bits and bobs pumpkin coconut curry

October 31, 2017 ~ Gillie ~ 2 Comments

I’ve never been a great one for Halloween (if anything I have always been more of a Samhain girl) so it surprised even me when now that the girls are all away at university I came home with a pumpkin today. I had the urge to do a little carving. I even found myself googling pumpkin carving ideas. Wow, there are some serious artists out there. I am not in that league.

This is a cat (just in case you weren’t sure and were embarrassed to ask).

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So now I am faced with a lot of pumpkin flesh. I am not a fan of pumpkin soup, there are far more exciting and tasty soups out there and if I had to choose a pudding pumpkin pie wouldn’t be top of the list. And anyway even though I chose the smallest pumpkin I have enough flesh to make more pumpkin soups and pies than either of us will ever want.

We are eating down the freezer at the moment so in the spirit of make do with what I have I bring you Bits and Bobs Pumpkin coconut curry. There is little in the way of measurements because this is a chuck it in and taste recipe.

Pumpkin flesh
Elderly mushrooms
Half a manky red pepper
What I could salvage from an almost dead aubergine
An onion
Some garlic cloves
A chunk of ginger
A red chilli
Tumeric
Tamarind paste
A tin of coconut milk
A tin of tomatoes
Some veg stock or water
Lime juice
Salt and Pepper

Chop the onion (I left mine reasonably chunky) ditto the rest of the veg. Chop/crush/grate the garlic and ginger and dice the chilli.

Soften the onion gently in oil (of your choice I used vegetable) in a large pan. After a couple of minutes add the chili, garlic, ginger and a generous teaspoon of tumeric. Continue to cook for another 3 or 4 minutes. Add the rest of your vegetables (including that pumpkin flesh) and stir to cover them with the tumericy paste (at this point take lots of deep breaths, the smell is divine). Add the tin of tomatoes, tin of coconut milk and enough water/veg stock to cover all that yummy veggie stuff. Stir in a couple of teaspoons of tamarind paste and the juice of a lime. Leave to simmer until you can’t wait and have to eat it. I might add a dollop of sour cream.

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Happy Halloween and Samhain Blessings

Love Gillie x

mango mango mango

April 11, 2017 ~ Gillie ~ Leave a comment

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There is nothing like a mango, nothing that I can know. With apologies to Oscar Hammerstein II. One of the many, many bonuses of being in SE Asia is the proliferance of mangoes. Back home we usually only have two choices of mango (Kent and Keitt) both of which are relatively bland compared to the huge choice available across Asia. Mango is sold on almost every street corner in Thailand, chopped up in little bags with convenient little wooded sticks to avoid getting your fingers sticky. As the girls will confirm, any attempt to prevent my fingers getting sticky and dribbling food down my front is bound to fail. I am the messiest eater I know. As a result when travelling and needing a snack to keep me going I avoided the fresh variety and instead stocked up on dried mango. The only problem was that I could eat an entire family sized bag in one sitting, and frequently did!

The good news is that it is now possible to get other varieties of Mango in the UK. One option is to seek out your local specialist Indian supermarket or if you live in Durham the wonderful Robinsons Greengrocers on North Road, but if you are in a specialist shop desert you can find some delicious Pakistani and Indian mangoes in some of the larger supermarkets and I am reliably informed that Thai mangoes will be available this year too. Get hunting mango lovers.

However, dried mango is readily available and to maintain my mango fix without dribbling down my front I made these yummy mango balls from Madeleine Shaw’s Ready Steady Glow

200g dried mango
grated zest of one lime
180g desiccated coconut
2 tbsp coconut oil
1 tsp fresh grated ginger
sesame seeds for rolling

Soak the mango in water for half an hour or so and drain. I kept the water and put it in my water bottle for the next day.

Add the mango to the rest of the ingredients and blitz in a food processor.

Mould into bite-size balls and roll in the sesame seeds. Keep in the fridge for as long as you can!

Next time I may pass on the sesame seeds or perhaps toast them first as I didn’t think they added all that much and they kept sticking between my teeth. But the wonderful thing about this kind of recipe is the total adaptability. Swap mango for dried apricots, swap coconut for chopped nuts (I’ve tried apricot and pistachio – you can see the little green squares on the left of the top photo – they were delicious and as you can see there are only a few left!)

Enjoy.

Love Gillie x

Rosehips

August 31, 2016August 31, 2016 ~ Gillie ~ Leave a comment

We have a huge Rugosa hedge and at this time of year it is bursting with hips, more than enough for me to pick my fill and still leave plenty for the birds. They are one of the richest sources of vitamin C (rosehip syrup was a popular means to keep vitamin C levels up, especially in children, during the winter months). We use it for rosehip jelly, rosehip syrup and also rosehip oil.

Rosehip oil is wonderful for the skin. Packed with anti-oxidants and anti-inflammatory properties it is a permanent resident in my bathroom cupboard.

True rosehip oil is made by cold pressing the seeds. Despite the fact I have succeeded in distilling my own rosewater (and broke a sink with the brick afterwards) I have yet to build a cold press in my kitchen. However, I have found an alternative. First of course you need to pick your rosehips.

750g of fresh rosehips

Remove the stalks and tails and any of the hairy seeds (great for itching powder). I harvest with a pair of kitchen scissors and cut the debris away as I pick. Next chop finely, I put mine in a food processor.

Finally you place the macerated rosehips in a heavy bottomed pan with the oil of your choice. I used 1 litre of Avocado oil this year, but any natural oil will do, avoid olive oil – it has rather a strong smell and can overpower the rosehips.

Bring to the boil and then leave to simmer on the lowest heat possible for about 6-8 hours. You could also use a slowcooker or yoghurt maker.

Strain through a jelly bag or cheesecloth and store in sterilised dark bottles. Store out of sunlight.

Love Gillie x

Save

Comfrey

August 29, 2016 ~ Gillie ~ 1 Comment

When the goldenrod starts to flower then summer is igoin out and autumn is icumen in. I am sure we will have lots more lovely sunny and warm days like today, in fact my birthday in early October has been a sunny day for as long as I can remember. However, now is the time to start preserving and drying to ensure the natural medicine cabinet can see us through until next summer. Today I have been out in the garden harvesting comfrey, lavender, rosehips and chamomile

Let’s start with the comfrey. Comfrey goes by many names Knitbone, Boneset, Bruise wort. You get the gist, it’s a healer. There is much discussion about the safety of comfrey due to its very high content of hepatotoxic pyrrolizideine alkaloids (PAs) wh rapich as you can guess from the name can lead to liver disease in high doses and it has been implicated in one death. Consequently I only use it topically, in a salve, tincture or fresh compress. See here to see it in action.

First collect your comfrey. This is remarkably easy around us as the Boss planted it some 10 years ago and it is very hardy! I collect both leaves and the root, there is a higher level of allantoin, which stimulates cell growth (and thus healing) and reduces inflammation in the root, but also a higher level of PAs. Again I only use comfrey products externally and would caution anyone who wishes to take it internally to seek the advice of a professional herbalist first.

I made two types of salve and a tincture.

Salve one was made using the oldest and most traditional method. Chop up your leaves and add them melted lard. I used 125g lard and four handfuls of leaves. Bring to a simmer, cover and leave to seep for a couple of hours and pour into a sterilised jar (you may need to warm it slightly to melt it sufficiently to pour into the jar.

Looks a bit poisonous doesn’t it?!

Salve two is the process I first learned when making salves. Instead of using lard I used coconut oil and cold pressed rapeseed oil. The first stage is the same as making salve one. 125ml of rapeseed oil and three tablespoons of coconut oil, four handfuls of leaves, chopped. Bring to simmer, leave to seep. What you have now is comfrey oil and you can leave it like that. It is a good massage oil for those broken bones that cannot be set (such as toes and shoulders). If you want to make a m ore solid salve you will need approximately 30g of beeswax (the amount you use will determine the solidity of your salve). Grate the wax and place with the comfrey oil in a bowl over a pan of boiling water and heat gently until the wax and oil are combined. Pour into sterilised jars.

Comfrey Tincture is the easiest recipe of all. Wash and chop 100g of comfrey root and place in a clean jar with 150ml of vodka (the highest proof you can find, I am kicking myself for not buying the 96% vodka I saw on sale in Romania for about £15/litre!) Leave it for 2-3 weeks and transfer to clean amber dropper bottles.

Finally I put the leftover root in the dehydrator and will grind it up to make tincture or salve later on in the year if we run out.

Next up rosehips.

Love Gillie x