Preserving.

Preserving - not persevering, though they were much the same thing, the single time I tried to make seville orange marmalade earlier this year. That's why I decided to go on the Summer Preserving workshop at Tresillian House in Cornwall a couple of weekends ago.

It was actually going to be funded through work, but I forgot to get the receipt in before the deadline. So I ended up not claiming the fee back, but that's ok because it wasn't that expensive - it was just useful to have an external push to do something different.

Mark and I were going to go down to Cornwall together, to make a weekend of it, but he had to work last minute on the Sunday. Neither of us thought it would be very nice for him to have to drive lots and rush back on Saturday night, just to get up and work all day Sunday, so I decided to go alone. It's about 2 1/2 hours drive, each way, so I decided to do it all in one day, rather than stay overnight. The drive was fine (and early start meant I was justified in getting breakfast from McDonalds, one of my favorite things to do since I don't get to do it very much). Plus I got to catch up on all of my podcasts.

I ended up arriving pretty early (I had left a big buffer for traffic, since a Saturday in summer usually means terrible traffic down into Cornwall - but I left so early that I missed it all), so I sat in an empty parking lot (Dairyland Farm World) and continued listing to podcasts.






The course was in a very nice "Regency period country house" (turned hotel). It was run by two ladies who work with the (fairly famous) British chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, who is the man behind the River Cottage.

It turned out to be more a demonstration course, rather than a hands-on affair. I hadn't really thought through how difficult and expensive it must be do set up cooking courses were everyone has access to their own stove and equipment. And they were able to run through a lot of different recipes that we wouldn't have had time for if they had had to wait for 18 individuals to follow along.

So this was the set up for most of the day. That's Pam on the left, and Liz on the right:


I don't have many pictures from the demonstration bit, because I had forgotten that I had brought my camera, until our visit to the walled garden in the afternoon. But it does mean that I have a lot of pictures of the walled garden.

It's apparently one of the largest walled gardens in existence, and the head gardener, John Harris, is big on preserving old varieties; he apparently has several varieties that are pre-19th century. He also uses the principles of Victorian 'moon gardening,' which takes as its premise that the phases of the moon affect the rise and fall of the water table, in the way they affect the rise and fall of tides. So he claims that he has never watered anything - except, I guess for the plants in the green house, which are in pots (and for them he uses rainwater). It's pretty incredible, if it is true, considering how green everything is, since we'd had one of the hottest Junes on record. Whatever the claim, it was a pretty impressive garden.

I'm sure you can pick out Mr. Harris in the pictures below.

















So it was a nice day, and I learned some things, and got some nice recipes out of it (plus a jar of strawberry and gooseberry jam and a jar of whole-grain mustard - both of which were from the demonstrations throughout the day. Mustard is really easy to make, if you have a food processor - I recommend everyone tries it.)

Bread and butter pickles are high on my list for one of the first things to try - once I get a glut of cucumbers from Mark's folks, which I think is coming soon. Now I just have to get all the gear...

Chasing trains.

A couple of weekends ago, as a joint birthday/Father's Day outing for Mark's dad, we visited the West Somerset Railway. It's an old line that is still kept open (their tagline is "Steam Trains for All Seasons"), running some old steam trains, and some old diesels, between Bishops Lydeard and Minehead, in Somerset county.

The plan was to visit all the stops along the way (not on the train, but in the car/motorcycle). Because we were pretty zippy on the motorcycle, Mark and I ended up following the same train for the first few stations.

We started out in Bishops Lydeard:

This is the train we would be following:

Behind Mark you can see the train driver:

Here he is, in the center of the picture - you'll see more of him later:

And here's the coal shovel:

Crowcombe Heathfield was the next stop:

Then Stogumber:

Then Williton Station, briefly (we got a bit lost, so we were running a bit behind):

But made up the time to get to Watchet:

Here you can see the Train Driver (as they call him here) with a new cup of coffee. Sadly, he took the lid off to put sugar in, but then got the signal to go, so as he was looking back into the station, he pressed his lever (not sure if he was taking the brakes off or what) and promptly knocked his coffee over and out the window. Everyone watching the train go saw it happen, but he didn't, until he looked forward again as they started going. He looked really sad after that.

We met up with Mark's family again in Watchet, each had an ice cream and then headed to Minehead, the end of the line (we gave up chasing that particular train).

They have a nice turntable in Minehead:

There was a big crowd there - and despite talking to various people, we couldn't quite work out what the big excitement was. Or even if there was a big excitement, or if that was a normal train day for most people. But there was a lot to look at:

And then we went home and had more ice cream. A pretty good day, in my book!

The Grill Saga's happy conclusion, part two.

As mentioned in the previous post, we got a lovely new gas grill. Which worked perfectly. But I couldn't get the idea of charcoal out of my head, nor the idea of experimenting with barbecue - proper barbecue. And of course I was already watching various grills on eBay.

And, as before, I got a bit over-researched and then I just jumped.

Which is how we ended up with the classic (though in an odd color):


It turned out be not as a good a deal as I thought (it wasn't the model with the thermometer built into the lid, sadly). But it was brand new (ex-display model) and so a little bit cheaper than going out and buying it from a store.

We've taken it for a few spins, and are still working out the best way to use the chimney starter (newspaper donuts are next - I hear it helps), but I think it's great.

On Friday, we tried out some ribs, in a kind of indirect-cooking way. They turned out ok, but I wasn't watching them carefully enough and they got a bit overdone.

On Sunday, I decided to try brisket. I followed a recipe from epicurious, which was actually one of Steve Raichlen's.

It uses a dry rub, then indirect heat and mesquite wood chips.

Here's the BBQ all ready to go, with the charcoal in charcoal rails on the side, and my thermometer in the middle (I can't believe how well used the grill already looks!).


And here it is with the brisket (and some of the smoke, which you can see, if you squint). It took me a little while to get the heat at the right level, so it ended up cooking a bit quicker than it should have. And of course no real barbecuer in their right mind would keep the lid off as long as I did to take this picture, but that's ok.


Despite all that, it looked not so bad, and tasted pretty good, especially for a first try (Dickey's BBQ sauce helped, of course).



The main thing is that it wasn't an abject failure, so I'm all ready to try again. I think maybe ribs next. Or maybe brisket again while I can still remember what I did right and wrong.

But all I know is that there is most likely a Smokenator in my future. Hooray for Cue!

The Grill Saga's happy conclusion.

As I mentioned previously, we were in the market for a barbecue grill. After much to-ing and fro-ing, and questioning everyone I knew about their opinion over gas vs. charcoal and the various brands, things happened the way they always do. I got over-researched and then I ended up buying on on eBay.

I was pretty certain that I wanted a charcoal, since it's the first grill I'll have bought myself. And because I'm interested in trying out smoking and 'low and slow' barbecue, it seemed right. I had been watching several, but then one came along that had what I wanted - in a gas grill. It was three burners, brand new (sold by an individual, but they had never used it) and had a hooded cover with a built in thermometer. It came down to the wire, we put a bid in, and won.

We got a pretty good deal, and we're pleased with it. Here are some pictures from the first two times we used it - once with the two of us, and once with Mark's mum and dad (just so you don't think we normally cook four steaks for ourselves!).

We like it and it works well, so we're happy.

Well, happy, but not quite satisfied, as you'll see from part two of the Grill Saga...

We're growing!

Now that we live some place with a place to have pots outside, I'm trying out growing some food plants. We've been fortunate to have lots of nice weather, which helps a novice like me.

I wasn't holding out much hope for my success, but most things have been growing nicely (I think despite my husbandry, rather than because of it!).

I've been really pleased with my tomato plant, but it turns out that it's too bushy - apparently you get more tomatoes if you pinch out the branches before they grow too big. That's ok, I'm just pleased that I haven't killed it yet and it looks healthy. Any tomatoes it might produce are just a bonus!

I'm most pleased about the strawberries. I remember trying once, when we lived in the house in Richardson, to grow strawberries. We had one of those clay pots with the holes in the side, and I was so excited. But the Texan sun and the neglect of an adolescent (I can't remember how old I was) meant that they burned up and died. And I think that was the last time I tried to grow anything to do with food. Consequently, I was excited all out of proportion when I noticed this:

And fortunately there were two ready to go, so we each got to have one.

Hooray for strawberries!