Monday 17 December 2007

Yule

Tree

It's a bit early but isn't it pretty?

Thursday 13 December 2007

A silly season moment

cheating bastards


Maybe I should try harder.

If you want to try this at home, watch out for the advertising link they sneak into the graphic.

Tuesday 4 December 2007

Wildlife in Abundance

a basket of mice
Aren't they cute?

You might think so, I couldn't possibly comment. In the last 24 hours the humane mousetrap has captured 5 guilty subjects, now released away up the field and into the forest although I have no confidence they won't be back, just as quickly as their little legs will carry them.

This place is a wonder for the quantity and variety of wildlife it supports. We were sorry to discover we had interrupted the winter hibernation of a fire salamander, something the books don't say will be resident in this area. My pictures of this were rubbish so here is a drawing I found.



There are also butterflies hibernating all over the house and we move around in fear of waking them up before the nectar plants are blooming again.

Not everything is quite so wonderful as the world of nature. The car battery, the same one as caused all the trouble last time so I have only myself to blame, has finally turned up its toes, just as I was about to sally forth to find one of those small garages where men in greasy blue overalls suck their teeth while telling you the car is beyond economic repair but they'll see what they can do. So I am well and truly stuck and have succumbed to inviting a British peripatetic mechanic to come over and bring a battery with him. He tells me the earliest he can get here is Thursday which was a day I had in mind for travelling back to the UK for a visit so it's just as well I've not booked a ticket yet. Still have not the faintest idea what this little adventure will cost us, hopefully I'll get an email tonight and all will be well.

Friday 30 November 2007

Arrived

late harvest

So much to see and tell.

Let's start with one of my biggest sadnesses while I was away. The little vegetable plot that we planted up at the end of July had been abandoned for three months and we were sure that it would have disappeared under a mess of weeds and rotting vegetation, stomped to a pulp by rampaging deer.

It's true, the deer had finally overcome their distaste for my string boundaries and chomped the tops off the carrots and beetroot making quite a mess of the place with their pointy little feet but the actual roots were fine and big, the cabbages, dill and oca protected by a wire cage absolutely fine and the winter radishes and peas, also under wire protection are slightly past their best but still growing, still trying to produce pods and with still enough tender roots to make salads and pickles. We were too late with the haricots and the spring onions don't seem to have survived but I am hugely relieved.

In the back garden plot the pumpkins had succumbed to frosts and the Moscata fruits were destroyed by the cold, but because the grass was so long some of the Rouge Vif d'Etampes had been buffered from the chill and are still good. I don't think they'll keep very long after this treatment but at least we'll have enough for a few meals.

We're proudest of the cabbages. Although we've been growing our own for years, all leafy brassicas have been a trial for us, martyrs to caterpillars and swamped by slugs. This year, by luck or judgement, with the help of the wire cloche the butterflies have been kept at bay and the cabbages have grown quickly enough to leave the slugs behind.

Another comforting discovery is that the oca has managed, despite my cruel and careless treatment of it earlier in the year, to make two good sized plants that will provide all the seed tubers we need for a proper planting next year. Even more gratifying is that both varieties have come through - I really thought I'd lost the slightly more tender maroon coloured sort but now stocks of both are in equal proportions.

It's so good to be back.

Wednesday 28 November 2007

Going Home

homestead

I think, I hope, I'll be back at the homestead this time tomorrow. It's been such a long wait, for many good reasons it's true, but I don't think that until now I realised quite how much my heart has been breaking.

Next time, in France.

Tuesday 6 November 2007

Medlar Jelly again

I've updated the original medlar jelly entry posted last year with this year's results. Just in case you were wondering where it had got to.

The other medlar recipe on the blog is here.

Tuesday 30 October 2007

Jam

At the weekend while we were taking medlars in before the wind blew them all to kingdom come the kind neighbours whose chaenomeles I plundered a few weeks ago stuck their heads over the boundary and offered me some of the quinces from their side of the fence. Slightly squirming with embarrassment I gladly accepted - I couldn't reach any more from my side but I could see the burgeoning crop and it was tantalising. In return we gave them a few medlars and a jar of last year's jelly. I hope it was o.k., it looked a little cloudy after a year in store.

medlar

Anyway, this meant as well as bowl of medlars to process I also have a bag of quince. How fortunate then that I found a Dutch recipe on the web for a Medlar and Japanese Quince Jam.

I've modified it a bit, there is no need to add extra pectin to these fruit, they set perfectly well without it and I slightly increased the proportion of Japanese quince to Medlar.

To make about four jars of jam take a kilo of medlars and half a kilo of Japanese quince. The medlar fruit should be as ripe as possible but not mouldy or smelly rotten and the quinces as golden and fragrant as the weather will allow.

Wash the fruit well and chop it up, cores and all removing any bruised parts. The seeds fall out of the quinces quite easily so take those out but don't worry about the medlars.

Place the prepared fruit in your large pan and barely cover with water. Bring to a gently simmer and let it all cook until the fruit is completely mushy and disintegrated. Mash it a bit with a potato masher to make sure.

If you have a food mill put the fruit through it to remove the skins, seeds and hard bits. My food mill is in France so I had to rub the pulp through a nylon sieve to get all the lovely fruit and its juices away from the rubbish. You should be left with just over 2 pints of thick perfumed pureed medlars and quince.

Put the puree back in the clean pan and add a pound of sugar to each pint of puree (that's about 800g to the litre). Stir it over a gentle heat until the sugar is completely dissolved then skim off the scum that rises and boil hard for 5 minutes. Check for a set by putting a little on a cold plate, letting it cool and seeing if wrinkles form as you push it. It should reach this setting point quickly and easily so don't overboil it.

Pot up into clean sterilised jars and seal immediately.

We were really surprised when first tasting it just how closely the flavour resembled apples. Is there a market for faux apple jam? Of course not, but for something as exotic as Quince and Medlar jam there are bound to be takers.

Saturday 27 October 2007

PoMo part 2

The second part of the answer to life and everything is about cats.

bagheera

This is my cat. We've been together for over fifteen years now and he's reaching the end of an eventful life. Before him, I've had a lot of other cats but I'm no expert. Even so, I feel qualified to record some salient facts about cat maintenance here for the edification of others.

Are Japanese cats valuable?

Too right they are. All cats are valuable and those belonging to the Japanese are no exception, but I expect the query was poorly formed. All pedigree cats are expensive and the most significantly recognised form of Japanese cat is the Japanese Bobtail. If you are planning to abuse a Japanese citizen by abducting their cat, the Bobtail is your mark.

Cat sanctuary in Normandy?

Let me give you a few of my feelings about the treatment of cats in France, and in particular Normandy. It's bloody terrible and it's no good shrugging your shoulders in a particularly British way and blaming it all on the French because this is a human failing, demonstrated with equal facility by all races of apes. We take these creatures in, use them for our own emotional support and then, when the going gets tough palm them off on others, crying huge crocodile tears while we do it. There are cat sanctuaries in Normandy but if I tell you where they are it's only so that you can help them. If I find you've been casting off your obligations by callously abandoning members of your family I will track you down and cut off your genitals. And I do know where you live.

Cats and [name your poison]?

There are a lot of queries about cats and particular foodstuffs, cats and paint fumes, cats and almost any sort of ingestible material.

I'm here to tell you that cats take fancies to all sort of odd things. Usually it's just because it tastes nice. I've had cats who've chased olive stones all over the carpet, as far as I could tell because they liked the salt. Sometimes it's because they're naughty, a couple of kittens of my acquaintance could never stop themselves from chewing open the bread bags in case there was cheese inside. The old cat pictured above likes to lick up the tomato sauce from a plate of pasta and will take a (one) drop of whisky from my little finger once in a while, because he can.

If the habit becomes a nuisance or the substance in question is too bizarre then there is a name for the condition. Pica which is the voluntary ingestion of non-edible materials accounts for approximately 2.5% of abnormal behaviors in the domestic cat. There is no clear explanation for cases of pica and they are usually attributed to dietary deficiencies or mental disorder.

Wool-sucking isn't the same thing as pica because it is a compulsive, misdirected form of nursing behavior. Read more about this here.

Significant poisons of cats include lilies and their pollen, antifreeze and aspirin. Additionally there are many other toxins that you should try to keep from your cat e.g.; alcoholic beverages, avocado, chocolate (all forms), coffee (all forms), macadamia nuts, onions, onion powder, garlic, citronella candles, insecticides, medications for humans or other animals, mothballs and batteries. A fuller list can be found here but basically if it would harm your toddler it will harm your pet.

Things which are NOT considered harmful include; water-based paints, toilet bowl water, silica gel, poinsettia, cat litter, glue traps and glow jewelry so get some perspective people, and check out other harmless possibilities for your pets here.

PoMo part 2

The second part of the answer to life and everything is about cats.

bagheera

This is my cat. We've been together for over fifteen years now and he's reaching the end of an eventful life. Before him, I've had a lot of other cats but I'm no expert. Even so, I feel qualified to record some salient facts about cat maintenance here for the edification of others.

Are Japanese cats valuable?

Too right they are. All cats are valuable and those belonging to the Japanese are no exception, but I expect the query was poorly formed. All pedigree cats are expensive and the most significantly recognised form of Japanese cat is the Japanese Bobtail. If you are planning to abuse a Japanese citizen by abducting their cat, the Bobtail is your mark.

Cat sanctuary in Normandy?

Let me give you a few of my feelings about the treatment of cats in France, and in particular Normandy. It's bloody terrible and it's no good shrugging your shoulders in a particularly British way and blaming it all on the French because this is a human failing, demonstrated with equal facility by all races of apes. We take these creatures in, use them for our own emotional support and then, when the going gets tough palm them off on others, crying huge crocodile tears while we do it. There are cat sanctuaries in Normandy but if I tell you where they are it's only so that you can help them. If I find you've been casting off your obligations by callously abandoning members of your family I will track you down and cut off your genitals. And I do know where you live.

Cats and [name your poison]?

There a lot of queries about cats and particular foodstuffs, cats and paint fumes, cats and almost any sort of ingestible material.

I'm here to tell you that cats take fancies to all sort of odd things. Usually it's just because it tastes nice, I've had cats who've chased olive stones all over the carpet, as far as I could tell because they liked the salt. Sometimes it's because they're naughty. A couple of kittens of my acquaintance could never stop themselves from chewing open the bread bags in case there was cheese inside...

If the habit becomes a nuisance or the substance in question is too bizarre then there is a name for the condition. Pica which is the voluntary ingestion of non-edible materials accounts for approximately 2.5% of abnormal behaviors in the domestic cat. There is no clear explanation for cases of pica and they are usually attributed to dietary deficiencies or mental disorder.

Wool-sucking isn't the same thing as pice because it is a compulsive, misdirected form of nursing behavior. Read more about this here.

Significant poisons of cats include lilies and their pollen, antifreeze and aspirin. Additionally there are many other toxins that you should try to keep from your cat like; Alcoholic beverages, Avocado, Chocolate (all forms), Coffee (all forms), Macadamia nuts, Onions, onion powder, Garlic, Citronella candles, insecticides, medications for humans or other animals, Mothballs and batteries. A fuller list can be found here but basically if it would harm your toddler it will harm your pet.


Non-toxic Substances for Dogs and Cats
The following substances are considered to be non-toxic, although they may cause mild gastrointestinal upset in some animals:
- Water-based paints
- Toilet bowl water
- Silica gel
- Poinsettia
- Cat litter
- Glue traps
- Glow jewelry

Friday 26 October 2007

PoMo part 1

Like most bloggers I keep a finger on the pulse of my readership by use of a tracking site. It doesn't give me much information about you, so don't panic, but it does quite often list the search terms that brought you to my blog in the first place.

angel

Apart from one or two very regular readers most of the traffic is from passing trade, people looking for images - the big hornet and the giant puffball are favourites - and recipes for jam and alcoholic beverages. This isn't the sort of place where people searching for new bondage knots or enormous willies are satisfied so the search terms are rarely more exotic than that and that's a good thing, but I have noticed a couple of other trends which I now intend to address because I don't like to think of people washing up here and leaving disappointed.

Firstly the matter of tripe.

It's in the title so it's hardly surprising that it gets a fairly frequent outing but as far as I remember there's nothing here actually about tripe. Until now, when I give you all the lowdown and a small insight into the naming of the blog.

There is the meat tripe. Tripe is usually the lining of a cow's stomach, although pork and sheep's stomachs also fall under the definition. The first cow's stomach gives smooth tripe, the second honeycomb tripe and there is also pocket tripe. Tripe is usually partially prepared by the butcher before further long cooking in an attempt to render it edible. There is a famous French dish called tripes à la mode de Caen, a local speciality to us in Normandy and as well as being on all the restaurant menus it is also available in jars in the supermarket and from the delicatessen stalls. The Spanish tradition with tripe is to make menudo, a sort of tripe soup. Naturally as a vegan I can't recommend you try it but even not as a vegan I know of few who enjoy it although some from the beleaguered North of England may sigh nostalgically when it's mentioned.

Then we have the second meaning of the word tripe which is:
Nonsensical or worthless language, drivel, codswallop or folderol, words which require definitions of their own but you get the general picture.

And that's the sort of tripe of which this blog is composed along with a little colourful imagery designed to nudge the imagination into comparing the intestines of cats with something said animal might have dragged in. The true level of my mind is revealed.

The second most frequent sort of query I shall address another day.

Thursday 18 October 2007

"It's coming"

"what's coming?"

"everything"

elderberry ketchup

About seven years ago, long before this blog started there was a good elderberry year. I know this because as well as making at least six gallons of elderberry wine I also put up a couple of bottles of a novelty preparation, an elderberry ketchup, which required to be matured for seven years before use.

This autumn we tasted some and, although it's going to be of limited benefit in the kitchen, for some things it's going to be very useful addition indeed.

This isn't a ketchup like a tomato sauce, this is an older style of flavouring, a pungent sharp liquid to be added in small quantities to your soups and stews and applied by the merest touch as a relish on sandwiches, salads and toasties. In fact, I think it would make a good base for a homemade vegan "Worcestershire" sauce with the addition of some soy sauce and a dash of tabasco. That's an exercise I will leave for the reader.

You will need an enamelled or stainless steel casserole suitable for use on the hob and the oven, or a ceramic oven casserole and a pan suitable for boiling the vinegar in.

To a kilo of elderberries, rinsed and stripped from their umbels, add a litre of vinegar and a couple of crushed cloves of garlic. Put all this in your multipurpose pan, bring to the boil slowly and then pop in a very gentle oven about 100C for six hours or so. Much easier for those of us with cast iron solid fuel stoves than a microwave I know. (If you're using a saucepan and separate casserole, bring the vinegar to the boil on the hob, pour over the berries and garlic and set into the oven for the same time). Leave the pan in the switched off oven overnight to cool down.

Next day strain the vinegar from the berries. Squash the berries hard to extract all the juice and discard the residue.

Put your flavoured vinegar back into your casserole or vinegar proof pan and add 20 cloves, 80 black peppercorns, one very finely sliced red onion (or equivalent in shallots), 10g cooking salt, half a nutmeg, grated and three or four slices of fresh root ginger. Bring it all to the boil and simmer gently for ten minutes.

I discovered while trying to measure the weight of 80 black peppercorns that they weigh about a dirham, a medieval middle eastern weight which is my new favourite unit for measuring very small quantities of spices. It's about 3g but that's very difficult to weigh even on my electronic scales so if you run out of fingers and toes just use a good dessert spoonful of black peppercorns.

Bottle your ketchup in sterile jars and seal tightly. Include all the spices, evenly distributed between the bottles. A sediment will form over time and the ketchup should be gently decanted before use. Keep seven years before tasting.

Sunday 30 September 2007

Blog Stop

tree

It's not that I want to stop the blog but there's bugger all to write about. The same can be said of the Stripey Cat Food Diary. There are a few food items to report but no pictures available so the moment passes and becomes lost.

This time last year I was in France, about to celebrate my birthday alone. It's hard to quantify what has changed for the better since then, possibly nothing.

Anyway, I hope to resume shortly but when that will be, I've no idea.

Tuesday 25 September 2007

A Trip Oop North

We, me, Paul and his mother, Sheila, took a weekend jaunt to her birthplace and the early environs of her life in and around Middleton, which is near Manchester for the geographically challenged among us. For me, it was a novel trip to a part of the country I've never really explored. For Paul and his mother it was nostalgia and history combined. We took pictures of houses and streets, looked in graveyards, found a surprising number of public houses associated with the family tree and Sheila was able to tell us how it all used to look, when there were fields and market places instead of housing estates and shopping malls. Family lore was refreshed and reinforced.

tram

However, history is hungry work and by the evening of Saturday I was looking forward to a good dinner. This part of the country is renowned for black pudding, tripe and a good deal of lard as a cooking fat, hardly ideal for vegans hoping to eat out.

We'd done a bit of research on the web beforehand to see if there was anything available and found the usual selection of small cafes only open during the day and interesting sounding places that were no longer in existence. It all looked rather bleak so eventually we decided to take a relatively long drive to the best sounding place that still had a working website, Greens. This is situated in a leafy gentrified suburb of Manchester which we would never have found without our trusty GPS.

It's not a huge place but modern and fairly sparse in decor it doesn't feel claustrophobic and the noise levels don't preclude civilised conversation which is often the case in popular small venues. Reviews on the web suggested it would be essential to book and I'd agree with that but actually we didn't, instead preferring to use the clever strategy of arriving at opening time, an unfashionable 5:30, and hoping to find a space in the first service. They warned us we'd have to be clear by 7:30 but the staff were attentive and the food prompt so that was no hardship.

We were slightly disappointed to find there were only a couple of vegan options available in each course. The possibilities for starters were the soup of the day, Roasted Tomato, Ginger and something I can't remember or Oyster mushrooms with Peking pancakes. After our long day of sightseeing Paul and I both wanted soup and Sheila decided against a starter at all, so we can't claim to have really tested the starter menu but the soup was excellent, arrived at the table quickly and was nearly as quickly dispatched.

Main courses seemed uninspiring. A Lancashire Hotpot or a Bean and Mushroom Chilli (which doesn't seem to be on the web published menu) so we had one of each and pledged to swap plates half way.

After two bites of my chilli I decided that this was a mistake. The chilli had sounded so dull I wasn't really looking forward to it, but it was delicious, warmly and cleanly spiced with crunchy vegetables and a soothing Dirty Rice as a side. By comparison Paul's Hotpot was only fair. The vegetables were lost in too much sauce, the crispy potato topping a mere garnish so that overall it was unsatisfyingly meagre and unfilling. I was a bit surprised to find pickled cocktail onions in it too instead of fresh baby onions. The relish of pickled red cabbage tasted fine but it seemed to be entirely out of place. Sheila, who is vegetarian not vegan, had the sausage and mash and pronounced it good.

And so to pudding. Only one vegan option, a fruit crumble served with coconut cream. This predictable modern standard for vegan dessert was pretty nice and we enjoyed it. Sheila had a Soft Centred Chocolate pudding and despite saying she wouldn't be able to finish it managed every mouthful so that must have been alright too.

The whole meal, 2 starters, 3 mains, 3 puddings, fizzy water, a bottle of wine and two coffees came to about £70 and we added a tip to this so it wasn't particularly cheap but it was worth it. A genuinely pleasant experience and a real joy for the vegan diner in this wicked world.

I would point out that the owner is not vegetarian and we were given some flyers for his other non veg*n venture which seemed a bit hopeful frankly, and is a pity but he can't be faulted for Greens which is an example many other veggie restaurants would do well to study.

After that we went on to the hotel, a completely different experience but this post has gone on long enough already. Maybe another day...

Saturday 15 September 2007

A Few Notes on the Making of Japanese Quince Jelly

I'm beginning to get into a bit of a muddle between this blog and the Stripey Cat food diary at the moment. I've just completed an entry on apple jelly there but I think there's room for a bit about Japanese Quinces here - they are not usually considered a major foodstuff and yet if you find them in the garden their colour and scent is almost irresistible. They are also packed full of vitamin C so make a worthy addition to the winter store cupboard.

Anyway, there's a lot about the genus at Wikipedia which looks good enough to me, explaining that the naming of the species and hybrids botanically is confused by the casual use of Japonica by gardeners to refer to just about any sort of Chaenomeles regardless of its actual identification. The Chaenomeles genus is NOT the same as the true quince, Cydonia and I suppose the common name arose to help with that differentiation as much as anything.

I don't even own a 'japanese quince', my fruit came from the branches of a plant that overhangs our garden fence. This bush is extremely vigorous and as well as threatening to swamp our greenhouse from above is sending suckers under the fence and up into the greenhouse from below. The thorns are extremely long and vicious making removal a dangerous task.

The fruit though, is fun. Absolutely vile to eat raw because it is so tart, it feels hard and unpromising but has a delicate aroma and a golden glow that encourages further investigation.

Cut them open and the plentiful seeds fall out from roomy seed cases that take up a large part of the centre of the quince. The flesh is jade in colour and slices easily into a large pan.

chopped

From this point it's much the same as making any other hard fruit jelly. Barely cover the prepared fruit with water and bring to a gentle simmer to soften the flesh and release the juice. Don't do as I did and allow the pan to boil over, I must have lost at least a pint of juice like that.

When the fruit is softened to a pulp, mash it a bit with a potato masher and strain the whole lot through a jelly bag for a few hours. Best not to squeeze for a beautiful clear jelly and this does make a wonderful glowing pot of loveliness.

Add a pound of sugar to each measured pint of juice, warm to dissolve the sugar and then boil briskly for 10 minutes or so. Something that surprised me was the frothiness of the boiling jelly, far more so than the apple juice I used earlier in the week. Skim off the scum as best you can. The jelly will set more quickly and more firmly than most as it has a lot of pectin in it.

Pot up in sterile jars and cover while hot. The jelly is still very sharp to my taste but refreshing and has a delicate flavour, which I think would take orange flavouring very well. It would be worth experimenting with the rind and juice of a couple of oranges in the next batch to make a Quince Marmalade, which might amuse the philologists among you. It looks beautiful.

jarred

Tuesday 11 September 2007

Warming

It's autumn now isn't it?

When I reached the UK I discovered that the elderberries in the garden were in full fruit and the blackbirds and starlings hadn't got to them yet so I decided to restock my supply of elderberry cordial.

168-6899_IMG

It's hard to mistake elderberries for anything poisonous but if you have the slightest concern about the berries you've gathered then consult a reliable source for confirmation before proceeding.

Elderberry cordial is an ancient preparation recommended by herbalists for coughs, cold and fevers. It is rich in vitamins and antioxidants and there has been some research showing that there is a quantifiable benefit to the use of elderberry extract for curing colds and flu.

It's terribly easy to make. Gather your elderberries on a dry day, green ones are mildly poisonous so only take plump fully ripened ones. Wash the gathered fruit in plenty of water and remember to lift the berries from the washing container. If you drain the water off through the berries all your work will have been in vain.

Strip them off the umbels into a pan. Some sources suggest that the whole umbel can be used at this stage but I dislike the smell of elder stems, leaves and bark and prefer to reduce it as much as possible. Small stemlets can be ignored.

Add a little water, maybe enough to come a third of the way up the berries or if they are very ripe the water left from washing may be sufficient, and set over a gentle heat to soften and give their juice. Mash them down with a potato masher from time to time until the berries are completely broken up. This will probably take 30 or 40 minutes.

Strain the berries and their juice through a jelly bag. It's o.k. to squeeze it, this isn't a very clear preparation however carefully it's done but obviously don't force through any pips, skins or sticky bits.

Measure the juice and to each 600ml (about a pint) add 300g of granulated sugar (about 1/2 a pound) and two cloves. Bring the whole lot back to boil slowly to allow the sugar to dissolve completely, then simmer briskly for five minutes.

Pour into your prepared small bottles dividing the cloves up evenly. If your bottles are sterile and you put the caps on immediately there should be no need for further processing after bottling and the cordial will keep for several years if needed.

Although this is usually served diluted with hot water to make a soothing drink for the unwell we have discovered it makes a damn fine cocktail with an equal measure of gin or, as I found during the styling of this photo, tequila. Cheers.

cordiality

Friday 31 August 2007

End of Summer

finale
The swallows left yesterday. It's so quiet without them.

Wednesday 29 August 2007

Day Trip

MSM

Visitors this week so a trip out to the most famous landmark in Normandy, the Mont St. Michel.

Beautiful to look at, it is swarming with tourists from all over the world from June to October, which makes for an uncomfortable day if you're not good in crowds, but we didn't do too badly although my guests eschewed a trip around the Abbey which is really the point of the whole edifice.

Read more about it at the official site here.

Sunday 26 August 2007

Red Sky at Night

forblogger2

Another brilliant sunset tonight, the sort where you have to fight with yourself to stop trying to suck it all into the camera so you can can keep it crippled but for ever and just absorb it into your soul. The magic of gold tinged pink and celestial blue will ever be my joy, it cannot be bettered.

However, to more prosaic matters. Today I harvested a crop of onions. It's not the sort of produce that will have the French onion growers shivering in their shoes but it's still a gathering. If the end days came and there were no more seed companies we could preserve our lifestyle in a small way by propagating from these onions and keeping the race going. However, it's more likely they'll be gobbled up in a couple of weeks worth of curries and stir fries.

onions

Note the damage to the leaves, those allium addicted deer are still in the neighbourhood. Just as well I'm not bothering with leeks this year.

And now I return you to that psychedelic sunset. Thank you and Good Night.

forblogger

Saturday 25 August 2007

A Productive Day

Sun came out and I basked in it like a basking shark. Then I got the lawn mower out and started on the grass, again.

grasshopper2

While I was mowing I came across this interesting and remarkably large (at least compared to the other grass insects) grasshopper. My tentative identification is of Tettigonia viridissima which is most often given the common name of Great Green Bush Cricket. However, I'm not entirely certain what distinguishes a cricket from a grasshopper and at least some American sites (and one British one here) refer to this as a grasshopper. So that's good enough for me, it's a grasshopper.

(addendum: the wikipedia entry gives some explanation about this insect but as it lays multiple eggs underground I still think it's a grasshopper.)

warty puff

Then, wandering around in the warmness of summer at last, I found (as well as a couple of deliquesced unidentifiable fungi) this Common or Warted Puffball, Lycoperdon Perlatum along with a couple of friends. These are edible when young but tiny and since I'm waiting on the Giant Puffballs to appear hardly worth the effort but at least they show the fungus season is just beginning.

Moon over Kite Field

Thursday 23 August 2007

How Wet It Was, How Wet.

Back at the farm, everything is the same but much, much wetter. The seedlings are swamped and beset by slugs, the hay bales sit in stagnant water, the streams and ditches are overflowing with excess moisture.

And how does this make me feel? Drenched, wringing, sodden with sorrow, wretchedness and depression.

pipe

But enough of these pipe dreams, maybe it will be brighter tomorrow.

Sunday 19 August 2007

Something of nothing

Fallen off the blog wagon...

well, not really but I've been in the UK and there's not much to talk about. I've made entries before where the depth of my despair is revealed and then had to delete them and that's sort of the point I'm reaching here.

Back to France tomorrow, to spend a couple of days at the little house with Roy before he drops me off at La Rup. on his way to the ferry. I'm looking forward to seeing the new seed bed again and keeping my fingers crossed against those pesky deer. I'm also looking forward to the time in Ouville, the other home that has held some of my dreams in France for the last 18 years. We'll do some gardening and reminiscing.

rainbow
I was looking for a picture of the Ouville house but can't find one... if you squint your eyes a bit, this might almost be it!

Anyway, plans for the next couple of weeks include:

Seeing the Dog Woman (formerly the Cat Woman) to give her a tutorial on managing her own website. I'm not really too stretched to do it for her but I'm beginning to become irritated by the need to edit her words and manipulate her very poor images before page mods can be made. Is that mean and small minded of me?

Doing a lot of house work as I have visitors booked for the last weekend in August, my friend V and her daughter, another V. Wondering what to do to entertain them, and hoping the weather will be good enough to make their break a pleasant one.

Concentrating my mind on finding a way to earn money. A storm is looming and I have no resources to meet it.

That'll do for now.

Tuesday 7 August 2007

Car Fixing

mechanics

The red car is sick and is gradually getting sicker but while I was using it for a trip to the shops a week or two ago it decided to have an acute attack of failure and broke its exhaust. I had an interesting trip roaring back from the Carrefour in St. Lo and subsequent investigations revealed that it was fortunate I hadn't lost the whole thing during the journey.

Luckily it was hanging on by a thread as the economics of repairing this 10 year old vehicle are poised on a knife edge - we only want to get it back to the UK so that we can use it as part exchange for a newer vehicle and it's extremely unlikely to ever pass another MOT test without a substantial injection of cash. The decision was made to do a running repair which we hope will last long enough to see us back to Newport Pagnell.

Flashback to the summer of 1976 where the adolescent M was first learning about the art of car maintenance at St. Margaret's House University Residence, Southampton on the hulk of an old Austin A40 owned by the first Paul. In those days an exhaust bandage and a set of gaskets made from cereal packets were the only requisites for repairing any vehicle, provided you were allowed to put the head on the dining table whilst tootbrushing the valve seats...

Anyway, a set of ramps and a tin can from the breakfast ackee and the repair has been made. So far, with fingers crossed it's holding but we'll test it properly tomorrow with a short run to the Le Molay Littry with the cat for his vet's appointment. Wish us luck.

Friday 3 August 2007

Previously on The Cats Tripe

sun set

Updates on recent posts...

The new vegetable plot is looking so good we have irrational fears for it, and some rational ones it must said. Already seeds are germinating, we have two sorts of radish, beetroots, peas and Paul almost convinced me that a few onions were poking their heads up but maybe it was grass. Apart from a dread of failing good fortune and some unforeseen catastrophe destroying our hard work there is the ever present threat of deer and other vermin which might well damage all our hopes in one night. Even the feral cat isn't entirely safe, the soft earth has tempted her to befoul a spot already. We have plans for protective enclosures but they're not yet in place. It's a worry.

We've decided to double the size of the plot over the next year. Paul has cleared down the rough grass and we will cover the ground with black plastic until next March. This worked well on the piece we've already cultivated and should enable us to rotovate the fresh earth in time for crops next year.

The cat, that most wicked of creatures has not been at all well these last couple of days. We're not sure what upset him but he was sick and dopey, unable to eat and wanting only to sleep. Today, he's a bit better and eating best steak. Does he rule our lives? Of course not.

Each night this week we've been out late, risking total vivisection by midges, trying to catch a glimpse of the barn owl. A couple of times we're caught a good view, out of the corner of our eye, just as we've decided to give it up for the night. That barn owl is a tease.

And if the owl is a tease, the buzzards are positive flirts, sitting on hedges, flying overhead and generally putting on some amazing aerial displays accompanied by heart rending shrieks but they're clever enough to only do it when the camera is pointing in another direction or there's not the slightest chance of recording their antics. I think they're holding out for a licence fee.

flowers

This Buddleia x weyeriana has a long history with me. The original plant was rooted from a cutting stolen from a Worthing front garden years ago after a drunken Karaoke night at the Elms in Broadwater. That plant produced a cutting for the garden in Ouville, now that plant has made a child for the garden here. It really is a most obliging rooter, just stick a bit in the ground and stand back.

Monday 30 July 2007

Natural Phenomena

A few examples of the natural world impinging upon the human order of things...

A couple of nights ago as we sat at our dinner in the courtyard we became aware of a continuous humming, droning noise, too high pitched and regular for bees. I thought it was the sound of far off farm machinery echoing around the boundary formed by the trees of the forest. Paul wasn't convinced by this and tracked it down to the old perry pear tree. High in the branches and swarming in their millions the tree was entirely surrounded by midges and it was the sound of their beating wings that we could hear.

I've not been able to find all that much on the web about midge swarms - it is believed the noise itself attracts more midges to join the throng and opinion appears to be divided upon whether it is a mating ritual or not. It seems the midges choose a marker spot for their swarm around a prominent landmark and may return to the same place over many years. There is a little bit about them here on the Marcia Bonta nature blog. The pear tree is showing some signs of stress this year, we fear the worst but hope that it is merely the fallout from these over-abundant insects that is causing mottling and die back of the outer leaves.

Later as it became dark a single spot of cold green light shone out. A solitary glow worm, really a beetle, desperately trying to attract a mate. It's the females that glow, wingless and pretty much helpless, they must advertise their presence for the winged males to find them at the same time revealing themselves to all other comers. Just as last year we seem to have only one lonely lady, I hope she gets lucky.

More trouble from our wildlife was caused today when we discovered that something, almost certainly the coypu or muskrats that infest our waterways, had chewed the leaves off the Barbara Davies waterlily. This poor plant was a gift to me from Paul last year and was nearly nibbled to death last year almost as soon as we planted her in the pond. We were so pleased to find she wasn't killed by that poor treatment and watched each new leaf as it unfurled this year with great anticipation. To find she had nearly suffered the same fate again was heartbreaking, so we went out immediately and bought some chicken wire to make a defensive cage to put around her. Of course, this meant someone had to don the waders and step into the sludge again but it's all in a good cause. I hope it works.

Sunday 29 July 2007

Summer catch cropping

field

Although we are theoretically in the height of summer now as you can see from the pictures there are a lot of rain clouds out there. Instead of hot dry months we are having an extended spring with frequent showers and frost free temperatures. At this rate summer may never arrive, apparently this is due to a deviation of the usual jet stream which is much further south this year than usual.

Ordinarily it would be hopeless to plant crops from seed for another month so at least the mild damp weather does have some potential for cultivating an interim crop of quick growing vegetables. We've chosen varieties which are normally sown in spring to provide the early harvests and fill the hungry gap until the main crops mature. These varieties might not be the heaviest yielders or the best for storage but they grow strongly and quickly. If we're lucky we'll have fresh baby veggies in a couple of months.

Yesterday we did the actual planting.
seeds

From the left; a half row of dill (last minute change of plan there), a row of Savoy cabbages bought as plug plants as we've got to give the deer something to keep them going until the other plants are up, then a row of salad onions, some Early Nantes carrots, Egyptian Beetroots (I'm particularly hopeful over these as they appeal to me), a row of Lambs' lettuce, a row of Chantenay Red Cored carrots, another row of salad onions, a row of winter radishes - half black round, half rose long - and then a row of dwarf mangetout peas and a final row of haricot verts.

None of these, possibly excepting the radishes, are likely to germinate before we take a break to the UK during August so we are keeping our fingers crossed that the weather remains temperate and the deer, cabbage whites and slugs can be averted sufficiently well that the baby plants survive a week or two with little attention.

If these look as if they'll be successful it might be worth sowing some of the Chinese vegetables in August to carry on cropping until late Autumn. Some crops are capable of overwintering and could provide early vegetables next spring but there's always the deer factor to consider. We might just lose the lot.

Friday 27 July 2007

Peasant labour

grass

When I chose a spot for our new vegetable patch all I really did was wander out from the house until I found an open area, mentally stuck some surveying pegs into the earth and announced that from now on this ground would be known as the Growing Fields.

With the grass shaved off short and a layer of black plastic to destroy the living weeds we left it covered over winter and this spring hacked our way through the top layer to produce a rough tilth in which we stuck our potatoes. Considering the weather, the blight and the wholly inadequate depth of soil we got a pretty good crop but unusually for us the blight has forced us to take the full harvest very early this year. The plot is currently empty.

We thought we would try some of the quicker growing vegetables - early peas, short rooted carrots, radishes and so on to keep the ground in cultivation and to supplement the small crops already growing in the back garden. However, we had discovered during the potato harvest that the ground was virtually undiggable, full of stones; some of them big enough to build houses with and such soil as exists is claggy lumps of clay and sand intermingled in uneven distribution.

So we started collecting the stones...


stoned

and after several passes with the rotavator we had taken out 10 or more barrowloads. This has hardly made any difference at all to one end of the plot, about a third of it, which seems to be entirely composed of rubble and rocks and might well have been a roadway or a hard standing in previous times. The rest of the area isn't quite so awful but is still capable of turning up brick sized boulders with very little disturbance. We'll have to keep at it, probably for years, while constantly adding extra organic material to rebuild the soil structure and fertility.

Did I pick the wrong place? Hard to tell, on a farm that has been primarily dairy for much of its history there is little previously cultivated land to discover and the unimproved fields are most probably of similar construction over the whole 9 hectares. We've started now, we may as well finish.

open field

Monday 23 July 2007

Cat

CAT

Monday Night Cat Blogging.

What's to say, this is a very bad cat. He's lying on a white sheet, he's not supposed to be. He's given the best food money can buy, he won't eat it, mostly. He has his own chair and blanket, he sits on the sofa. He has fires lit for him in July. You can see his fire here.


fire

He sleeps all day, but he wakes us three times every, did I say every, I meant every night. If he's in he wants the sun turned on so he can go out, if he's out naturally, he wants to come in.

He's a very bad cat.

bad cat

Friday 20 July 2007

Eating my words

blackberries

A few days ago I commented on a post that The Old Foodie had made about brambling or blackberry picking. I said she was a bit early for that in this hemisphere and that it would be several weeks before we could expect to harvest this most popular of wild forager's fruit.

Well, I was wrong. Blackberry bushes? vines? shrubs? if they were raspberries it would be canes, are extremely variable and I had noticed that this plant, near to the cider house, was particularly early in fruit last year but in the peculiar weather that we've had this year it's surpassed itself and there are many large and fully ripe fruit ready to be picked right now.

Of course, there are still some left because as usual the biggest and ripest were way out of reach or protected by huge vicious stinging nettles but I have picked plenty for a crumble and very pleased about it too!

Wednesday 18 July 2007

Obscene

Abbey St Vigor

No, not the Abbey for all that it's a monstrous carbuncle signifying a repressive, misogynistic and perverted regime dedicated to frightening people into submission, no, that's still rather beautiful and a monument to architecture.

What's obscene was the phone call I got last night, which woke me from my comfortable sleep and despite my most sanguine efforts at dismissal kept me awake for two hours fretting until I finally crawled back to my bed only to be woken an hour later by the same pervert trying all the same things again. I believe I have this person's telephone number and if I do, then I know where he lives. It would be the work of a moment to ensure that he never bothers anyone again but of course, mild mannered and middle aged women do not murder their assailants, they meekly take the phone off the hook and change their telephone numbers at the first opportunity.

It's been a while since I had this sort of problem; last time I finally exorcised the spook by telling him that I knew his wife and would tell her. Did I? of course not, but anyone as sad as a late night heavy breather can't take chances. I don't really think I'm being stalked, about to be murdered in my bed or any of the other horrible fates a sleep deprived mind can imagine but I'm seriously considering getting a dog.

Monday 16 July 2007

Blighted

Today I had a go at rescuing the last of the Ratte plants, devastated by blight. The crop was ruined, Ratte is an older variety, very susceptible to all sorts of diseases and the first variety to suffer when the spores arrived this year.

blighted

Hardly anything to save, the shallow rooted tubers were as badly affected as the foliage, a smelly slimy mess. I had the Winston potatoes a couple of days ago. They were o.k in the main but the actual potatoes are not as delicious eating as the Ratte should have been nor as generally useful as the Stroma or the Ambo. Ambo will be the last potato plants to harvest, hopefully not too badly affected in the tubers although the top growth is nearly all destroyed. If it doesn't rain too much I'll start on them tomorrow.

I also took up the last few remaining tomato plants, no hope of saving them and no crop to speak of. This is positively the worst year for blight we have ever known, even in bad years before it has been much later in the year before the plants have succumbed so totally.

In their place I have planted a row of french beans which should provide a crop in 6-8 weeks time, I hope.

Sunday 15 July 2007

We haven't had one of these for a while

Yesterday I was going to have a bonfire to celebrate Bastille Day but got sidetracked into playing with webcams, fairly unsuccessfully it must be admitted.

Another day has dawned and I've always wanted to know what Harry Potter Character I'd be - particularly as I can barely tell one from another...

You scored as Hermione Granger, You are Hermione. You are academic, intelligent, and reasonable. On top of this, you are highly concerned with justice, scorn the small-minded prejudices of others and work hard to defend the under dog. Many times you may find that your heart and mind are constantly at war with each other.

Hermione Granger

78%

Albus Dumbledore

72%

Neville Longbottom

72%

Luna Lovegood

72%

Ron Weasley

72%

Draco Malfoy

69%

Bellatrix Lestrange

66%

Sirius Black

63%

Harry Potter

59%

Remus Lupin

59%

Severus Snape

56%

Lord Voldemort

50%

Oliver Wood

50%

Percy Weasley

44%

Harry Potter Character Combatibility Test
created with QuizFarm.com


I think this means I'd make the perfect sidekick for any situation.

Friday 13 July 2007

A good day for...

Well, actually it's just a good day.

But I have noticed that it's a good day for photography, especially if you happen to have the sort of kit that I don't. This morning, at about 5:30 there were big deer on the lawn by the pear tree, some with antlers and then later four fish posed perfectly together in a warm patch of the pond. I didn't catch either of those spectacles but I did get some pretty summery shots. It's so lovely now the sun is back and warm enough to go naked which as regular readers will know is favourite mode of mine.


That cheered me up enough to get some chores done. First, three loads of washing.

washing

Then, I dug a row of potatoes. This was really encouraging because we thought the crop had been ruined by blight but these Winston are mostly big and beautiful with a good yield except on the first few plants to be affected and I only put my fork through one of them!

winston

And after that, I did a big patch of lawn mowing.

wide open spaces

So I feel virtuous and good. They say it's going to rain again tomorrow.

Thursday 12 July 2007

Overview



I've been playing with my links lists. From here I want to give access to sites that are of interest to people researching Normandy, self sufficiency, obscure food products and also to some of the more personal blogs and places I like to visit. It's a work in progress. For vegan recipes and resources please visit the Stripey Cat food diary, my other blog.

Wednesday 11 July 2007

Visitors

This year has been rather quieter for visitors than last. Lots of people have expressed an interest but for one reason or another haven't been able to make a firm date so it was great fun to welcome two old friends to stay last weekend.

champers

We didn't get a lot done, plans for sightseeing fell by the wayside thick and fast as it turned out all we really wanted to do was sit in the sun, soak up the peace and get quietly sozzled in beautiful surroundings. One popular outing for guests was achieved, a trip to the Abbey in Cerisy la Forêt where many photographs were taken, none of them actually available to me at this time - however this is the view away from the Abbey across the fish pond.

etang

I'm hoping to have a few more visitors before the year is out, ideally people looking for a working holiday (!) who will destroy brambles and strim nettles in return for plenty of food and drink but actually anyone will do, it can be a bit lonely here sometimes.

One unwelcome visitor is the feral cat, scorned by Bagheera and anxious to keep a hold on the valuable property that is his leftovers she has twice come into the house and sprayed her foul scent across the furniture. Enough is enough and doors are being closed rigorously to prevent her getting in again but it does mean the old chap doesn't have the same easy access to the sunshine he once enjoyed. So a cat flap is another task for the list, Paul is going to have plenty to do when he gets here.

Thursday 5 July 2007

Cherry Jam

cherry jam

I used about a kilo of cherries, sour morellos, with a kilo of jam sugar (the sort with added pectin), about 300 to 500g of redcurrants.

Pit your cherries, this takes ages so round up some helpers and some extra cherry stoners. My kilo took about an hour on my own. Try to catch all the juice as you work. You won't succeed so make sure your apron covers all your clothing and protect precious work surfaces.

Put the stones and the redcurrants into a small pan and simmer gently until the currants have completely disintegrated. I was using frozen redcurrants from a couple of years ago so had my doubts about their pectin content, hence the pectin enhanced sugar, but if your redcurrants are fresh this should be sufficient to set the batch.

Then I think I made an error, I added half a pint (300 ml) of water. The cherries were so juicy that this seems unnecessary in hindsight. Anyway, strain your redcurrant juice into a very large pan and add the cherries, their juice and the sugar. If you were using sweet cherries you might consider adding the juice of a lemon at this point. I also cracked some cherry stones and added the kernels to the pot, about half a dozen are sufficient.

On a gentle heat stir until the sugar is completely dissolved and then allow to come to a full boil, stirring frequently. With the pectin sugar it was only necessary to boil the jam for 4 minutes before a setting point was reached, without it you will have to use your favourite method of judging when the jam is done. I usually put a little on a cold plate, wait a moment and then gently push the spot with my finger. If wrinkles form the jam is ready to pot. If you boil hard for much more than 15 minutes the flavour and texture will be damaged and you may end up with toffee.

Pot into clean warm jars. A typical jam maker's fault is demonstrated in my pots, all the fruit has floated to the surface. There are ways of avoiding this but I don't seem to be able to achieve them. It tastes good anyway. Yield would have been 4 x 340g sized jars but because of the extra water I had a small jar of cherry and redcurrant jelly left over!

This should keep well in a cool dark place if properly sealed, but will be better for refrigeration after opening.

Wednesday 4 July 2007

A Stocking full of Cherries

The time has come to share a top tip with you all. Unfortunately, although I'm most taken with this idea I've only just decided to try it myself so I can't guarantee its efficaciousness only its novelty.

cherries

And the tip is this - to stop cheeky blackbirds (and starlings and sparrows and probably penguins also) from eating your cherries before they're even properly ripe and you've had a chance to pick them, enclose the fruiting branches in stockings, nicely pulled up over the immature fruit. Here is an example;

stocking

What's that I hear you say? You have no stockings? I rather think you do and you'll find them bundled up in the back of the sock drawer so let's hear no more excuses (leave the fish nets, they're not as effective and you may need them sometime).

morecherries
Your reward for sacrificing your leg apparel.

I'm hoping to make cherry jam with this batch, but need to research recipes as last time the jam was nearly toffee before it set, nice in cakes but not much good for toast. In the meantime another whacky idea for the detritus, Cherry Stalk Tea or Tisane.

It's best to pick cherries with the stalk attached, use scissors to avoid tearing the bark from the branches, but of course stalks in jam are no fun. As you prepare the fruit for cooking save the stalks and then dry in a warm place, your dehydrator or solar dryer until quite brittle. Store in an airtight container. To make the tea, take a big handful of stalks and add about half a litre (slightly less than a pint) of fresh water. Bring to the boil, simmer for five minutes and then allow the stems to steep for four or five hours before straining. Drink the tea cold or warm it up again, with or without sugar.

This is supposed to be very good for the kidneys and fluid elimination but it's a nice drink that makes a change from ordinary tea or the overflavoured fruit and herb concoctions available in the shops.