2012.01.14 My Day

After this morning'spost I eventually fell into my usual Saturday routine.  And I fell lucky at the Veg shop this morning.  I bought 4 baskets of lemons £1 each (4.5 kg in weight) and 3kg Seville Oranges at £1.32 kg (yay I have my Seville Oranges - yippee - I shall buy some more next week as well), two savoy cabbages for 50 pence, some sprouting broccoli and two baskets of tomatoes at £1 a basket (2kg in weight)  The veg and fruit is presented in big baskets but you bring them away in bags.  I still have some veg left over from last week ( and I have started keeping things like broccoli in my fridge to give it a longer shelf life) however I also have carrots, swede,  sweet potato, parsnip, broccoli and carrots as well as potatoes and onions and leeks as well as Brussels to use up yet (I bought them on the stem and keep it outside and we just go and pull a few as we want them), and  so we have plenty to eat  but at least this way I get to put down some serious stuff in the Put Down for this year.   Unfortunately she did not have any more limes, but is going to keep me in mind if she does as I have a delightful recipe for Orange and Lime Curd that I want to have a go at.

However I would have liked to have come away with some plums,  as she had some reduced to £1 a punnet that I could seriously have made use of i.e. bottling them, making jam, making plum sauce, freezing for puddings, making some prepared crumbles or tart etc.  For the most part I like to take advantage of seasonal produce, but come on lets get real you have to take advantage of whatever comes your way and if there is a special offer on something and you have the money in your pocket then you would be an idiot not to take advantage.  Its all about feeding the family as reasonably and cheaply as you can, but cheap doesn't have to mean inferior quality food;  far from it.  So from time to time I preserve items that are quite seasonally incorrect; I also don't have a set preserving season - I preserve in response as to what is available to me, but then one of the reasons  why I preserve is so that I can enjoy things out of season in any event. Years ago the housewife knew that if she did not squirrel away as much as she could during the months of plenty her family would not fare so well during the leaner months.  I am basically a country girl and as the saying goes "You can take the girl out of the country but you can't take the country out of the girl".  And how that girl wishes she was back in the countryside!  Its too noisy in the City although you do occasionally get some quiet.

What surprised me this morning is that no one had touched the lemons; is it me but I saw all sorts of possibilities stemming from the beautifully cheerful baskets of lemons.  Especially when they have recently in this area been as much as 40 pence per lemon.  Possibilities that I saw straight away were that   I could make some more lemon curd; lemon jelly, lemon marmalade, lemon syrup/cordial, lemon chutney, lemon vinegar, freezing squeezed lemon juice into ice cube trays so that when I need lemon juice for a recipe it is to hand. If I had of had some Vodka in I could have made a supply of home made Lemoncello but that will come in due course (unfortunately my preserve fund has nil in it at the moment, but it won't have before I am finished). Lemon Drizzle Cake, lemon ice cream and lemon sorbet.  Any peel can be salvaged for either making your own preserved peel or vinegar cleaner or dried to add to stews and casseroles these are just a few of the possibilities and I am sure there are many more that I have not covered.   So I have a lot to do as usual!  Just the depth that varies.

Tonight for tea we  are having home made stir fry.  I bought some prepared pork especially for stir fries last night together with a basic stir fry pack £3 in all to which I have added small bits of veg that would otherwise go to waste. Please see separate post on this.

I have also been busy pottering about looking for recipes  that I quite fancy having a go at for the Seville Oranges and also for the lemons. I have decided I am going into the kitchen tomorrow like I did last week and have a serious play.

We have roast chicken for tea tomorrow.

Its gone dreadfully cold again this evening and I am fretting as Demetri has not returned. I am hoping he is not going to be very long as it is very bitter outside it woudl seem that after the milder weather this week winter has truly arrived.  The frost has not lifted all day. We have been lucky in that the sun has been out but it hasn't got rid of the frost.

Please take care wherever you are and keep safe.

Catch up again soon

Pattypan

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