Good for you and virtuously good are only two of the three Witches Kitchen goods, and I used to think broad beans failed on number three until I discovered the north African and Middle Eastern way of cooking them with lemon, olive oil and garlic.
This is a bit of a Tuesday Night Vego Challenge rules cheat. Now the days have started really lengthening, even the geriatric chooks are laying so handmade pasta with real eggs was in my mind. And then I was looking for a cake tin deep in the back of the shelf and came across a fluted flan tin that I forgot I had. And in a moment of inspiration realised…
It’s getting towards the end of the best season for leeks. Pretty soon, the big ones will start to realise it’s spring and want to bolt to seed. if you have leeks hanging on in the garden, it’s a good time to use them, before they start developing the hard core they get as they go to seed.
I’m starting to pick the first of the season’s real spinach. I have silver beet growing most of the year – there’s a couple of months in midsummer when it’s a bit too vulnerable to fungus diseases, grasshoppers and bolting – but with successive planting I can get it most months. And it will substitute nicely for spinach in most recipes. But there are some recipes where only real spinach…
I love my kitchen. It has a great big central kitchen bench in the middle of an otherwise very compact space (in a very compact house). I means cooking can be a social activity – several people can chop and stir and roll and fill at once. Kids can sit up at a stool and be involved, and if they play it right get to listen in on adult conversations.
It hasn’t been a great year for zucchinis. This La Ninã year has been so wet here, that they are only having a short life before succumbing to fungal diseases. The trombochino though is loving it. Because it climbs, the vines and fruit are up off the ground and get better air flow. It’s the difference between growing commercially and home gardening, and one of the reasons why I think…
Have you noticed yet that I have a certain amount of experience with zucchini recipes? There is a Marge Piercy poem that I think perfectly sums up zucchini: Attack of the Squash People. I thought I had learned the lesson: One, no more than two, zucchini each planting break.