TARRAGON & THYME

I have managed to gather all my ingredients together to make my piccalilli now I have an evening to set to and prepare all the ingredients and salt them until tomorrow when I can finalise and bottle up. The recipe I use is here: piccalilli However before then we have this to eat.   I have prepared carrot onion and beef stew with dumplings.  I hope it tastes as good as it looks.  Not too sure on the dumplings! The photos were taken just after I had popped the dumplings in. Catch you soon. Pattypan x   

Now the colder evenings are coming upon us I have taken to having a nice hot drink between 8:00pm and 9:00pm.  Last night it was just plain Cadburys drinking chocolate in a mug with hot water and some lovely creamy milk, finished off with whipped cream and some soft miniature marshmallows.  Very naughty but I did so enjoy it.   It does us all good to enjoy a treat or two every now and then but during the colder months of the year in particular I love of an evening a nice hot drink of some sort of the other. It has become an autumn/fall custom for my little household.  Indeed, I first bought a very small slow cooker solely for the purposes of making mulled wine for myself in the run up to Christmas and over Christmas as OH does not drink it, so I think in many respects I am carrying on the story with this drink.   OH does not do spicing of any kind especially cinnamon.  Me I cannot get enough of the cinnamon.  I just love it.  So this evening'...

I met my friend for lunch today and then tootled off into town to pick up some bits and bobs that I needed or had on the wish list. I ended up buying a mixture of bulbs, narcissus, some grape hyacinths, some hyacinths, some snowdrops as I want to plant some planters up for a bit of colour come next spring.  I am also in the throes of drawing all sorts of items together for Christmas and some for next year with projects I hope to have a go at and the narcissus heads will be ideal for drying and using in a recipe for pot pourri I have come across. I intend to go back and have another look at what other bulbs they have so then it will be a matter of just putting up some planters for next spring.  I am paying it forward.  I have never done bulbs before.  I have been around them as my Nan and mum always used to do them but for me it will be an actual first at actually growing them. I have also bought myself a sealed pot for saving odds and sods probably for Chr...

I have started making lists of the things I hope to do before Christmas, in preparation for Christmas.  Whether or not I will get to do them all is another matter but the outline is there in my mind's eye.  Now just need to get to it whilst things are a little quieter before everything goes crazy.  I shall no doubt be adding to this list as time goes on.  This is as well as all the other stuff I have on the rumble as well.  I thought if I picked off a few items at a time I might actually work myself down the list a lot quicker as well as keeping on top of the other stuff I have in hand. Here goes: Crab apples for jelly and spiced crab apples Sloes for sloe gin and sloe chocolates and also for freezing. Dry bay leaves. Dry whole oranges and orange slices as well as clementines and clementine slices. These can be used in mulled wine as well as garlands, and making a drink and also decorating cards, wreaths, and parcels. Make gilded whole oranges. Dry l...

From blowing a hooley yesterday, today started off wet, wet, grey and then latterly the wind has got up again.  No wonder I have been a little stiff today. However silver linings come in all sorts of forms and today I have pootled on Pinterest a little and started to read some new to me blogs which is not a bad thing in the bigger scheme of things.  Trouble is I get thinking, plotting and planning and buying resources in to make stuff with.  One little thing leads to another as the saying goes.  This always happens when I have a deadline on other stuff! We have just walked Missy.  The other day I bought one of the ball cup throwers and she has gone mad for it even when we have finished throwing she is still pestering for us to throw it so she can play.  It was rough out with the wind and very fresh.  OH is warm and has the window open now but I am not very warm.  I think it is going to get a little colder yet. We have egg, bacon and sausa...

I am very smitten with the white poinsettia Christmas tree stocking as highlighted in my post of yesterday.  I have been looking for fabric in the right width to do both the stocking and also a Christmas tree skirt.  I like to match things where I can, but I have also been thinking Christmas presents, not necessarily for this year but probably for the start of next.  I have a step-daughter and daughter-in-law so maybe if I get my act together early enough next year this will be something that I can make for them both.  I liked the simplicity of the white poinsettia, reminding me of virgin snow, but there is no reason why you could not do the more traditional red poinsettia with green foliage and also add some additional beadwork. It got me thinking in any event and as I am an advocate of Pinterest as a living thinking ideas and how to do stuff board for me, I often post bits and bobs up on there even if I do not have the physical time to actually do the item the...

I have been looking for, for absolutely ages are suddenly coming to light despite  previous hunts for them coming up with nothing.  Funny that when you are doing a tidy up.   Last year I bought some threads and braids for Christmas decorations and when I wanted them could I find them.  Today they have been found together with all sorts of decorations, threads and kits. I had neatly put them all together in a box with like minded stuff and then had popped something completely different on top of them so that they could not be seen.   I am one of these people who puts things in a safe place and then cannot locate them when I need them.   NOTE TO SELF must be better organised. I have also come across a box of Christmas decorations, candles, lamps so they have been put out where I can find them.  I also came across some Bucilla Christmas felt kits that I had completely forgotten about.  I am going to revisit these in January as there i...