It's always great to hear from Matti at Hedgerow Products . He embodies the spirit of locally produced food. Not for him using supermarket fruit for his jams - yes, some people do; he goes to great lengths to ensure that he uses ingredients sourced as locally as possible. He says:
Hello Phil,
It has been another bumper year in the hedgerow and there are some new product lines available. I have even had to purchase a second freezer to store much of what has been gleaned from the hedgerow and peoples' gardens.
Pear and walnut chutney has made a most popular comeback and the wild cherry jelly is fabulous. Hawthorn is so sought after I am having to put it into smaller jars so that it goes round further.
For those wishing to buy for Christmas see the website that is being updated and made more friendly.
Thank you
Matti
Monday 25 October 2010 at 5:49 pm
Pickled Walnuts
Something I'd forgotten to write about is the batch of pickled walnuts I made in July. It's too late now to make them, you'll have to wait until next year as you have to pick them when they still have their green outer covering - before the shell has started to form.
The walnuts are put into a brine of 150gm salt to 1 litre water and left for a week. This process is then repeated with a fresh brine. After the second week you drain the walnuts and leave them in the sun(?) or at least somewhere dry for a day until they go black. They are then bottled in boiled and cooled spiced vinegar. Simples!
Saturday 28 August 2010 at 8:08 pm
We're at the start of the chutney, pickle, jam and jelly season when surplus fruit and veg can be preserved for later use. The main-crop rhubarb season is getting into full swing and in my opinion Rhubarb makes one of the best chutneys. That is with the exception of peach, my favourite, but unfortunately something that doesn't grow locally!
To ring the changes with no effort, I added a couple of chopped chillies to my usual rhubarb recipe, upping the heat considerably. It's not now something that you slather all over your sandwich, it now has to be treated with respect!
Later in the year, I hope to buy my chillies locally, probably from the Charnwood Chilli Co. - which reminds me - I must put an entry for them in the directory.
Monday 10 May 2010 at 8:43 pm
I was luck enough to be given quite a quantity of locally grown apricots; they came from a neighbour of Mum and Dad's. The best were devoured in minutes but I decided to make jam with the others.
Now jam making and me make uncomfortable bedfellows as my previous blogs on the subject show. So it was to the Internet I turned for advice. Some chance! I found recipes with more sugar than fruit, less sugar than fruit, every permutation possible, and some that I'm sure aren't! Ah well, I tried. Back to making it up as I go along.
Firstly, put a plate in the freezer. Then chop the apricots off the stones which I you tie in some stockinet or similar. Weigh the flesh and put it to cook down in the minimum amount of water necessary to cover the bottom of the pan - about ½ a pint - add the juice of a lemon. When the flesh is soft, but still has pieces of apricot still visible add the same weight of sugar as fruit and dissolve it over a low heat - you need to stir it regularly as the apricot pulp has a tendency to stick to the pan. Add the stones to the pan and when the sugar is fully dissolved turn the heat up and bring it to a good rolling boil - again stir regularly to avoid sticking.
It's at this stage that you wish you had a 3 ft long spoon and were 7 ft tall; a shortish wooden spoon and face at eye level with the pan is not good when it decides to spit out boiling sugar! (Fortunately, it only landed on my shirt, but it could have been nasty.) After about 10 minutes slide the pan off the heat and put a little bit of the jam on to the, now very cold, plate. Leave to cool a little and push the side of it with your finger - if the top of the jam 'wrinkles' slightly it's done, if not put it back on the heat and boil it some more testing regularly; I may take 15 - 20 minutes. When it's ready leave it to cool for 20 to 30 minutes and pot in sterilised jars.
Many recipes actually break the stones, remove the kernel, boil it, and add it to the jam; if you ever try this you'll realise that life's just to short for this sort of thing!
Tuesday 04 August 2009 at 10:57 am
When you're operating from the bed, 'cos the doctor's told you that's where you've got to stay for the time being, it's difficult to write about what you've cooked; my kitchen's just too small to fit the bed in there!
That's when you invent a new cooking system: cooking by proxy, or in this case, preserving by proxy!
My only contribution to the two lots of preserves we made last Thursday was to cut the lemons and slice the rhubarb; the rest of the preparation and cooking was all Pauline's work. I guess it's just the same as Gordon Ramsay managing numerous restaurants around the world!
The rhubarb chutney was made from this Rhubarb Chutney recipe., my adaption of this one from The Great British Kitchen website.
The preserved lemons are from Rick Stein's book "A taste of the sea". Rick's shop sells these at £5.50 for a small (250ml?) jar!
The recipe
Boil 2 pints of water. Weigh 10 oz salt. Cut about 10 lemons (preferably unwaxed) into quarters length-ways leaving the lemon joined at the end (i.e. don't cut them right through). Sprinkle a pinch of salt into the cuts on the lemons and put into a jar. Dissolve the rest of the salt in the boiling water and allow to cool then cover the lemons with this brine. Leave for a month or so before using.
They're superb in this Chicken with Garlic, Lemon and Basil recipe.
Saturday 04 July 2009 at 1:02 pm
Dad brought me some rhubarb earlier in the year and I made 'rhubarb turnovers' with it, using the rough puff pastry that I have written about before. The only trouble is the rhubarb has a devastating effect on my digestion system, not good when you use a wheelchair and can't run too fast!
Bob, offered me more last week and I just couldn't refuse; it's the frugal streak coming out in me again. This time I thought I might make chutney with it to keep my chutney-munching nephew Mickey happy. I was a little doubtful as to how it would turn out but it looks like being surprisingly good
The recipe is a reworking of this one from The Great British Kitchen website.
Click here 'cos there's more to read...
Sunday 22 June 2008 at 2:00 pm
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