Tomatoes & Chilli

Tomatoes & Chilli

Originally uploaded by T o w n i e

Tomatoes & Chilli

This is the last of my tomato crop.

The plants in my greenhouse are well past their best, so I have decided to pick whats left and clear out the plants. The lack of sunshine has not helped their growth and fruit production this year.

I think they were also hit by some kind of tomato blight as some of the stalks and branches had grey furry stuff growing on them, has anyone else experienced this on their tomato crops this year?

Raspberry Pavlova

for the Merangue:

• 250g Caster Sugar
• 4 egg whites

1. Place the egg whites in a mixing bowl until you get to the soft peak stage
2. Add the sugar one tablespoon at a time until fully mixed
3. Place on parchment paper on a baking sheet
4. bake at 140 degrees C Gas Mark 1 for 1 hour

 

For the Cream:

• 1 large carton of double cream
• 3 tablespons of icing Sugar

1. Put the cream in a mixing bowl and whilst it is whizzing round add the icing sugar
2. Whip until soft peaks are formed.
3. Smooth over the top of the merangue
4. cover with raspberries and dust with icing sugar

Topping:

• Fresh Raspberries
• A dusting of Icing Sugar

Fresh Fruit Salad

We’re all having fresh fruit salad for after our tea this evening… my mouth was watering just making this today 🙂

Ingredients:

• 1 Red Gala Apple, Diced
• Half a Galia Melon, Diced
• A tub of Strawberries (we visited a pick your own shop)
• A tub of Raspberies      ”               ”            ”              “
• 4 Small Donut Nectarines
• 1 small Pineapple, cubed
• 1 small glass of fresh orange juice (to stop the apples discolouring)

Mix together, cling wrap and chill in the fridge until required.

Orangic Blackcurrant Jam with Freshly Baked Scones

 

I Picked blackcurrants in my garden yesterday , this evening they became Jam…

Recipe :

• 290g Blackcurrants
• 290g Golden Caster Sugar
• Juice of half an organic lemon
• enough water to cover the blackcurrants in their pan.

Method:

1. Wash the blackcurrants
2. Place in a pan and cover with water
3. gently bring to the boil and simmer for 30 mins
4. remove any scum
5. add the sugar and bring to the boil again for 8-10 mins until a set is achieved
6. allow to cool a little before ptting into a sterile jar

Scone Recipe

Ingredients:

• 500g Plain Flour
• 75g Icing Sugar
• 25g Baking Powder
• Half a teaspoon sea salt
• 125g unsalted butter, chilled and diced.
• 2 medium eggs
• Milk

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C fan/200 Degrees C/Gas 6
2. Sift the flour, icing sugar and baking powder into a large bowl or food processor and add the salt.
3. Rub in the butter, add the eggs and enough milk to bring the dough together.
4. Roll the dough out 2cm thick on a floured surface and cut out 7 or 8 scones using a round 7cm cutter.
5. Leave these to rest on a baking tray for 20 minutes then brush the tops with milk and bake for 17-20 minutes.

Mouthwateringly gorgeous 🙂

Scone Recipe courtesy of Gorgeous Cakes by Annie Bell ISBN 1-85626-614-1

Micro Tom Tomatoes

I bought a couple of these tomato plants from my local garden centre, and have been wondering why they have not been growing as well as my other tomato plants, so today I decided to do a bit of research on them to see just what they were all about….

No wonder they are not growing much, theyre a tiny tomato plant! doh! how thick am I?!  LAODS it would appear 🙂

MICROTOM TOMATOES

80-85 days to maturity

The smallest tomato plant in the world, the Micro-Tom reaches only 4-7″ high. Plants bear smallish red tomatoes, about the size of large cherry tomatoes. The plants are suprisingly productive, a 6″ plant can produce up to a couple dozen fruits. The Micro-Tom is an excellent choice for gardeners with little room, or to grow in a 4-6″ pot on the window sill. …

That’ll be why theyre not growing much then !… note to self, read the labels 🙂

 

Todays Ploughmans (of sorts)….

  

Sarnie

Originally uploaded by T o w n i e

Saturday afternoon lunch for the kids and myself… the OH is out working so he has missed out 🙂

We love to make up a large plate of sandwiches and crudites.

We had popped out to the Farm shop earlier on this morning and picked up our fruit and vegetables for the week, once we got home we used some of those for this lovely lunch.

Green Pineapple

Green Pineapple

Originally uploaded by Towniesmallholder

This is todays picture taken for the 7 days of shooting with the theme GREEN… this is for Shiney Sunday.

Trip to the Farm Shop…

This afternoon my daughter and I took a trip along to our local farm shop to buy our veggies for the coming week, the cows were outside today so we took a picture of them.

Inside the farm shop there was loads and loads of seasonal produce, we bought:-

Potatoes

Cabbage

Cauliflower

Carrots (normal ones)

Carrots (purple, yellow and light orange variety)

Green and Red Peppers

Ordinary Onions

Red Onions

Shallots

Flat Leafed Parsley

MacIntosh Red Apples

Purple Sprouting Brocolli

and my daughter wanted a pineapple so we bought one of those too :o)

We have friends coming round this evening so i’m heading into the kitchen to make a nice chicken curry, some pilaf rice and some naan bread.

I’m going to make some fresh tomato salsa too, its very yummy, recipe and pics to follow.

 Anyway… if anyone reading my blog is local (fife) here is the details of my local farm shop… its well worth a visit.   Nancy is really friendly, when I was chatting to her today she was telling me she cant believe how busy she is, the more people that buy local and boycott supermarkets the better… !!

Nancy Wishart

Bankhead Farm

Crombie

Fife.