Preserving for Winter

More than half the month gone and harvest time is apace. Apples and pears are begging to be picked and fall off the tree if they’re ignored. So much to do at this time of year. The fallen fruit is being appreciated by the garden wildlife so it’s not going to waste.

I found time to make my apple and cinnamon squares from windfalls. If you’ve tried my recipe, here’s a discovery I made when I forgot to sprinkle the sugar on the apples. I nervously mixed the sugar and cinnamon and sprinkled it over the cake mixture before I baked it. Needn’t have worried. The result was delicious. A sweet, crispy topping and a piquant apple base with a lovely crumby cake in between. They still freeze just as well, if you can resist eating them straight away.

This week I’ve been happy in the kitchen making chutney. I make two different kinds. My husband’s favourite and my own. These are recipes I’ve worked out to suit our individual tastes. One is dark and sweet and the other, my favourite, is more piquant and a bit more spicy.

I use courgettes in them but this year my courgettes have been very unyielding. I put out an S.O.S. and a very kind person let me have some of hers in exchange for some cooking apples. She said they were very big because they’d been away on holiday and so the courgettes had kept on growing. They were also yellow ones instead of green. I didn’t mind. Just so grateful. They were in fact marrows rather than courgettes when they arrived but they were still juicy and they were fine for chutney. So thanks all round. I had five. Here’s a picture of three of them.

I might cook one with a stuffing of Lancashire cheese, tomatoes, breadcrumbs and onions.

The cupboards are filling with delicious preserves for the winter. They add a kick to simple cold weather meals.

The two chutney recipes are in my Earthy Homemaker’s Cookbook, available with Amazon. Here’s a link if you would like it.

https://geni.us/eANQu

There is a picalilli recipe too, which makes the most of the season’s vegetables .

They involve a lot of chopping but are very easy to do and there’s nothing to go wrong. The chopping can be speeded up in a food processor or, if you enjoy sociable cooking, by having a helper.

Here’s a tip for chutney or jam making. Wash and rinse the jars, place in the cold oven without lids and turn the oven on to low heat. Allow the jars to dry while you make the chutney or jam. Dry the lids with kitchen paper and put somewhere warm but not in the oven as some lids have an inner plastic coating.

When the chutney or jam is ready, keep it hot and have a covered surface next to the hob. Take out each jar, one at a time, and fill the jars with hot preserve using a funnel, leaving about half an inch (1 cm) of space at the top. Put on the lid and tighten immediately. As the jar cools a vacuum forms and pulls the lid on, sealing it. You will hear it pop as the lid pulls on. Then the contents will keep for a very long time.

Of course, jam and chutney will keep well if you don’t do this but not as well as when the jars are sealed. I always do this and I have never had anything mouldy or spoiled. It’s so simple to do and so satisfying when the lids go “pop”.

In the polytunnels I have “Autumn King” carrots coming along nicely and “Tender and True” parsnips look very promising. But I had a problem with my leeks this year. A few years ago my entire crop was wiped out by allium leaf miner grubs. This is a pest which hadn’t troubled my locality before but climate change had pushed it northwards. So I began to grow leeks under cover in the polytunnel. Went brilliantly for a few years but this year the little so and so’s have managed to find a way in and spoil my crop.

I was naturally dismayed but I had the idea (might have read it somewhere) of cutting the leeks down to about 5cm from the ground to see if that would cut out the pest. So far, so good! The leeks have regrown and are looking healthy.

Ignore the weeds. Been too busy in the kitchen!

The cucumbers have been wonderful. I grow “Marketmore”, an old outdoor variety. They are easy to grow and are generous croppers. Although they have prickly bitter skin, the flesh, once peeled, is juicy and delicious. I’m hoping to make a few more pickles before the plants have finished.

Not many flowers to see but a few pretty things, here and there.

I finished my flower painting. Not entirely happy with it but it was a pleasant way to spend a few hours. I love the colours of flowers and although it’s a challenge to recreate that glow I do what I can. I don’t think it will be one for framing but it might look better to me when I’ve forgotten all the bits I struggled with.

I’m a self-taught amateur artist but I prefer to do my own style, come what may, rather than take instruction. Having said that, I wish I’d gone to art school to learn about colours, painting media, composition and the history of art. Since I don’t fancy doing that now, at my age, I will muddle along in my own way and hope for the best. It’s the most absorbing hobby. I find it’s the only thing which holds my concentration. Good for the mind.

I hope you’re finding lots of summer pleasures of your own. Bye for now. With you again next week.