Monday 25 August 2014

Stuff of Life...and More Assemblage


I know that it's meant to be a blog about renovation but I can't resist the occasional guest appearance of a cooking blog.  I do, after all, aspire to be Nigel Slater.  So, as I was saying in an earlier post, I am an assembler.  Yes, I admit it.  My cookery is OK but I am best at salads.  Of course, I took these pictures a while back and can no longer remember the recipes that I used but will endeavour to describe them as best I can.

For this first one, I sort of borrowed from two Waitrose salad recipes and added halloumi.  Roasted tomatoes, then a dressing made by softening celery in a frying pan with olive oil then adding lemon juice.  Then mange tout, asparagus, lots of parsley, black olives and spring onions.  Probably other stuff too.




Of course, I must also mention the bread in the picture above.  It is S's world renowned walnut and honey.  Delicious.  Here it is in all it's glory.


Note the beautiful concentric patterns of this loaf.  Now that S has moved beyond Baking 101, he has started to think about his presentation as well as content.  It's a bit like maturing as a teacher really.  Note the beauty of these examples below.



I should mention that, on the rare occasions that bread is leftover (i.e. when H and D aren't here), then the squirrels enjoy it too.  It must be the walnuts.


Back to assemblage, this was a table arrangement that took my fancy for a photo.  Olives, tomato, cheese and bread from the local Deli (S's day off), asparagus from the man with the stall in the alcove by the butcher's (which I should have taken out of the plastic bag for the purposes of art!) and some lemon drizzle, also from the Deli.


And this was some roasted veg that I thought looked pretty and rustic.  A sort of ratatouille with courgettes, peppers, onions, aubergines and herbs from the garden.  Perhaps next year it will all be from the garden.  We live in hope. 


This was a torta di pistacchio, again courtesy of Waitrose magazine and Giorgio Locatelli.  I had three goes at the pastry.  The first time I used shop bought.  You had to bake it blind.  I dropped it when I was checking to see if it was cooked.  Very Great British Bake-Off.  The second time, I used shop bought and decided that the instructions didn't really mean bake blind by putting beans (or pasta in this instance) into the case while it cooked initially.  Not that I'm saying Giorgio's recipes aren't clear, of course.  It collapsed.  The third time, I had to use my own pastry.  And go back to the blind baking plan.  It worked. 

Stuffed peppers.  Prepping in the garden again.  What a great summer we've had.  Even though the temperature has plunged to single figures now - late August - and I even thought of putting the heating on last night.


And a yummy cheese board to finish.  Coffee anyone?









Tuesday 19 August 2014

Tanks for the Memory

S thinks that he gets a bad press in this blog.  That I represent him as a killer of baby birds, pet dogs and plants.  I merely report the truth as I see it.  I apologise if that seems harsh in any way but as cub reporter of this parish, I abide by the wise words of the long serving editor of the Manchester Guardian newspaper, C.P. Scott, who said in 1921: "...but facts are sacred".  And they are.  So, over the next two posts, I intend to report further facts and, in so doing, to showcase some of S's greatest achievements on this renovation to date.

The first triumph was the replacement of the water tank.  I went to get H's room ready for one of her many and welcome returns the other week.  There was a strange musty, damp smell.  I checked her 'wardrobe', the ex-server room.  There had been a fan in the window that has been removed, leaving a circular hole in the pane.  It has been made weatherproof with sellotape.  I wondered if the system had failed and rain had got into the room.  It hadn't.  And it hadn't rained either.  Then I happened to look up.  There are many faults in H's room but the ceiling is not one of them.  It is pristine.  Correction.  It was pristine.  There were two damp patches.  What the....?  I couldn't think what was above her room that could be leaking.

Damp Patch
Another Damp Patch
The investigation continued up to the top floor and to the water tank.  Water was pouring down the beam to the ceiling below.

Wet Beam
The first thing that I did was to insist on moving H's bed so that it was no longer positioned below the tank.  I remember reading something about someone lying in bed and the tank of hot water above them bursting.  They died as a result of the scalding.

We emptied the tank by siphoning out the water with the garden hose, which trailed down the roof, down three floors across the garden and into the shrubs.  And then we tried refilling it.  It reached a certain point and then started to leak again.  We figured out that it was leaking at a certain point so we had to keep refilling the tank to that point every time someone used some hot water.

Did I mention that it was Sunday?  It always is when these things happen.  There is some universal law.  Let us call it A's Law.

On Monday, S set to: he found a similar tank, removed the old one and replaced it.  Just like that.  And had to make it all fit by putting in new piping.  A very neat job and a great relief.  Tanks, S!

Ex-Tank
This Tank is no More
Lovely New Tank
Further Proof of Loveliness of Tank

Tuesday 12 August 2014

Assemblage and a Daylesford Diversion

Nigel Slater always claims to be a cook who writes, rather than a chef.  I can't even claim that, I think.  If I were ever mad enough to apply for Masterchef, then I would be accused of simply assembling food, rather than cooking.  I am an assembler.  I can chuck things together and they taste quite nice, sometimes, but my cooking skills are not great.  This grieves me.

We have recently discovered Daylesford Organic Farm near Stow-on-the-Wold.  Amongst other wonders, they run cookery courses there, including a Chef School in October, requiring six evenings of commitment over six weeks.  But it is a busy time of year for me and, much as I'd love to go, I know that it will just add to my stress levels and reduce my pleasure in the experience.


(Before pontificating more about the assembling of food, a quick advert for Daylesford, if you fancy a trip out and some great food.  There is a wonderful store, selling organic food from artisan suppliers and lots of produce from the farm itself.  There is a marvellous refrigerated cheese room, which stinks, but sells wonderful local cheeses.  You can visit the farm to see how the animals are kept and how the food is produced.  They also sell kitchen equipment and accessories.  There is a garden shop, a spa and one of the most expensive clothes shops ever.



The highlight for me, though, is the great restaurant, selling fresh and delicious food, open for breakfast, lunch, tea and, on Fridays and Saturdays, supper.  (A word that I usually find intensely annoying - it's dinner, isn't it?  We're not living in a Jane Austen novel!  However, I forgive them in this instance because the food is so good.)  They cook before your eyes, using a stone-clad wood burning oven with huge stainless steel flues disappearing up through the ceiling and beyond.  The chef places the food in skillets, moving it either nearer to the heat or further away according to how great a temperature is required.  The decor is plain, simple and stylish.  White, light and bright.


For the greedy reader who appreciates foody detail, when I went with H for lunch, we had three salads, the best of which was raw slaw with toasted cashews, chilli, ginger and soy dressing.  Delicious.  And assembled.  I must try it.  I think it fits my skills.  And, luckily, H bought me the Daylesford cookbook ('A Love for Food: Recipes and Notes for Cooking and Eating Well') for Christmas so I have the recipe.


When I went with S for supper, we had the most brilliant farm baked bread and hot cheddar dip.  A sort of sophisticated, deconstructed cheese on toast (although the bread wasn't toasted).  Then we also shared a starter: buratta (mozzarella cheese), heritage tomatoes, mint and sourdough.  Yum.  Then I had lemon and thyme wood roast chicken with salsa verde, heritage tomato and basil panzanella salad and he had charcoal grilled hanger steak, watercress, rosemary potatoes and balsamic dressing.  To finish, ice cream for him and strawberry jelly and strawberry sorbet for me.)


So, having gone off on a diversion to Daylesford, I'll leave my thoughts on the art of assemblage for another day - and try to remember that this is a renovation blog and not a restaurant review!



Monday 4 August 2014

View from the Bridge

With scaffolding there for the repair of the lintel, I took the opportunity to clamber up the ladder for a bird's eye view of our house and garden.


The View to the Shed in the Church Yard

The Sycamore Tree Overhanging the Gin Terrace

The View Towards the Road

Down on the Gin Terrace
The Higgledy Piggledy Roof Scape

Close Up Corbels and Plaque

View Down
Looking Back to the Long Room on the Top Floor

Stone Tiles


Lintel

So, the blue tit finally fledged and the builders came back.  The old and rotten lintel was removed, stonework repaired and then a very sturdy piece of oak put back.  Of course, it now shows how bad the pointing is on the rest of the wall.  But that is life at the Old Rectory.  No sooner is one problem solved than another appears.