Tere

£24.99? *faints*

I love the kneading suggestion in the Reddit post about putting it in a bag and stomping all over it

Busy weekend gardening, and the Instant Pot came in handy for a couple of meals. Last week I roasted a chicken and the Aga was playing up because of the weather being so still, so the legs were a little more under than I liked, so we ate the breast and I saved the legs and wings for a stew. Skin stripped and chunked, stuffing added as well (!) I made an umami bomb stew with tomatoes, mushrooms, lots of garlic and the last of the anchoiade that Really needed using up, as well as some jack in the hedge, olives and a few other bits and bobs like the posh tomato ketchup I bought and hated so has been going into every tomato based thing I could think of. Slow cooker for a couple of hours then on to keep warm mode when I picked the hubby up from the station. No pics as it was basically orange mush but it ate really well. Sunday was even easier, defrosted something marked beef and mushroom ragout, sauteed it a little to bring it up to temperature then onto keep warm. While I sauteed I part microwaved some baking potatoes. Into the oven with them then back out for the last half hour of planting. Meant we could hold dinner while we both collapsed into a bath. The keep warm function is invaluable on its own - makes Friday nights and busy nights so much easier! Not exactly cooking per se but definitely helpful. And I do like that you can do so many different processes all in the one pot

Slight change of plan yesterday, we went to the local supermarket / garden centre for some compost and they had very reasonable fruit plants. Bought a morello cherry tree for a fiver that is perfect for cordon planting. Also bought 9 plants at three for a fiver, if they don't take we haven't lost very much. Plus a few other things at seven quid. So in the fruit cage we planted 3 early raspberries, a middle and a late raspberry, white currant redcurrant and black currant, a green gooseberry, a red gooseberry, a tayberry, a blueberry, and we have a couple of cranberries to plant next weekend. We did manage to plant the rhubarb, but the asparagus crowns are lurking for next weekend, tucked up safely in the barn, since poor light stopped play. I ache in places I didn't think were possible, but it's a good job jobbed

Spent the day in garden clear up and hauling well rotted manure to the new veg plots. 30 asparagus crowns to plant and 9 rhubarb to pot tomorrow. Busy day

I honestly didn't' try. He was punting this as easy sous vide to non owners, he was a bit bummed when he said hands up who has a water bath like the pros and my husband and I raised our paws. He joked about it at the signing :). My theory is that with a good cut of steak that is good enough for tartare he was relatively unworried about fluctuations. I've not seen the Heston version. If it works it is a good intro to low cooking imo

I did wonder if it was likely to be disgusting! Thanks

I'm no help here. It all tastes like sausage to me

You can eat soba in hot dishes as well. Both they and the udon noodles would be tasty, if not technically ramen.

I love spectating this thread. Cocktails are not my thing. Can anyone shed light on what's going on in the video here? (You can safely turn the sound off and it's fairly annoying). I am assuming relative densities but I am wondering what she is likely to be making?

That looks decent. Commercial ones are squarer to fit better into the roll! Note this Scottish butcher explicitly says it's the same recipe as their beef sausages just without the casing: http://www.macbeths.com/shop/charcuterie/sausages/lorne-sausage/

Sounds like Lorne sausage to me right enough. They taste sausagey Very similar to a British pork banger but not being in a casing and being sliced and then fried instead gives it a slightly different texture, firmer. I've never made them but the recipe looks fine at a casual stare. I defer to sausage makers though They are great in bread rolls. Hangover cure of champions with a fried egg on top. Almost as good as the killer combo of sliced haggis, black pudding, fried egg and HP sauce https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorne_sausage (I'm not Scots, but I lived for several years in Edinburgh).

Heh. No problems. At the time I just assumed translation fail as I had no idea there was a hawthorn with such big fruits. Definitely one to try in the fruit garden I think

In the meantime I will continue shooting stuff that looks like testicles, and not the canine kind... #reallynotafoodstylist What meat did you get off the pheasants? I am impressed it managed to make those pies What else was in them?

BonVivant, your pics are always so beautiful

Yes, exactly that! It was a lovely old lady who was selling her wares just outside the summer palace at Chengde. Right, now I really have to buy that tree It was in 1995 so it was almost certainly Chinese hawthorn. Thanks so much!

I was very wary of ramen when living in Japan and only ate it a couple of times - not that I am an unadventurous eater, far from it, but there was so much other delicious food to fill up on! Even the language school students I studied Japanese with were happy to try all sorts of lunch setto, and I'm not mad on ramen noodles, so it kind of passed me by. That said, some of these photos look absolutely yummy

I was an exchange student as a teenager for a year on the shores of Lake Champlain, so I know your winters are pretty vicious. Anything I plant has to be hardy down to -15 celsius just in case, so I am always looking out for hardy varieties! But not a patch on northern continental US and Canada, I'm sure. I'm designing a cut flower bed as well, I'm working on setting a couple of holiday lets up and cut flowers for there and the house would be fantastic. I suspect I have bought 5 years supply

It honestly sounds like they will be craving nothing more than a cup of tea and your company. If someone dropped in on me like that I'd make a pot of good tea and break out some nice shop bought biscuits to go with, and show them round, mugs in hand. My husband evaporates them so we usually have something sweet on hand like that. /Brit

Existing fruit: Unknown eating apple in the Golden Delicious vein that isn't a heavy cropper but then I'm not mad on apples anyway so fine. All form of crab apples and semi crab apples etc Elderberries Rowanberries Hawthornberries Hazels Wild damsons Sloes A big cooking / cider apple tree that is allegedly Bramley according to the national collection but looks nothing like the Bramley I ever saw. Given they lost the other apple we sent in to ID I am thinking someone made something up to save face. It cooks and presses well, anyway. The Bramley apple my father in law gave us and will sulk if not installed (we have a huge apple tree as it is, I am going to cordon train it in the least nice place as it doesn't really matter if it crops, although it does quite happily. Fig (Wild Turkey) in the ornamental garden that is being designed ATM. Amelanchier in the ornamental garden, hey free food! Quince in the ornamental garden, eater specified Current fruit wish list: Nashi pear - I adore these Other pear (same pollination cycle, Canadian pear or Williams de Chretien seems to be recommended) Chinese hawthorn now I know I need one Maybe a cooking plum, although we get plenty from our next door neighbour Medlar Ume plum for umeshu. Yum! Persimmon would be hilarious but I don't know if it's possible in our climate. Mulberry for two generations time Walnut for ditto Not all of these will fit in the 5 cordon spaces available so I need to prune or decide what's best just as a tree (mulberry for sure, and probably medlar). We have plenty of places to put trees so that's not a problem. We also managed to germinate a sweet chestnut from the tree over the valley last year so that should go into the ground soonish I think. Bushwise: Blackcurrants (although my neighbour gives me some too) Redcurrants Whitecurrants Gooseberries Japanese wineberry Raspberries Alpine strawberries Lots of research to do

Heh. We discovered two yellownecked mice having a wild orgy in our (wildly expensive) wild flower seed a few years back so yeah. They are all tucked up in a metal box file We also have some weird and wonderful things from the seed exchange, thinking about it. I forsee a line of All The Things in my future. Currently stalking fruit trees but that needs a great deal more thought and consideration being such a long term investment.

Yeah, you can make wine and jellies and stuff from the British one too, although I have never tried - it looks like a lot of work. Maybe one day, I have plenty on the land. Anyway, hopefully someone recognises what I'm talking about with the toffee hawthorn berries

They definitely weren't anything like the British hawthorn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crataegus_monogyna - the fruits were larger, not quite an inch round, about the size of a cherry tomato, and appeared to be hollow in the middle. I wonder if it was the fruits from this tree? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crataegus_pinnatifida - they look about the right size and colour? Goji berries appear to be a gigantic pain in the rear to grow in the UK and get to fruit. Maybe I should get one of these trees instead?

Not a dessert as such, but I had a delicious street food in Chengde many years ago. The lady (with help from the guide) described them as "Hawthorn berries" but I think they were probably goji berries, strung on a stick and covered with caramel like a toffee apple. Sweet / tart and yummy! I am going to try growing them anyway. I was also partial to the sesame coated sweet potato / taro toffees which cropped up in the banquets included on our package tour.

I did my seed order yesterday for our new veggie plot. I already had some freebie basic salad leaves. To that I've added a courgette and squash selection, carrot, parsnip, borlotti bean, dwarf french beans, runner beans, broad (fava) beans, peas, nasturtium (for the seeds to pickle), sunflowers (likewise and for cutting), leek, sweetcorn, sprouting broccoli, perpetual spinach, sorrel, coriander, basil, parsley, raab broccoli, and cornichons for pickling. I am sure I have ordered way too much but only one way to find out! I also ordered asparagus crowns for the asparagus bed and some rhubarb plants.