Tag: chutney

Posted in Friesland Farm

RIP HRH Queen Elizabeth II 😔

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Tuesday 6th September 2022: I didn’t blog yesterday as I was still at Sam and Luke’s looking after the children until around 6pm, I called in to see Charlie, Macca and Oscar on the way home. We eventually got back in time to get some dinner on, John did the birds and the egg collecting and then an evening of sitting down. It is getting dark much earlier now but I quite like that, it means you actually get some time off rather than continually working. We have one heck of a storm last night, thunder so loud and plenty of lightening to go with it plus very heavy rain, I am not complying I love a good storm plus I am loving the rain 🥰 I was watching the live lightening strike map as it was going on and it covered a huge area of Europe as well as the UK, thousands of strikes, incredible.

This morning we got up and down the usual jobs, John went off to work and I went out into the greenhouse to plant up some plants and sow some seeds. The plants are from the rudbeckia I have already growing, they send out runners under ground and then little plantlets appear, I dug those up the other day put them in some water and this morning potted them up, they will probably go out for sale once established. Then it was onto sowing some ‘snaps’ snapdragon or antirrhinum in various colours, also some white marigolds and a few cornflowers. All in seed trays to bring on over winter, I have still got plenty to direct sow as well. I tidied up the greenhouse a little while I was in there and then inside to do a bit of paperwork. The rain has started again lol same old thing, once it starts…..

The looming energy crisis is a hot topic at the minute and I am trying to look at all angles to see how well we will do. Financially we will manage but that doesn’t mean to say that we shouldn’t be doing all we can to keep the costs down. I read that many people are batch cooking now before the costs go up so that they can just reheat food which makes a lot of sense. I have thought a lot about how I will be doing g the cooking as the oven uses a lot of electric to heat up so slow cooker, microwave and induction hob will be used as much as possible instead. Potentially two slow cookers, one for dinner, one for pudding 😁 they use only as much energy as a light bulb so it makes sense to cook that way. Tiered steamer pans are also a great saver as are microwave steam bags, they work brilliantly. One of the problems that has caught my attention is the possibility of blackouts, this might seems very 1970’s (to anyone old enough to remember the strikes) but the UK producers approx 40% of its energy needs, 30% is bought from Norway. That leaves a shortfall of 30% that we will have to buy from other sources, the problem is that because of the Russian pipelines being closed, all other countries that need it will also be trying to buy it from elsewhere. Two potential problems arise, a price bidding war and a shortage. Europe has already warned of potential blackouts, our government has not but the energy sector is talking about it and so it makes sense to prepare. If the preparations are not needed it doesn’t matter but if they are then I am ready for it. To be fair when we switched over to all electric I prepared then because we do have at least 5 power cuts every winter 🙄 so I bought a small camping gas stove and canisters so that we could still boil a kettle and cook something warming. I do have battery powered lights we can use indoors and we have always have powerful torches for use outside if needed. I just need to make sure we have our thermals to hand and some big blankets 😂 you never know when you will need them 🤪 We have thermal door curtains already which come out in the colder months but I am thinking of getting thermal curtain linings or some material to make some for the the bedroom windows, I figure every little will help this year but in all honesty it’s probably something we should have already been doing before.

I sat down for a couple of hours at lunchtime and got a few things done that made me feel productive, it’s raining outside so might as well get on inside. I looked up thermal curtains etc but in the end I decided to order the material and make the linings myself 🤪 as if I don’t have enough jobs on the to do list already. I did a few bits of paperwork, I say paperwork it’s mostly digital these days but they are done ✔️ I ordered a rug for the spare room, the floor really needs doing in there but I doubt we will get it done before winter so a rug will help with any draughts hopefully. I also ordered a second slow cooker, I a, definitely going down this route lol. I need to write John a list of winter ready jobs, mostly just small ones but they will make a difference

Wednesday: A sunny start so I got the morning jobs done and then out into the garden. First job was to cut flowers for my weekly customers flowers and then into the small tunnel to do plenty of cutting back. Some of the cosmos was beginning to get powdery mildew so I cut them right back and removed the foliage, the flowers went into my collecting bucket and will be used for jam jar flowers. Then onto the big tunnel where I did much the same, though there is no mildew in there the plants were getting big and flopping over onto other plants. I watered the cucumbers and peppers plus fed and watered the flowers and then picked lbs and lbs of tomatoes 😂 plus courgettes, peppers and cucumbers. Inside then to sort all the produce out, weigh it and put some of it out for sale. Then whizz up the tomato sauce I made in the slow cooker yesterday and bag it ready to go in the freezer. Sit down at 1pm for a rest, the heavens opened and right at this minute there is a heavy downpour. It hasn’t really stopped since the drought was broken by the first lot of rain 😂 it is a doubled edged sword because we really need the rain but it would be good to have a dry day inbetween so I can get stuff done. I did also put 200, yes 200 ranunculus tubers to soak, what was I thinking, 200 🤪 I have to find somewhere to plant all of those 😝

Thursday: Last night I went to flower club, totally got my weeks mixed up, not surprising really, I thought it was last week but no it was this week. It was competition week and at 6pm I did think is there anything I can do in the next hour to submit, in the end I thought nope just leave it this time 🤪 John dropped me off as he always does, he went round to Shelley’s to drop off some tomatoes and stopped for a cuppa. He made his way back to ours at dusk, he turned into the downs road which is the lane that connects to ours (about 2 1/2 miles long) he had only driven a short distance along the lane when he thought, oh my god! A little way ahead of him he saw an animal come out of the hedge on one side of the lane, take two bounds and disappear into the hedge on the other side. This is not unusual as we regularly see deer, foxes, badgers, owls, rabbits etc but this appeared to be a big cat 😯 Sadly we don’t have a dash cam but he said it was as tall as an Alsatian, long in the body, black and had the unmistakable rear end of a cat. There have been several sightings in the area over the past couple of months and I have heard first hand from someone else who has seen it in their paddock a few miles from us 🙄 He drove down the lane on the way to collect me later and then we both drove down together on the way home but no more sightings. Internet chatter suggests that because of the drought there have been far more sightings than usual throughout the country, I guess they were looking for water just like all the other wild animals, I may put the wildlife camera up and see what we get.

This morning I have been busy in the kitchen and doing the washing line Hokey Cokey, each time I put it out it rains so I get it back in, at the minute I have given up 😂 I have done a fair bit of batch cooking, I bought a second slow cooker so that I can have two lots going at the same time. Today I have mince,veg and potato in one and I have a spag Bol sauce in the other, that was bulked out with mushrooms, peppers and a tin of salad beans and I used the sauce I made yesterday. Johns was bulked out with plenty of veg including spinach and half a tin of baked beans I opened last night for dinner. Each batch had half a portion of mince in and I think I will get around 5/6 portions from the mince meal and 4/5 portions from the spag Bol meal. Apart from what we eat tonight the rest will be batched and labelled and into the freezer for another day. I then peeled and chopped a load of cooking apples and stewed those down with some blackberries and sugar and I made up a batch of crumble topping. The topping I pre cooked spread out on oven trays and then once the apple mix was cooled and batched up I sprinkled the crumble mix on top. My thinking behind this is that I will be able to get those out of the freezer and because it’s precooked it will only need reheating, saving me time, energy and money. While I did have the oven on to toast the topping I also made a cake and cooked that as well which will also be frozen until needed. I made a batch of chutney with the tomatoes and apples as I have plenty of those, a couple of courgettes some wrinkly grapes, brown sugar, malt vinegar, chopped ginger, onions and some mixed spice went into the mix as well 😁 The cake was a bit of a use it up cake, I had some caramel sauce to use up so I made up a general mix without sugar, added the sauce and some apples and it appears to have baked well, hopefully it will taste ok too. We are not really in the position where we will be worrying about the energy bill too much (I may spit feathers when I see the next bill mind you) but I love a challenge and we should all be more energy conscious no matter what the price of it is shouldn’t we? So I am aiming to trim the costs however I can and batch cooking and baking is definitely one way of doing it. Having two slow cookers is something I should have done years ago I think 😂 because John and I eat totally different things it is much easier to do big batches for each of us at the same time. The above is one example but I am also thinking that while John loves a good stew I prefer a curry or korma so I can do both now plus once it’s all prepped and in I have the rest of the day to get on with other things 🥰

Tomato and apple chutney 🥰

As I sit down to type this up, our Queen has been taken ill and they are concerned for her health, the family is travelling to Balmoral to see her so it’s not looking good. I think even people who are not royalists nevertheless have a deep respect for Her Majesty, for her total dedication to a position she didn’t expect to inherit and one that she has unfalteringly carried out through thick and thin all these years.

Early evening we had the news that we hoped wasn’t coming but in reality we knew it was 😢 HRH Queen Elizabeth II has died peacefully at Balmoral Castle. That is the end of an era, the 2nd Elizabethan Era, it’s pretty profound, we have a new King, King Charles III. The devotion and dedication that The Queen gave to the position that she held was unfaltering and that alone deserves huge respect, what an incredible woman, dignified and constant, a great example to us all. RIP Your Majesty, you will be deeply missed not only by your family but by millions of people around the world. Long Live The King 🇬🇧

Friday: I still feel pretty emotional this morning, it is just sinking in, the magnitude of the event on our historic timeline. When I started blogging it was to diarise the events of our life in a new adventure on a Smallholding, the good things that happened and the bad. Over the years it has included major world events and so it really has become a snapshot of life in the 21st century.

This morning I cut some flowers for jam jars later today, it was drizzling, the rain hasn’t really stopped since last Thursdays break in the drought conditions 😂 The poor flower heads are hoping for a dry day tomorrow as we are forecast sharp showers today and more often than not this week they have come with thunder and lightening. You couldn’t write this stuff, months of no rain, burning temperatures and then straight into torrential downpours and storms 🤷‍♀️

I batched up and got everything in the freezer, I also made a bath of dumplings yesterday which I open froze and they have now gone into a bag to use whenever we have a good stew. Stews and soups are a staple over the winter for us, they are wholesome and warming plus cooking in the slow cooker means I can get on with other things.

Saturday: I spent a lot of the day with my apple picker getting cooking apples from the tree, there are so many 😂 I have been giving plenty of them away. Shelley came over with Josh and Flo and we picked some blackberries and then after they left I went and picked a whole load more. There are loads down in the back paddock and it was so peaceful and quiet, I just have to do something with them all now. I also want to get some elderberries picked and some rose hips to make the syrups which are great for winter, rose hip for coughs and sore throats, elderberries for colds and boosting energy.

Sunday: More picking today, eating apples and pears today as well as digging up some carrots and collecting a few more mulberries. Mum and Ken came over with bags to pick elderberries, I sent them in the direction of the blackberries as well, they also went home with windfall pears, cooking apples and some carrots. Charlie and Macca called in with Oscar, they had been out blackberry picking so I also sent them down to the paddock to get more blackberries and elderberries. To add to their haul were carrots and beetroot that Charlotte had sown back in the summer and they also had some pears and cooking apples. It’s a fabulous time of year and there is plenty to go round, I have been giving away loads of cooking apples but I still have more than I really know what to do with or indeed have time to process. Tomorrow I have pears, cooking apples and carrots to either process for freezing or wrapping for storing, I also want to get some batch cooking done in the slow cookers, chicken this time. John meanwhile has been digging up the ground 🙄 the IBC tanks won’t fit how we would have liked them to so we have had to rethink. While he was exploring his options he decided to re-route the drainage pipe that runs a cross the back of the hard standing. It makes sense because it collects run off rain water and goes off at a 45 degree angle, when it gets blocked this makes it difficult to rod so he decided to straighten it which meant digging out the concrete. For someone who complains about the amount of jobs there are to do he has done a great job of making himself more work 😂

It’s the end of another week but not just any old week, in just one week we have had a wedding, a new Prime Minister, a big cat sighting, the death of The Queen and a new King on the Throne. The mood of the country is double edged. Sorrow for the loss of a very much loved Sovereign who did her duty with total dedication for 70 years and was working right up to the end of her 96 years. Relief and happiness that King Charles III has taken up his rightful position. I don’t know about anyone else but that time in between the announcement of the Queens passing and the address to the nation from King Charles seemed very strange, almost as if I needed to see him to know all would be well and that someone was at the helm of the realm. It would take a whole blog on its own for me to explain how I feel about having a Monarchy, I know not everyone is as enthusiastic but for me it’s a rich tapestry of intricately woven threads forming a scene over hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years. The traditions, protocol and ceremonies are so old they seem archaic but I like that, it’s some of those rich threads forming a links with the past. I think there are a few Royals at the forefront that are fantastic ambassadors for our country and do far more good than harm. And then there are those who are either completely stupid or self obsessed and don’t have the grace and dignity it takes 🙄 I feel that generally the country is behind King Charles and wishing him the best at such a time of loss, I know I certainly am 🥰 As we leave the second Elizabethan age and move into the Carolean age we can look back with fondness and look forward with hope and what could be better than that?

Have a lovely week x

Posted in Friesland Farm

Winter preparations, Chutney & Sustainable Flower arranging 💐

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Monday 4th Nov: It rained in the night, it woke me up so must have been heavy at some point. The ground underfoot quickly goes from dry to a bit of a mud bath and, except for when it’s freezing, I don’t expect that to clear now until next Spring 😏

I got on with the morning feeding and then straight on with drawing and dressing (Sally Stewart 😜) the cockerels we dispatched and plucked yesterday. By 10.15 I had all three done, two in the freezer, one ready for roasting later, all the cloths and apron in the washing machine on a hot cycle, the utensils all washed on hot soapy water and the entrails in the incinerator. The necks, feet, heart and liver are cooking in the oven for the cats and dogs so nothing is wasted apart from the intestines, lungs, kidneys and gizzard, the first two are no good any way and the dogs won’t eat the other two. Previously I have kept the chicken livers for pate but I still have some in the freezer so the dogs can have these. Tonight we will have roast chicken, potatoes and vegetables, the whole lot will have been grown on the farm with almost a zero carbon footprint, I say almost because if I’m being purist things had to be delivered or transported here including feed for the birds so it’s ‘almost’.

Time for a coffee and sit down to watch a couple of videos on flower farming 😀 I reckon I have earned it. I watched that for about an hour and then had many more questions that needed a bit of researching lol.

I am planning on lift my dahlia bulbs and the freesias but I have to get the timing right for both of them, after the first two substantial frosts should be a good time. Normally I wouldn’t faff arse about with things like that but I want to move them from where they have been growing this year so lifting them is the only answer I think and besides having invested in the bulbs in the first place I really ought to try and keep them going each year. Most of the seeds I have collected are now dried and they will be stored in the spare room, it’s too damp through winter even in the greenhouse to keep them successfully but I have to put a notice up to remind myself where they are otherwise come spring I will be searching everywhere for them!

While I was busy on Saturday John installed a dog flap in the back door, we have a door to the boot room then a back door but we always had to leave the back door open for the dogs, now they have a lovely flap and I can keep the door shut 😀 it didn’t take them very long to work it out and I was hoping the cat would use it too be he has declined so far, he may get braver as the weather gets colder 😜

Reading through the previous blog that has been published those dratted ads are back, I’m very sorry about those they should not be there and I report each and every single one of them but somehow they manage to get back in, not sure how to get rid them entirely.

Tuesday: Morning rounds done and dusted, included this morning was the cleaning out of the duck shed 😏 a heavy mat of wet s**t is mostly what it is when it’s been raining like it has, all nice clean straw now but that won’t last long lol. On my way round I have shut the horses out of the big side paddock and at the moment they are in the small middle one but soon I will need to open up the large back one for them to use all winter. The ground gets poached very quickly when the rain is constant and this year is no exception, I’m slipping around in sloppy mud already, we have been trying to devise ways of getting the hens off the paddocks and maybe keeping them in the spare stables over winter but as I said to John they will just be all over my veg garden. We agreed that maybe a six foot fence around the veg area might be the best option however the logistics of doing that are complicated lol.

I did a good mornings work outside, not on the jobs I had intended to do as is often the way lol, I went into the big tunnel and decided that it needed tidying and sorting out. Last spring I used it for growing seedlings as the old greenhouse was gone and the new not finished. Most of the stuff had been moved out long since but there was still quite a lot left in there, plus I needed to get to the plants that now all resemble triffids and cut them back, pull them up or cosset them for winter temps. I grew cape gooseberries and the plants are huge and sprawling, plenty of flowers lots of fruit but none of them ripening 😏 I have cut them all back and left it on the ground to see if the fruit will ripen at all, I don’t hold out much hope, the plants I will cosset and see if they make it through the winter. The same applies to the lemon verbena, it got swamped by the gooseberries but it’s still alive and so I cut it back and hopefully with extra bubble wrap it will last. I have some lemon grass and pepper plants which have also been given a bit of protection with bubble wrap. The ground I have put in some well rotted manure and covered with weed membrane for the winter, I don’t tend to use the big tunnel for winter crops as it is not as sheltered as the small one and so crops do better in there besides it’s quicker to get to when it’s blowing a hoolie or there is snow on the ground, I’m a keen gardener but there are limits and winds and the cold are mine 😜

I can’t seem to make a decision to save my life at the moment, is it an age thing or brain fog or just apathy, I’ve have no idea. We have had our sofas for about 25 years, one set has gone as that broke, the other is threadbare but structurally sound and I have one that was Shelleys she was getting rid of which is perfectly fine but doesn’t match the other one. I have patched up the covers as best I can and throws hide a multitude of sins but keep thinking about getting new ones, but then thinking, well actually there is nothing wrong with these really lol, shall I just get some new cushion covers? Then I look at the selection and can’t decide what colour or pattern or if I should bother at all, I’m all of a fuddle 😜 The problem isn’t that the original sofa has covers that come off and can be washed but they are not going to stand up to many more washes, I have used the cushion covers from the sofa that broke to patch it up but I’m running out of cushion covers 😂 First world problems and all that 🙄

I don’t know about you but I often don’t know what day it is either 🙄 all day today I keep thinking it’s Wednesday, I had to ask John this morning because I thought I had forgotten to take my meds yesterday but no it’s seems we are only on Tuesday so that ok.

I did a bit of hoovering in the afternoon, that’s when the whole sofa debate rose in my head, then got some dinner on, chicken casserole for John from the left over chicken yesterday and I have had a lentil and vegetable soup going on the slow cooker all day, smell great 😀 the sky is getting very dark luckily I lit the fire earlier too, looks like I might get a soaking when I do the afternoon feeding and egg collection 😔 I have left the turkeys in their pen today as yesterday no only did I have to get them back in from the driveway but they were impossible to round up come bed time, good job John arrived about half an hour of me trying although by that time I was swearing a lot 🤬

I feel very tired this afternoon, I mean absolutely washed out dead on my feet tired, I’m wondering if leaving the blood tests for two weeks was a bad idea and that my inflammation markers have soared or if I am just coming down with something, that’s the problem with the Lupus you can never see the wood for the trees 😜 I have instructed John to return with chocolate just in case it’s what I need 😂

Wednesday: It’s fresh this morning, not sure if there was a frost but it seemed cold enough however at 7am there was no sign of one? The morning rounds were pretty straight forward, go to feed room fill up buckets go round empty out and let out, collect any eggs already laid. Two out of the four chicken huts/pens are not let out straightaway, they are the one in the stable and the ones in the front paddock, because they have complete free range they tend to run off and scatter when they are let out which means they are not eating their feed which in turn means they won’t lay so they are confined until they have had sufficient time to eat their breakfast lol. It seems to be working with the front lot as the egg numbers are slowly going up but the stable lot are probably getting too old to be laying very many eggs, most of them are the retired lot, we don’t get rid of them when they are no longer productive they are just allowed to while away their days on the farm keeping bugs and grubs down, pooping and fertilising so I guess they are still earning their keep really 🙄 There are signs of rat activity in the stable block again, new holes have been excavated and there is an empty eggshell in an unused stable. I am reluctant to put poison down but sometimes you need to knock a problem on the head quickly and it seems like the best way. I have tried traps and not caught a single rat in them but I know when the poison disappears I will find a dead rat sooner or later. Placement of poison has to be done with care obviously, I generally pour it down the hole and then put some sort of cover such as a piece of wood or a large stone over it so that it can’t be seen by small birds. I have tried the black boxes that you often see but they mostly get ignored by the rats, this way is a quick removal of bait usually overnight it’s all gone. We are careful to make sure that chicken/duck feed is not left down overnight but I learnt the other day that rats actually drink a lot of water on a daily basis so it’s best not to leave water buckets full overnight either.

Rat activity

I decided not to have a hard day today lol, so I have been making chutney from the apples and tomatoes (that never ripened even in the dark) and the grapes I picked were still in the fridge and are now drying out slowly in the oven to make sultanas 😀 waste not want not 😜

I feel stressed this week and it’s only Wednesday 😜 not anything on the smallholding but lots of, fairly trivial, things and each day seems to bring a new stress factor with it building it up to a bigger stress ball. I’m doing the deep breathing exercises and even trying some meditation but so far I’m still feeling it 😏 and ‘it’ is a physical thing, could be to do with not being on the Lupus meds after all they were stopped abruptly and although they needed to be, it can’t be a good thing for my physiology can it?

Did a bit of online shopping for Christmas presents, better get started I guess lol.

Thursday: I have a fresh head on today Aunt Sally, just in case you are not familiar its from an old programme called Worzel Gummidge 😜 Onwards and upwards as they say.

It rained heavily overnight, I was walking around this morning on what felt like wet carpet, it’s squishy underfoot everywhere you go, the silver lining in this has to be that the reservoirs must be full if not overflowing. There are warnings of flooding over parts of the country, I’m not sure we have had so much rain this early in the Winter before and who knows what the remainder of the season will bring we just have to ride it out.

After doing the animals I potted up some plant that arrived yesterday, these don’t look in as good condition as the ones that arrived earlier and plug plants at this time of year in an I heated greenhouse are a bit of a risk but hopefully they will pull through.

My aim this morning is to do a bit of research on rat proof duck housing. The hens will lay up high if you give them a place to do it but the ducks lay on the floor as they are not as agile. This morning I have been into the stable where I put down the poison and I can see another duck egg pulled through a hole in the wall from the stable where the ducks are 🙄 the poison remains untouched so I’m wondering if it might be something else such as a stoat or weasel. Anyway if I can find a solution for the duck housing we might be able to save a few eggs.

I have been out and cleaned out the stable that the hens use and tried to give them more places to roost, still not sure what to do with the ducks 😏

We popped out in the evening to go a see Mum, my stepdad is doing ok after a small procedure and hopefully will be home at the weekend. On the way there we saw two big deer in the road but by the time I got my phone out to take a photo they had gone and on the way back we saw a badger crossing the road, plenty of wildlife around here lol.

Friday: I didn’t do much other than the normal stuff and prepping the dinner for later, I lit the Rayburn early as Sam and the kiddies came over in the afternoon and I didn’t want it to be cold.

Saturday: A very cold start to the day, that killing frost had arrived with a vengeance, we did the morning rounds and then John took me over to Daylesford Organic Farm where I spent a lovely morning learning about sustainable flower arrangements, foraging for foliage (both dead and alive) to make an informal arrangement along with some flowers that were provided. The flowers were imported from Holland mind you because there is not much in the way of lovely blooms at this time of year over here.

I kept thinking, what a pleasant way to spend my time doing this, I think I would like to do a lot more of it next year.

John meanwhile had been very busy, dropping me off, going to pick up feed, getting in wood, lighting the Rayburn and meeting someone who had come to buy the horse box, then coming back to pick me up at the end of the morning 😀 We decided to pop out for lunch and spend the afternoon in the warm watching the telly. The weather started off ok today but soon spiralled downwards with the constant rain and the cold, a vile day to be working outside so if it’s not necessary then don’t do it lol, much better indoors nice and cosy for the afternoon, until feeding time that is 😜

It’s mid evening and still raining, sometimes heavily, flooding is an issue in many parts of the country and I fear for the village we live in. Although we live up on the top of the hill the main part of the village is in the Shill valley with the brook running through and a very picturesque pond in the summer. There was some flood prevention installed a couple of years back but it can only do so much and the ground was already sodden as I mentioned earlier this week, I can only imagine they are all praying for it to stop raining 🙄

Sunday: Well it rained most of the night but had stopped by morning when it was cold but sunny. I was shocked at the amount of water we had standing in the paddock and out in the lane, it always does this after persistent rain and soon clears but I think that it’s bigger than I have ever seen it before. I checked with someone in the village first thing to see if it had flooded but the new flood defences seem to have done the job intended and held back the water thankfully. I have spotted and marked a spot where water appears to be coming up, I’m secretly hoping it’s a spring lol or at least a point where a bore hole would be most beneficial 🙄 We went out early to get some shopping and then called in to see Mum and Ken, he is home now and looking/feeling ok so that’s good news.