Anyone for a game of Scrabble?

For over one hundred competitors at the World Scrabble tournament in London, that was the perfect way to spend a rainy November weekend. 

For me, in between showers, I stored away my summer squash. 
I’m not sure my letters would have got me very far in the tournament but hey, I do like to have an ‘s’ up my sleeve for plurals! 

Disclaimer - 
No jiggery pokery or photoshop was used to create these contorted fruits, they just grow like that!

Officially a courgette, ‘Tromboncino’ can be eaten small and young, just like any other courgette. What a shame though. Rather, leave them to scramble away until the autumn and you will reap massive, thick skinned fruits with tasty dense flesh and just a smattering of seeds in the bulbous end. 

Stored in the cool and dry my crop will keep us in soup all winter.

Busy...

…by A.A. Milne

"I think I am a Muffin Man. I haven't got a bell, 

I haven't got the muffin things that muffin people sell. 

Perhaps I am a Postman. No, I think I am a Tram. 

I'm feeling rather funny and I don't know what I am — "

Monday.

I think I am a squirrel. I haven’t got a nut

Perhaps I am a butcher with lots of meat to cut.

I have one and a half pigs lying on my kitchen table. Mostly chopped up by a real butcher. Errr, kidney, ears, heart, tongue? Freeze now, worry later. Wot, no snout?

Tuesday. 

No I think I am a chef.

Deboned a huge ham and minced up great slabs of slippery liver to made lovely garlicky country pate.

Wednesday. 

I think I am a sous chef, 

Working for the chef.

Put a couple of trotters and that big ham bone (from the pig with a limp) into the biggest stock pot I own and simmered overnight for broth.

Thursday. 

Perhaps I am a vet who is visiting for a limp.

Deconstructed the pig’s knee joint as I was straining my stock. 
Aha, found a cluster of bone spurs - little bony growths that inhibit the smooth movement of the joint.
(I would not ordinarily have been so fascinated but I have just illustrated an arthritic knee for a cookery book.)
Froze pots and pots of stock and supped restorative broth for lunch.

Friday.

No I think I am a seamstress.

Off to the Haberdashers to buy muslin to wrap up an arthritic ham for air drying. 

Saturday.

I’m feeling rather funny and I don’t know what I am!

In my Farmhouse Garden

“The garden is never dead, growth is always going on and growth that can be seen, and seen with delight.” 

Canon H. Ellacombe  (In my Vicarage Garden and Elswhere. 1901)

Flecks of buttery yellow and russet, splashes of crimson and sherbet greens. 

Poised against the grey sky, the sagging bunting is reluctant to loose its grip 

but is already being elbowed out by next spring’s cheeky pink buds.

Easy peas-y soup

Sometimes the sluggard in me triumphs.

I didn’t want to head out into the rain to tug at caterpillar riddled greens or scrub muddy roots.

I just fancied a nice comforting lunch. 

Instead I slunk to the freezer for inspiration and in the frosty depths found the tail end of last year’s pig, 

(no, not literally the tail... bacon stock and gammon) and a bag of peas. 

I whizzed the peas into the stock, threw in a handful of gammon scraps and some fresh thyme. Delicious. 

Only 99% smug though. I really should have grown the peas!

This and That

This is a tale about a box of grimy, wooden picture frames that I picked up at the local auction two and a half years ago. 
They have been sat under my desk ever since but I always knew they would come in useful some day. 

Sunday was that day. 
It was a grey, dreary, damp day and it was my birthday.

I received three delightful cards from my three children. 

That made me immeasurably happy. 

Time to get out that box.

After a quick dust, a lick of paint, some waxing with a soft cloth and a final polish, 

my cards looked deservedly well dressed. 

And that’s that.