It has been a busy summer, one way and another, but there is always time for some baking, especially bread baking.
This was a wonderful walnut bread, it worked really well with cheese, but for a bread lover like me, it tasted good just as it was.
The wild plum trees in Owl Wood have been giving us a bumper crop. We have enjoyed them simply cooked and served with our lunchtime bowl of yogurt, sharp and delicious. They have added a fabulous shot of colour to many dishes, including this windfall apple and wild plum crumble, the crumble crust having the addition of chopped hazelnuts to add to the autumnal notes and goodness.
The barley fields have already been harvested and the straw baled, which means that the fields are vast and empty and we have the pleasure of roaming through them at leisure. It always feels like a summer holiday destination during this magical period which the grandchildren, dog, and I enjoy to the max!
We have just been along the old railway line and picked about a pound of blackberries. We acquired a number of nettle stings and scratches along the way, but that is all part of the fun. Frankie took her revenge by stomping on nettles, thereby forgetting the stings. Emergency field medicine, but it works.
Our next door neighbours have kindly brought round a(nother) bag of plums and a(nother)bag of windfall apples, which is fabulously generous of them, but we have reached the point where my smile becomes fixed and my heart despairs. I make, bake, pickle, share and pass on the fruit...and still it comes.
Right now I am busy dealing with a glut of huge and beautiful tomatoes and the courgettes have all decided to really kick in at the same time. Hedgerows are glistening with the deep, dark elderberries and the rosehips and hawthorne berries shine out like Christmas lights, all of this at the same time - oh, and let's not forget the sloes!
I am grateful, don't get me wrong, and it is a wonderful feeling to be able to put down so much food ready for the hard winter months...does all this bounty mean that we are going to have a really harsh winter?
In other news, although it, too, saw me chained to the kitchen stove for quite a while, we have just had the Annual Village Show. The committee numbers have diminished again, so have the number of helpers, but more of that another time.
The show was a success and it was wonderful to see people come into the hall, proudly bearing their cakes and bakes, fabulous flowers, and magnificent marrows, etc.
This cake was made by possibly our oldest village resident, it was her 'Summer Celebration Cake' all the decorations are made from rice paper. Makes me think of a pretty summer bonnet - tasted very good, too!
Herbs. flower arrangements, paintings, photographs, eggs, fruits and vegetables all helped to transform the hall, for a few hours.
The refreshment stall was filled with home bakes as well as tea and coffee. Once the hall filled up, after judging, I was too busy to take any more photographs but, trust me, it was full to overflowing and people sat outside at the tables and chairs we had provided, to drink tea and chat with old friends.
Now, I must get back to the kitchen and I may be some time.
x
This is all so refreshing and also comforting to read ... as if out of a Miss Read novel! The thought of all those wild foods, the rosehips and the wild plums positively made my townie mouth water! And the walnut bread looks wonderful. About time I had a bash at bread-making again!
ReplyDeleteMargaret P
I'm glad you enjoyed it, Margaret! I often feel that I have tumbled into a novel, but I am not complaining. It is a mostly gentle, Miss Read-type of experience, although there are definite undertones of Midsomer Murders at times. I hope you can find the time to do some bread-making, it is really just taking that first step.
DeleteWe are enjoying crumbles at the moment, all made with foraged and homegrown fruit. It has been such a busy time, harvesting and processing all that the allotment and foraging has provided. I am rather looking forward to the coming weeks and months where there is less work in the kitchen, which will allow more time for crafting... I have missed it and have itchy fingers.
ReplyDeleteSorry for the delay in replying - our weekend guests arrived and all was chaos! They are asleep now and won't surface for an hour or two... You just can't beat a good crumble, we eat lots of them in our household, Scarlet! Your allotment work is very productive, but then you do work very hard at it. I understand what you mean about itchy fingers. I need to begin thinking up things for the late November Bazaar, last year I made peg doll fairies. Not sure what I'll do this year, and then there are the three quilts which I am gradually getting assembled. I think we both like to keep busy. I'm looking forward to catching up on some blog reading too.
DeleteWonderful, that you put up so much of the summer bounty.
ReplyDeleteThe oldest member is still a marvelous baker. How lovely is her cake.
You make me tired, with all you do, during these summer months. Well, all the time. :-)))))
Hello Luna, Joan is an amazing woman and great fun as well. She has informed us that next month's meeting (for people 50 and over) in the Village Hall is going to be a singing game... I am pretty sure that I am having my tonsils out that day. Well something, anything. I am a terrible singer. Joan used to be a village schoolmistress, she knows a lot of singing games... wish me luck.
DeleteGlad to have you back posting. What an assemblage of goodies!
ReplyDeleteHello Marcia, I wish I had had the time to take more photographs, there were some amazing entries and not just in the baked goodies. It is a hard event to stage with so few helpers, but it is also a magical event. So much good humour and talent comes pouring out of people we don't normally see hide nor hair of. It is a tradition which helps the community gel, if only for a s hort time.
DeleteThat walnut bread looks delicious and so does the wild plum crumble. Picking wild blackberries and wild plums brings back memories of staying with my cousins and going berry picking when we were young. We just don't see things like that anymore. There were some blackberries growing along our dirt path, but Duke Energy came along and sprayed everything. Now the vines are brown and dead.
ReplyDeleteHello Henny Penny, I promise you, walnut bread goes down well with everyone who tries it - and as for wild plums, they are so full of flavour and even if they were not, that colour would win me over anyway, the magical transformation which happens when they are cooked. What a shame about your blackberries - better luck next time! We have a fruit farm just two miles along the road, we could have gone there to pick some big and luscious ones, but it was more fun to trek across the barley field and along the old railway line, where they grow in scratchy profusion.
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