Sausage casserole in the slow cooker. The area in the kitchen around
the boiler and controls has been cleared ... kettle has been filled ...
we are ready for the engineer ... OH is off to work ... the fire here in
the sitting room is on low and I'm listening to the radio in here
rather than in the kitchen which is where a lot of time for most of my mornings is spent. There's nothing really that I can get on with so I expect I'll
knit and noodle until the heating is fixed ...
I'll get veg tomorrow ... hate leaving it until the last couple of days ... the thing is, sometimes when I do the Christmas present swap at Bro's farm, I get given sacks of potatoes, parsnips, carrots, onions and some sprout sticks ............ and sometimes I don't. He's not the sort of chap you can say 'are you giving me some veg this year' to ... he'll worry if he's forgotten to get some ready and as he's injured his knee and ankle and is on crutches (again ... our family's legs eh?) he'd have to get one of the farmworkers to organise it. However, what's the betting if I've bought all that we'll need I'll come home with a car boot full of veg
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I made a small Christmas cake yesterday. I'm going to just use toasted marzipan this year as OH is trying to reduce sugar (seems to make him more susceptible to migraines). I also made the pudding ready for steaming today. I make mincemeat for mince pies so it's far less sweet (and no suet). OH makes the pastry and puts the pies together. Jamie Oliver suggests a segment of satsuma in the middle of the mince pie to cut the sweetness of shop bought mince.
Making fish pie today and getting a few bits from the butcher - I'll collect the Christmas food on Christmas Eve (it's always jolly and never too crowded in the village of Christmas Eve). I've got sprouts and parsnips aplenty in the garden, so don't have to buy them.
Gardening on the edge of Exmoor, in Devon
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
@Fairygirl Vic & Bob are next on NYE 23:10 on BBC4 ... set your revorder
Ta Dove I forgot to mention that bamboo thread for flagging. Sprout and parsnip soup, r'girl ....where's that green 'boak face' smiley when I need it No one here really likes sprouts or parsnips, so I probably won't bother. I occasionally made my own mincemeat, probably to make mince pies for my parents, and it was a recipe by the late Michael Barry, who used to do the Food and Drink prog. perhpas we should start a petition about the sugar in mincemeat, since we all seem united about the content. Daughter makes the pastry, but we never add sugar to that either. I always make cranberry sauce, because, like the mincemeat, shop bought stuff is hideously sweet. It's like jam. Horrible day here - heavy wintery showers of sleet/hail and rain. Yesterday was lovely with a wee frost to start it. Venus was in evidence too.
It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
Problem with reducing the sugar in mincemeat is that as with jams, the sugar acts as the preservative so that the mincemeat keeps in the jar outside the fridge ... reduce the sugar and the shelflife is reduced unless an artificial preservative is added ... dont want that
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Fortunately I am ahead with everything. I have just been told this morning I have labarinthitis. Wondered why I kept walking into walls and rocking. Eye clinic tomorrow things could be a lot worse. This time last year I was preparing for 19!
off for a snooze, the meds are making me sleepy!
Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.” A A Milne
Evening. Great that’s all sorted Dove - enjoy being cosy. That is so rubbish Lily - that is a horrible ailment to have - take it easy. For all those making mince pies - I never make them as MIL makes lush orangey ones. I never liked them until I tasted hers. My Grandmum used to serve them with home-made brandy butter but as I didn’t really like them, she used to let me have some brandy butter on a digestive 😋 Hope everyone else doing ok.
I'd rather eat a commercial mince pie than brandy butter. Nasty stuff - mind you, that may be MIL's fault as she wasn't a good cook and I'd never met it before I went to their's for Xmas dinner - ONCE. My parents were Methodists so such stuff was never served. After that one Xmas at MIL's I decided we needed to stay at home with our cats......
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
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Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Morning everyone.
I made a small Christmas cake yesterday. I'm going to just use toasted marzipan this year as OH is trying to reduce sugar (seems to make him more susceptible to migraines). I also made the pudding ready for steaming today. I make mincemeat for mince pies so it's far less sweet (and no suet). OH makes the pastry and puts the pies together. Jamie Oliver suggests a segment of satsuma in the middle of the mince pie to cut the sweetness of shop bought mince.
Making fish pie today and getting a few bits from the butcher - I'll collect the Christmas food on Christmas Eve (it's always jolly and never too crowded in the village of Christmas Eve). I've got sprouts and parsnips aplenty in the garden, so don't have to buy them.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I forgot to mention that bamboo thread for flagging.
Sprout and parsnip soup, r'girl ....where's that green 'boak face' smiley when I need it
No one here really likes sprouts or parsnips, so I probably won't bother.
I occasionally made my own mincemeat, probably to make mince pies for my parents, and it was a recipe by the late Michael Barry, who used to do the Food and Drink prog.
perhpas we should start a petition about the sugar in mincemeat, since we all seem united about the content. Daughter makes the pastry, but we never add sugar to that either. I always make cranberry sauce, because, like the mincemeat, shop bought stuff is hideously sweet. It's like jam.
Horrible day here - heavy wintery showers of sleet/hail and rain. Yesterday was lovely with a wee frost to start it. Venus was in evidence too.
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
things could be a lot worse. This time last year I was preparing for 19!
off for a snooze, the meds are making me sleepy!
A A Milne
Great that’s all sorted Dove - enjoy being cosy.
That is so rubbish Lily - that is a horrible ailment to have - take it easy.
For all those making mince pies - I never make them as MIL makes lush orangey ones. I never liked them until I tasted hers. My Grandmum used to serve them with home-made brandy butter but as I didn’t really like them, she used to let me have some brandy butter on a digestive 😋
Hope everyone else doing ok.