Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Kitchen fun

Masterchef has nothing on us here in East Harling at the moment. We have been cooking fit to burst.It was our annual Blackcurrant blitz on the weekend. Somehow it's turned out that Ricardo makes all the jelly. Thank God for him because it takes HOURS. We picked all the black and red currants at Harriet's on Saturday afternoon (Kelly we missed you), rolling around underneath the currant bushes, trying not to sit on too many, hiding from the odd shower and dodging wasps. We got a mammoth haul of 8 and a half kilos of fruit. So.....we made, redcurrant jelly and black currant jelly and I made blackcurrant sorbet Mmmmmmm and now Ricardo is STILL in the kitchen making Creme de cassis that's been marinating in red wine for 2 days.
Here he is having a welcome respite for a glass of water, "Nothing sugary please as I'm covered in stickiness".
"Wow those sunflowers have grown while I've been slaving away in the kitchen".
Meanwhile we were having our friends Jeremy and Gudrun over for dinner on Sunday night so I hopped back into the kitchen to make slow cooked shoulder of lamb on a bed of fennel, onions and garlic a great recipe if you have 4 or 5 hours up your sleeve. Here's the beginnings of it. 2 whole heads of garlic in this recipe.
For dessert I made a raspberry clafouti to have with the blackcurrant sorbet YUM.
And now I've made a tester cake for a catering job I'm doing on Friday. It's the cake-o-the-month at our house at the moment, lime and pistachio courgette cake My friend Carryll (of morning bike riding fame) has lent me her cathedral shaped cake tin. Perect.

5 comments:

kelly said...

yum, yum, double-yum!

When I read your last post featuring Miss Harriet Sprig, I harkened back to our fun currant-picking episode (the picture of me in the currant bushes is STILL my avatar pics for several social networking sites AND is my internal directory pic at Big Blue).

Sorry I missed the excitement this year, but it looks like you guys managed magnificently without me. :-)

xxxxxxxxxxxx

JoeyJoJo said...

Only just Kellski, only just. xxxxxx

GinaLamour said...

Gosh...the country -life :)
Guess I'll just have to pop to M&S to get those blackcurrants....not quite the same eh!!! but hey! the 02's only ten mins away so I get to go to lots of concerts...lol
I got my lovely cushion and it is so beautifully made. I love the fact that the fabric is old and you picked up the braiding from your travels. It means so much more. I will always treasure it :)
Best wishes Gina

suez said...

SOOOOOOOOOOOOoo good.All your pictures look so good. I feel like the Ludbrooks are not so far away.Spread the love of blackcurrants all over the world !!!And what an amazing cake tin. Nearly as good as a Nauru House cake!!

JoeyJoJo said...

Hey gang thanks for all the lovely comments. I've just got back from the North Norfolk coast with some samphire and smoked mackerel for dinner. The food frenzy continues.