From Spade to plate: Elderflower cordial making and easy bagels

This post was first published on 23/5/2018

As making elderflower cordial is such a typical English drink, we made this again with the Wednesday group. As it is a 2 day process, the Monday group picked the flowers  and prepared the lemons and let it steep so that the Wednesday group can finish it off and start another batch.

For lunch we made this amazing bagel recipe



















lovely with the vegan mayonnaise  or if you don't have chickpea aqua faba and don't mind using milk, this is another great recipe

we made and the vegan 'smoked' salmon'

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veganaise

Stuffed Mushrooms - gluten free

This post was first posted 47/2017
Today we made a vegetarian gluten free  stuffed mushroom recipe with the mushrooms and rice and the french beans.



We started with a lettuce soup to show how easy and quick it is to make a delicious creamy soup.



As Pauline's Morello cherries are ready to harvest and we have 9 pairs of hands to prepare them, we picked them and turned them into jam.




Yesterday I made a batch and turned it into Cherry Juice and some jam.

Although I never use straws to drink from, I have found that the dried chives stalks that I was pulling out were perfect biodegradable straws!

  

Wednesday - Dolmehs and creamy courgette soup (all gluten free)

After a very successful dolmas making session last week with the Monday group, I have been asked to have a repeat. This time the stuffing is going to be with an Iranian slant. I would like to thank Simin for her recipe as it turned out delicious.

Yesterday I went to my garden in Garden Walk and picked 50 vine leaves, about as big as a lady's palm of her hand. I let it sit in a brine until this morning.  I rinsed and dried them for use today.

We had a very large group 9 of us, we also went out to pick the vine leaves from our opposite neighbour. A 2 minute job that turned into some delicious food.

Ingredients:  1/2 cup rice (I use basmati rice); 2 table spoons of split peas; 3 T.S of chopped parsley; 1 T.S of mint (of course fresh ones); 2 T.S sultanas; sundried tomato and tomato puree; 1 big onion; turmeric; salt and pepper.  You can use more parsley if you want to add them to the juice at the end.

Boil the rice and the split peas together.  Make sure they don't become mushy. There shouldn't be any water left.  When cooled down a bit add the herbs and sultanas plus tomato puree and other spices. When completely mixed put a portion of a large tea spoon inside the leaf.  Wrap them and put them one by one in the saucepan.  We had 2 layers in the pan.  At the end add about 1/2 glass of stock and some olive oil, put a lid over the pan and let them cook for about 15 minutes. 

Chop the onion finely and fry it in a frying pan with some olive oil.  

When the colour starts to change add a tea spoon of turmeric add to all the other ingredients and use as stuffing of the leaves.

With the courgettes ready to harvest we made a vegan,creamy gluten free soup served with a slice of toast. This was a wonderfully tasty and easy recipe

Kale is ready

The kale is looking beautiful so thought we could make some Kale Patties with some new potatoes and a green salad with strawberries and feta cheese.
Rather than quinoa I am using couscous.

The pesto we made from rocket that was growing in the garden underneath the apricot tree. It got a little tough and has gone into flower  so a good trim gives it space to grow some tender leaves over the coming weeks.


With the Monday group we harvested new potatoes but the ones we did not need I stored in a large plant pot with soil, We dug these up and had with our Kale burger. When we harvested all the lettuces from the garden to make space for the new french beans  we noticed that the ones we sowed in March were now beginning to be ready so we shared them amongst ourselves. One each! they were worth it though.


We  also harvested the lettuce and some strawberries.  Yummy for in the salad as well as the strawberry icecream with only 2 ingredients

From Spade to Plate

Bank Holiday Monday: From Spade to Plate

We had a full house today. It was great as the swiss chard had bolted and therefore in need of removing and making space for the next crop.

freshly harvested chard

I decided to make a cream of spinach soup with some garlic bread (only a couple of ingredients)
This basic bread recipe is quick and easy and is the basis for pretzels, pizza base and bagels as well.

Terry washing the Chard

For our main meal we made Swiss Chard with chickpeas and cousous.

A hive of activity

For dessert we made a rhubarb muffin

Chopping the rhubarb