This November...

I didn’t think there was much to say about November, but it turns out I was wrong. We finally put the garden to bed ahead of the cold snap that was forecast, and which duly arrived, but it felt odd as the week beforehand was almost tropical, or tropical for this time of year anyway.

In the kitchen

I picked my peppers and hoped they’d ripen more indoors, and that’s pretty much the case - they got to a lovely autumnal orange (and more orange than below) before heading for one of our dinners.

I did make some jewel coloured chilli jelly, but as yet I haven’t made the second batch I hoped to - all is not lost though as while my crab apples are finished, the recipe can also use Bramleys and I picked some of those up in the village shop. The limiting factor has been a lack of jars, but it’s amazing how quickly they can accumulate when you put your mind to it!

We’re continuing our Reformer Pilates journey, and with some progress already I’m sure. MOH was asked how he was getting on and likened himself to ‘an elephant on roller skates’ which made me laugh, but it’s something I also totally relate to! Our last session was a hard one and learning some very technical and traditional moves, thankfully our instructor knows more about our bodies now and was there to catch me as I toppled forward at one point, for which I’m very grateful.

Stir up Sunday has been successfully completed, even though ours mostly took place on the Saturday. We’ve now got a stock of three various sized Christmas puddings lovingly made by MOH. Christmas puddings have become his thing and are much requested on family visits each year, and this year was no different. Our main job with them now is to regularly feed them with brandy until a week or so before the big day.

Crafting, radio and game

The start of the month saw me heading off to a new village hall for the Living Threads ‘sewing room sort out sale’ and I left with a bag full of inspiration and plenty of ideas. On the way home I checked out a new to me farm shop - Harkers Farm Shop if you’re local, and it’s definitely one I’m adding to my regular visits list. For a relatively small shop it was jam packed full of goodies from farm fresh vegetables, local meats and pies and plenty more besides. Definitely a new farm shop unlocked for me.

I’ve been in a bit of a quandary about what to sew lately, and so having not sorted anything out to take to my evening sewing group I grabbed some embroidery that I’d been toying with for a while. It’s been on trips with me but hasn’t actually made it out of its pouch and started on, but that’s changed.

In fact since I’ve been forced to slow down a bit after catching a stinker of a cold in the second half of the month, I’ve finished the second part of the embroidery. The paler section at the top I completed while we were visiting Gargano’s Peninsular last year, so it was long overdue. I’ve also worked out how I’m going to use this - yes, another pouch - but there’s more to do, and embroider, yet.

I even got around to doing some more Indian Block Printing, and it wasn’t as much of a faff to set-up or clear down as I envisaged, so that was good and I can see that I’ll be doing this more regularly. I just need to remember not to go overboard on the printing side as that leaves me with a pile of embroidering, which vies for time along with everything else.

Our favourite restaurant in Newark held their annual game night, and it was delicious. Of course it was on the same day that I was going to Harrogate for the Knit & Stitch Show with sewing group friends, so it made for a busy day, but both were well worth it and very enjoyable.

We even managed a port tasting earlier in the month too discovering some more favourites, and potentially even a Christmas present or two - but what’s even better is, we had a great night out and managed to time it so we could get the bus home. Writing that though, makes me feel old!

And we finished the month with the restoration of one of our Saturday morning habits of listening to Huey Morgan’s show on 6 Music in a little bit more style than we have been. For a while now we’ve only been able to listen to it on Alexa, and that’s meant it’s been on in the background, but now with the addition of a clever streamer box that’s changed and we can listen to it actually in the room. Sometimes it’s the small things isn’t it? And no, I don’t know why it’s taken us so long either, but there you go…

Markets and discoveries

I’ve not ventured too far from home this month, but there has been a visit to Nottingham and another to Harrogate for the Knit & Stitch show. I’ll share more from the show another day, but Harrogate is very much on my visit list - it looks a beautiful place and full of independent shops and more. Though I might be swayed by one of the coffee station venues at the craft show, which was in the beautifully restored Harrogate Theatre - very grand!

In Nottingham I finally ticked off a visit to Sneinton Markets, and it won’t be my last. As well as the craft shop I planned to visit we also discovered a great independent bakery, a curios shop where I stumbled across a stack of vintage fabric for £9, a restaurant I want to try and an Asian Grocery shop. And that was on a Thursday when the area was relatively quiet, I’m sure on Fridays and Saturdays it’s buzzing, I’m already planning when I can go back!

If you want to read my ramblings from previous monthly updates then please check out my ‘This is’ series.

A garden for all weathers

* I was invited to this year’s Gardeners’ World Live and provided with a pair of tickets to the show, therefore all my posts will be marked as 'Ad’ though as usual my views and opinions are very much my own.

Given the weather we’ve had recently, which seems to have been everything from summer to winter in a matter of days, sharing this garden seems appropriate!

Lyn’s Garden: a garden for all weathers was designed and built by August Ponds Ltd and won a Silver Award at the show, and it looks at how we can continue to have a garden that can be enjoyed with year-round interest in light of changes to our climate, while also being mindful of the environment.

There’s much I like in this garden, but there’s also a couple of things that I’m unsure about.

To me that very much looks like a front door on the house at the back, and it’s great to have a good looking front garden, as well as a back garden but I can’t get my head around having a table and chairs in a front garden. And yes, I know this isn’t a real garden and is demonstrating what we could have.

The main feature of the garden is a pondless waterfall that is fed by rainwater collected from the house roof, which I could get on board with as given the amount of rain we have at times it would be good for us to manage the rainwater in our gardens. The waterfall means the water is aerated and therefore allows the water in the main harvesting unit to remain fresh for use for irrigation.

I loved the planting which was chosen for their hardiness and ability to withstand winter rains and summer drought conditions, and I love how densely it’s planted. That’s definitely something I could use and learn from, but I’m unsure about the plants dotted in between the pavers.

I just don’t think they work on a practical level. I know that I’d be tripping over the plants, or kicking them, as I wandered up the path with my shopping etc - though of course that would be comedy gold for anyone watching!

Don’t get me wrong, as a show garden it looks great - and that table is definitely swoon worthy, but as a front garden this one doesn’t work for me. Which is fine, especially as I don’t actually have a front garden!

But the planting, that’s definitely something I can get onboard with.

* With thanks to Gardeners’ World for inviting me to Gardeners’ World Live, it was quite a show! I’ll be sharing more from my visit to this year’s show throughout the year - I hope you enjoy them as much as I did the show.

Making chilli jelly

With lots of ripening crab apples on our little crab apple tree this year I was keen that they didn’t all go to waste. One sunny afternoon in October I picked just over two kilograms of crab apples, and still the tree looked fully laden.

Then I read the recipe properly - I mostly followed Sarah Raven’s Chilli Jelly Recipe - and realised that straining the jelly through muslin was essential for it to be clear and jewel-like. I had muslin, but I wasn’t sure that I could rig anything up that would be secure enough to hold the 2kg of fruity mush. And if I did, then I didn’t want to have a collapsing accident part way through and need to clear up the mess it made.

A rethink was needed, and that was the Lakeland jelly strainer, which I now highly recommend, but of course it was out of stock with more stock expected soon - so I got my order in quick, and waited for it to arrive. Thankfully that was only a week, but it was a long wait for my little apples.

Now armed with all the kit I needed I set about prepping my apples. Sorting through those that I’d stored while waiting for the jelly strainer to arrive, giving them a good wash and then weighing and chopping them before chucking them my big preserving pan.

Thankfully the majority of the crab apples were as patient as me, and it turned out I’d overpicked a little - but even so I did need to nip out to the garden and pick about ten more apples to make up the numbers. Which wasn’t bad really.

I brought the apples and water up to the boil, then added the cider vinegar and boiled until it was at the jam setting temperature on my jam thermometer (another piece of kit that makes preserving so much easier, and takes the guess work out of is it set or not, and without a cold saucer in sight).

Onto the straining

I’d read that I must avoid the urge to squeeze the bag if I wanted to have a clear jelly, so I did and MOH was under strict instructions not to dabble with it either. And we did good, but the set-up was much taller than I’d expected so there was no way that I’d be lifting the large preserving pan and pouring the hot apple mixture into my strainer.

Well some creative thinking was needed, and out came the kitchen steps, the ladle and a jug. And it worked. Phew.

Then I realised that my large bowl was already filling up and I’d not even added all the apple mixture yet.

I’m so glad that I’d put some table mats under the jelly strainer as this helped me switch out the almost full bowl for its replacement, while the liquid happily continued to drip (well stream) through.

And so I left it to strain overnight, fairly confident that this bowl wouldn’t fill or overflow - and thankfully it didn’t. The jelly strainer didn’t collapse either, so that was double good news the next morning.

Adding chilli flakes

I’d originally bought fresh chillies but in the wait for the jelly strainer we’d used those but I’d seen in other recipes some used chilli flakes so that became my plan. The apples were supposed to yield about a litre of liquid, but I had double that - so then my dilemma was how much chilli flakes to add.

In the end I added a couple of tablespoons along with the sugar and hoped for the best taste-wise.

The pulp

I was curious to see what was left from the overnight straining - and it was a soft but shape holding mush of apples. I’m sure this could be composted, but mine went into the green bin (which is actually brown).

Jewelled jars

My next decision was to gauge how many jars I’d need, and given that I had more liquid I realised I’d need more than I first thought. So I got what I thought I’d need and a couple extra - in the end I used all nine jars (of various sizes) filling them with the jewelled hot and sticky jelly.

Doesn’t it look fab?

As a fair few chilli flakes were left behind or removed when I skimmed off the froth I decided to add a whole dried chilli into the jars. This wasn’t as successful as I hoped as it floated to the top and isn’t visible from the outside - but it will be a surprise for the recipients, and will hopefully build a depth of flavour as the jelly stores.

It tastes pretty good too, as well as the nine jars I had enough for a small plastic tub which is in the fridge and very much in the 'eat now’ category. We’ve had it with cheese, cold meats and in sandwiches - but I think you could use it alongside sausages, and anywhere you’d use condiments such as redcurrant jelly, and I’m looking forward to adding some to gravy too.

We had enough crab apples to make even more, but my jar situation so far is severely lacking and in that time our apples have gone over - the tree has shed its leaves, and the apples are riper than I’d want to use. But there’s still a chance I may make a slightly different variant using some local Bramleys instead - watch this space…