Whooosh!!!

That's the noise I have heard here for the past few days. It has been so stormy here, I'm really glad I haven't put much of the greenhouse in place. My Dad and my husband very kindly built the base and frame up for me on Saturday. last step is to install the door and all the glass. No rush now to see if it improves weather wise in the next few days.

greenhouse update and a recipe!

My greenhouse has arrived!!!! Woo Hoo!!!!

It finally arrived in all it' s flat pack glory on Monday afternoon. Now all I have to do is get the blasted thing put together. This is not going to be fun, but at least I won't be doing it all by myself. My parents are coming down to give me a hand to start the put together process.

I'll try and remember to take some pictures as I go along to chart my progress :0)



Now for the recipe. It's one I came across yesterday while scouring the internet for inspiration on what to do with pork pieces for tea.


Butter Pork

You will need:

1lb pork pieces
1 pepper (capsicum) any colour
3 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tablespoon tomato purée ( I didn't have any left so I used ketchup and it tasted fine)
1/2 teaspoon each of ground coriander, ginger, chilli and fenugreek
1 onion finely diced
1 small tub cream (125mls)
1 large knob of butter, about 1 ounce
handful button mushrooms, whole if small or chunked if larger
2 spring onions finely chopped
Salt and Pepper



In a large pan (I used my wok for this) melt the knob of butter over medium heat and add a drizzle of oil to stop it burning.
Gently fry onion and garlic until soft
Meanwhile add spices to a plastic bag and place pork pieces in bag. Shake well to coat pork in spice mix. (I didn't have fenugreek in my store cupboard so I omitted this)
Add pork to pan and fry until browned.
Next add sliced up pepper and mushrooms, fry for a few minutes then add tomato purée.
Stir puree well into mix and allow to fry for another few minutes, stirring well to prevent sticking.
Finally add tub of cream to pan, reduce heat to low and simmer for 10 minutes until mixture is cooked through and sauce is slightly reduced.
Add salt and pepper to taste for seasoning.
Just before serving stir in a handful of finely chopped spring onion.

I served my pork with crushed baby potatoes which worked really well to soak up all the lovely sauce. You could used rice or cous cous to serve.

Greenhouse woes

I still haven't received my greenhouse. It was promised for delivery in January!!!!
I'm seriously behind now with all my seeds and I really don't know whether to start anything or not in case my greenhouse doesn't arrive. I have been told, allegedly, that it wioll be here for definite on Monday afternoon.
Yeah, right, I'll believe that when it is sitting in my back garden all nicely built and ready to receive some plants!!

Easy Oven Wheaten Bread

I took the notion to bake tonight. I had buttermilk in the fridge to use up, so little sprog and I made oven wheaten.


8oz plain flour
6oz wholemeal (this is the one I use)
2 - 3 oz sugar adjust to taste
3oz margarine
1/2 pint buttermilk
1 egg
1 heaped teaspoon baking soda
1 level teaspoon salt


mix all dry ingredients together
add margarine to dry ingredients and rub together until consistency of breadcrumbs
mix egg and buttermilk together
bind dry ingredients with egg mix using a fork until just sticky and no dry bits left in bowl
turn out onto a wholemeal floured board
shape into a round and place either in a round loose bottom cake tin or a silicone mould (I suppose you could use a loaf tin, but you might need to split the mix in two, I haven't tried this)

bake at 170oc - 180oc (depending on oven, mines a fan so I bake at 170oc) for 1 hour

great served with soups, casseroles, salads or equally as nice on it's own with butter jam and a cup of tea.


enjoy

Garden Planning for 2009

The time of year has come for me to start and sort my seeds out. Of course this year I'm incredibly disorganised. We've had nasty weather so I haven't been inclined to do much round the veg patch in way of preparation. Also I've been delayed as I'm waiting for my greenhouse to arrive!

Last year we built a greenhouse from scrap wood and a big roll of plastic.


My parents very kindly bought me a proper glass paned greenhouse for Christmas. It hasn't arrived yet and I'm not able to start work on the veggie patch until it is in place! *sigh*

Anyway, this year I plant to grow the following in my garden:
Chilli peppers - cayenne variety
Tomatoes - assorted some in the greenhouse and some tumblers in planters on the wall
Cut and come again salad leaves
Sweetcorn - F1 applause
Peas - little marvel and early onward
Sweet Basil
Flat leaf parsley
Turnip - purple top
Carrot - Nantes 2 and chantenay red
Leek - Lyon
Raspberry cane - Currently in a pot
Spinach
Rhubarb - Currently in a pot waiting to be sited for fruit next year
Alpine Strawberries - These were grown from seed last year and over wintered in my current greenhouse. we did how ever have 1 strawberry in November!!!!

I also have goji berries to try as well. I got these seeds fro free and I've never tried them, so I have no idea if they will do or not!!

This is what some of my plants looked like last year in process. However by the end of the season, the tomato plants had taken over. It was like day of the triffids every time you opened the door to go in!

This was my first pepper last year when it appeared on my plant!
The tomato plants last year before they took over the greenhouse:

I'm also aiming this year to try potatoes again. I won't however be growing them in bins as I did last year. It was too much effort for very little return. I'm sticking to growing them in the garden as they should be.

Of course how much I actually plant depends on how much space I have after my greenhouse is in place!

I'm a winner!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today I found out that I won a prize, woohoo!!

I won second place in a draw over on Adventures in Bentomaking

My prize is 20 packets of furikake, which is seasoning for rice balls. I can hardly wait, I'm so excited :0)

My entry was the picture is used on my blog on 25th February.

Many thanks to Pikko for holding the draw !

Spanish Omelette

Tonight I made a Spanish omelette from this recipe that I found. Oh my, it was really gorgeous! I have packed my bento lunch for tomorrow and I have some slices of the omelette packed with salad and a few other bits and bobs.

I'm quite looking forward to my lunch now!

On the boiled cake front, I have had to make another batch already! Eldest seems to have taken quite a shine to it, in fact she's even eating it for breakfast :0/ Oh well, I suppose there are worse things she could be eating, or I could be cooking away and no one would want to eat any of my food, now that would be horrendous!!

Curry night

Tonight we had a curry night , made using the recipe from Curry Queen HERE

I made the korma with beef pieces and made my own naan bread as detailed in the recipe.

Turned out pretty good, but I think I added too much red food dye to my pilau rice :0)