and I talked about picking the last dahlias. This one is Eveline from Mr Fothergill’s.
This one is David Howard. I’ll be leaving mine in the ground again this year, covered in a foot of of dried leaves and a cloche to keep them as dry as possible and to protect them from the frost. If you have wet heavy clay soil, it’s best to dig them up and put them in a frost free place such as a garden shed or garage. Thanks for listening in and reading the blog. Have you decided what you are doing about your dahlias yet? We’ve had three night frosts this week, so I’m covering mine already.
I’ve spent the day clearing out my 20ft second-hand Alton Cedar greenhouse. This was purchased for £260, the best £260 I’ve ever spent. Admittedly, it was 32 years ago- but the greenhouse is still almost as good as new. I’ve painted it black, although it was a harsh bright red when it arrived. The staging is also painted black which really sets off the pelargoniums housed there. Plants live in pots along the front path in front of the greenhouse during the summer. It just gets too hot indoors, and they appreciate some fresh air and rainwater. But at this time of the year, I sweep it out, wash down the windows and give it all a quick re-paint. Everything must be back inside before the first frosts.
In the background you can see my 10ft sunflowers that I thought were small multi-headed types for cutting. I’d need a ladder to harvest those! Instead I’m leaving most of them to dry out for bird seed. A few blew down in the recent storms, so I’ve put them in jam jars on the kitchen table. I’ve made a note to carefully check the seed packets next summer so I don’t make the same mistake twice! They are beautiful though, and the bees and butterflies enjoying the pollen are currently a wonderful sight.
Next to the greenhouse there’s a matching 20ft polytunnel where I grow fruit, vegetables and flowers. Tomatoes and peaches have done really well this summer. You’ll also see a little pile of cobnuts in the basket. Alongside the greenhouse there’s a huge hazel tree which squirrels usually strip overnight. This year there were more nuts than they could manage, so I’ve harvested some to make into cakes and biscuits.
Peaches have been a great success this summer. My trees are grown in large 15” containers in the poly tunnel. This protects them from peach leaf curl which thrives in wet conditions. Keeping leaves dry is the best way to combat the disease.
Baskets nearly always contain flowers as well as fruit and veg. This is Rose of the Year 2022, ‘It’s a Wonderful Life.’ Highly recommended for fabulous scent, repeat flowering and disease resistance. I’ve also picked some seedling nasturtiums. I’m particularly fond of this peachy-coloured one and keep it going by taking cuttings which root in water. I collect seeds too, but it might not come back exactly the same colour as nasturtiums readily hybridise. There’s also a few herbs, mint, marjoram and rosemary which add a lovely scent to any jam jar flower arrangement. The climbing beans are pink-flowered Celebration which don’t go stringy and crop late into the season.
Still on the theme of peaches, these are the little pastry custard tarts I made with slices of fresh peach, autumn raspberries and home-grown blueberries. The recipe is for my column in Garden News Magazine which I’ll share next week. They are very quick and easy to make.
I’ve had this potted purple bougainvillea for about 30 years. I’ve trained it into a round-headed shape so that it doesn’t take up too much room. It will be the first plant to go back in the greenhouse as it’s not at all hardy. Bracts stay colourful until December and I often use it in my Christmas table arrangements.
In pots alongside the bougainvillea are these beautiful grey-leaved tender perennial plants. They have long sprays of pale blue flowers. I’ve temporarily forgotten the name! Each winter I take insurance policy cuttings just incase I lose the parent plants.
There’s a border full of low-maintenance day lilies in front of the greenhouse. In autumn when the day lilies are starting to die back, these beautiful spires of persicaria appear. This one is Persicaria Rosea.
The flowers deserve a close inspection, they are so dainty.
There’s also a white persicaria. Sadly, the label has been lost so I’m not sure of the variety. It thrives in dappled shade and flowers from August to November. The photo is out of focus as it was such a windy day, but it’s a very pretty flower nonetheless.
And finally, this one is also growing in with the daylilies. This persicaria is either Firetail or Firedance. They are good for cut flowers, lasting at least a week to 10 days in a vase if you change the water each day. The spire shape gives a nice contrast to round, daisy flowers.
In amongst them are several types of phlox. This one is Blue Paradise- very highly scented and long-flowering in late summer.
The back field behind the summerhouse had oats growing there this summer. It’s been wonderful to sit in the shade and watch the field slowly turning to a shimmering gold. On a windy day, the crop ripples like waves and before it ripens the green-grey colour reminds me of the ocean. Instead of seagulls we have barn owls silently gliding by at dusk. There’s no sound at all from the beating wings and they quarter the field without knowing we are watching from the little wooden house.
We are always pleased and much relieved when the farmer manages to get the crop in before bad weather arrives. They work through sunset and into the night if rain is threatened. We lie in bed and listen to the tractors going up and down the fields and along the lane. At 2am there’s suddenly silence again and we know they have successfully got in the crops. Rain falls the next day and it’s wet for a week.
This is the view from our five bar gate at the top of the paddock. For a few weeks after the harvest, the fields retain their golden glow, and I drink in the scene and hold on to the memory as autumn and then winter darkness descends.
When we moved here, it was just a decrepit house and no garden. The farmer who built the house sold us an acre of land alongside it, and we planted 250 sapling trees given to us by the woodland trust and local council. At the time, there was a scheme giving free trees to anyone returning farm land to nature and we planted a small woodland area. All along the boundary, we left viewing points through to the fields beyond. The ever-changing seasons are a delight to spy through these holes in the treescape.
Thank you for reading my blog. Please sign up for e mail updates and I would love you to press ‘follow’. I often join in with Cathy for her ‘In a Vase on Monday’ meme. Mostly I write about what flowers I’m growing to give to my friends and family, and what produce I’m growing for family meals. I don’t grow in traditional rows, everything is mingled together and much is grown in window boxes and containers, with many different varieties ripening early, mid-season and late. There’s nearly always something to ‘forage’ from the plot.
Plums have been prolific again this year. I’ve filled four draws of the freezer so far!
If you’re looking for a recipe to use up your plums I can highly recommend this one! It’s so quick and easy to rustle up. No pastry to roll out, you just whip up the milk and creme fraiche mixture, pour it into a large dish, and pop the halved plums on top! Such a simple recipe to follow and the taste is quite amazing.
This makes about 6-8 portions, but it can be cut up and frozen as individual slices. One minute in the microwave, and the slices are ready to eat!
My tree is a Victoria Plum. Jubilee is thought to be an improvement, and there’s also Marjorie Seedling which crops later in the season.
After I’ve harvested the plums, I do some tidying up and pruning. If you’ve never done any pruning this can seem like a daunting task. However I simplify it by starting off cutting out any broken twigs and branches. Plum trees bear a heavy crop and the wood is brittle, so there are often a lot of damaged stems.
Next I cut back anything that’s rubbing or crossing as these stems will rub together in the winter and cause wounds where infection will get in.
After that, I cut out any stems that are heading towards the centre of the tree, as a good air flow helps to prevent mouldy fruit and fungal diseases.
Finally, I shorten any really long stems, as I want to keep the tree compact – I’ve got to the age where I’m not keen on going up ladders! So I keep the tree at a manageable size.
Hope these tips have been helpful. Do think about planting a plum tree over the winter. Bare root trees are cheap and easy to plant. And after planting you’ll have years of produce to make jam, crumble, plum cakes and clafoutis!
Photos of my orchard in spring. Tulip Exotic Emperor in the cut flower bed in front.
If you are listening in to Ben Jackson on BBC Radio Leicester on Wednesdays at 3.10pm, you’ll hear us pruning Ben’s apple trees. I often go over and do some gardening with him and we record a ten minute tip for the radio. Just simple ideas to help and encourage new gardeners and give some fresh ideas to experienced gardeners too.
Thanks for reading my blogs and leaving a comment in the box below. You are among 400 people who read bramblegarden every day! I’m so pleased to see you all here!
Here’s a link to a list I wrote on Plum Jam and also Plum crumble cakes.
This week’s recipe from Garden News Magazine. So lovely to have sunny weather at the weekend to sit outdoors and eat with the family. Food seems to taste better in the sunshine.
Herbs are grown in shallow terracotta pans and window boxes. These are still in the greenhouse, but will go outdoors the first week of June when all the cold winds should have disappeared.
Here’s a mini-windowbox full of basil, parsley, chives and coriander. The kit comes with small packets of seeds and just enough compost for four individual pots.
I recommend Johnson’s seeds for herbs. Dwarf dill can be grown in containers.
I also recommend Jekka’s Herbs produced by Johnson’s Seeds.
A very useful book to dip into, especially if you’d like to try different herbs.
Hope you are having a good gardening week. It’s been a cold spring so far and very wet. We are behind with most vegetables, but the spring flowers have enjoyed the cool conditions and lasted longer than usual. Bluebells are just starting to fade, but bright blue geraniums have started to flower to take their place and all the wild flowers, ragged robin, pink campion and oxeye daisies are starting to bloom. Thank you for reading the blog and, if you have time, leave a comment in the box below, letting me know what herbs you are growing for your summer cooking. I’m very grateful to have the opportunity to write for Garden News Magazine. Each week I share a different recipe featuring something harvested from the garden. Sometimes I only have a handful of herbs, or a dish of berries. It doesn’t have to be a huge amount, just whatever I can find to put into my cooking.
Seed potatoes arrived promptly through the post in a paper sack from Potato House. These are the varieties I selected. Some for containers and some for the open ground. The potatoes were in a good condition, fresh, solid, with no mould, and an ideal size for chitting. I set them out in a seed tray with paper strips between the varieties and labels at one end.
Seed potatoes have been placed in a bright, cool, frost free place to chit. Chitting just means to start them into growth. Small shoots will grow from the eyes, which have been placed upwards. When the shoots are 2cm the potatoes will be planted in containers on top of 20cm of compost. As the leaves grow, handfuls of compost will be added to cover them, until the leaves pop out of the top of the containers. I’ll water sparingly until the containers are half full of compost – by which time the potatoes will be growing strongly. Too much water in the early stages causes the potatoes to rot. When the leaves emerge out of the top, watering will be stepped up to make the tubers grow.
I’ll be harvesting these in about 100 days for earlies, and 120 days for main crop potatoes.
There’s nothing like the taste of newly-harvested potatoes, fresh from the garden. It’s a money-saving project, but also grown for the flavour. Only a few varieties are usually offered in the shops, and yet there are hundreds of varieties to choose from to grow. Some potatoes I grew last year, showing the shoots starting to grow. Usually three shoots are allowed to develop. The rest are rubbed off so they produce larger -sized potatoes.Leek and potato pies.
Potato and cashew nut savoury bakes Love these two-tone white and pink potatoes. Charlotte potatoes, just washed and ready to steam. No need to scrape new potatoes. The skin contains lots of vitamins and minerals.
I love the colours of Violetta and Shetland Black. Before Christmas, I bought some ready-to-eat potatoes from Potato House UK as a try-before-you-grow scheme. It was fabulous to try different varieties before committing time and space to growing them at home.
What plans have you got for growing potatoes this summer? It’s exciting to think about spring and summer harvests after such a long, cold grey winter isn’t it.
Potato House have kindly given me a code to offer to readers of bramblegarden. This is an offer independent from my blog, and Potato House will be responsible for all discussions regarding orders.
Amy from Potato House writes: Here is a 10% code for your readers for seed potatoes for orders over £15
BRAMBLE T&C 10% Voucher valid till 31/4/23 for SEED orders over £15, includes all 6 tuber, 1 kg nets. Excludes 10kg, 25kg sacks, gift cards, patio sets, grow bags and our To Eat range. Coupon cannot be used in conjunction with other coupons. One discount per email. Usual discounts still apply. Usual web T&C apply.
For listeners of today’s BBC Radio Leicester gardening. Here’s what I was talking about today. This advice comes from Glenn Facer, who has worked in the gardens at Chatsworth House for 33 years. Glenn has been growing fruit and vegetables in the kitchen garden for 14 years and grows produce for the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire. Glenn supplies the family in the main house and also the restaurants, cafes and hotels on the estate.
Glenn Facer working at Chatsworth
Glenn says: “I force the rhubarb by lifting small clumps off the rows out on the beds from November until about the end of march, leaving the roots on top of the ground to be frosted for a few days. This aids the forcing process.
Rhubarb dug out ready to be forced Forced rhubarb has sweet and tasty, pale stems
In dustbins, I place a layer of compost in the bottom and place the clumps on top, filling round with more compost but not covering the crown. Then lightly water and replace the lid to exclude light.
The dustbins are placed in a heated glasshouse for a quicker crop, but can be placed in a cold greenhouse or shed. They are usually ready to harvest in about 3 to 4 weeks time.
I usually dispose of the crowns after forcing, as they are worn out and would take a while to crop again.
The varieties I use are Victoria , Timperley Early and Champagne.”
Forced rhubarb from the Chatsworth gardens. photos Glenn Facer
Recipes we talked about on the radio. These were published in the Garden News Magazine in 2022. I write a column each week focussing on what I’m growing and how I’m using the produce in the kitchen.
Smoothy recipe:
1/2 cup cooked, cooled rhubarb
1 teaspoon sugar ( optional) or maple syrup or honey
1.5 cups plain yoghurt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon fresh grated ginger
Or pinch of dried ginger
Add icecream to serve (optional)
Cut the rhubarb into 2cm pieces. Wash and place in a saucepan with just the water clinging to the stems. Cook until soft. Add the sugar or sugar substitutes if using. Cool. Add the other ingredients and whizz in a food processor. Adjust the taste/ consistency by adding milk/cream/ or a scoop of vanilla ice cream according to taste.
If you are looking for a special dish for New Year celebrations, I can highly recommend this recipe. It’s a really tasty onion, mushroom and nut filling encased in golden puff pastry. It’s easy to make and serves 7-8. You can also make it ahead and re-heat it, or cut it into portions to freeze. We have it for Christmas every year, served alongside roast potatoes and honey roast parsnips, greens and onion gravy. wishing you all a very happy Christmas and wonderful New Year! Thanks as ever for following the blog and leaving your comments.
Take the pastry out of the fridge so that it comes to room temperature while you make the filling.
Heat the butter, sugar and onions in a frying pan. Gently cook for about 15 to 20 minutes, until caramelised and soft. Allow to cool
Use the same frying pan to cook the red onion in the 1 tbsp olive oil. When they are soft – which takes about 20 minutes on a low heat- add the chopped mushrooms, herbs, lemon juice and vegetable stock.
Cook on a low heat for 10 minutes.
Chop the nuts in a food processor very briefly. Add the mushroom mixture and process for a few seconds to incorporate. Leave it chunky, but well mixed
Add the breadcrumbs and seasoning and stir.
Mix in half the beaten egg. The other half will be for glazing the top.
To assemble, unroll the pastry on a baking tray, using the paper covering as a non-stick parchment
Spoon the caramelised onions down the centre of the pastry
Add the mushroom nut filling on top.
Cut the pastry sides into diagonal strips about 2cm wide and fold these one at a time over the filling to form a plait.
Brush the top with the reserved half beaten egg or oat milk for vegetarians.
Cook for about 40 minutes until the pastry has risen and turned golden and the filling has heated through.
Can be made the day before and reheated in foil in the oven. Also nice cold of there are any leftovers, served with jacket potatoes and salad. Enjoy!
The filling mixture The filling piled in the centre of the pastry. I’ve put the caramelised onions on top here. Doesn’t really matter either way. Plaiting the pastry
The finished roast. Sprinkle some fresh herbs over, if you like.
I’ve often thought it would be a great idea to try out different varieties before committing to ordering and growing seed potatoes. Well now you can do just that. Potato House are selling ready-to-eat varieties of heritage, coloured, rare and organic spuds!
I ordered five varieties, Arran Victory, Blue Annelise, Heidi Red, Pink Fir Apple and one simply called ‘Chips’ for cooking chips and wedges.
The coloured potatoes really appealed to me, as it’s not easy to buy them locally. I like the idea of keeping heritage varieties going, and it’s lovely to try something new. Potatoes arrived promptly after ordering. I was delighted with the quality. The potatoes are a good size and beautiful condition.
‘Chips’
Amy from Potato House says
“We are renowned for our colourful range of seed potatoes. These look and taste amazing. The best thing about growing your own produce is experimenting with colours that are not readily available in supermarkets.
We grow the purples, pinks and the in-between with multi-coloured skin for you to experiment with in your gardens and allotments.
In some varieties it is only the skin which is coloured and in some, the colour goes beyond the skin for vibrant additions to any plate. Think blue mash, purple chips and red crisps!
Unusual colours on your plate is a talking point – whether it is toddlers or friends round for a meal – everyone is impressed. The toddlers get told that the blue mash has superpowers and the adults will check if blue potatoes have superpowers!
Nutritional values are the same although there are some studies which indicate that a range of food colours is better for you.
Growing and cooking coloured potatoes takes no extra skill. You grow according to the maturity and then cook according to the potato type. So if you have a second early, smooth, blue seed potato such as Salad Blue, it will grow like any other second early taking about 14 weeks to mature and then will be delicious as a mash!
Try some home made chips and crisps – a lot easier than you would think!
Some of these varieties have been around for a long time – your grandparents would have had some, and others have been bred more recently giving protection against diseases.
Our range of seed potatoes comes in 6-tuber nets and 1kg nets (as well as larger sizes) and discounts start when you buy only 5 nets of any combination. Our range of ready-to-eat potatoes comes in 5k, 10kg, and 15kg bags. Both are delivered direct to you from our farm.
We do, of course, have white skin and flesh seed potatoes too. We’re here to help you decide so let us know if you have any questions.” https://www.potatohouse.co.uk/
Pink Fir AppleSome tasty purple potatoes I grew this summer. They kept their colour during cooking.
I’m using some of my potatoes for Christmas, but I’m also looking through my cookery books to decide what else to make with them. I probably won’t be able to resist buying all of them as seed potatoes too. To have beautiful varieties like these coming out of the veg plot next year is a very cheerful prospect indeed.
Are any of you looking through catalogues and on-line deciding what varieties to grow right now? What potatoes would you recommend, and have any of you tried the more unusual red, blue and black varieties? Thanks for reading my blog. Happy gardening! And happy cooking too!
Beetroot was one of the few vegetables that did well this summer. Climbing beans were a disaster. Flowers failed to set and immature beans dropped off the plants. Very disappointing to see. But beetroot didn’t seem to mind the heat and drought. I write a weekly column for Garden News Magazine all about the fruit and vegetables I’ve harvested in the garden and what I’m making with them. It’s a fun project and I really look forward to my cooking and recipe-writing sessions. Sometimes the recipes come from my Mum who is a fabulous cook. Sometimes I delve into a lovely archive of recipes shared by my late mother-in-law Joan. Many happy memories swirl around as I make her famous flapjack and fruit cake recipes. Joan never came to visit without having a cake in her shopping bag. And we always looked forward to seeing what she’d got in her cake tin in the pantry at home. Some of the recipes are just ones I’ve devised for feeding my family of four (although the girls are grown up now and have homes of their own). Nothing too fancy or with too many ingredients. In fact, most recipes can be made with a few basic store-cupboard ingredients and what vegetables you might have in the veg basket or fridge. They don’t take hours to make either. I’ve always been frantically busy, so recipes have to be quick and easy. I’ve had some lovely letters and e mails from Garden News readers thanking me for the recipes which they say are simple to follow and tasty without taking too long to cook.
Here’s a recent column featuring deliciously moist beetroot and chocolate muffins. Have a go at making them and let me know how you get on. I freeze batches of beetroot in quantities required for these cakes, so I always have the ingredients to hand.
You can freeze the little cakes and they thaw out within minutes.
These photos were taken in the back-of-the house glass porch, the only sunny place at the time, and my pressed glass cake stand is balanced on top of an upturned laundry wicker basket! No one will know….
Beetroot from the garden I grow a pinch of seed every 10-15cm and I let the beetroot grow in clusters. I carefully harvest the largest beetroot when needed, but leave the smaller ones to carry on growing. When I was searching my i-pad archives for photos of beetroot, the computer offered these hyacinths. Just shows you, machines and computers still aren’t as clever as humans….yet! It made me laugh. I hope it makes you smile too. Enjoy your gardening week.
For the avoidance of doubt, please don’t eat hyacinths! They are poisonous.
To expand the photo to read, if using an i-pad or phone, place two fingers on the pic and spread thumb and finger. The picture will expand so you can read it easily.
Here’s the link for the recipe this week. It’s apple crumble cake, making use of the windfall apples.
Monty Kitten keeping me company in the garden while I sweep up leaves. It’s been a productive year, growing fruit and veg in the poly tunnel raised beds. I grew Pot Black aubergines in Dalefoot sheep wool and bracken compost. I created some grow bags by cutting holes in the top of the compost bags for two plants per bag. The compost has comfrey leaves, which adds potash-rich nutrients. Drainage holes were spiked through the bottom of the bags. Book recommended this week. It’s a thought provoking read, with lots of ideas for making our gardens more insect-friendly places. As insects are part of the wider food chain, we are helping all wildlife by attracting them to our gardens. The garden is surrounded by mature beech trees. They turn a lovely golden hue in autumn. Stepping out of the top gate, this is the view of the lane in all its misty autumn colours.
The weather has turned really cold here. We’ve had high winds and hail. I’ll be sorting through my seed box and making plans for next year this weekend. And keeping warm. All my tender plants have been stored in the greenhouse and poly tunnel, safe from freezing temperature. What gardening tasks have you been doing recently?
Latest news from the plot. Click on the photo to enlarge the print. There’s never enough room for all the photos I take. So here’s a selection of pictures to go with the diary recently published in Garden News Magazine.
I’m looking forward to growing this Limonium Pink Pokers next spring. The photo above was taken at Mr Fothergill’s seed trial grounds in August. I love the two-tone flowers and their delightful habit of twisting and turning as they grow towards the sun. They remind me of fireworks. I’ll start seed sowing indoors in February at 20C in a propagator and plant them out in June. They will be perfect for my jam jar posies. In addition, flowers can be hung up to dry. It will be useful to have flowers for winter decorations. Limonium, a half hardy annual, grows to 80cm and flowers from June to October. Available from Johnson’s seed, the premium range from Mr Fothergill’s.
In the article above, I mention growing dahlias from seed. I’ve been so delighted with the success of my seed-sown dahlias this year. I’ve had outstanding flowers, large single blooms with bright, jewel-like colours. It’s a money-saving option too. My Mum manages to fill her back garden with dahlias grown from a packet of seed. Started early in February, seedlings make small tubers and grow to full-size plants by mid-summer. There’s a non-stop supply of flowers for our vases. Plus bees love them too, so it’s an wildlife-friendly option. Pollinators have easy access to the flat, open centres of these flowers. You can sometimes see the ‘bee lines’ showing pollinators the way to the centre. If you don’t have any storage space for dahlia tubers over winter, don’t worry. You can get excellent results by starting from seed in spring.
Another beauty- grown from a mixed packed of seed. I also grew some ‘Bishop’s Children’ types this year with very good results. Each plant had dark leaves which set off the bright flowers a treat.
I mention the new Home Florists’ range of roses specially bred for cut flower gardens. I’ve been amazed by the sheer number of flowers these provided. Such good quality flowers which last a week in a vase, if water is refreshed each day. The scent is reminiscent of old roses, particularly old-fashioned bourbon roses. The roses, by Wharton’s Nursery, can be found in most good garden centres, or on line. Look out for Timeless Purple and Timeless Cream. Both recommended.
In amongst my cut flowers, I grow vegetables such as peas, climbing beans, courgettes, sweet corn and beetroot. I’m growing Valido peas, a new maincrop variety which is disease resistant. Luckily it is resistant to mildew which means the plants keep cropping right through to the autumn. Often pea plants turn brown as leaves and stems die back. Valido copes with anything the summer weather can throw at it, and produces a heavy crop of delicious peas. I’ve saved some of my seed for growing in seed trays over the winter. Pea shoots will be harvested just a few weeks from sowing – and won’t have cost me a penny. Lovely nutritious shoots to add to my salads and stir fries.
Monty Kitten is more like a dog than a cat. He follows me around the garden and likes to get involved in everything I’m doing. He followed me out onto the grass verge when I put my jam jar flowers out for sale.
Finding newts in the garden is always a cause for celebration. It’s reassuring to find them under stones by my mini-pond, and in the greenhouse and polytunnel. They must be attracted by the moisture. I only use natural seaweed-type feeds, diluted in a watering can, to feed my fruit, vegetables and cut flowers on the patch.
Fruit and vegetables have grown well this year. In my basket there’s white-stem chard, perpetual spinach, herbs, white-flowered runner bean variety ‘Moonlight’ onions, tomatoes Blaby, Marmande and cherry types. There’s been a steady flow of blueberries from the plot. Ivanhoe is growing in a large 40cm diameter pot.
This is made by Martin and Jill Fish who provide cookery talks and demonstrations and have written a favourite book ‘Gardening on the Menu’ with advice on growing fruit and veg, and how to cook and preserve them.
Thank you for reading my blog, and my diary in Garden News Magazine. If you also listen to BBC Radio Leicester, the gardening show has moved from Wednesdays to Saturdays, 11am to 11.35. If you get in touch with the producers, I’ll answer any questions live on the show.
Here’s a quick link to the recipe mentioned in this week’s Garden News Magazine. Let me know if you make my peach crumble cake. The recipe is great with tinned or fresh peaches, apples, plums, cherries, rhubarb and blueberries- anything you have to hand. Thanks for reading my garden diary column and for all your lovely kind comments and encouragement. It’s always appreciated.
Some more photos from my April garden diary. Enjoy the spring flowers- and new additions to the garden, Merlin the cockerel, and Daphne, Daisy and Dot bantam hens.
Here they are, enjoying a dust bath. They soon found a cosy corner in the garden where I’d piled some old compost. Perfect for their favourite daily activity. I love the contented little sounds they make as they swoosh compost into the air in all directions. Hens are certainly messy creatures.
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Here’s Merlin, searching for slugs, snails and grubs in the veg plot. I’m hoping they will help me with my organic gardening, no chemicals- approach.
I’m not forgetting Monty kitten, looking quite windswept as he sits on his favourite look-out post on top of the boat cover.
The greenhouse – with barely and inch to spare. I can just about still get in there.
The poly tunnel swathed in fleece as we hit -3.5C two nights in a row. It’s currently 7C at lunchtime with a freezing icy wind and sleet. The old peach trees are flowering despite the cold. I’ll have to pollinate them with a paintbrush. There’s no bees about in these cold temperatures.
Despite the cold, daffodils are looking lovely. So cheerful.
My favourite narcissus Snow Baby looking lovely in spring pots planted three years ago and still going strong.
My new spring pot with ‘instant’ plants from the garden centre. Cheering up the front doorstep.
Wild anemones flowering in the mini woodland garden. Bluebells are just starting to raise their heads above big strappy leaves and potted Lily of the Valley is scenting the potting shed.
A few flowers fresh picked from the veg plot.
My wild Tenby daffodils, flowering around the pond, still look good at dusk. These are planted in memory of my Welsh grandmother, HM Foulds. A very reliable and hardy daffodil, highly recommend.
Bulbs and spring bedding plants are making me smile, after such a long, cold winter. I couldn’t get out last autumn to buy any plants, so I’ve reached spring with nothing to put into containers. But restrictions have lifted- and I’ve had my jab (hurray!) and I’m able to get out there! I can’t adequately describe the shear delight of actually being able to visit a plant nursery and buy a few flowers. Never in my life did I think such a simple thing as going out and buying plants would be so joyful- and appreciated. I’ll never take it forgranted again. Never.
I bought some potted anemone blanda, Bridal Crown narcissus and bellis daisies. I didn’t go mad with my first trip out. Every plant was savoured, the scent enjoyed, the colours marvelled at. I set the Bridal Crown in the centre of a favourite terracotta pot, and nestled the anemones and bellis daisies around the edge. Bridal Crown is perfect for a centrepiece as it’s multi -headed, which means it flowers for a long time. The stems twist and turn in different directions, giving a fountain-like centre to any pot. Anemones have a charming habit of scrambling between the narcissus stems and filling the gaps. Bellis daisies are just so cheerful. I particularly love the double pomponette types. All in all, my plants have provided a much-needed breath of spring, and the containers are cheering up my front doorstep and all the garden table tops, just in case we have visitors, which is now allowed. It will feel strange to have friends and family walking around my plot, after a whole 12 months without anyone visiting.
Here’s this week’s Garden News article, mentioning my treasured plant pots.
And more photos of the containers, which have survived two windswept nights of -3.5C temperatures.
The scent is wonderful.
Just planted. Instant plants can be put together to make a colourful display. No one would know the containers hadn’t been planted last autumn.
Anemone blanda, mixed blues and whites.
I popped in two large anemone coronaria. I would usually grow all these bulbs myself, starting them off in September and October. But there’s so much choice at the garden centres, you can easily catch up now, and they don’t cost a fortune.
Here’s the Superseed Trays I mention in the article. I’m trying to reduce my use of flimsy plastic trays which are not recyclable. The plastic breaks down to smaller and smaller pieces and gets into rivers and streams and out to the ocean.
Behind them there’s a Bustaseed tray, made from recyclable plastic. Again, with divided module cells which can be lifted out without disturbing plant roots. These will be useful for taking cuttings.
I love trying new products and I’m always amazed by the ingenuity of new business enterprises.
I’ve adopted a rescue cockerel. His days were numbered as there were too many cockerels where he came from. Sadly, if you hatch out chicks, some of them with obviously be cockerels and then they become unwanted. I’ve named him Merlin because he has the most gorgeous petrol -coloured feathers. And he has magiced his way into my life, just when I needed something to make me smile again. He’s now been joined by three beautiful bantam hens, so he’s in heaven here.
And finally, the latest photo of my lockdown kitten Monty. He’s been a constant source of joy since arriving here last summer. Hasn’t he grown into a beautiful boy. He’s enormous and very fluffy, but he has such a kind and gentle temperament. And he’s always by my side, keeping me company in the garden.
How are you all doing? Are any of you managing to get out and about and see friends and family again? It’s a while since I last wrote on here. We had several very sad deaths amongst friends and family. The latest being a dear friend, Jo, who died just six weeks after a diagnosis of cancer. We will be attending her virtual funeral on Friday, and I’ll be planting a tree in her memory.
Take care everyone, and thank you for reading and for your friendship and kind comments. This has not been an easy time for any of us, but there’s always hope for the future.
Here’s a link to my recipe for lemon crunch triangles:
Family favourite lemon crunch triangles. Easy tray bake. Tastes much like a lemon drizzle cake, but so easy to make. I used lemons from the greenhouse. I’ve had these fruit bushes for 20 years. Huge fruit and very juicy.
Recipe to follow from Garden News Magazine…..
Apologies, I accidentally deleted 9 years of blog diary photos!
I’m making these again today. I opened the kitchen cupboards and there was literally nothing cheerful in there! No biscuits, chocolate, cake. We’ve run out of everything. I wonder if we will look back on these times and ponder how we lived through this pandemic and learned to appreciate the simple things in life. I shall certainly never take for granted being able to just pop to the shops. Everything has to be so well organised. Lists on top of lists. All food is being delivered, for which I’m extremely grateful. But, oh, the dismay at discovering that I’ve forgotten something- just as I’ve pressed the button to order supplies. It’ll be a week before I can get another delivery. We do see an end in sight with vaccines on the way, so keep going everyone. Keep smiling. And make pastries, as there’s nothing nicer to cheer you up than the sight of these lovely tasty treats. Any fruit can be used, they are just as lovely with apples, frozen plums, raspberries, tinned peaches – any combination you like. Let me know what recipes are keeping you cheered up, and report back if you make any of these delicious pastries too.
And a photo of spring flowers to bring some joy as well:
White primulas. My favourites. Though I have seen some deep red double varieties mixed in with burnt orange which might look lovely in a blue China casserole dish…. if only I could get out to buy some.
Narcissi Geranium and cut flower collection tulips from last spring. All my tulips are poking through the ground now, and daffodils are in bud and flowering early. The veg patch is covered in forgetmenots. I use them as a green mulch to protect the soil and keep down weeds. Some are potted up to stand on the summerhouse steps. They are very easy to dig up as they have a shallow, fibrous root system. They do well when lifted and grown on in containers.
Daffodils make a very welcome return. I’ve watered them with potash or tomato fertiliser, having taken advice from a medal-winning grower. The liquid feed helps to strengthen the stems and enhances the colour, making them stronger and brighter. A good tip as we regularly seem to be getting stormy spring weather. It’s so sad to see daffodils flattened by the wind.
Eranthis hyemalis – winter aconite in the woodland garden. They won’t last long as temperatures are currently 13C.
Green-tipped Galanthus Viridapice looking pretty on the potting shed window. Snowdrops too have been a very welcome and joyous sight. But in the mild weather, they have opened right out and will be going over sooner than usual. I shall water these too with weak tomato fertiliser in the hope of boosting the size of the bulbs and increase the number of flowers for next year.
Have a lovely weekend everyone.
*I’m trying something new- doing Instagram live sessions from the greenhouse every day, essentially to keep in touch with my Mum and MIL Joan, and also to show my daughters how to grow plants from seed. Under normal circumstances I would be by their side helping them with their new houses and first gardens. But I can’t while we are in lockdown, so I’m doing what I can from home. I’m karengimson1 on instagram.
If you are reading this week’s Garden New Magazine (February 6 edition) here is the recipe I mention for apple crumble cakes. Our stored apples usually last until the end of February, but the autumn, and winter up until Christmas, was so mild the fruit started to go soft. I sliced and froze some of the apples, and turned the rest into delicious little cakes. These too can be frozen and will thaw within a few minutes, or defrost in a microwave. Let me know if any of you try the recipe, and how you get on with it. I’ve added frozen blackberries and raspberries to my cakes. Or you can just make them with apples on their own. All equally tasty. It’s lovely to have something reminding us of summer – right in the middle of winter.
You’ll need three or four apples, and a handful of berries, if using them. Use what you have. Equally good using tinned or fresh peaches, plums, blueberries, apricots, pears. It’s a very versatile recipe, using up store cupboard and frozen fruit.
I’ve made mine in silicone muffin trays, but you could just make one large cake and slice it. Use oat milk and egg substitute for vegans.
Muffins cook in 25 to 30 minutes. But check they are cooked through.
We store the apples wrapped in newspaper in the unheated glass porch and potting shed.
There was a good harvest from the orchard last autumn. Plenty of apples and pears.
I’ve been making apple crumbles all winter. Such a simple dish, so lovely and warming on a cold day.
Thanks for reading and getting in touch. I’ve started doing live videos from the greenhouse over on instagram as a way of keeping in touch with family and friends.
I’m karengimson1 on instagram
And @kgimson on twitter
Update: Sue Appleton on twitter used blackberry jam instead of berries and sent this message:
One of the ways I’m keeping upbeat at the moment is reading blogs. Barbara Segall writes about the Japanese rice recipe Seven Herbs of Spring in her ‘Garden Post’ blog. I was immediately inspired to go out into the garden and find seven herbs to make my own revitalising rice dish.
Barbara explains that the severn herb dish is a kind of porridge eaten during the first weeks of January as a way of detoxing and giving the digestive system a boost. Simple food after all the excesses of Christmas. I didn’t quite have the herbs Barbara mentions, but rather than just giving up, I searched out and used what I could find. I was delighted to discover small amounts of mint, fennel, rosemary, thyme, marjoram, Welsh onion, and chervil. Most were in self-watering containers placed in the greenhouse for winter protection. Rosemary grows by the back door, and perennial Welsh onions are in the polytunnel. They are a good source of fresh onion-flavouring when chives have died back for the season.
Just searching about the plot and discovering small amounts of herbs was a joy. The scents released as I snipped the herbs into a colander made me think of summer when I planted these containers. I perhaps use fresh herbs more in summer than I do in winter. It requires more of an effort to go out in the cold, ice crunching underfoot and wrapped up against the chill wind. Much easier to reach for the dried herbs (dare I admit to using such a thing). But the taste was worth it. Every mouthful was a burst of flavour – transporting me back to sunshine and summer heat.
I boiled some organic long grain brown rice to go with my herbs. A nice easy meal, in contrast to all the complicated, lengthy cooking of the festive season. The rice was ready in 25 minutes. I roughly chopped the herbs and sprinkled them over the steaming rice. I found some tiny emerging spring broccoli and nasturtium leaves to add to the dish and yellow broccoli flowers, which are edible and should not be wasted.
Delicious! Using what I have about the place and keeping things simple. It made me feel as if I was looking after myself. Which is no bad thing just at the moment when we are all rather stressed and in lockdown.
Do read Barbara’s blog and learn more about Japanese cooking traditions. Barbara’s writing is like silk. It’s a joy to read. And you never know, it might inspire you to grow more herbs and cook something delicious and good for you. Let me know if you do!
Here I am, pottering about in my garden again. I must say, the weeks fly by and it’s soon time to write another column for Garden News Magazine.
I hope you enjoy today’s article. I’ve had some lovely letters of support from readers saying my ‘potterings’ have kept them upbeat and busy during the pandemic. I’m pleased to see many readers have been inspired to have a go at different gardening techniques, or decided to grow something new. And many say the recipes are tasty, and always turn out well. What a relief!
Here’s some additional photos the editor didn’t use for the column. It’s fascinating to see which ones they choose. I submit about 10 for them to select from. It takes about a day to decide what to write about, take the photos and then actually sit down and compose the piece. It’s 350 words – which is actually quite a challenge. I try to say a lot in not many words. I edit it three times before I send it, taking out any spare words each time. What a luxury it is to write the blog. No one is checking the word count on here.
My hazel plant supports in the snow. New rods have replaced any that snapped, and have been woven along the centre to add strength. We seem to be getting stormier summers, so plant supports have to be extra sturdy.
Some sweet peas I grew last summer. I’ve sown some in autumn, but the second sowing now will provide plants that flower right through to November. Successional sowing extends the season.
Here’s a photo of ‘Sunshine’ climbing French beans. Highly recommended, easy to grow and prolific. We have a freezer full, and they only take a few minutes to cook from frozen. All the flavour and goodness is captured for tasty winter meals. I’ll be starting my bean seed in May. Don’t start them off too early as they cannot be planted out until the first week of June. If sown too early, they become leggy and weak. They are very fast growing.
Here’s a larger photo of the willow heart flower arrangement in the potting shed window. It’s made from Paperwhite narcissi, alstroemeria from the poly tunnel and dried gypsophila and honesty seeds from summer. The foliage is eucalyptus saved from Christmas floral arrangements. Flowers are held in a jam jar covered in moss which has garden string twined around it, kokadama -style. We are all trying to do without florists’ foam, and using jam jars, and tiny glass test tubes works really well.
This year, more than ever before, we are rolling out the Christmas family favourite recipes. It seems more important than ever to have reminders of all the happy celebrations from the past.
Candied orange peel is easy to make and fills the kitchen with a wonderful, comforting scent. If you need to get into the Christmas spirit, take some oranges and sugar and turn them into these irresistible treats. You can add dark chocolate and give them as little gifts to friends and family. You can’t buy anything as good. Honestly.
INGREDIENTS
4 large oranges (unwaxed if available)
300g caster sugar
Water
Granulated sugar to coat
Dark chocolate (optional)
METHOD
Scrub the oranges in hot water, especially if they have been waxed.
Peel wedges of orange skin from the top to the bottom of the fruit.
They should be 5mm thick and include the pith as well as the skin.
Lay the wedges down and flatten. Cut them into matchsticks 7mm wide.
Place peel in a saucepan and cover with water. Bring to boil and simmer for 5 minutes.
Drain and throw away the water.
Cover peel with fresh water and simmer for 30 minutes.
Drain and reserve the liquid. You’ll need about 300ml. Add 300ml of sugar and heat until dissolved.
If you have more peel, the ratio is always 100ml of water to 100g of sugar.
Return the peel to the syrup (sugar/water mix) and simmer for 30 minutes.
Drain and place the orange peel on a wire rack set above some baking paper to catch drips. Put the rack and paper in an oven on the lowest setting for approx 30 minutes to dry.
You can use the reserved syrup in orange drizzle cakes, sponges and trifles.
Put some granulated sugar in a basin and add a few strips of peel at a time. Use a fork to toss them in the sugar and liberally coat. Lay on a clean wire rack to dry in a warm kitchen.
Optional: after adding the sugar, you can coat half of the sticks in dark chocolate which makes a delicious treat. Wrap in little packets of foil to give as home-made presents.
Variation: use lemon. Simmer and discard the water three times to remove bitterness.
Store candied peel in an airtight container. It will keep for 6-8 weeks.
Use for Christmas cakes, or toppings for sponge cakes, muffins and biscuits. Or just on their own as a teatime treat with hot chocolate or coffee. Utterly delicious. Enjoy 😊
Let me know what family favourite recipes you are cooking this year.
We have decided not to mix the households – even though the rules say we can. We can’t risk the health of elderly relatives. Especially when there’s a vaccine on the horizon. We must just be patient for a little longer. Everyone must decide what is best for them. Visits to the care home are still currently barred as we are still in tier 3. No flowers can be sent to my darling mother-in-law, J. But we can send jars of jam and home made treats and chocolates. So I’m concentrating on making this a Christmas we will all remember- and hopefully the last one we have to spend separated from one another.
It’s been a bumper year for fruit. There’s crates of pears in the spare room, and little piles of rosy red apples all along the windowsills. The whole house smells like pear and apple crumble! I’ve never managed to reach the top of the fruit trees before. Our old ladders were too wobbly. But this year I’ve a fabulous new addition to the garden- a Henchman tripod ladder. It’s made everything easier – and safer. All the best, tastiest fruit- always at the top of the tree- has been harvested. This year, more than ever, it feels as if nothing should be wasted. Spare fruit has been distributed to friends and family in little paper bags. Damaged, over-ripe fruit has been enjoyed by hedgehogs and blackbirds, so wildlife has not been forgotten either.
One of our favourite autumn recipes is Pear and Almond Pastries. As usual, just a few ingredients are needed, and the little parcels of tasty pears only take minutes to make. Have a go at making them, and let me know how you get on.
INGREDIENTS
1 pack of ready rolled puff pastry
3 or 4 ripe pears
1 tbsp dark brown sugar
3 tbsp ground almonds
1 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2tbsp flaked almonds for the top
1 egg, beaten (optional- use almond milk for vegans)
Icing sugar for dusting (optional)
Baking tray with baking paper or silicone sheet.
190C oven 15-20 minutes
METHOD
Unroll the pastry and cut into squares. Lay them on the baking tray.
Peel and halve the pears. Place slices on top of the pastry squares.
In a bowl, mix the sugar, ground almonds, ground cloves, cinnamon together. Pile spoonfuls of the mixture on top of the pears.
Take the corners of the pastry and draw them together to make a rough parcel. The pastries will stretch and turn out all shapes, and it doesn’t matter. They will still taste the same.
Brush the top with beaten egg (or almond milk) and sprinkle over the flaked almonds.
Cook in a preheated oven for 15 -20 minutes. Check them after 10 minutes to see how brown they are. The pastries will be ready when they are risen and light brown. They burn easily, so keep an eye on them. 20 minutes might be too long for fast ovens. Dust with icing sugar, if you have some.
Can be eaten cold or warm. Can be frozen for 3 months. Delicious with clotted cream, or custard. We also love them with home-made vanilla icecream.
Thanks for reading. Have a great gardening week and keep in touch.
Suddenly, at this time of the year, the kitchen windowsill is covered with tomatoes. All sizes from giant heritage beefsteak Marmande to tiny cherry types such as Sweet Million and Red Robin. Some are bright sealing-wax red, soft and ready to eat. Some shine like emeralds, green and firm. They will ripen over the coming weeks.
Here’s a favourite recipe, perfect for utilising your tomato harvest. As usual, it’s a quick and simple idea. It takes 10 minutes to make, and 15 minutes to cook. Tomato and herb tarts travel well and are suitable for picnics too. Enjoy!
INGREDIENTS
1 pack ready rolled puff pastry
1 egg yolk -beaten
7oz /200g cheese ( can be Cheddar, gruyere-or whatever you have)
14oz /400g tomatoes, thickly sliced
Few sprigs of thyme – leaves only
1tbsp olive or rapeseed oil
Salt and black pepper
METHOD
Preheat the oven to 210C /190C fan/ gas mark 7
Cover two baking trays with either re-usable silicone sheets or baking parchment to prevent the tarts sticking.
Roll out the pastry. Use a 7” tea plate as a template. Lay the plate on the pastry and use a sharp knife to cut a circle.
You’ll get two 7” round tarts, or one 7” and four 4” tarts from a roll of pastry. The off-cuts of pastry can be used for cheese straws. Just add grated cheese and twist to incorporate.
Transfer the circles of pastry to the baking trays. Use a blunt knife to score an edge to each circle, 1.5cm or 1/2” wide.
Brush each border with the beaten egg. Use a fork to prick over the base of the tarts to stop them rising.
Pile grated cheese into the centre of the circles. Take care not to get any filling on the edges, or they won’t rise.
Arrange slices of tomato in concentric circles on top of the cheese.
Season with salt and pepper and scatter over the thyme leaves.
Drizzle over a few drops of olive or rapeseed oil
Bake in the oven for 12-15 minutes or until the pastry edges have risen and are golden brown and the filling is bubbling. Garnish with some fresh herbs.
Can be served warm or cold. Can be frozen.
For a vegan alternative, omit the egg and use melted vegetable margarine and use vegan cheese.
Some of the 4” tarts, fresh from the oven
My Marmande tomatoes were prolific this year. I sowed seeds in February, pricked seedlings out in March and planted them in their final 12” pots in May. I grew mine in an open-ended poly tunnel, which protected them from the worst of the weather.
Pictured above, some of the tomatoes we’ve grown here. Recommended varieties include blight -resistant Crimson Crush. Also Gardeners Delight, Tumbling Tom, Sweet Million and Golden Sunrise.
I listened to a podcast called Fresh from the Pod this week. Gardener and writer Tamsin Westhorpe was interviewing Chris Collins. Tamsin is the gardening world’s version of Michael Parkinson, in my opinion. It’s fascinating to get a real insight into the lives of our gardening personalities. Anyway, half way through the interview, Tamsin says she never turns any opportunities down. She never says no to anything. Always has a go, because you never know where it might lead. So, this gave me courage to try something new this week. As you know, I love cooking. My happiest memories are sitting around a table with my parents and grandparents and just being fed the most delicious meals. Just that feeling of being loved and cared for. It lives on in my memory like an indelible photo album. Well, it’s gradually become my turn to produce memories for other people. I’ve loved cooking for my children and the recipes here are written down for them, incase they ever need them. And today I also recorded my first “grow it, cook it, eat it” for Ben Jackson at BBC Radio Leicester. They have a ‘Food Friday’ segment which I’ve always wanted to have a go at. Remembering Tamsin’s words, I ventured forth! It was a shaky start, as we were cooking outdoors (social distancing) and the wind was blowing my bits of baking parchment about. The cat wanted to join in. He usually “helps” when we are gardening. And the neighbour’s dog started barking. Ah well, nothing is perfect in real life, is it. It was a fun thing to do and I hope you enjoy listening. It’ll make you laugh, I’m sure.
When I was a teenager, I was taken on as a trainee reporter at the Melton Times weekly newspaper. One of our jobs was to go out into the town and obtain comments from residents. These were called ‘doing a vox pop.’ We would ask for views on local planning applications, council proposals, and any controversial subjects the editor could think of. There were no mobile phones in those days, so with no-one keeping track of us, we would be out about about for hours. Vox pops were one of my favourite jobs because I loved chatting to people. We just knocked on doors, said who we were, where we were from, and people let us in! Two hours later, we would leave, with our one paragraph comments, nicely replenished with home-made cake and numerous cups of tea. One elderly gentleman that stays in my memory was called Albert. I can’t remember what the vox pop was about, but when I knocked on the door, he took me straight through to the garden where he showed me his fruit and vegetables. He had rows and rows of gooseberries- green ones, yellow, and red, glistening in the sunshine as if they had been polished. The pruning demonstration and growing advice took an hour, and at the end we sat down and had the most delicious crumble I’ve ever eaten, gooseberries flavoured with elderflower syrup and crunchy almonds on top. At that moment, I was happy. I think we store up such moments in our memories, and come back to them from time to time. I have a picture in my head of me, sitting on a dining room chair brought out into the garden, enjoying the sunshine, eating delicious food. Albert, a widower in his 90s, lived alone. For one afternoon, he had someone’s rapt attention while he talked about his passion for growing fruit. I was very glad that I’d knocked on his door. In those few short hours, I learned about the generosity of gardeners, how a love of growing things, and sharing with others, drives some people. And kindness. I learned a lot about kindness. Looking back, I’m grateful and relieved to say most people I’ve chanced to meet have been kind. I’ve tried to honour their memory in this blog.
Here’s my Gooseberry Crumble Recipe – with grateful thanks to Albert, and his two ginger cats, who made me equally welcome in their garden.
RECIPE – CRUMBLE TOPPING
8oz (225g) plain flour
5oz (150g) soft light brown sugar
3oz (75g) butter or dairy alternative
2 tbsp flaked almonds (optional)
1 level tsp. baking powder
METHOD
Place the flour and baking powder in a large bowl and add the butter. Using your fingertips, rub in the butter until it has all been dispersed fairly evenly and the mixture looks crumbly. Add the sugar and almonds and stir well to combine.
GOOSEBERRY CRUMBLE
Use 2lb (900g) gooseberries
2 tbsp elderflower syrup or cordial
Top and tail the fruit and place in a large pie dish. Sprinkle over the elderflower syrup and cover with the crumble mixture.
Bake in the centre shelf of an oven at 350F/ 180C/ gas mark 4 for 30- 40 minutes. Check to see if the topping is getting too brown after 30 minutes and cover with foil to finish cooking.
Keeps three days in a fridge, or can be portioned up and frozen for three months. Thaw before reheating.
Serve with custard, or thick double cream.
Enjoy!
My crumble mixture. Without almonds as a guest had an allergy to nuts.
All that was left of our family gooseberry crumble. I was lucky to have this piece left for the photo!
Gooseberries from my garden.
I recommend Hinnomaki Red, green Invicta, and yellow Early Sulphur. These can be grown in a shaded position. Like many fruit that is ‘tart,’ sunshine isn’t needed to make high sugar levels. So you can grow gooseberries, blackcurrants, redcurrants, raspberries and sour cherries such as Morello in shade.
Gooseberries will grow in full sun, but they are tolerant of shade, so it’s much better to save your sunny beds and borders for peaches, sweet cherry (Celeste is a good variety) gages and plums.
Thank you for reading this blog. I hope you enjoy the recipes. Have a great gardening week. Karen ❤️
Try these tasty treats. They are perfect for summer picnics and special occasions. And vegan friends and relatives will love them.
INGREDIENTS
Makes 3 small ramekins. We re-use the glass ones from Gu.
Base:
190g cashew nuts
1 tbsp. vegan margarine
1 to 2 tbsp. maple syrup
Topping:
150g Creamy Violife – original flavour (cream cheese substitute)
1 tbsp. icing sugar
1 tbsp. caster sugar
1/4 tsp. Vanilla essence
1 tbsp. soya milk
strawberries to decorate
1 tbsp. maple syrup to drizzle over strawberries.
METHOD
For the Base:
Roast the cashew nuts in the oven at 190C for 5 to 10 minutes. Keep checking and remove from the oven when the nuts have turned light brown. They easily burn, so keep an eye on them.
Whizz the cashew nuts in a food processor. Add the margarine and maple syrup.
Spoon the mixture into glass ramekins and place in the fridge to cool.
For the topping.
Cream all the ingredients together and spoon on top of the base.
Slice the strawberries and place on top of the cream mixture. Drizzle the maple syrup over the top.
Delicious! And very quick to make. The cashew nut base makes a change from biscuits and is healthier.
Here’s a quick and simple recipe using the first rhubarb of the season. We have literally run out of all treats in the house. I suddenly realised, if I wanted to have something nice for tea, I’d have to make it myself. Luckily the rhubarb clump we saved from Joan and Keith’s garden, now growing in a huge pot, is producing a daily supply of delicious fruit for baking. Enjoy!
INGREDIENTS
For the base:
25g butter or vegan spread
50g light brown sugar
400g approx rhubarb, or whatever you have in stock. Can be peaches, apples, mandarin, pears, cherries.
For the topping :
50g butter or vegan alternative
150g sugar
3 eggs or alternative
190g SR flour
120g plain yoghurt
Few drops vanilla essence
Icing sugar to dust the tops
Oven temperature 180C
A pie dish, or loose-bottom cake tin. I used a 12 hole silicone muffin pan. Use a circle of greaseproof paper if you are not using silicone.
METHOD
Melt the butter and sugar base ingredients together in the microwave. Take care not to burn it. Place in the bottom of the dish or muffin pans.
Remove the skin of the rhubarb and chop the sticks into smallpieces.
Place rhubarb on top of the base mixture
Cream together the topping mixturebutter, sugar, vanilla and eggs.
Fold in the flour and yoghurt.
Spoon the mixture over the rhubarb.
Cook for 35- 40 minutesor until the cakes slightly shrink from the sides, and a knife comes out clean. It will be less time for muffin cakes.
Leave to cool. Turn out onto a plate, upside down, and dust with icing sugar.
Keeps for three days in an airtight tin. Or can be frozen. Lovely with icecream, custard or just as they are with a cup of coffee at tea break time.
I managed to find a catering company sending out boxes of fresh fruit and vegetables for my Mum. Such a huge relief. On-line shopping is hopeless and there’s a three week wait. I listened in to BBC Radio Leicester, and heard an announcement about small companies trying to survive the covid crisis, and help. And amazingly, the catering company is in the next village to Mum! I’d never heard of them, but I listened as they described filling boxes with fresh fruit, vegetables, meat, butter, eggs and delivering them around the county. Their livelihoods are at risk, all public events, parties and wedding are cancelled for this year. It’s a huge comfort to know Mum will have fresh food without having to go out. Anyway at home here, we have now run out of nice treats such as chocolate, biscuits and cakes. I never realised how many times I just popped to the shops for the odd item here and there. Not being able to go out is difficult. To say the least. I’m sharing my recipe for coffee pecan bites as they may be just the cheer-up you need today. Keep positive and focus on all the good everyone is doing. Lots of love to you all. Xx
INGREDIENTS
For the cakes:
50g self-raising flour
50g low fat spread, can be vegan spread
1 tbsp cocoa powder
2.5 tbsp sugar or granulated sweetener
1 tsp baking powder
1tbsp instant coffee powder
Pecan halves to decorate
Pinch of salt
2 large eggs ( or 1 mashed banana, or 4 tbsp oat milk, or vegan egg substitute)
You will need reusable silicone fairy cake cases. Ours came from Lakeland Plastics.
FOR THE BUTTERCREAM
This is suitable for any cakes or biscuits you might make
INGREDIENTS
25g butter, or margarine, low fat spread ( can be vegan sunflower spread )
50g icing sugar
1tsp cocoa powder
1tsp coffee powder.
METHOD
Set the oven to190c / gas 5
Place all the cake ingredients, apart from thepecans, in a bowl and mix with an electric hand whisk. The mixture should be light, smooth and fluffy with lots of air incorporated from the whisking.
Place a tablespoon of mixture in each cake case. Stand the cake cases on a metal baking tray.
Place the cakes in a pre-heated oven and cook for 16 minutes.
Cakes will slightly shrink from the sides of the cakes cases when cooked and a knife willcome out clean.
Set aside to cool
METHOD FOR BUTTERCREAM
Mix the buttercream ingredients together. If using butter, slightly warm in the microwave toincorporate. Pile 1 tsp of buttercreamon top of the cakes and add 1 pecan half for decoration. You can use any nuts if you don’t have pecans. It’s very nice with almond slices or hazel nuts.
TIP
Can be stored in airtight container for 3 days. Or can be frozen before adding the buttercream.
Perfect with morning coffee, or as a sweet for a main meal. Place one on top of any fruit, such as sliced pears, to create a simple pudding. Pear and coffee/ chocolate make a tasty combination.
What recipes are you turning to to help you through this current crisis? Are you managing to obtain all the shopping items you need? I can highly recommend listening to your local radio station. They have a campaign called BBCMakingADifference. And I think they are doing so. Thank goodness.
If you’re struggling to put your mind to much at the moment, here’s a fast pudding you can make with store cupboard ingredients. You don’t even need to switch the oven on. It’s cooked in the microwave and is ready in five minutes.
INGREDIENTS
3oz margarine ( we use palm-oil free Lurpack)
3oz sugar
5oz SR flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 egg
4 tbsp milk
Sprinkle of mixed dried fruit (optional)
1 apple (optional)
Sprinkle of Demerara sugar for the top.
METHOD
Use an electric hand whisk or food processor to mix the sugar, margarine, egg and milk. Add the flour, baking powder and dried fruit and whizz to incorporate.
Chop one apple and place in the bottom of a glass Pyrex deep dish. You can use any fruit you like. This is also nice with drained tinned peaches, apricots, mandarins, pears, pineapple. Or you don’t have to use any fruit at all, just the sponge mixture.
If using fruit, place the sponge mixture on top.
Cook in a microwave for five minutes. Remove promptly or the pudding will steam. The pudding will carry on cooking for a few minutes after you’ve taken it out of the microwave. Insert a knife into the centre to check that it’s cooked. The knife will be clean if cooked. If not put back for another minute. The pudding shrinks from the sides of the dish as another clue to check whether it’s cooked.
Sprinkle a tablespoon of golden or Demerara sugar over the top. Place under a hot grill for a minute to caramelise and brown the top.
Serve with ice cream, custard, fresh cream.
Serves 6 people and lasts 2 days if kept cool.
VARIATIONS
Instead of dried fruit add 1 heaped tablespoon of cocoa powder. You do not need the Demerara sugar topping as the cake will be brown. This is delicious with mandarins.
This recipe came from my mum and is a family favourite. I’m especially sharing this here for my youngest daughter who is buying a house in the middle of this corona crisis. As if life wasn’t stressful enough. And she will be cooking in her own kitchen for the first time in two weeks. Good luck Rachel xx
Fred, from the FrenchGardener blog (see comments below) suggests making caramel before adding the apples.
150g sugar and 50cl water in the dish for 2.30m to 3 minutes on 900w power. Then add the chopped apples followed by the sponge mixture, sounds delicious. Thanks for the idea.
Here’s the recipe for today’s BBC Radio Leicester cakes. I always take some home made cakes in each week for the Sunday staff. Our gardening programme is on at lunchtimes and we all get very hungry.
This week’s recipe has the addition of some mandarins from the greenhouse. Add some zest to the mixture and place mandarin segments on top before the chocolate sets. Quite delicious for a cold wet day. You could also add Terry’s Chocolate Orange segments if you like.
My cakes and home made treats relate to what I’m growing in the garden. This week I was talking about starting to water my citrus trees, feeding them and looking under the leaves for scale insects. You can sometimes find little flat insects attached to the leaves, and there might be black mould as well which is caused by their sugary excretions. You can scrape the scale insects off with a damp loofah sponge. Use horticultural soft soap to clean off the mould.
Scale insect on a citrus leaf
Citrus flower. Gloriously ~highly scented.
The most delicious panettone you’ll ever taste. These individual tins make lovely Christmas presents. I’m sharing this recipe now, to give you time to save enough tins. These went to all the children in the family. Adults had tins decorated with sprigs of rosemary and holly leaves with tiny hand stamped labels. If you make them, do share photos of yours.
INGREDIENTS
125ml milk
125ml water
600g strong white bread flour
7g sachet of dried yeast
1/2 tsp salt
75g mixed candied peel
75g sultanas and raisins
3tbsp sweet sherry (optional)
2 large free range eggs
2 large egg yolks ( save the whites for meringues)
75g golden caster sugar
Zest of large orange
150g butter
75g good quality dark chocolate, chopped, or use chocolate buttons
1 egg, beaten for brushing the tops
Soup tins, washed and dried and lined with baking parchment, 1″ higher than the top of the tin.
METHOD
Place the mixed peel, dried fruit, orange juice and sherry in a bowl to soak for 30 minutes. Set aside.
Heat the milk and water until just warm. Not hot.
Combine flour with the yeast and salt.
Add the liquid to the flour mix.
Add the butter a bit at a time, sugar, whole eggs and egg yolks
Put the mixture into a bread making machine and set on ‘dough ‘ only. You are making an ‘enriched’ dough.
Or, thoroughly mix the dough and kneed for 10 minutes. Leave in a warm place to rise with a towel over the bowl.
When risen, tip the dough into a large bowl and add the dried fruit mixture and orange zest, fold in the chocolate. Kneed to incorporate. Add a small amount of extra flour if the mixture is too wet.
Place a circle of grease proof paper or baking parchment in the bottom of the tins. Line the sides with a rectangle of paper.
Divide the dough into pieces weighing 150g. Roll into balls. Drop the dough balls into the tin cans.
Place the tins on a baking tray in a low temperature oven with the door open, until the dough has doubled in size.
Brush the risen dough with the beaten egg.
Bake at 200C for between 15-25 minutes. Keep an eye on the dough. It should be golden brown on top.
Allow to cool in the tins and sprinkle with icing sugar, if liked. I didn’t bother, as the golden tops look pretty on their own.
Go to town on the decorations around the tin; ribbons, raffia, string, rosemary, lavender, pine or holly leaves! Enjoy!
Do you have any family favourite recipes? Let me know what you are making for the festive season.
A rather rich and indulgent treat. Perfect for Christmas. I’m decorating my summerhouse for Christmas. No doubt I’ll be serving these bars as we sit and read gardening books and chat, with warm welsh woollen blankets on our knees, and lots of hot tea. Enjoy 😊
Melt chocolate, butter, Mars Bars together in the microwave
Crush biscuits with a rolling pin
Add dry ingredients to melted chocolate mixture
Spread mixture in a foil-lined 9″ x 9″ tray
Cover top with melted chocolate
Score the tray into fingers
Decorate with more cherries if you like
Place in the fridge to set
When cold, cut into fingers and serve
This is such an easy recipe, it’s perfect to make with grandchildren. I have very fond memories of making this with my two young daughters. I’m recording the recipes here in case they want to make them with their children in the future. I’m sure they won’t be able to find the recipes written on tiny scraps of paper. Hopefully, writing them here records them for posterity.
To vary the recipe, you can add mint chocolate if you like. Mint Aeros are particularly yummy.
I’m gathering another recipe here for my children. This is a much -loved recipe I’ve made for open gardens, picnics and school cake sales. It is suitable for vegans, vegetarians and people who are allergic to eggs. It’s so simple to make and the kitchen smells delicious when it’s being cooked. Enjoy!
INGREDIENTS
6oz brown SR flour ( if using plain flour, add 3 tsp baking powder)
2oz ground almonds (omit if allergic to nuts, and use ground oatmeal instead.)
2 tsp mixed spice
1lb mixed fruit
4 oz dates, finely chopped
4 oz apricots, finely chopped
Rind of 1 orange or lemon
1/2 pint water (you can use tea)
2 tbsp orange juice
METHOD
Soak the dried fruit in the liquid overnight.
Add the dried ingredients and fold in.
Bake in a 2lb loaf tin for 1.5 hours at 160C. Cover the cake for the last half an hour to prevent the top burning.
At this time of year, my kitchen work surfaces are covered with piles of apples. Little pyramids of golden cooking apples, tiny rosy red eating apples, giant Bramleys. My family complain. There’s nowhere for anyone to put anything down. I usually store them wrapped in newspaper in the potting shed, but I’m still trying to evict the mice, making many trips back and forth to the woods with my tunnel-like humane traps baited with peanut butter. I can’t kill them. They will take their chances in the leaf litter under the trees. I’m trying to ignore the tawny owl fledglings in the branches above, still being fed by harassed parents. I feel slightly guilty. But watching the mice run when I let them out, I think they stand a fair chance of surviving.
Meanwhile, I’m steadily working my way through the apples. My mother always says, if you’ve got an apple, you’ve got a pudding. It can be an apple pie, a crumble, a cake, or if you are pressed for time, just apple purée with lashings of creamy custard, or Devon clotted cream. A special treat.
Today’s recipe is another family favourite, an apple tray bake which is quick and easy to make and tastes of autumn. As usually, I’m recording it here for my children, in case they can’t find the scraps of paper these recipes are written on. It’s so lovely to see my grandmother’s best copper plate hand writing, as she lovingly wrote these recipes for me. Food, and cooking, bring back such special memories, don’t they.
APPLE AND ALMOND SLICE:
INGREDIENTS – FOR THE TOPPING
30g butter or vegan margarine
30g SR flour
25g golden caster sugar
2 tbsp. Jumbo oats
1/2 tsp cinnamon
25g flaked almonds
METHOD
Mix the butter, flour and sugar together. Fold in the cinnamon, oats and flaked almonds to make a crumble topping. Place in the fridge while you make the base.
INGREDIENTS FOR THE BASE
150g SR flour
200g golden caster sugar
200g butter or margarine
3 eggs ( or use 6 tbsp. soya oat drink if vegan)
100g ground almonds
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2 large apples slices and tossed in lemon juice
100g any other fruit you have; blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, plums,
METHOD
Mix the flour, baking power , sugar and butter together. Whisk. Fold in the ground almonds and cinnamon. Add the beaten eggs.
Put half the mixture in the base of the tin. Put apples on top. Add the rest of the base moisture. Press the blackberries or other fruit on the top.
Cover with the crumble topping mixture.
Cook for 40-50 minutes, or until a skewer come out clean.
Gas mark 4, 180C oven, or 160C fan oven.
You’ll need a 20cm tray bake tin, at least 4cm deep, lined with baking parchment.
Put baking paper on top if it is browning too quickly. Leave to cool and slice into fingers.
Can be frozen for 3 months.
Enjoy!
You might also like : Review of Orchard Odyssey by Naomi Slade here :
I’ll leave you with a photo of my 1930s summerhouse, looking autumnal today. There’s heaps of blankets to keep us warm when the temperatures start to dip. It’s quite cosy in here though.
My mother-in-law Joan used to make these flapjacks. It’s amazing how quickly a tray of them can disappear. Fresh apricots are in the shops now, and British growers have had a record-breaking crop this year. You can also grow your own fruit. There’s several new varieties for growing in small spaces, such as Compacta. Moorpark is traditionally grown, but there’s a newer apricot, USA-bred Goldcot recommended for flavour and hardiness. Tomcot produces large apricots, and there’s also New Large Early and Isabelle. Golden Glow is a delicious apricot variety, discovered in the Malvern Hills in Worcestershire.
FLAPJACK
Ingredients
400g fresh apricots. Other fruits can be used such as peaches/ plums/ raspberries/strawberries. Roughly chopped. I didn’t have quite enough fresh apricots, so added 5 dried apricots to my mixture.
2 tablespoon lemon juice
130g light brown soft sugar
230g butter or margarine (use soya for vegan recipe)
100g golden syrup
100g blanched almonds
350g rolled porridge oats
Three quarter teaspoon of cinnamon
Half teaspoon of salt
20cm baking tray, lined with parchment
Recipe
Preheat the oven to 200C gas mark 6.
Place the apricots, lemon juice and 30g of the sugar in a saucepan and simmer gently until cooked. Stir occasionally. It will form a thick purée. Almost like jam.
Place the remaining sugar, butter or margarine and golden syrup in a saucepan and melt together on gentle heat.
Mix all the dry ingredients together and pour in the melted liquid ingredients. Mix together until all the oats are coated.
Place half of the mixture in the baking tray and level. Cover with a layer of the fruit purée. Top the fruit with spoonfuls of the oat mixture. Carefully level the topping, using a pallet knife or silicone spatula.
Bake for 25 minutes, or until the topping is brown. Check after 15 minutes and cover with parchment if it is turning too brown.
Cool completely and cut into fingers.
Can be kept for 3 days in a tin.
Enjoy! 🙂
I topped my flapjack with nasturtium flowers, which are edible. Take care when using flowers to decorate food to check that they are edible and haven’t been sprayed with any chemicals.
These delicious little cakes travel well and are perfect for picnics and parties. We always make them if we are invited round to a friend’s house. They are quick and easy to make and really tasty.
INGREDIENTS
Makes 12
12 plums, stones removed and fruit chopped into chunks.
For the sponge:
85g (3oz )sugar
85g (3oz ) margarine or butter.( I use Lurpack which doesn’t contain palm oil.)
1 egg
113g (4oz) self raising flour
1 level teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon milk
1 teaspoon good quality vanilla extract
Few blanched almonds for the top.
METHOD
Cream together the sugar, margarine and egg with an electric hand whisk. Add the flour and baking powder and whisk. Add the milk and vanilla extract, and whisk.
Place the chopped plums in the base of a silicon cup cake mold which has 12 ‘cups.’
Top with the sponge mixture. It will be about one large heaped tablespoon per cup. Sprinkle blanched almonds on top.
Cook for approx 15 mins at 180C, 356F gas mark. They are cooked when a knife comes out clean from the sponge. Take csre not to burn the almonds.
Leave to cool in the trays. Use a pallet knife to remove them. Sprinkle with sugar. Serve warm or cold.
Crumbles are a simple family pudding which can be varied according to the fruits in season. At the moment, we have plums from our Victoria plum tree. We’ve filled the freezer and made jam. Here’s my favourite plum crumble, using a recipe that came from my grandmother.
BASIC CRUMBLE TOPPING
Ingredients:
225g (8oz) plain flour
150g (5oz) soft brown sugar
75g (3oz) butter
1 level teaspoon baking power
METHOD
Place all the ingredients in a food processor, or rub in with your fingertips, until combined.
You can freeze this mixture until needed, if required.
Sprinkle the mixture all over the fruit in a 1.75 litre (3 pint) pie dish, spreading it out with a fork.
Bake for 30-40 minutes or until the top is tinged with brown.
Oven temperature : 180C 350F gas mark 4
FRUIT SUGGESTIONS
Plum, Ginger and Almond : Add 1 teaspoon of powdered ginger to approx 900g plums cut in half with stones removed. Top the crumble mixture with a sprinkle of sliced almondsor chopped nuts. Take care not to burn the almonds.
Rhubarb and Ginger: 900g chopped rhubarb, 1 level teaspoon powdered ginger, 75g brown sugar.
Gooseberry: 900g fruit, topped and tailed. 6oz caster sugar.
Apple: 900g apples, 25g soft brown sugar, quarter teaspoon cloves, 1 level teaspoon ground cinnamon, 75g raisins. Cook all the ingredients in a saucepan until the apple is soft. Remove cloves and place apple mixture in a pie dish. Cover with the crumble topping.
Enjoy 😊
More fruit from the garden. Blueberries and blackberries. Can be added to apples for a delicious alternative crumble.
If you were listening in to the radio for Garden Hour, these are the biscuits I took in for the team. I made the lemon and white chocolate version yesterday. Today I made them with dark chocolate. Delicious!
Recipes featured here use produce from my garden. I’m always looking for ways to use up my citrus fruit from the greenhouse. This is a favourite recipe. It only takes ten minutes to make. Perfect if friends turn up unexpected and you want to give them a quick home-made treat.
Ingredients
180g biscuits ( I’ve used home-made Scottish shortbread, but you can use any biscuits. Custard creams are delicious, as are chocolate bourbons.)
3 tbsp lemon curd. Home-made (recipe below) is totally delicious, but any will do.
100g best quality dark chocolate, or white chocolate.
Few bits of fine lemon peel for decoration
Recipe
Crush the biscuits in a food processor, or in a plastic bag, bashing them with a rolling pin.
Add the lemon curd and mix to combine.
Use a melon baller or a 7.5ml measuring scoop to form balls. Press them slightly while in the scoop so they hold together.
Tap out on to a tray covered with foil. Place in a fridge.
Melt the chocolate in a Pyrex bowl suspended over a pan of boiling water. Ensure the water doesn’t get into the chocolate mixture. Or melt in a microwave in several 10 second bursts. Take care not to over cook.
Drizzle the chocolate over the biscuits in long lines. Add some fine lemon peel to decorate. Return to the fridge to set.
Will keep in the fridge for 3 days. But they won’t last that long. They are truly delicious!
Lemon Curd Recipe
Makes 1.15kg
Ingredients
6-8 large lemons (unwaxed, organic, or home-grown)
225g butter
575g caster sugar
5 large eggs
Recipe
Grate the zest from the lemons on the finest setting. Squeeze the juice and strain into a jug. You will need 300ml of juice.
Cut the butter into small pieces and put into a glass bowl along with the sugar, zest and juice. Set over a pan of hot water and stir until the sugar has dissolved. The bottom of the bowl must not touch the water which must simmer and not boil.
Lightly beat the eggs in a bowl but don’t whisk them. Strain the eggs through a sieve into the lemon mixture. Simmer on a low heat, sitting continuously until the mixture thickens. Will take about 20 minutes. Do not allow to boil or it will curdle.
Pour into warmed sterilised jars. (pop the washed jars in an oven for 10 minutes until sterilised).
Place wax disk over the lemon curd ( wax -side down). Smooth down the disk to remove any air.
Cover with dampened cellophane circles, label and store in the fridge.
If you were listening in to Gardens Hour today, this is the fruit cake we were eating in the studio. It’s a recipe from my Mum. You can put fresh fruit on top of the cake when you serve it. I put slices of mandarin orange on mine today. I’ve served it with slices of peach and pineapple too. Very moist and tasty. Can be served with cream or custard as a pudding, it is very versatile. Perfect for picnics too.
INGREDIENTS
285g SR flour
85g butter, softened
110g golden caster sugar
180g mixed dried fruit
1 tsp. mixed spice
1/2 tsp. bicarbonate of soda
1 egg
280ml milk
7″ round cake tin
METHOD
Mix flour and butter together. Add sugar, mixed fruit, spice and bicarbonate of soda. Mix well.
Beat egg and milk together. Mix in with dry ingredients.
Turn into a well-greased cake tin.
Cook at gas mark 4, 170C oven for 1 hr 15 minutes. Check after 1 hour and put foil on cake if it is getting too brown.
Citrus Trees Update
I’ve started to move my citrus fruit trees out of the greenhouse into the garden for the summer. I’ll start them off in a shady position until the plant cells have become accustomed to the outdoors. After about four days, you can gradually move them into full sun. Moving straight from greenhouse to bright sunshine can cause
If you were listening to Radio Leicester this week for the Gardens Hour, you will have heard us munching on Lemon Triangles. It’s a nice quick recipe that everyone seems to love. It keeps for a week in a tin, or can be frozen. But to be honest, it disappears quite fast in our house ( and at the radio station). Lemons come straight from my greenhouse. It’s been a good winter for them, with plenty continuing to grow and ripen. Now is the time to re-pot them or if they are in the maximum size pots, remove the top inch or so of soil and top dress them with fresh compost. Start to increase watering and add feed every time. I’m still battling scale insect. It’s a slow task of removing them with a washing up sponge and warm soapy water. I just turn on the radio and settle down to the task. At least it’s warm in the greenhouse. And the citrus flowers smell divine.
INGREDIENTS
175g butter or margarine
175g soft light brown sugar
175g self raising flour
2 medium eggs
Grated rind of 1 lemon
TOPPING
Juice of 1 lemon
100g caster sugar.
METHOD
Heat oven to 180C gas mark 4. Grease and line a 19cm x 29cm shallow tin.
Melt butter and sugar together in a saucepan and stir to incorporate.
Remove from heat and beat in the flour, rind and eggs using a wooden spoon, until smooth.
Pour into the tin and bake for 25-30 minutes.
Stand for a few minutes and then remove the grease proof paper. Return cake to the tin and cool slightly.Mix juice and sugar together and pour evenly over the cake. When cold, cut the cake into squares, and then halve to make triangles. Perfect for morning coffee, or afternoon tea.
I love the quiet time after Christmas. It’s so peaceful here. No rushing about trying to keep up with the world. I hold on to that feeling of calm for as long as I can. I’m reluctant to drive to the shops. So I look about the house and garden. Leeks and potatoes are plentiful, so I make one of my favourite recipes, Leek and Potato pie. They are easy to make, and it’s lovely to come indoors from a session in the garden and find tasty little pies for tea. Dashing about, dealing with shopping, parking and self service tills that never seem to work, can all wait for another day.
INGREDIENTS
A quantity of shortcrust pastry, or 2 rolls of filo or 2 packs puff pastry, rolled out and cut into approx 12cm squares.
800g potatoes, chopped into approx 2.5cm chunks
2 leeks
2 red onions
25g butter
1 heaped tbsp plain flour
200ml milk
130g cheddar cheese
Pinch of salt/black pepper
Optional. If you have them:
Pinch of paprika and cayenne pepper
Half tsp Lea and Perrins Worcestershire Sauce
Pinch of mustard powder
Chopped chives, sage, thyme, marjoram, parsley.
1 beaten egg for glazing
METHOD
Boil the potatoes until they are just cooked, but still slightly firm. Drain and set aside to cool.
Melt the butter and add the leeks and onions and cook gently until soft.
Add the flour and cook gently for 2 minutes, stirring the mixture so it doesn’t burn.
Remove from the heat and add a few tablespoons of the milk and stir well to incorporate. Add the rest of the milk, a bit at a time, stirring well.
Return to the heat and cook for a few minutes until the sauce thickens, stirring to prevent burning.
Remove from the heat while you grate the cheese.
Add the grated cheese, the seasoning and optional ingredients.
Gently fold the sauce mixture into the cooked potatoes.
Divide the mixture between the pastry squares. Transfer to a parchment-lined baking tray.
Pull the four corners inwards to meet in the centre, folding one corner over the other like closing an envelope. Pinch along the folds to hold the folds together. Some beaten egg will help the pastry to stick together.
Brush the pies with beaten egg.
Cook for 15 to 20 minutes, until the pastry is puffed and the filling is piping hot. The parcels may open up a little as they bake.
Sprinkle over some reserved fresh herbs.
TIP
Make picnic versions by using silicone muffin trays.
Vary the recipe by adding whatever vegetables you have in store. If you eat fish, you can add tuna. If you are vegan, use soya margarine, soya milk and brush the pies with almond milk. Add chestnut mushrooms and chopped nuts instead of cheese.
PASTRY RECIPE
300g plain flour
1tbsp or 15ml baking powder
150g butter or margarine
3-4tbsp or 45-60ml water.
METHOD
Put the flour and baking power in a basin. Rub in the fat until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add sufficient water to give a soft but manageable dough.
Note: use warm water if using wholemeal flour.
The photo below shows filo pastry pies, made in muffin trays.
Melt 110g 4of of the chocolate in the microwave. Mix the raisins with the rum and ginger. Stir into the melted chocolate. Shape into small balls the size of a walnut. Leave to set on non stick paper. Melt remaining chocolate and dip the clusters in it. Keep in a cold place until required.
I’ve used Waitrose crystallised ginger and chocolate buttons from http://www.chocolate-alchemy.co.uk/ . These are very gingery. Adjust the amount of ginger to taste.
When I started this blog, my intention was to write down all our family favourite recipes in one place. It occurred to me that our much loved recipes exist on tatty pieces of paper. My children might want to find Aunty Betty’s toffee apple recipe, or the Gimson Christmas trifle. Stained and ripped pieces of paper might be difficult to find. So recipes are deposited here for future reference. Today I’m sharing my home made cherry chocolate recipe that I make every year. It’s a money saving recipe if you use your own fruit. And it’s simple to make. Even little children can have a go.
Ingredients
Home grown cherries, preserved in brandy. Choose good quality fruit that is slightly under ripe. Only preserve the best fruit, and none that has any blemishes.
Or
200g glacé cherries
500g marzipan
200g good quality dark chocolate.
Method
Soak the glacé cherries in cherry brandy overnight. Drain and reserve the liquid for adding to cakes.
If using your own preserved cherries, drain and gently pat dry with a clean tea towel.
Break the block of marzipan into four, and microwave for a few seconds to soften.
Take tablespoons of marzipan (about 13g).
Roll into a ball, and then flatten to enclose a cherry. Roll gently in the palm of your hand to smooth the marzipan. Leave to dry for a few hours.
Melt the chocolate in the microwave. Drop each marzipan cherry into the chocolate and use a spoon to roll them about to coat.
Stand the chocolates on foil until set.
Keeps for about 1 week in a cool dry place. If you can resist them that long!
Enjoy 😊
I made mine in the summerhouse, with the radio on and sunshine streaming through the open doors. It’s amazingly mild for December. We’ve had 12C for days, although last night it was -2 and we woke to a frost.
Here’s the ingredients. It’s a really simple recipe. Wonderful if you have a cherry tree in the garden.
I used white marzipan, but you can use golden if you like.
Drop into the chocolate. Make sure you don’t get any water in the chocolate, or it will go dull.
They take about an hour to set. The recipe makes about 35 cherry chocolates. There’s enough marzipan and chocolate to make another 30 if you buy more cherries. Or make 30 almond marzipan chocolates.
Simply enclose one whole blanched almond in the marzipan as above, and coat in the chocolate. Delicious! You can also use whole Brazil nuts and use milk or plain chocolate.
How to Preserve Cherries
450g cherries
75g sugar
2 drops almond essence
600ml brandy.
Remove the cherry stalks and stones and prick all over with a sterilised needle or cocktail stick.
Layer the cherries with the sugar in a large sterilised preserving jar, fill to within 2.5cm of the top. Add almond essence.
Pour the brandy to cover the cherries. Seal the jar and shake well.
Keep in a cool, dark place for at least three months to allow the flavours to develop. Shake the jar from time to time.
Strain the cherries through a funnel lined with muslin. Put the cherry brandy into sterilised bottles to give as presents. Use the cherries in the chocolate marzipan recipe above, or in pastries, ice cream and other winter treats. Enjoy 😊
Autumn raspberries are easy to grow and so prolific. I’m growing a variety called Polka – much earlier, and larger fruiting, than Autumn Bliss. Now is the perfect time to plant raspberries. They are sold bare-rooted, mail order, or from nurseries and garden centres. They are grown in nursery fields and lifted for sale at this time of the year. In garden centres, you’ll find them bundled together and plunged into 10″ pots with some compost to keep the roots moist. Tip up the plants and separate them out. Roots are fibrous and need to be planted shallowly in well-drained soil. I plant mine no deeper than 2″ and incorporate lots of well rotted home-made compost to improve drainage. It’s possible to buy soil improvers in bags from garden centres. There’s also composted maize fertilisers which I recommend as they are easy to use and weed free. Plant Grow is the one I use most often at Bramble Garden. Choose a sunny, or semi-shaded site and plant the canes 2ft apart, with rows 6ft apart. If space is limited, it’s no problem to grow them in pots on the patio. There’s dwarf varieties bred specially for containers and small raised beds. New variety Yummy grows to 45cm and fruits on the first year’s wood. There’s also a new variety called Ruby Falls which is very compact and prolific.
Here’s a favourite recipe, quick to make and cooks in just a few minutes in the microwave. It’s great not to have to turn on the oven, saving electricity or gas. It’s ready in a flash.
INGREDIENTS
3oz SR flour
3oz caster sugar
3oz butter (or vegetable margarine for a vegan recipe)
1 egg (or 2 tbsp oat milk for vegans)
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp milk (or milk substitute)
1 tbsp cocoa powder
Handful of fresh or frozen raspberries
You can use small mugs, cups – or a deep glass Pyrex soufflé dish as long as they are microwaveable.
METHOD
Throw all ingredients apart from raspberries in a food processor and whizz, or use a hand whisk to incorporate.
Place some raspberries in the base of the containers and top with the sponge mixture. Reserve some raspberries for the top.
Cook for 3 minutes. Open the door promptly and let steam escape. The sponge carries on cooking for another 2 minutes. They will be cooked when the sponge shrinks slightly from the sides of the dish. Use a skewer to check the mixture has cooked. If the skewer is clean, they are ready. If the skewer comes out with some liquid mixture, pop the dishes back in the microwave for another minute.
Serve hot with custard or double cream. Or allow to cool, sprinkle with reserved raspberries and icing sugar.
Makes a wonderful recipe for picnics and parties. Easily transported. Can be dressed up for a party with chocolate leaves.
This recipe can be used for any fruit. I use blueberries, pear, apple, blackberries, mandarins, whatever you can get your hands on. If you have no fruit, the sponge on its own is wonderful, or you can add a spoon of berry jam at the base instead as a change. To change it again slightly, omit the cocoa powder and you have a plain vanilla sponge. Add golden syrup to the base, if you like. Quick, easy and affordable. Just what’s needed to get us through this difficult time and with winter on the horizon.
Thanks for reading, and let me know if you make the recipe and how it turns out.
I’m talking on BBC Radio Leicester every other Wednesday at 1.10 am just after the news. Have a listen in on BBC Sounds, or DAB.
I’m also on twitter @kgimson and karengimson1 on instagram
More reading! I also write for Garden News Magazine. Here’s my most recent column.
Paradise Regained Garden 