Smashing pumpkins...

OK - now I know it seems this blog is turning into somewhat of a harvest festival, but I've just been out to cut the pumpkins now that the weather's turning colder and the mice are starting to nibble at things in the garden.

Anyway - we had an "accidental" pumpkin plant that grew in the polytunnel - probably from a discarded seed... who knows ?? But I didn't plant it. It bobbled along quite merrily under the tomatoes.

Et voilá !!!
Not bad for an unintentional plant.

I predict pumpkin, blue cheese and sage risotto, pumpkin soup and of course, the mandatory Hallowe'en lantern.

One year on....

Yes - today is the first anniversary of moving into this house. In lieu of a celebration, we spend the day in Dublin at a climbing competition with Ellie (9th out of 20 in the Under 16's males & females category)

Doesn't seem like a year, but then again, looking back on the things we've done in that time, it somehow seems a lot longer.

Anyway - talking about it in the car and none of us have any regrets about the move whatsoever. Which is worth a lot.

Tomato heaven

Better late than never we're experiencing our latest glut..... tomatoes.

Despite an attack of blight in the polytunnel, probably passed on from the potatoes, we've taken remedial action - remove and burn all affected foliage and fruits, and it seems to have worked.

Well judge for yourselves. This was one day's worth of picking. The yellow variety is called "Golden Sunrise" and is delightful


For a marvellous pasta sauce, lightly oil a roasting dish, halve a load of tomatoes and place in dish, cut side up. Spray or drizzle lightly with olive oil and sprinkle with coarse sea salt. Roast slowly in the bottom of a medium oven (about Gas 4) for a couple of hours (works best if you're cooking other things at the time as it does take a while) until the tomatoes look...well... dried out...
Blend with a food processor or similar.

You can experiment with adding cloves of garlic, chunks of onion to the roasting mix as well. Just don't add herbs till after cooking.

This freezes exceptionally well and when thawed, add herbs etc for a lovely pasta sauce, pizza topping, whatever you fancy.

Another recipe we love is Jamie Oliver's Mothership Tomato Salad.
Beautiful.