Adventure 46: Underneath the walnut tree, where you said you'd wait for me....

Well, I wasn't waiting for anyone this weekend (apart from, perhaps, Hogwarts to finally realise that they forgot to send my letter all those years ago. Better late than never, I suppose...). After a bit of a quiet Saturday, having felt horrendous (maybe food poisoning? And not from my own food I might add), we were invited by one of Levi's colleagues to join in a new staff outing to the Turf Lock Hotel, between Exminster and Starcross. 

We had a good pint of Otter Bitter and they had a very reasonably priced barbecue, with nice apple and pork burgers with thick slabs of cheese and sweet onions, and a big plate of salad, roasted vegetables and cous cous. The regular menu looked fab too, with offerings including locally reared Powderham Lamb and scallop and chorizo potato salad. For more details, please see: http://www.turfpub.net/food_drink.php

Sadly, we missed the ferry back over to Topsham, so we're forced to walk the eight miles home our side of the river. Boo hoo! Yet, every cloud has a silver lining, and in this case it was walnuts! I forgot to mention, that last weekend when we were out with Matthias and Ronni, we came across some in the graveyard. I only took a couple, but was fascinated. Could there really be a nut in these green fruits? I did some reading on the matter and donned some rubber gloves and got to work...

Why the gloves? Well I'm sure many of you know this already (and I don't mean to teach grannies to suck eggs) but the green outer coating contains a chemical which dyes things brown. I mean really brown. I found this blog post here about how you can dye your hair with walnut husks... http://almostexactlyblog.wordpress.com/2013/08/16/natural-hair-dye-with-black-walnuts/

I'd actually already become aware of this fact a few years back, when Mrs Pole in an episode of Return to Cranford (BBC, 2009) says that the rather exotic Signor Brunoni, the magician, must be the real thing, because she got up close and didn't smell any walnut oil. Got to love Mrs Pole. 

Then today, on our long weary trip home, we stopped at the Double Locks for a swift half of Waggle Dance and to my joy, next to the pub was another walnut tree. The green outer casings were split and with a quick shake of one of the branches, five lovely walnuts fell onto the footpath.

But what to do with such a stash? It was only little, after all. Nonetheless, I decided to make myself a little starter for dinner tonight: Olive oil crostinis, with blue cheese and poached pear. All very well, but how the hell to get into these things? Luckily, I'm good at getting creative and wedging each nut between my bread board and chopping board, I whacked the top board with my hammer and was able to prise the nut (mostly whole) from its shell. The resulting dish was delicious and as Levi doesn't like blue cheese, I didn't have to share. Bonus.

In other news, I've made myself some apricot jam (sadly not foraged) as I was too tempted by Tesco's cheap fruit offers last week and had over bought. It does taste delicious though. And that's about it, I'm afraid this week, a quiet one, but feeling much better all ready in time for work. Well that's ok then.

Adventure 45: why sloe jam makes your home look like a crime scene

So here's the second part of my post. So, elderberries are first, all delicate but juicy. A paint to get off the stalks, but I worked out pretty quickly, that dragging a fork through them getsthe berries off pretty much unharmed.

Then they look all pretty and glistening like little beetle eyes.

The jelly is easy to make: measure the weight of your berries and put them in a pan for a few minutes to bruise them up with some water over the top. They start disintegrating pretty quickly and you must sieve them through a muslin to remove the seeds. Then add half as much weight in sugar and a squeeze of lemon juice (for pectin) and boil. I don't own a jam thermometer, but as a rule of thumb, put some of the mixture on the back of a spoon you've had in the freezer and if it sets, it's ready to take off the boil and pop in a sterilised container.

Now, for sloes. The new ones I picked, have been put on a tray in the freezer (this not only simulates the first frost making them better for sloe gin making but also makes them easier to store because they're not all frozen together in a big clump). As for my remaining sloes from last year, I decided to experiment and make jam. BIG MISTAKE! I treated them pretty much the same as the elderberries (there aren't many recipes out there for this) but the sieving process was an absolute nightmare. It was like doing a gym session, red gore went all over my hands, face and kitchen and at one point I was practically reduced to tears.

The result was some nice jam but bejesus, I swear I will not be making it ever again.

Lastly, I had my blackberries. I did some jam as I did last year, but strained it to make it a jelly but kept some behind to experiment with. I'm trying to do something like the cherry liqueur like last year. Completely experimental I might add. I've layered the blackberries with sugar in a bottle (this time using the balloon thing to prevent any explosions... My kitchen is clean...). It's already been fermenting using natural yeast (the balloons been swelling) and basically, I'll keep you posted with how it goes.

Then last weekend, we enjoyed some fantastic visitors, Matthias and Ronni from Cambridge. We had a great time in various pubs, including the Beer Cellar, Western, Bridge Inn, Imperial, The Albert etc. These photos are taken in the Fat Pig, where they have Raspberry and ginger gin. What more could you want?

Anyhow, back to work tomorrow, but then the weekend. Huzzah! Goodnight! 

Adventure 44: back to school

Quick post tonight as I'm absolutely shattered! It's in two parts as I'm unable on my iPad for some reason to add extra photos... Grrrrr.... 

So, basically it's back to work time. I've had a smashing two weeks (the girls are awesome) but I'm as tired as hell. Before teacher time, I was blessed to spend a few pleasant days back in Wales for the wedding of the superduper Bryn and Martyna who live in Angelsey. Brilliant wedding, lots of craic, and many thanks to the lovely Owain and Daisy, respectively for having us to stay. We managed to fit in a bit of foraging, spying big juicy damsons near Llanfair (the one with the supposed longest place name in Britain... See photos below). Damsons of course, being bigger and sweeter than sloes or bullace.

Then, in our final weekend before term started (nearly two weeks ago now!) I managed to persuade Levi to join me on a foraging mission near our home in Exeter. As mentioned in previous posts, everything seems to be ripening much faster than last year. It's a bit weird but I can only assume the exceptionally good weather is responsible. Even the sloes were starting in places to wilt. And that was another weird thing. Last year, a real struggle to find sloes anywhere (all the inclement weather???), this year the sloes and bullace were fricking everywhere. Like literally DRIPPING off the trees. We got enough for two or maybe two bottles of gin but we didn't even make a dent. We got a big bowl of blackberries, though again, many were ruined already (and we were competing with several others who had also spied them) and though we didn't gather any, the haws and rowan berries were fat, juicy and ripe. Despite a few scratches, and nettle stings, it was a pretty successful operation. The message for foragey folks now is: get out there now, it's an early autumn clearly, and you don't want to miss out on any of the fun!