I am so lucky living in the country side with a big garden and having a dad who is gifted not only with a green thumb but with green everything. I just do as I am told and most of the time I have no idea what I am doing but in the end…it works. My dad grew up on a farm in Cambridgeshire and he hasn’t forgotten what his dad taught him. His mum used to have a greenhouse in which she grew tomatoes, cucumbers, radishes etc.  Continue reading »

I’ll not be around next Monday but be sure to read the end of this post for details of what’s happening.
Well here it is – this week’s round up of Bookmarked Recipes and this week we have some more great recipes from some more great bloggers who have bookmarked them from some really great places!!!

Michelle in Colorado Springs kicks off this weeks round up with Triple Strawberry Cream Pie using a recipe from A year from Oak Cottage.  Continue reading »

……….I wish

We arrived back to on Friday evening and decided to continue the Italian theme for dinner on Saturday. The structure of a full Italian meal is usually some kind of antipasta followed by gnocchi/pasta, then a meat/fish dish and finally dessert.  Continue reading »

I can’t believe it!!!!! This is my 200th post on Ruth’s Kitchen Experiments!!! I was hoping to make a special treat for this occasion however I have a few things to get done for various food events, as well as a big clear out of our house for getting some new furniture and things in and on top of that I’m going to be away from Thursday evening until Tuesday morning at Summer Madness.  Continue reading »

The finished product;
Seville/Bigarade/Naphre/Bitter Orange Liqueur
(I still havn’t decided what to call it)
ready for consumption.  Continue reading »

On Saturday – two weeks after our (supposedly) point-of-lay pullets arrived – there was great excitement when the Husband discovered a little egg, still warm, on the bottom of the hen house. Unfortunately, by the time he found it, it was already cracked, proving that our chickens still haven’t got the hang of things. The chicken that laid the egg managed to do it from her perch, rather than the nice cosy nesting box.  Continue reading »

On Saturday – two weeks after our (supposedly) point-of-lay pullets arrived – there was great excitement when the Husband discovered a little egg, still warm, on the bottom of the hen house. Unfortunately, by the time he found it, it was already cracked, proving that our chickens still haven’t got the hang of things. The chicken that laid the egg managed to do it from her perch, rather than the nice cosy nesting box.  Continue reading »

On Saturday – two weeks after our (supposedly) point-of-lay pullets arrived – there was great excitement when the Husband discovered a little egg, still warm, on the bottom of the hen house. Unfortunately, by the time he found it, it was already cracked, proving that our chickens still haven’t got the hang of things. The chicken that laid the egg managed to do it from her perch, rather than the nice cosy nesting box.  Continue reading »

My web friend Jedrzej has a superb picture on his blog, Venividi of two old men on a park bench in Munich.  Continue reading »

First instalment of my Finish experience is here.
So there I was, a little worse for wear on a dull, drizzly Finnish Summer’s day, resigned to the probability that this trip would not turn up much in the way of interesting beer. I was quite accepting of this fact – I’d just had a wonderful day at a friend’s wedding and was in a small town in the lakes of Finland looking forward to spending more time by the lake with my new Finnish friends and my old Irish ones.  Continue reading »

As you can see, I didn’t even manage a week of a food diary. A strange thing happened as I began to take note of what I eat, I started to think about it too much. In the supermarket I found myself in the biscuit aisle and looking at packets of crisps and junk food. I never buy this kind of stuff, and suddenly started wanting it. I decided that food is best left to your desires and common sense and I’m not keeping track of it, harrumph.  Continue reading »

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for Fair Trade products. But, I’m officially upset by Sainsburys’ Fair Trade oven mitts. There I was at the fast trak lane on Saturday afternoon at a very busy Sainsburys, smugly telling people they couldn’t come into the short lane because they didn’t have a scanner, when my daughter started looking at an oven mitt. At 99p I thought it was a steal.  Continue reading »

I just spotted this. It’s probably not a winning concept, but it is further proof that finding new ways to distinguish one wine from another and woo the undecided is a busy business.
Drink wine anytime & anywhere.  Continue reading »

After we have enjoyed our meal and 2 bottles of Bordeaux Rose (didn’t deliver much in depth), Sofie and myself called it a night. The next morning we had the glorious idea to collect Elderflower which are in bloom at the moment. And the area I live in is full of elderflower tree/bushes so we took my dad’s cutter and off we went. We got quite a bit of them. Back home we decided to make elderflower cordial…..so we cleaned the flowers and asked my dad to clean a bucket for us.  Continue reading »

I found this reproduced post-card in an Olde Worlde shop in St. Guilhem a couple of weeks ago.
I think it’ll do nicely as a label for the Seville Orange Liqueur

Which is now just about ready to be sweetened and bottled.
It now has leached most of the colour and flavour from the Seville, smells wonderfully aromatic and when -at Sile’s suggestion- I sprinkled a spoonful on some strawberries last week the effect was magical.  Continue reading »

I wish it would be weekend every day….;-) Took it very easy this time. Started my Great British Menu Project Friday night. I printed out the recipes from the BBC website and went shopping. My plan was to make the starter and dessert for Sofie. Tried to get plum tomatoes but had to settle for vine tomatoes. I was not going to infuse the onion cream with bacon as Sofie and myself are veggies.  Continue reading »

In Tin Pan Alley songwriters used to play their compositions to the.  Continue reading »

I really love the blog event Taste and Create. This is my 3rd time taking part now and I just love the idea of being paired up with a fellow food blogger and trying a recipe from their blog. This month I was paired with Phe MOM enon and I had a great time looking through this blog and in fact had about 5 or 6 recipes I really wanted to recreate.  Continue reading »

This cake was made for a birthday. It’s a simple madeira cake, since almost everyone likes that, and is covered in sugarpaste.
The recipe and the design idea are from a decorating book I got recently “The Home Guide to Cake Decorating by Jane Price”. It’s a fantastic book, explaining a wide range of techniques and suitable for all levels. I plan to work my way through some of the things, such as runouts and practising my piping.  Continue reading »

I have seen quite a few recipes for panna cotta recently and since I have never tried to make it, I wanted to give it a go. I found this recipe and thought it looked nice and simple and now that the strawberries in my garden were starting to blush into a vibrant red colour, I wanted to serve them with it.
I first of all made the lemon thyme sugar.  Continue reading »