Apples! They be everywhere. Red ones, yellow ones, green ones. Big and small. Round and wonky. Crunchy and soft.
There’s only so many we can eat. Time to get creative, and try out the fancy new steam juicer while we’re at it… Read More
I feel a little bit guilty about this. I am a committed Vacola preserver, like my mother before me, and her mother before her. We don’t can, we preserve. What is this pressure canning thing anyway?
Autumn is about preserving the harvest. Autumn contains many large and bubbling vacola units, and results in beautiful preserved fruit and food. But now we seem to have gone over to the dark side of the force. And I think I’m glad we did. Read More
Damsons are a much-loved preserving variety of plum, and with good reason. They’re intensely beautiful with their indigo skins and pale bloom, and their astringency means that the jam they make is divine.
I was at Allsun Farm this week hosting our autumn Organic Market Garden Masterclass, and the damson tree by the back door was ready to drop. Time for a jam session, alongside the weekend’s action of growing new growers. Read More
The peaches growing out the back of the homestead are grown from cuttings of an ancient peach tree that Nick’s parents found when they bought Kirwin, the property next door to Milkwood Farm. So technically, these peaches could be said to be from a 120 year old tree.
Whatever their vintage, they grow like no other fruit trees around here. And chips off the old block (or tree) are good enough for us… Read More
It was bound to happen. The beautiful insanity that is tomato season on a small farm. Big ones, little ones, fat ones, skinny ones. We’re eating them with breakfast and we’re eating them with dinner. Plenty of preserving happening, too.
This year, it’s passata, diced tomatoes and roast tomatoes in the vacola preserving jars. Experiments are afoot for lacto-fermented tomato sauce also. Read More
As promised, here is Rose’s nitrate-free, home made way of making bacon from scratch.
I say ‘way’ rather than ‘recipe’ because it’s still in development in terms of quantities. But if you too are a tinkerer rather than a straight-up recipe follower, then come on down and join us in the glorious land of home made, DIY, no nasties, bacony goodness. Read More
The red cabbage sauerkraut that Rose made recently is a beautiful thing, and we’re consuming it daily. It’s sour and it’s crunchy, and it’s complimenting many a meal here at the farm this spring, from potato curries through to our first home-grown roast pork dinner last weekend… here’s the last of the good stuff, moved out of the crockpot and into a jar in the fridge. What’s next for the crockpot? Hmm. Anyone tried Cima di Rapa ferments?
How to make the most of the late brassica harvest? Sauerkraut! Fermented cabbage is a hard thing not to love. It’s spicy and it’s sour and it looks beautiful too, especially made with your own red cabbages.
The cabbage harvest was not what we’d hoped for, with lots of half-headed cabbages that were obviously perfect for… something. So when in doubt, sauerkraut. Because ferment takes any vegetable and makes it better. Read More
Labneh is a very easy to make and tasty cheese made of strained yoghurt, that can be stored in a jar of olive oil on the shelf. Cheese meets yoghurt meets olive oil meets extends shelf life (without refrigeration). And darn yummy. I’m in! Read More
Now that Autumn’s here, our woolshed is bedecked in produce and garlands… brown onions, red onions, preserves, pickles and all the rest. And it turns out (fortunately) that stringing onions into a garland is actually quite easy. Read More
