The last day of July down at the allotment

This afternoon we went to the allotment to finish digging over a bed, plant a couple of fruit bushes and water.  We enjoyed a nice cup of tea, made in our Kelly Kettle, and ate brownies.  It is so peaceful at the allotment, yet still a nice buzz with people tending their plants and harvesting their crops.

We don’t have much to harvest on ours, just a few months ago it was an overgrown wilderness of weeds, the result of neglect due to us planning our wedding.  Thankfully, we have started to get back on top of it.

The photo on the left was taken on 10th June, the photo on the right today, 31st July…

Portobello mushroom burger with garlic and goat’s cheese

For someone who loves his meat, I love that one of Mr Rigg’s favourite meals is mushroom burgers. 

This week we decided to make a summery version, with a little mayonnaise smeared on the sliced buns, the mushrooms grilled with a garlicky butter, then filled with blobs of soft goat’s cheese and a sprinkling of chives.  Finally they were topped with a handful of salad, including tiny nasturtium leaves.

Summer food – a green salad with edible flowers

One day I hope to make this meal again, with everything but the sausages grown in my garden or on our allotment.  I do believe that the best food is made with what’s available seasonally and from an idea of what it is you want to eat.

What started as a simple meal (and possibly one of our favourites), of grilled sausages, new potatoes and salad, turned into something a bit more interesting.  The sausages came from the fab new Kenyon Hall Farm Shop, the new potatoes were boiled and violently shaken with salty butter and lots of mint from the garden.

But it was the salad that became something far better, using up odds and ends from the garden and the fridge.  To a bowl I finely sliced spring onions, added a splash of white wine vinegar and some salt – I like to do this to take the edge off the onions.  Otherwise I find that all you can taste is onion.

Scrambled egg topped with crispy bacon, chive flowers and a warm tomato dressing

It has been ages since I last posted a recipe – as a result I can’t remember what I’ve been eating over the past few months and I don’t have the notes written down anywhere to recreate anything nice that we made.  Last night’s dinner was worth finding some time to sit down and share it with you – I could have eaten platefuls.

To start with, there was scrambled eggs on lightly toasted bread.  I like to make my scrambled eggs by melting butter in a pan, cracking in the eggs, letting them cook a little before breaking them up a bit, letting them cook some more, stirring, and so on.  This produces a scrambled egg with bits of white and yolk rather than just a uniform pale yellow version.

I also fried some pieces of streaky bacon, before using the same pan to whistle up a warm tomato dressing.  I didn’t tip away the bacon fat, instead I chopped up the tomatoes and tipped them into the hot fat, cooking them quickly so until they almost disintegrated.  To the tomatoes, I added salt and pepper, and a tiny splash of sherry vinegar.

So, to buttered toast I added the scrambled eggs and popped the crispy bacon bits on top.  Then I realised that I hadn’t stirred my chopped garden chives through the egg, so resolved to sprinkle them on to at the end.  I spooned over the warm tomato dressing, and topped it off with a good handful of chopped chives and purple chive flowers.

I just love the colours as well – it’s like summer on a plate.  This will be one version of scrambled eggs that I won’t be forgetting soon and will definitely make again.

Platefuls of homegrown raspberries, loganberries and strawberries

We are busy picking platefuls of raspberries, loganberries and strawberries from our garden.  The first of the raspberries appeared at the end of June, which seemed really early to me – anyone else finding that their raspberries are out earlier this year?

For all the cursing I do during the year about the raspberry canes that pop up in all the wrong places (like the middle of my raised veg beds!), and all the promises I make to pull out all of them over the winter, I can’t help but leave them when we get such a bounty during the summer.

The strawberries have all but disappeared from their original location (overtaken by the raspberries) but have sprung up in unlikely places.  If you pull back their parasol shaped leaves you discover lots of very sweet fruits – a wonderful surprise.

The loganberries are prolific growing over an archway, but I find if I don’t pick them in time many of them that still look ok have yucky little white maggot/caterpillas inside them – those ones go on the bird table.

We have too many raspberries and loganberries at the moment to eat, so I bung them in the freezer until a time when we have enough to maybe make some jam.  The strawberries are fewer so those we are eating.