Rainy Monday

Yesterday was a really wet, generally horrible autumnal day - and so I got busy in the kitchen.

First, my lazy passata which is basically skinned tomatoes,cooked for a while, then when I think everything looks thick enough, pop it in jars, and re-boil them to seal.

Next task - freezing runner beans. These were so big and tough that a lot of them weren't fit to keep, but they did have beans inside which I've kept.

They look quite pretty when raw....





but boiling them turns the pink-shelled beans grey so I popped them out of their skins.

On to dinner - an almost free goulash-style meal using our allotment-grown squash and red pepper, onions, mixed batch of cannelini and borlotti beans, tomatoes and potatoes.

I used a small amount of smoked paprika, instead of my normal home-grown chilli which can be too hot, a small piece of pork from the Sunday roast, some left-over breadcrumbs and cheese for topping - so very nearly a 'free' dinner.








And, last thing before settling down with my knitting, setting up cucumber and onion to soak in brine overnight before pickling tomorrow.

Homegrown dinner #2 Goulash or something close

Continuing to 'eat what we've got', I decided to make goulash - probably not remotely authentic, it involved lots of tomatoes, an onion, some small peppers, a jalpeno, white beans, runner beans and potatoes, helped by some left-over chorizo slices and gammon stock from the freezer.

For an experimental, make-it-up-on-the-go dinner it worked well - so well I'd try to make it again, but homegrown chillis are always very variable and the next version of this may be a lot milder.

Lunch from the Lottie #5

'green salad' - ie chopped cabbage, rocket, baby lettuce, american land cress and cucumber - with tiny red and yellow tomatoes

'minestrone' with fresh parsnips and carrots and last year's broad beans and tomatoes from the freezer

chilli with 3 beans - french, broad and white. Used up lots of small wrinkled tomatoes, a variety of peppers and chillies, and added some fizzy ,turning to alcohol, homemade passata to thicken.

Lunch from the Lottie #3

It doesn't really feel like the weather for salad lunch but I found radishes and salad leaves at the allotment so thought I should eat them!

"Green soup" made with runner beans, broad beans from the freezer, potatoes and parsnips in gammon stock.

another similar salad - red cabbage, beetroot, onion and cucumber mixed to make pink coleslaw.

Store cupboard fail!

I decided one lunchtime last week to make chilli - mainly from home-grown veg - the end of a pumpkin that had been sitting in the fridge a little too long, my unpredictable chillies, tomatoes from the freezer - and a tin a cheap shop bought kidney beans.

Everything was going wonderfully till at almost the last minute I went in the 'tins' cupboard for the beans - plenty of special offer chick peas, cheapo baked beans, even a tin of cannellinis but NO kidney beans!

Now, I know I could have used one of the other sorts of beans but it seemed like a good opportunity to have a completely home grown lunch, so I raided the freezer again and added broad beans. Not usual for chilli, I'll grant you, but tasty nonetheless.

Beans!!

Decided this week to try some of our own home-grown, home-dried beans for lunch in minestrone.

Here they are - soaked but not yet cooked

I was just a bit on the wary side as we've never dried beans before but soaked and boiled them as for shop-bought dried pulses- and we're still here to tell the tale!
Also into the pot went home grown (frozen) tomatoes and leaves from the early purple sprouting broccoli (which isn't sprouting yet) along with supermarket's own organic carrots. As I was chopping these, I wondered about the feasibility of replacing them with parnips - we have lots of these to use at the allotment but no carrots.

Saving for winter

We seem, rather happily, to be inundated with produce this year, well, some sorts of veg - beetroot, runner beans, apples and tomatoes mainly.

The beetroot and apples are stored where-ever I can find space - in boxes, baskets, bags - whatever I can find. The beans have had to go in the freezer as I can't think of any other way to store them but I'm trying to NOT put all the tomatoes in there. I'm rather paranoid about the possibility of the electricity being cut off due to snow or high wind and everything in the freezer turning to slush.

So, I'm trying out other methods of storing them.
It's a long while since I've had enough tomatoes to make passata making seem worthwhile but I'm on my third batch this year! The first didn't keep well - one jar started to turn mouldy, so the other is being kept in the fridge (not helpful if there's a power cut).
The second batch had olive oil floated over the passata before sealing and re-heating - maybe I shouldn't have re-heated as the oil just mixed in with the tomatoes!

I then decided to 'sun'dry some tomatoes - with the help of the top oven. I sliced them up, placed on baking paper on the grill and placed them in the unlit top oven while the bottom one was in use. I've used this method on apples but I left the tomatoes till they were much drier. The plum tomatoes with thicker sides and less pips seem to have worked better than the juicy steak tomatoes. They're all very leathery now and packed into a jar. They should be covered with oil but for now I'm seeing how well they will keep without it.
Today though, I'm back to making passata. Smaller jars, no oil on top and we'll see how well this batch keeps.