Igenlode Wordsmith

I've spent rather a lot of money so far this month (buying two batches of asparagus, replacing a big bottle of oil and a large block of cheese, and stocking back up on butter, in addition to getting over-excited on discovering a market stall that sold tins of evaporated milk, biscuits, passata, tuna, and even haggis), but when I stumbled across the unexpected opportunity to buy some Welsh lamb today I couldn't resist.

Three slices of lamb neck; I'm planning to make a Persian stew with dried beans and chickpeas, and then maybe an ersatz lamb pilaff as per "Cooking in a Bedsit". It's the first red meat I've had my hands on in months... well, unless you count the aforementioned tinned haggis, which I finished with great enjoyment last night. And the packet of sausages!

The snow is melting, the sun is out, and the greengrocer's stall is back in its place. I went out on the offchance, and came back with 12lb (according to my brass Hughes's Pocket Balance (British Made)) of potatoes, onions, beetroot, lemon, celery, leeks, eggs (local but not free-range, I'm afraid; the small print on the box says 'enriched cages', which are the new minimum-welfare replacement for battery cages) and oranges. ( Read more... )

I bought some yoghurt from Kent in the "Farmers' Market" on impulse, having discovered that no yoghurt at all makes a larger hole in my catering than I had anticipated. I'm not sure if it was three times better than the expensive yoghurt from the supermarket in addition to being three times the price, but it was certainly better -- and much better than mine! And it was strained yoghurt, which means it's good value in that it's pretty concentrated (about the consistency of cream cheese). It would have taken quite a lot of milk to make that much yoghurt.

They had a milk-vending machine where you brought back your glass bottle and had it refilled for a couple of pounds (again, about three times the price of supermarket milk), and I was almost tempted. ( Read more... )

I'm definitely getting fitter. I went back to find the elderflowers that I stumbled across during my Unintentional Adventure (when I almost got benighted on the golf-course after trying to take a short-cut across a corner of it one evening), taking my bicycle this time in order to save several miles of shoe-leather, and managed to cycle all the way up the steepest part of the hill (a gradient of about 1 in 8: a sharp pull on foot, a nightmare on a 3-speed bike) without having to get off.

I used to have to do that on a daily basis, but not without being in regular training and practising for several weeks first before I made it non-stop!

But the elderflowers still weren't open yet. ( Read more... )

I split up some of the extra seedlings in my Pot With Too Many Marigolds -- not quite as scientifically as I'd intended, as levering with an ordinary fork out of the cutlery drawer simply sent half the compost flying in a huge chunk! I retrieved and planted three in one large pot and three in another, and threw away a couple of the small ones left over in the spilt earth. Since they grow to eighteen inches or so, I only need two or three adult plants, but survival at this age is far from certain.

I am still finding new slugs emerging from the pansy pots daily -- every time I lift the pots, there's a new batch of inch-long slugs curled up in the drainage holes. I can only assume they must be living in the soil. They seem to be thinning out the poppies ;-p

( hot cross buns )

( supermarket )
The magic mackerel was nice, though -- even made without dill, with parsley instead of rocket, without the hazelnuts, and with frozen broccoli. (I simply couldn't bring myself to buy the Kenyan, and after all a big bag of frozen broccoli will go a long way before the summer vegetables come in...)
And I did have some sunflower seeds, which I 'toasted' in the frying-pan and which contributed a significant flavour.

How to make two helpings of lunch out of one fillet of smoked mackerel and half a lemon ;-p

I have one more helping of porridge left -- two if I'm careful. Mind you, once I run out of milk that won't be a problem...

I bought some roast buckwheat last weekend as an (expensive) emergency measure, since I like it and it's nice with just butter and salt, but it doesn't go very far and I don't suppose I shall be able to get any more. Of course I can just have bread and marmalade for breakfast, or skip breakfast altogether -- I often do.

The annoying thing is that all the porridge is almost certainly sitting on the shelves of people who don't eat it, but think they ought to have some in order to make themselves feel better :-(
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I've given up hope of being able to get any more dried milk -- if only I'd bought it when the bag first started to run low, instead of waiting until I actually came close to running out, at which point all the world and his wife suddenly decided the world was about to end and they needed the hitherto-despised dried milk right now.

Had to buy fresh from the supermarket in a plastic bottle; I'd forgotten how much extra space it takes up when it's not dehydrated, not to mention how much extra plastic waste this is going to generate and how much extra it's going to cost :-(

Meanwhile I've gone out and bought replacements for all the other things that have been low in the cupboards for a while, like lemon juice, Marmite, cinnamon, lard, tinned tomatoes, etc., in case I have the same experience again and the products simply disappear without ever restocking at the point where I actually run out. Which of course means that I'm now part of the problem myself.( Read more... )