the accidental smallholder :: diary archives

Homebrew on the horizon

A long time ago we tried making our own wine. It wasn't a total disaster, but while the resultant blackcurrant and pea-pod wines were alcoholic and just about palatable, they didn't seem to be worth the effort - a 3 quid bottle from Tesco was infinitely better than anything we could produce ourselves.

Our wine kit was duly sold on eBay, and we've been happily drinking supermarket wine ever since.

One thing we're talked about many times since then has been brewing our own beer. Never ones to be put off by previous failure we're now embarking on that particular journey - today I ordered a Premium Real Ale Starter Kit from Brew it Yourself.

Rosemary's now talking about growing some hops this year, and making beer from first principles... will we ever learn?

Bradley smoke generator in action

In advance of me getting my finger out and putting up some proper information on making bacon, here's a quick video showing our smoker setup.

Before we got the Bradley smoke generator we used a gas-ring to heat a metal plate, on which we would pile sawdust. It produced pretty good smoke, but also too much heat. Now the generator sits in the greenhouse, the smoke goes through the cardboard box and up the tumble-drier hose, outside and into the smoker. By that time it's pretty much at the ambient temperature, which at this time of year means damned cold.

Cold smoking bacon from asmallholder on Vimeo.

Smoked bacon and Christmas cake

Dan fired up his smoke generator today and smoked one piece of streaky bacon. The rest will get done tomorrow. He's really pleased with his new equipment - now he's talking about building a smoke house!

The best thing is that he's got the generator in the greenhouse - to get it in, he had to clear out the greenhouse, a job I've been trying to get to all week. So I can score it off my list without having expended any effort!

He also harvested the remains of the runner beans, which are on their way to being butter beans and are drying in the greenhouse - another one off my list. With that bed clear, I can now get some manure on it. I'm aiming for one barrowload a day, as I take it off the field. Why doesn't anyone want this lovely fertilizer and soil conditioner? It even smells nice...

I've made 6lb mincemeat and a Christmas cake and the pudding mix is ready to be put in the steamer tomorrow. The cake's a bit well-fired, so Dan will eat this one and I'll make another during the week. I never get the first cake right - second attempt is always better. We had the scrapings of the mincemeat, warm over icecream tonight. Yummy.

Pork progress

Well, really bacon progress. The bacon is now cured, rinsed and drying in pillowcases in the garage. On Monday, Dan will fire up the smoker, with its new Bradley smoke generator and maple briquettes, and smoke it. He promises me that he will put something super-duper in the articles, showing the process.

The back bacon looks particularly good and the butcher who butchered the pigs has agreed to slice the bacon, so roll on the first bacon buttie. Even if it is bad for you!

What some folk eat...

I was browsing the Ascott Smallholders' Supplies website tonight - retail therapy, I'm afraid.

The website's been upgraded since the last time I looked and it now has one of these facilities that shows you what the last person who bought that item also bought.

There was a book listed called "Home smoking and curing". The person who bought this also bought a multi-mouse repeating mouse trap and a live catch rat trap.

I rest my case...

Garden progress

A wee bit more progress has been made over the weekend in the garden. I sowed six rows of swede (Marian) and Dan sowed 32 sweetcorn seeds (Sweet Nugget). I didn't make a very good job of netting the swede so will redo it tomorrow night. I was back to work today after a fortnight off and I'm absolutely dead beat, so am having a night off.

A cauliflower seedling is showing and I only sowed them last week - that's my kind of plant! The tomatoes, cucumber and courgette need to be potted on but Dan's going to do that in his "Gardening Hour" before work. He's only got three more days of gainful employment with the Council - then at least he'll only be doing one job.

Muffins

A friend loaned me a book of muffin recipes. While I was on holiday at half-term, I sorted out a basic recipe then started adding things. During the week I made blueberry; banana and walnut; apple and cinnamon and, finally, blackberry and vanilla (the last one was supposed to be raspberry and vanilla but what I thought were raspberries when I took then out the freezer, weren't). Dan (always conscious of his waistline) was taking them to work to hand out and I was sending his Mum home with some most days - she put on a pound and half that week. Dan started to count up the calories - but I argued that they're GOOD calories.

Tonight, I was bored so I made chocolate ginger muffins. We've tried them and they seem really nice but they were too hot to really tell. Ho hum, have to try again later. They're just so (too) easy -and the possibilties are almost endless. I'm toying with pineapple and coconut, chocolate orange, passionfruit...

Curried sweet potato soup

We had this lovely soup at Carol and Graham's just before New Year. First time I made it, I forgot to add the coconut milk, but it was still lovely.

1kg sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
1 onion, peeled and chopped
two dessert spoons of curry paste
1l vegetable stock
can coconut milk
olive oil

Sweat the onion in oil, add paste and cook for a few minutes, add the sweet potato and the stock. Bring to the boil and simmer for 20 minutes or so until the potato is soft. Add the coconut milk. Whizz until smooth.

Thank you, Sylvie.

Marmalade polenta cake

This is for Anna, who has lost this recipe. It was in "Country Living " magazine in February 2006, inspiring me to make marmalade for the first time. I opened the last jar this morning, just in time for this year's Seville oranges to hit the shops.

Anna recommends this cake as easy and delicious.

200g softened butter; 250g golden caster sugar; 1 medium orange; 2 tbsp of fruity virgin olive oil; 4 large free range eggs; 150g SR flour, sifted; 1 tsp baking powder; 100g polenta flour or fine polenta; 100g Seville orange marmalade.

Heat the oven to 170C (150C fan oven), GM3

Beat the butter and sugar together until fluffy. Add the grated zest of the orange and the olive oil. Beat well. Add the eggs one at a time. With each egg, add a couple of teaspoons of flour. Mix the baking powder with the remaining flour and fold it into the mixture, then fold in the polenta, the marmalade and 2 tbsp of fresh orange juice.

Spoon the mixture into a 24cm deep springform cake tin, levelling the top. Bake for 60 -70 minutes, covering the cake with foil after 40 minutes of baking. The cake is ready when it is firm in the middle and a skewer comes out clean. Remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

Tea loaf

You might like to try this recipe more or less from from Jane Grigson's "English Food".

Soak 12oz dried fruit (I use sultanas) and 4oz soft brown sugar in half a pint of cold Indian tea, overnight. Add 8oz SR flour and a beaten egg. Mix together, put into a greased 2lb loaf tin and bake for about an hour on 180C, or until a skewer come out clean. Cool, turn out, wrap in tinfoil and keep for a few days to mature. Serve thinly sliced spread with unsalted butter.

It is so easy, really yummy and it keeps for ages. We've just finished one that was made 10 days ago and it just gets better. It's really handy to have if friends drop by for a cuppa. You can kind of kid yourself on that it's really, really healthy!!

Only thing is, I've made it so ofetn lately that Dan's a bit fed up with it, so I need to find some variations on this theme.

Something simple

Sometimes the simple things are best.

Today, we couldn't decide what to have for lunch. It certainly wasn't going to be sausages (for reasons Dan will explain in due course). Since the eggs are piling up in the fridge, I suggested "soft boiled eggs and soldiers". Although we eat eggs a lot, usually we have them scrambled, poached, omelettes etc. and I just fancied a nice soft boiled egg. Or two.

They were delicious - laid yesterday, huge and brown, with creamy yolks, a wee spinkle of salt and black pepper. Dan cooked them to perfection, and we had them with buttered toast soldiers and a glass of whole milk. Absolutely scrumptious. It was like a "Famous Five" lunch!!

We've started buying whole milk in preference to semi-skimmed. Against our whole diet, the difference in calories is minimal and we like it much, much better, especially in porridge, on cereal, in a glass. In fact, just about any way. Hey ho, we all die of something and I don't think semi-skimmed is going to save me. Anyway, I worked off the calories in the garden this afternoon, weeding the vegetable beds, while Dan watched the Chelsea game.

Elderflower cordial

Dan made elderflower cordial last week. It was abit of an impulse thing and when it was ready, we discovered we had no bottles. So we used 4 pint milk cartons, instead, which worked well. We're getting through it quite quickly so he's going to make more this week, while the flowers are available. The cordial can be frozen, so we'll do that. It's a lot cheaper the the Dule of Cornwall's!

The most difficult part was getting citric acid. Dan tried Boots. The assistant asked him what he wanted it for. He explained. She explained to him that heroin users cut the drug with citric acid so Boots don't sell it anymore. "Try the Co-op", she said. The Co-op didn't sell it either, but the third pharmacy did. That's the one where the methodone is dished out so maybe they're more used to disreputable looking characters than the other two - and Dan did look a bit disreputable. Anyway, he ordered a kilo off the internet today, which should see us through the cordial season.

Recipes

I often pull recipes out of magazines and newspapers. A huge bundle was stuffed in the back of a book that my sister gave me, which is specifically for writing recipes in.

In a fit of spring fever (which also lead to me cleaning the cooker and sweeping the garage floor!), I decided that I would go through these recipes, throw out the ones that we hadn't tried and never would or had tried and didn't like; try the ones we hadn't tried and, if we liked them, I'd write them in the book. Still with me?

What I'm finding is that there is an awful lot of puddings and cakes...

Why is that?

Melting Chocolate Risotto

This is soooo wonderful I can't tell you.

Put 200ml creme fraiche in a measuring jug and make up to 800ml with whole milk. Put the milk and the creme fraiche in a large saucepan and add 40g of golden caster sugar and 175g of carnaroli or arborio risotto rice. Bring to a gentle simmer, stirring occasionally. Add 50g of good quality dark chocolate (70+% cocoa solids) and allow to melt. Transfer the mix to a shallow, buttered dish and put in a preheated oven at 150C / 300F / Gas mark 2 for 20 minutes.

After 20 minutes, stir in any skin, return to the oven for a further 15 minutes. Chop the remaining 50g of chocolate. Remove the rice from the oven - it should be cooked but not mush. Stir in any skin. Sprinkle the chopped chocolate on top and cover the dish (I used a chopping board). In a few minutes, the chopped chocolate will have melted into chocolatey pools in the chocolate rice. Drizzle with single cream and serve in warmed bowls with more cream handed round.

This serves 6 - it didn't look a lot because we served it in big bowls, but it is very rich. And very wonderful.

Soup recipes

Prompted by an email from a reader who has tried a couple of my soup recipes, I've added 3 new soups to the recipes section of the site. When I say new, I mean new to that section - the two stilton recipes originally appeared in the diary some time ago, but are now in their rightful place. The Carrot and Parsnip soup recipe is new - and was used this weekend to try to make a dent in the bumper crop of parsnips we've got this year.

Marmalade

I've never made marmalade, but apparently if you're going to do it, this is the time of year, with Seville oranges in the shops.

I'm going to give it a go. "Country LIving" magazine (Feb 2006) has a recipe for Seville orange marmalade, but even better, it has recipes for using marmalade - Paradise Slice; Duck breast with marmalade sauce; marmalade polenta cake; steamed marmalade and cointreau pudding with caramel sauce. Yummy.

Alternatively, serve with toast!

Christmas cake

Here's one of the recipes I use for Christmas cake. It's very rich and dark (like Dan!). I've made two - we ate one but the second one is living in the pantry and being fed brandy weekly. It's dead easy.

7" square or 8" round tin, greased and lined with greasproof paper.
1lb currants, 6oz sultanas, 6oz raisins, 2oz glace cherries, washed, dried and chopped, 2oz mixed candied peel, chopped.
Soak the fruit in 3 tablespoons of brandy overnight.

Sift 8oz plain flour, 0.5 teaspoon salt, 0.25 teaspoon grated nutmeg, 0.5 teaspoon mixed spice into a bowl.

In a large bowl, cream 8oz unsalted butter with 8oz soft brown sugar. You will add the flour and the fruit later, so make sure the bowl is big enough.

Beat four size 1 eggs, then whsk them into the creamed butter and sugar, one tablespoon at a time. Adding the egg slowly will stop the mixture curdling - but don't worry if it does.

Now, fold the flour etc into the creamed mixture - gently to keep the air in. Fold in the soaked fruit then add 2oz chopped almonds, a dessertspoon of black treacle, grated zest of an orange and a lemon.

Put the mixture in the tin and cover the top with a double layer of greaseproof paper with a small 50p sized hole cut in the middle. Bake at GM1, 275 / 140 degrees for a minimum of four hours. You might need another 30-45 minutes, though. Check if it's ready by pushing a skewer into the cake - if it comes out clean it's ready.

I've overcooked this cake in the past, so err on the short side (but not less than four hours) and test for readiness. Also, don't use a fan oven, if you can avoid it. I've had much better results this year using the oven on a conventional setting.

Let the cake cool for 30 minutes in the tin, then let it get cold on a rack. Once it's completely cold, you can feed it with brandy before wrapping it in greasproof and tin foil until you're ready to decorate it or eat it.

Our "nearly Christmas" cake

Last weekend, I started our preparations for Christmas by making 6lb of mincemeat and a Christmas cake. Usually, I make two Christmas cakes - I burn the first one, so we cut the sides and the top off and eat it immediately, then I make a second that we keep for Christmas.

This year, I remembered not to use the fan oven and, since Dan was waiting to put the Toad in the Hole that he'd made for dinner in the oven after the cake had been in only four hours, I took it out earlier than I usually do. It is perfect - the best Christmas cake I've ever made.

But - a dilemma! What do we eat now to prepare us for Christmas? Needless to say, we've started on the cake so I'll be making another one this weekend.

Home baking

I baked some really nice scones today - cheese, onion and olive. The recipe is in Delia's Christmas book.

Take a medium onion and chop fine; heat a tablespoon of olive oil and cook the onion for 5-6 minutes until it is brown. Keep it moving to stop it sticking.
Into a large bowl, sift 6oz of SR flour. Add half a teaspoon of salt, half a teaspoon of mustard powder, half a teaspoon of cayenne pepper and a really good grinding of black pepper.
Grate 1.5oz of strong cheddar and 1.5oz of parmesan.
Rub in 1oz of butter to the flour and spices, then add the cooled onions, six chopped black olives and about two thirds of the cheeses. Mix well.
Beat a large egg, then add it to the dry ingredients. Mix well with a knife.
Add a couple of tablespoons of milk, to make a soft but not sticky dough. Use your hands to mix; it's easier.
Roll out to about 3/4 inch thick and cut into rounds.
Place on a lightly greased baking sheet, brush with egg and top with the remaining cheeses.
Bake in a hot oven 200F for 10-12 minutes until well risen and golden.
Cool on a wire rack.

We did all this except the cooling bit - we ate them for lunch, warm from the oven with butter, tomatoes and salad. They were really, really nice.

Game for a pie

With the weather so unpredictable I spent a lot of Saturday in the kitchen. The main event was a game pie, based on a recipe from Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall, and made with a pile of game which had been in our freezer for over a year waiting for me to get organised. We had a rabbit and some venison bought from Stirling Farmers' Market, and 4 pheasant breasts bartered last year for some pork chops. Shug's recipe had an option for a cold version - simply add a pig's trotter to the mix, simmer for an extra hour and you've got a stock which will turn to jelly when cool. Since we've got about half a dozen trotters in the freezer I thought we'd go for this version.

Everything went pretty well, and the pie tastes great. A few pointers for next time, or for anyone who fancies having a go themselves.

The bottom part of the pie was fab, thanks to the jellified stock. Unfortunately the top of the pie was stock-free, and a little dry in places. More stock is the order of the day, so fill it to the brim (Shug said to leave 2 cm from the top of the pie dish, I say piffle). The first slice of the pie was a bit of a bugger to get out of the dish cleanly - so grease the pie dish well and cook it a little hotter and maybe a little longer to get a better bottom crust.

If anyone wants the recipe just yell and I'll put it on.

While waiting for the various bits of the pie to need my attention I also knocked up some lentil soup and fresh wholemeal rolls. The recipes are on the site now, the lentil soup is dead easy and very tasty, and the rolls even easier and tastier.

Smokin'

Yesterday I got the last pieces of the jigsaw that is our home-built smoker - a length of tubing for the propane gas bottle and a couple of retaining clips to keep it firmly connected to the boiling ring and the bottle. So last night we assembled it, set about discovering its nuances and put one of our Wiltshire cured hams in as a first try.

During the night I made adjustments to the gas ring every 3 hours and added sawdust as required. The temperature ranged from 20-40 degrees centigrade, at first, but settled at a perfect 30 degrees once I'd got the hang of it.

This morning, fairly confident that I could maintain a steady supply of smoke at a fairly constant temperature I hung the 2 sides of belly pork in to be smoked for 24 hours. I've just removed the ham from last night, boiled it briefly in water and it's in the oven baking. Photos to follow.

I'll produce a page with details of how the smoker was made later, but here are some photos from last night:

1. The boiling ring, from the Outdoor Megastore:

2. A bottle of propane gas, hooked up to the ring:

3. The smoker base. The hinged flap on the front allows access to the baffle plate where the sawdust sits:

4. The smoker cabinet. At the bottom you can see the diffuser which should distribute the smoke more evenly, and at the top the three bars for hanging food from:

5. The baffle plate with sawdust in place:

6. The smoker fully assembled with the cabinet on top of the base:

It's huge, standing over 7 feet tall, but will accommodate a lot of food to be smoked at the same time, and should work as a hot smoker too. The plan is to use this for a year or so, then build a brick smoker with integrated barbecue next summer. I should point out that it was built by my dad to a design we both refined - I wouldn't have a clue where to start, but being a former metal-worker he can clearly work wonders with the stuff.

Recipe articles

I've added a new section to the articles section of the site for recipes. We do make a lot of stuff, using recipes we've found on the web or in books, or made up ourselves over time, so will add the best to the site as and when we use them. Today it was pickled eggs, this afternoon it's going to be mange-tout soup.

We'll only post recipes we've used ourselves, but if anyone wants to send us recipes we'll be happy to try them, add them to the site and credit the source.

Wednesday night is soup night

I'm an opportunisitc soup-maker. If I see something reduced to an outrageously low price in our local supermarket my first instinct is to buy it an make soup with it. And so it happened this afternoon - a big head of organic celery and a load of broccoli all at a knock-down price.

Fortunately my family and I all love soup, any time of the year. So although this probably isn't ideal weather for Celery and Stilton or Broccoli and Stilton soup, that's what we've got oodles of now. If you think they sound good here are the recipes - dead easy and very, very tasty.

Celery & Stilton

1 large onion
1 head celery
1.5 oz butter
1.5 pints vegetable stock
A splash of single cream
6 oz stilton

Chop the onion and celery (discarding any tough or leafy bits) and soften in the butter for a few minutes. Add the stock, cover and simmer for 20 minutes. Leave to cool for 15 minutes then whizz up in a food processor or with a wandy thing like we've got. Add the stilton and cream and heat gently stirring often until the stilton has melted and the soup is hot. Season to taste. Yum.

Broccoli & Stilton

1 large onion
About 1lb broccoli
1 potato
1.5 oz butter
1 pint chicken stock
0.5 pints milk
A splash of single cream
6 oz stilton

Chop the onion and soften in the butter for a few minutes. Add the potato (peeled and diced) broccoli (just the florets, discard the stems and leaves) and cook for a few minutes. Add the stock, cover and simmer for 20 minutes. Leave to cool for 15 minutes then whizz up in a food processor or with a wandy thing like we've got. Add the stilton, milk and cream and heat gently stirring often until the stilton has melted and the soup is hot. Season to taste.

15 minutes organic teas

A quick plug. When we stayed in the Scotsman last month they provided a nice range of teas and coffees in the room, including some of these 15 minutes organic teas. I was disappointed when visiting their site to find that they only sell to trade, but an enquiry got a friendly response advising that they can now be bought by consumers from a couple of vendors.

I ordered from The Tryst and they arrived safely and quickly. The Sweet Camomile and Berry teas are particularly good....

Rick Stein's Food Heroes

Last night saw the start of the latest series of the excellent Rick Stein's Food Heroes on BBC2. It's a must-see programme for anyone interested in real food, and Stein's enthusiasm for the subject is infectious. In the first programme he tackled (no pun intended) Clovelly Herring, organic Guernsey beef, an organic veg grower and a Cornish producer of sparkling wine.

The highlight for me was when 14 butchers from Smithfiled market assembled in a local hostelry to participate in a beef taste test. To a man they were dismissive of the concept of organic beef before the tasting, but lo and behold 11 of the 14 selected the organic Guernsey over supermarket 'finest' and high-street 'cheapest'. The guernsey was grass-fed, hung for a good couple of weeks and the difference obviously shone through.

If you don't get beeb 2 where you are the series website is pretty good too: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/foodheroes/

The Meatrix

I've just stumbled across a great site called 'The Meatrix' (from the You Grow Girl forums). It needs Flash and sound to get the full effect, but underneath the excellent animation is a great site concerned with factory farming and local food production.

Home grown tea

Tonight we're indulging in another home-grown tea - a potato, leek and bacon bake accompanied by some sweetcorn. Everything except the bacon is our own, and next year we hope to cure some pork for bacon so we'll be able to do it all ourselves. It's meals like this that make the effort of growing vegetables worthwhile - there's a deep sense of satisfaction in knowing that not only are all the ingredients organic, produced without a trace of chemical or hormone, but they all come with not a single food mile between them (okay the bacon is from Ayrshire, so about 50 food miles then).

Even if you're not growing your own, I'd urge you to be an attentive consumer and to look carefully at where the vegetables you buy in the supermarket are sourced. There's a fair chance they will have been air-freighted in from Africa or South America, at an unsustainable cost to the environment. Ordinary consumers like you and I have the power to change this - the supermarkets will stop stocking these items if we stop buying them, it's that simple. As an added bonus you might buy some British vegetables and rediscover the wonderful seasonal variations that our climate produces. After all who wants to eat Kenyan green beans every week for a year?