My Voice?

 

My voice has gone missing. I have a cough and when I speak it is coming out rather croaky unless I resort to whispering. I've been lead to believe the whisper is preferable. Fortunately though I do not feel the slightest bit sick. It's my birthday on Friday and I don't want to be poorly especially then. Anyway, I'm sure I'll locate my regular vocal abilities in the next day or two until. It doesn't matter too much here what I sound like so I'll keep exercising my blogging voice a little bit.

 

It probably happens in most households that the person having the birthday chooses their meal (or perhaps they choose the restaurant). It's what happens here anyway. Last year Grace couldn't decide from a rather long list of favourites so I thought why not a week of meals decided by the birthday girl. It took the chore of meal planning out of my hands for the week and she chose things that we all like anyway. So I thought why not for me too.

 



A lot of our dinners are coming out of this book this week. Lentil and squash pasties , leek and blue cheese tart, spicy lamb burgers to name a few.

And for my birthday 'cake' I am finding it hard to go past this chocolate chilli tart with dulce de leche ice cream. I'm not really a fan of cake so a chocolatey tart sounds good to me. I have the magazine from the local library and the recipe proper isn't on the Taste website as yet but there is a good recipe adaptation here if it appeals to you.

And what else to eat during my birthday week. Sugar snap peas of course. They are by far the best peas this year. I always favoured snow peas but the sweetness and juiciness of the sugar snaps has actually toppled the snow peas from their pea pedestal.



 

Bunches of Broccoli Waltham. Steamed until they are only just done. The broccoli are almost all done for the season so it's time to make the most of them.

 

And because it's my birthday on Friday, Brussels sprouts will be on the menu. I love them. My ruby variety are leaving their run a bit late and I think the warm weather will be too much for them before they crop heavily but their leaves are quite stunning and worth growing for them alone. The leaves actually taste fine. As a note to myself, I am going to try starting my Brussels sprouts earlier so they have more time in the cold and lessen the chance of them bolting when the weather turns warm (usually early these days).

Of course there could be surprises in stall for me and I might be whisked out for a fancy meal but I don't think so. I love cooking and I love cooking new things. But, I will not be washing up on Friday.

Do you prefer home cooked birthday dinners or a restaurant treat?

Tracy

There's always something

 This afternoon I was looking around the vegetable garden for something to contribute to our dinner. The baby broccoli aren't anywhere near ready but as pizza had been requested for tonight then that didn't matter. I was quite surprised though that there was enough out there to make much of an impact. I had underestimated the leafy greens.

 No need to have just an Iceberg lettuce. There are beetroot leaves which are almost too pretty to pick. Almost.

 Bunches of tatsoi.

 Mustard for a little bit of a zing in the salad. I picked rocket, parsley, pak choy and herbs too.

And perhaps because that is what is flourishing right now then that is what we probably should be eating more of. Our garden is so hot and dry in summer that the leafy greens don't hold up too well then but in winter, they shine. Oh how glad I am that my chickens have never found a way in to the vegie patch because they wouldn't last long (the plants that is).

Something else I spied while out and about which has become lush after our recent rain is nettles. And tomorrow night they will be on the menu and possibly in a soup for Sunday night too. When they are soft and have nice new growth, they are good but once the plant ages and gets on the woody side they don't seem to taste so nice. I'm not sure if it is that they taste any different or that by the time they get to that stage we have tired of them for the season. I'll pick some leaves for tea for people and for mixing in with the chickens breakfast too.

How's your garden growing right now? I know the Northern Hemisphere is really kicking into gear.
Tracy

Caught up

Well, I am happy to say that I am caught up with my gardening work. School holidays give you that little bit of extra time to catch up on things. Well they do for me anyway. School is back on Monday though and I will be a little sad to see the girls hop on the bus on Monday morning. They are my bosom friends and kindred spirits and I miss them. 

 

 This week, I removed the last of the tomatoes. The poultry benefited from any fruit which wasn't fit for the kitchen. The flurry of activity and weeding and pruning has exposed a few bare spots in the herb garden. Which reminds me I must take a few pictures.

Planted this week: carrots, turnips and cavolo nero (Tuscan kale). Not a lot in the ground but I did spend a day out of town with Tim whilst he was working (that's my excuse). Unfortunately we still have had no rain and although the temperatures are low overnight, I'm still having to water quite often.

 I know that leaving things to flower and set seed can drain a plant and sometimes it is even the end stage for a plant but I usually let things go their full cycle. I am rapt with these garlic chive seed heads right now. They were stunning a while ago, all white and covered in bees and now they are equally pretty, dried with their shiny black seeds.

And because it is the end of the school holidays (and  because I promised myself at the beginning of the year), we 'did' lunch today at a local restaurant. If I'm dining out, lunch would be my choice over dinner. It is usually more economical and just like today, I don't usually need an evening meal afterwards. Hope opted for a dessert instead of lunch and was very impressed with her meringue roulade. I was equally impressed with my choice of French onion soup, Grace with her pumpkin salad and Tim with his choice of croque monsieur. Yum. It has inspired me to be a little more creative in the kitchen too which can only be a good thing.

I'm off now to do a little stitching on some sweet little Matryoshka dolls that I have been working on for far too long.
tracy