Seriously, I've had enough asparagus...

When my daughter lived in London I remember her telling me how she had overheard some overindulged child whinging in the supermarket "Mummy I'ms so bored of smoked salmon".....
Which is a bit irritating to listen to, especially for those of us who grew up in the post war years, when you ate what you were given by your mother, no consultations having been made with you about what it might be, and when it arrived you thought yourself  lucky to have it. Lest I dissolve into a Monty Python "luxury" sketch, let me say that I am lucky enough to be currently enjoying a surfeit of asparagus.

 Such that you can only really have if you grow your own or win the lottery. Well I know it's not as expensive as it used to be, because you can buy it imported from Peru or somewhere for most of the year.  But we're not even going to talk about that, this is English asparagus, seasonal and delicious and fresh, and only available in May and June. Even if you do win the lottery you are unlikely to be able to buy fresh asparagus of the quality you can grow yourself.

It's not really in the staple food category, shades of "Peel me a grape darling" I know, but if you have the space for it, and enough years of your life left to wait for it to mature into a decent crop then it's well worth the effort and the wait. My asparagus bed is about four years old and in full production.  I bought two year old plants which I recommend you do if you're thinking of planting your own, it cuts the wait from four years if you grow from seed, to two years. I've been really surprised that my crop has done so well as I'm on very heavy clay soil here and asparagus is supposed to do best on sand. I should have taken out a deep trench, lined with sand and gravel for drainage and backfilled with compost. Instead I planted straight into the ground and  hoped for the best. And the best has been very good indeed so far. I think the variety I used was Gijnlim (how you pronouce that I wonder?) and it's not only prolific but early as well. Even allowing for the good weather the crop has been early.  Starting picking in mid April we have an 8 week window after which the plants are allowed to grow on and replenish themselves for the next year, and on for the next 10 - 20 years.

The one vital thing though is to keep the bed weed free. You just cannot grow asparagus in a weed infested bed, you will destroy the emerging spears trying to get the weeds out, so start as you mean to go on as my mother told me when I got married, and start with pristine soil and top dress with some compost every year if you can, pull out any weeds at the tiny stage and that's it. When you stop picking the little spears will quickly grow into a forest of ferny foliage which you can chop off  at ground level after it turns yellow in late autumn. And wait for the next crop the following April/May.

Asparagus with Hollandaise Sauce
The first delicious spears are treated to the full works, proper hollandaise, or as near as I get to proper hollandaise which is my stick blender version

2 egg yolks (duck eggs are especially good)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
4 ounces/125 gr salted butter
Bundle of asparagus roughly coated in olive oil

Put first 3 ingredients into blender cup or small jug.
Gently heat the butter in a small saucepan until melted and hot.
Mix egg yolk mixture with stick blender and slowly pour on the hot butter keeping the blender going all the while, to make a creamy emulsified sauce. Taste and add salt, pepper, and more lemon if required. If it's too thick and mayonnaise-ey you can add a bit of thin cream or milk.
Quickly flash the asparagus in a very hot frying pan until it's hot and a little seared if you can manage it without setting off the smoke alarm.
Tip onto serving plate and pour over the sauce. Dust cheffy - fashion  with a bit of cayenne or chopped parsley.

As the season goes on, and the crop needs to be used up, I find myself eating it raw on the way to the polytunnel, chucking it onto the barbeque, wrapping it  in smoked salmon, (if I'm not too bored with smoked salmon of course) choppping it into salads and so on.


 And Asparagus Surprise, the surprise being something that doesn't have asparagus in it, sorry I know I've made that joke before...And then I get to the stage I'm at now where I've had enough. No really. Enough already.

Asparagus and smoked salmon, not again....Yawn....

Quick Scones

I've just looked at the weather forcast, and the lovely weather we've been enjoying lately is all set to change. It's going down from 23 degrees to 12 tomorrow, so we will have to make the most of today's lovely sun, and spend the day in the garden, and not too much time faffing about indoors.

So quick cream tea...
 I've posted my traditional scone recipe before, but I've made some today and as I was in a bit of a rush to get out in the garden, and my flour supplies are not what I'd  ideally like, I used up some self raising flour that I had spare and it seems to have worked well so here's the recipe.

As I've also said before, scones are quick and easy to make, and if you keep some of my freezer raspberry jam in your freezer, and some cream in the fridge, clotted is best,  you can pretty much have an instant cream tea.

Quick Scones - 
For light scones work as fast as you can and handle as little as possible. Start to finish 10 mins max.

1 lb/500 gr self raising flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
3 oz 75gr caster sugar
3- 4 oz75-100gr soft butter
half a pint of milk

1 Switch on the oven 180 degees.
2 Put first four ingredients in large bowl and rub in until like breadcrumbs
3 Stir in milk and form a rough wet dough
4 Turn onto floured surface, Dredge with more flout and pat down to a thick slab
5 Cut out with cutter or just into squares with a knife.
6. Bake 10 - 15 minutes until lightly browned.

We haven't got any clotted cream at the moment** but we do have some good double cream from our local village shop so we used that, together with my raspberry freezer jam which being uncooked has a lovely fresh fruit flavour, this is how you make it -

Freezer Raspberry Jam

1 lb/ 500gr raspberries lightly crushed
2 kg caster sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
half a bottle of Certo

Add the sugar to the fruit and leave for a few hours for sugar to fully dissolve.
Add the Certo and stir continuously for 2 minutes
Add the lemone juice and stir for another 2 minutes
Leave to stand at room temperature overnight.
Ladle into small containers. Jam will gradually thicken over next day or so, when fully set store in freezer.
This jam keeps for ages and thaws out very quickly and is perfect for cream teas as it is quite soft set and can be easily ladled on top of clotted cream Devon style. The recipe shouldn't take you more than ten minutes to make and ten minutes to bake, (and ten minutes to scoff!!)

**Of course if you've got your own Jersey cow as I have, you have really no excuse for not having a ready supply of clotted cream. However, as I've discussed with my cow keeping friend Sally, there's a bit of a knack to making it, and getting it just right. I should practise more....

Covid Cake - Or Make Do And Mend Cake

I was tempted to call this post Old Jam Cake, which is what's in my head when I make it, but then I thought that no one would read it, let alone bake it, so I thought I would call it  Covid Cake, in the spirit of my theme of using whatever you have to hand in these unusual times. Mr Wilkinson thinks that sounds even less attractive. But in my defence, let me say that this is a really good family recipe for normal times, but for these times it seems even more relevant, - It's easy, quick, versatile, and yes frugal.
.
Like many people at the moment I'm restricted in what shopping I can do, and have to manage with 

a) what I've already got in and 

b) stuff that has been delivered to me as "substitutes" for what I ordered, and that I don't really want. 

So if you're clearing your cupboards out don't throw away the jam and marmalade that's half used. and the fruit you don't fancy.  You really can make something quite delicious with it.

Make some Covid Cake.

 In principle this is really a kind of ginger cake as it contains no sugar, but uses  instead melted preserves/honey or syrup instead. So you can name it for whatever surplus preserves and leftover fruit you have around Marmalade and Ginger say, or Plum and Apple.  I used some plum jam that was fine but  a bit dull, and as I have lots of other lovely preserves it wasn't going to get used any time soon, so that with half a jar of marmalade that had been open a while, and the remains of some golden syrup to empty the tin. Topping was a couple of Granny Smith apples sent to me in a delivery which I didn't order and which were horrible to eat raw but lovely sliced onto the top of this cake. 


You could use pears, plums, cherries  or nothing at all. I'm sure you get the idea.  


 You end up with a lovely tea time cake, which also doubles as pudding served hot with a drizzle of syrup or honey, and cream or custard.

Not to mention the warm glow of smug satisfaction at your amazing ability to conjure something out of nothing.




















Covid Cake

Stand a saucepan on your digital scales and weigh in
700grams/1 lb 8 ounces of jam, golden syrup, honey and/or marmalade in whatever proportions you like or have available.
Add 300 grams/10 ounces of butter
and warm over gentle heat until just melted.

Put the pan back on the scales and add
500 grams  of plain flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda
4 teaspoons ground ginger
good pinch salt
4  eggs
about a half pint/300 ml milk


and beat briefly with a hand mixer till smooth.


Pour into a lined tin, mine was 11" x8"/ 27cm x 20cm

Thinly slice Two apples/pears/plums and place gently on the top of the mixture.


Bake at 160C  for about 45 mins or until risen and firm.









NB If you save a spoonful of the melted jam from the recipe you can brush it over the cake when you take it out of the oven, to give a nice shine and then sprinkle generously with demerara sugar.