All in a weeks work

Since the wee bairns have been back at school, life has resumed it's normal pace once more. This involves a long list of things that needed doing yesterday. By the time I get around to stuff it has usually piled up to an alarming degree or in the case of produce become nothing better than pig fodder.
One sad event this week was the demise of my beautiful muscard squash. Alas it had wandered free from the confines of the veggie bed and chosen to grow within reach of the killer chickens. They reduced it to an obscure orange blob on the end of a stalk.

I have succesfully bottled and frozen all the roma and cherry tomatoes. They are now safely tucked away, although this does mean that we have no room left for the sausages and bacon this winter. Hmmmm...I feel the chest freezer may well become a priority this year!
I also bottled some fantastic peaches. We are blessed with the most amazing selection of peaches and nectarines in this region of France, the white peaches in particular are to die for. I just don't remember ever tasting anything quite so delicious in England. Peaches and nectarines do not ripen when picked green so you have to take advantage of the short season when they're ripe and overindulge, or ferret away what you can for a dark winters night, when you'll hear those golden orbs whispering your name from the back of the cupboard. Bizarrely enough I'm enjoying the anticipation of busting into a jar of preserved peaches more than eating them fresh right now.

I did a little experimentation with preserves this week too. A friend had given us a carrier bag full of grapes and we just couldn't get through them all. The wasps were unswervingly attracted and it was starting to annoy me. "Enough of this!" I cried and promptly looked up a recipe for grape jelly. Now I wasn't expecting much 'cos frankly the only grape jelly I've eaten has been in those little individual packets you get at B&B's to scrape on your cold, hard toast. And that stuff is insipid at best. But mine actually tastes pretty good. They were some very floral tasting muscat grapes to start with, but to add some interest I gently swirled a bunch of lemon thyme through the finished jelly until the flavour came through. Yum!

Alas, the blackberry season is almost at an end. Alex and I have doused many an american pancake in blackberry syrup this summer. The supply, even with the multitudes of bushes around us, just coudn't keep up with demand. I do have some blackberry and apple jam bottled but it's just not the same. Sigh.

The children have been unadventurous with my creations so far. Finn will devour any number of fresh blackberries as we pick them but won't eat anything made from them. He will also eat stewed apple pulp purchased in little plastic packets from the supermarket, but not eat mine. Alex thinks it's got something to do with the amount of sugar/corn syrup in the commercial ones. I find it a bit saddening that the kids are turning their nose up at the delicious fresh fare around us. As our diet widens and becomes as about as fresh as it could, with vegetables and fruit plucked and at the table in minutes, the kids diet seems to stay the same. A desire for white flour products, sugar and the minimum possible number of vitamins.

Next I have to find something to do with all those hazelnuts, which doesn't involve an oven, since all we have at the moment is two gas hobs to cook on. Hmmm....can you cook sweet biscuits on a griddle/pancake pan. I'll keep you posted.