Becky Bakes…

As someone who seriously dislikes upheaval, can you imagine how I’ve felt this week? Our house is shrouded in a lot of scaffolding, with numerous people bringing lots of information (not all good) about our roof. A result of this has been my anticipation of disruption to our usual routines, so I had the forethought to make the beleagured shopkeepers cake earlier in the week. Now that the local butchers shop is added to the list, with five chaps working on Fridays, a traybake is called for. A request came from someone for Brownie, so that’s what they’ve had. Thankfully, with such a high sugar content, it stays fresh and they will never know I made it on Tuesday. Delivering it on Thursday to some of them caused a degree of chaos though 😉

With a slight chill in the air, the children have returned to the classroom. The summer has flown by – we’ve been busy but I don’t know where the weeks went. Now the greenhouse is groaning with tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers, but I’m not complaining as there’s nothing like fresh vegetables, is there? OK, tomatoes are technically fruit, but let’s not split hairs 😉 With all this busy-ness our weekly adventures have gone by the wayside, until last weekend when we took a Saturday Saunter to the north of the county and visited Beccles. What a treat that was. Although paying for parking was complicated, the nearby river Waveney was a delight, wider than I expected with rental boats pottering under the bridge and lots of bigger ones moored by parkland where open-air theatre was taking place. The town is delightful with plenty of independent shops alongside some of the familiar chain stores. Lunch in a hidden courtyard garden was delicious under a cloudless sky. We both chose the bacon, Brie and cranberry panini with tea in a vintage pot and fine china tea cups. It was lovely. If you’re in east Anglia I can recommend a visit 🙂

For as long as I can remember we’ve grown tomatoes. My father planted them directly into the ground and would sink an empty flower pot next to each one. When he watered them, it went into the pot and gently drained down to the roots. Often there would be a stag beetle which had fallen in. I’m sure he rescued them, but I wouldn’t hang around to watch! We have grown them in every garden we’ve worked, even on the balcony in Milan and on the patio in Lexington. This garden has them shared between the greenhouse and pots on the sunny outside . I always hope that they will fruit gradually, with a few ready each week, or day. How is it that they all ripen at once? So many people have too many to eat and are giving them away or asking what to do with the surplus. Honestly, I freeze our extras to use in casseroles and bolognaise sauce during the winter. My favourites are the big ones – more flesh and thinner skins. Some of the little ones can be quite tough and unpalatable so best cooked in a traybake with sausages or chicken pieces. Roasting them and then pureeing to make sauce works too, but the skins can make it a bit grainy. But yellow, orange, purple or red, I can’t get enough 😉

Unusually we’ve managed to see all of our favourite young people this week. It started with a trip to Norwich on Friday, with Cake Friday being delivered on Saturday – a change to the routine which went down well with the shopkeepers 😉 Lunch with our daughter was a treat .Then after a baptism on Sunday we had dinner with younger son and his wife. This week looked clear until older son found himself free to drop in (not literally, even though he flew over us during the afternoon) and stay a couple of nights. Of course he wanted to see his siblings so there was another trip to Norwich. Phew. In the midst of all the busy-ness we’ve eaten a variety of meals in different places with some being better than others. Sadly one restaurant served us probably the least delicious meal I’ve had for a long time. Maybe we just chose badly, but I won’t be rushing back there for a while. There have been some dubious cakes too. I don’t have a sweet tooth so often decline, and I wish I had…. Hey ho!

We all have them, don’t we? Whether it’s always doing laundry on the same days, or shopping every Friday, plumping the cushions before we go to bed….. I’m sure you could make a little list like mine. But sometimes we need to work some flexibility into the week and that’s exactly what’s happened this week here! You might have noticed there was no mention of Cake Friday today and that’s because we needed to be in Norwich by 10 o’clock. We had tickets for the Cathedral’s service to commemorate VJ Day and so no opportunity to distribute to the shopkeepers as we left home before 8.30a.m. I did warn most of them and explained it would have to be Cake Saturday this week which seemed to be tricky for some, but maybe this is the way forward? I’ve always enjoyed being a bit unpredictable so that life doesn’t get into a rut… We’ll see what they say tomorrow 😉

You might remember we had a lovely holiday in western France just after Easter, staying on the beautiful sandy coast of the Vendee. Whilst there we ate some delicious food in restaurants, I made some pretty decent meals too, as we were self catering for some of the time. Everything tasted wonderful, so I came home full of enthusiasm to recreate some of the things we ate. There was a very slow-cooked lamb dish with a herby sauce I described to our lovely butcher at the top of the road. He struggled to work out which cut of lamb had been used but we settled on rump. These were vacuum sealed for me to cook them sous-vide, a process I haven’t employed before, but the slow-cooker provided a perfect water bath. Imagine my shock/horror when the packages expanded and threatened to burst during the 6 hours they were floating around! Did it work? Not really. Then there were the gallettes. I even had a tutorial (in French) about the perfect way to create them. Buckwheat flour was easy to find in a health food shop, but could I get the consistency right? Having tried several times and failing I decided that It’s better to enjoy the moment whilst on foreign land and look forward to the next time we can enjoy them when travel to these fabulous places 😉

We first started to make videos during the pandemic, when our son found himself at a loose end – he works in the events industry and of course there were no events. He suggested filming me making a Victoria Sandwich, editing it and then uploading to You tube. It went well and we made more. Eventually life returned to normal and his work became busier and busier to the point that lately he hasn’t had a moment to work with us. In the meantime Richard has taken up the challenge and been filming, recently he’s got the hang of editing too, so today we were able to bring you another video. It’s Little Lemon Curd Tarts and I’m hoping the use of that last word won’t mean we fall foul of the algorithm which took down a previous video. Vocabulary seems to be tricky sometimes, so I’m going to keep an eye on the visibility and restrictions in case I’ve breached some unknown protocol 😉

Over the last few days we’ve had ripe tomatoes and two cucumbers…tomatoes fresh from the plant don’t last long though as they taste amazing warm and just picked. When we bought the greenhouse, the plan was that I’d be able to have a pot of freesias just inside the door – we’d share it. Well I can report that hasn’t happened 😉 My reason for requesting a pot was that an old friend, who we lost earlier this year, had a lovely pot which smelled wonderful when the door was opened. I can’t complain though, as we have peppers and salad leaves along with tomatoes of all colours and sizes, along with lots more cucumbers to come. It’s a lovely time of year, the leeks are doing well as are the beans. French beans are our favourite and already we’ve picked several handfuls. How does your garden grow? x

…the jasmine’s in bloom. It’s a song I love which speaks of July being dressed in a tune. Only this week there was a magical tune audible in our little High Street – it was coming from the “crocodiles” of children walking from the railway station to the beach, with cries of “I can see the sea !!” All the schools have now finished for the holidays and many parents are calling for the holiday to be shortened to four weeks. Now, it’s just my opinion, but I think six weeks is great, although the end of term should be brought forward to early July when the weather is better. Children need time to relax and do nothing. They need to make a tent , read a book, paddle, play with their friends and wonder what to do next (the word ‘bored’ has always been banned in our house) Getting messy in the kitchen is always a treat for little people and I appreciate that child care is an issue for many and that’s where grandparents can help. We made a new video this week which is waiting to be edited, but it’s perfect for little hands. It’s Little Lemon Curd tarts and is perfect for tiny helpers to get involved, so look out – it’s coming soon! 🙂

It’s been wall to wall coverage of Wimbledon for these two weeks so if you aren’t a fan, then it must have been a pain! For me, it’s been brilliant. I started to play at secondary school and even represented the school in a match against a prestigious Bedfordshire school. Did we win? Honestly I can’t remember, but I loved it. Later I watched the Dewar Cup tournament played in Nottingham with Nastase as a star competitor. A trip to Wimbledon centre court was a dream, but once was enough. So many people and such heat, which has been the situation this year. No wonder spectators have been taken ill, sitting in the extreme heat. It’s been great fun messaging friends who are watching the same match, though, sharing our thoughts about the grunts and groans of certain players as well as “ooh”s and “aah”s when a serve hits the spot or a rally of several shots creates excitement. Strawberries and cream in a cardboard box doesn’t appeal though 😉