TARRAGON & THYME

Today would have been my darling dad's 81st birthday and June 1st would have been my Nans.  Happy birthday to you both and I hope you are having a jolly old good knees up to celebrate! I have  chicken roasting in the oven for tea with pigs in blankets, roasties, broccoli, carrots cauliflower and peas with lashings of gravy.  It will not be long before it is ready. Its been cold here today and miserable most of the day but typical it has now brightened up a bit. On a positive note we do need the rain but it incapacitates me quite severely when it is damp as I stiffen up.  I also know when its going to rain - stick me on a wall hook and I would make a very good barometer! Lots of things have happened over the past few days which will be revealed over the coming posts and it looks as though I am going to be on a steep learning curve.  What I will say straight away though is that I do need a much larger pantry than I have at the moment. It does look as though ...

Over the years I have managed to accumulate a fair amount of preserving jars (a few have also been broken along the way) but one thing that really bugs me is not being able to use a jar because you can no longer get the consumables to use with it or those said consumables become so expensive it prices them right out of you price zone and they then stand dormant, hidden in a box or cupboard out of the way.  The more so now I am bottling more and more items. That's when I started experimenting with other closures and in fact have used Leifheit seals and rings for some of my original dual purpose Kilner jars and they have worked perfectly well.  There are also cheaper jars out there with plain gold seals that work just as well.  It is just a matter of trying things and being sensible about such choices in the process. However if you have more bottles that you cannot get closures for then it is well worth contacting "The Kilner Jar Man" at  http://www.preserving...

I always remember lavender from the early days of my childhood as my mother had a big bush of it in the garden.  The smell to me is evocative then of what seemed for ever long summers, being out in the sun bare legged enjoying the freedom to roam and be children.  But it is also a "clean" refreshing smell a comforting smell - warm days, long nights - scented gardens . I love the scent of this old fashioned long-lived aroma that makes my undie drawer smell lovely each time I open the drawer.  I have some lavender sachets in there made to pretty up as well as make the linen smell lovely. A girlie girl thing which started when I was a little girl at junior school where we were each taught to make a mother's day present for our mothers.   A simple heart lavender sachet made of various fabrics (mine was made of distinctive green taffeta and then edged with pretty white lace - I believe it was some fabric left over from my mother's 21st birthday dress). ...

I love cherry tomatoes as does OH.  I am pretty partial to the plum tomatoes as well.  I happened at dinner time yesterday to pop by the market to see what was available and I found cherry tomatoes at £1 a net at least 2 1/2 times the size of the punnets you get and I also found plum tomatoes at £1 a kilo.  Our household uses a lot of tomatoes during the year and for the past few years I have popped up at least 20 bottles of home oven roast tomato sauce which can be used as a base for pizzas, lasagne, bolognese or even popped into a stew, or used as a soup base, but in any event we use a lot of tomato products.  In previous years I have also frozen cherry tomatoes and then served them up with Sunday breakfast (fry up) frozen straight into the pan and they are delicious. I do not have a pressure canner  I do have a pressure cooker which is not the same thing but it can be used for processing the tomatoes, alernatively  you can hot water bath process tom...

Or maybe that should be things do not go quite right at all.   First, apologies for my absence I have been having IT issues which now seem, to be resolving themselves a little although there are still a couple of more things to sort - like my pictures.  I need to sort out my photo albums and get them copied to then free up more space on the computer and my phone.  I just need a nice run of time to sit down and work through them -  time which I do not have at the moment, and as a result photos are likely to be scarce on here until I can. The photos are there they just will not download so it is something for me to sort out in the coming weeks and then attach later on. Then there was the rhubarb fiasco - well nearly a fiasco - I had prepared the rhubarb in readiness for bottling and spending an evening dreaming, stirring, bottling and processing to put this much under-rated ingredient onto my pantry shelf for rhubarb crumble,rhubarb cheesecake and for use with...

Whilst I have been absent I have been working away at my knitted square blanket which consists of squares knitted in different shades of lilacs and purples and white.  It is not perfect but it is a first blanket for me and knitted.  Crochet I have no problem with but knitting I get very bored with even though I love and appreciate knitted patterns. I am just not patient enough. I have spent most of my free time in the evenings stitching up this blanket.  It is a little bigger than I envisaged but it is snuggly and will be ideal to cuddle under on  a cooler day.  To finish it off I just need to knit the edging which I have already started and then when it is finished stitched on then my UFO will be completed and that will be another one that bites the dust. Still have plenty more to go though. Unfortunately I am having technical issues in downloading the photos I have taken but I will add these in at a later date.  The photos below are the start of th...

 I received a lovely email from Rebecca and just thought I would share.     Hi, I just thought I would send you an email to let you know how much I love reading your blog.   It has been an inspiration to me, I have started at the beginning and am upto jan 2013.  I hope you continue to write your wonderful posts as they bring joy and peace to my day. I tried to log onto blogger to leave a comment,  but it wouldn't let me.  Kind regards,  Rebecca X Rebecca hello and welcome I am glad that my "ramblings" are inspiring you.  Often it is posts from other bloggers that inspire me to do or write something or even try something.I am sorry that Blogger would not let you post - On checking I think that the settings are okay but if you have or if anyone else has problems let me know and I will look into this in more depth.   Writing this blog is a form of self-expression  and release for me - my take on things if...

For those of you not in the know I really am passionate about preserving in all its different formats. I refer to all the preserves that I make through the year as the "Put Down".  I have done for years since I was 19 when I started off with Pickled Onions in a big old sweetie jar.  Things have stalled a bit on the preserves front recently  mostly because I had been concentrating on the freezer.  That is now chock a bloc and has all sorts of goodies stuck within it.  However I want to get back into the swing of  preserving things again as it seems ages since I got stuck in . To kick start this operation I have bought a very large box of Rhubarb about 10lb (could be more) from the greengrocers.  It is destined to be bottled in syrup for the winter months, some chutney and a few jars of jam.  .  OH will be going fishing again soon so I may well take advantage of that time alone to get stuck in and sort out what I want to "Put Down" for th...

There is a little forum that I have belonged to on and off over the past 8 years or so maybe more and its where I started out with like minded ladies and gentleman learning to do different stuff at home and sharing their experiences and most importantly helping others with practical guidance and some very good recipes. It is very friendly and a lot of long running Internet friendships have been formed as a result of this little forum. I learned to make Mincemeat and how to bottle fruits from this group of ladies and figuratively speaking I think you will find it a win win situation.  Excuse the pun but I think you will find that everyone has something to bring to the table.  It is a members forum so if after you have had a peek you like what you see join up. Do go and take a peek I think you will be pleasantly surprised. They are located here:   http://homeandhearth.myfreeforum.org/index.php Pattypan Catch you later x

Its my birthday today and so far I have just been chilling and it has been a really relaxed day.   I am 28 again for the second time around. So far it has been chucking it down with rain but it looks like the sun is trying to come out. Yay the sun has got his hat on. I have had flowers lots of them: Chocolates Perfume Lots of Cards Scratch cards from my stepdaughter  - and I have won a fiver. Lots of lovely messages on Facebook. And the really big news is that I think I will be getting the Excalibur Dehydrator that I have had my eye on for over 5 years next month.  Whoopee yay.   Good things do come to those that wait! http://www.ukjuicers.com/excalibur-9-tray-dehydrator-with-timer-black-clear-door And Cake From my darling mother who has gone to the effort of making me a cake even though she is not always too steady on her pins, due to back problems and arthritis.  Mum has always made cake for us since we were little.  She makes a ...