Hunkering Down

Saturday was calm and sunny. As I walked Ziggy in the afternoon under blue skies, admiring the catkins and magnolia buds, I thought what storm? By Sunday lunchtime though the roof sounded like it was about to take off and at one point the heavy rain being blown against the windows looked like someone was chucking buckets of water at the front of the house. Our dog walk that day was quick and businesslike, Ziggy strangely unwilling to linger, sniffing, over every blade of grass and lamp post as he usually does.

We battened down the hatches and stayed indoors. John had to work but, with the kids occupied and the dog asleep, I set to work in the kitchen, cooking so often my way of dealing with the weather. I turned sunshiney vegetables into soup, roasting squash, sweet potato, onion, peppers and garlic, and then blitzing them with chilli, coconut milk and vegetable stock.

I've been making a few forays into sourdough bread baking over the last few weeks, trying to get into the habit of baking it weekly, thereby saving us the small fortune we spend on nice bread each week. We are a family of sourdough lovers. and the children will choose it over any other type of bread. I love it because it doesn't go soggy when toasted, making it a perfect carrier for toasted cheese, beans, avocado, scrambled egg...

I've had this sourdough starter in the fridge for months and had forgotten about it and was going to throw it out, but you can apparently revive an old starter by throwing away all but a teaspoon full then starting again, feeding it with flour and water daily over a week. It worked, and a couple of weeks ago I made a white loaf.



The whole process worked a lot better for me if I mix the dough at tea time, stretch and fold it now and then over the course of an evening, and then put the dough into a floured banneton basket in the fridge overnight. I made a half white/half rye loaf last weekend and this is how it looked when I tipped it out of the banneton onto a baking tray, ready to be baked.

In the recipe I follow, you bake the loaf for 35 minutes in a pre-heated cast iron casserole dish (dutch oven) with the lid on, then put it on a baking tray for another ten to get a good crust. This is how the rye one looked when it came out of the oven.

I am so happy with how it came out. It's huge - it's not even half finished now and we've all eaten loads of it for breakfast and lunch - and the deep, sour rye flavour is wonderful. It doesn't have the holey centre that many sourdough loaves do which suits me fine, as I find all the butter or jam falls through the holes. 

The crust has softened over the last twenty four hours making it better for sandwiches. 

Other nesting activities have been firmly centred around yarn. Progress on my sweater came to a sudden halt when Ziggy chewed my wooden crochet hook and of course I didn't have another one in the right size. 

The front and back are almost finished. I just need to do the collar and arms then sew it all together. I love it but I think it's going to be very baggy when finished. 

I found myself dipping into this book, Making Winter, last week. It's a real gem, with some gorgeous crochet patterns inside. I spotted this ball of yarn in my local yarn shop at the weekend and something about the variegated pattern made me think of feathers. The pinks, browns and greys are so wintry and are currently being turned into a cowl.

I have also started this Trio Blanket, using three Schepjees yarn cakes which I bought with birthday vouchers almost a year ago.

As you can see I haven't got very far. I'm at the stage where I need to have faith and persevere, remind myself what it was about the blanket which appealed so much in the first place.

I think it's going to be one of those projects that will be satisfying and relaxing when you've got into it a bit and can see the pattern start to grow and the colour changes pool. Right now it's just a tangled mess.

I hope you are all staying warm and dry in this weather. Thank you for your lovely comments on my last post - I am really happy that you enjoyed it and found it uplifting. There's a lot that's good about winter. 

Winter Comforts

Despite the mild, wet days and shy spring bulbs peeking up here and there, the wind today felt resolutely wintry. And, while I did not enjoy that hour spent on our school's very exposed playground today, or the dog walks I've done after work in the wind and rain, I do really enjoy winter. I like the opportunity for nesting and hibernation, I like going to the beach when it's bright and blustery, I like the time spent indoors pottering around quietly. I also like the time it gives me to pause and make plans for the coming year; I have arranged a day in London in May with old NCT friends from Leeds, a weekend away in June for John's birthday, and there's more in the offing. I feel like this is the time of year when I catch up with myself a bit and I do appreciate it.

I like it when Seville oranges are in the shops and I can make marmalade. These golden jars have been sitting on my kitchen windowsill for over a week but I keep putting off moving them to the cupboard because the sight of them lined up there, glowing in the light, makes me so happy.

I like buying clementines with the leaves still attached.

I like using some of the marmalade in a cake. It's a Nigel Slater recipe, from the first Kitchen Diaries book, and I look forward to making it every year. This one sunk a little on cooling and the icing drizzled down into the cake, making it so moist and sweet. 

I like getting outside as much as possible and timing a dog walk to the local fields with sunset, watching the sky change by the minute.

I like looking at the sunrise while I make my morning cup of tea.

I like warming up with hot chocolate from a thermos on a walk. Even better when I pack the squirty cream and marshmallows too.

I like it when potted bulbs start appearing in the supermarkets. I bring them home and re-pot them in bowls and dot them around the house.

I like buying bunches of daffodils for £1 and popping them in a jug. I always think they look like paintbrushes before they open.

I like finding the kids with their head in a book.

I like crocheting woolly jumpers and the smell of daffodils.

Kitchen-Diner Refresh

Hello! Before anything else, I want to say a massive thank you for your brilliant, thoughtful and encouraging comments on my last post about not buying new clothes throughout 2020. It is heartening to know that so many of you are doing similar. Also, I am very aware that a choice like this - and decluttering the home too, for that matter - is one of privilege. To have enough clothes that we can choose not to buy new, to have such a surfeit of belongings that we feel the need to regularly clear out clutter - this comes from a place of privilege, and I recognise that. I also hear what you're saying about the cost of fabric and yarn when you want to make your own clothes, and how expensive that can become. It's something I weigh up carefully myself, buying fabric on sale and asking for yarn store vouchers for birthday and Christmas. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and views with me.

*

Anyway, we've been doing a bit of decorating and I am very excited to show you the results. The kitchen-diner has needed a lick of paint for some time and John recently spent a week long holiday (ha!) painting, sanding and sawing to give the room a bit of a lift. This was the previous colour, (Empirical Grey by Valspar) which we only painted on one wall.

I was very keen that the whole room be white but thank goodness John talked me out of it. 

Instead we went for Pleat by Little Greene paint*, a sort of green-blue-grey depending on the light and time of day. I was very worried that the room would be dark but it's north-east facing with large windows so gets pretty good, consistent light throughout the day so it's fine. I did however buy a set of Cable and Cotton lights in white which, when lit, give a much warmer glow to the whole room, very necessary on a gloomy January afternoon.

As well as buying emulsion for the walls, we bought a one litre tin of satinwood for the metal and wood, painting the radiator in the same colour. John made this fabulous picture rail to my specifications, designed to run the whole length of the wall. Similar to the IKEA picture ledges I love so much, it's deeper so can hold small vases or candlesticks as well as pictures and prints. It's made from MDF and painted in the Pleat satinwood paint.

I had a lot of fun arranging prints (these were all above our bed before) alongside books, magazines and other bits and bobs.

As you can see below, we continued the new paint colour around the corner and onto the wall which leads into the living room, which had previously been white.

This is what it looked like before:

It was completely John's idea to continue the paint colour and I have to hand it to him, it looks so much better.

I just love the shelves so much. We kept the same white brackets that were there before but John primed and painted them in the same paint as the radiator and picture ledge so that they almost disappear into the wall. We said goodbye to the cheap white contiboard shelves that were there before (chewed by Ziggy as a puppy) and put them in the garage where they will get another lease of life, and bought some wood from our local timber yard. 

It is pine window sill board with a rolled edge, which I like because it looks a bit more finished. John cut it to size at home, then sanded it and gave it a coat of Danish natural wood oil.

The wood adds so much warmth to that corner of the room and I had a lot of fun faffing with books and plants, seeing which colours work against the deep green-blue.

As much as possible, I have tried to use things we already have; the spindle backed chairs below, bought on eBay a few years ago and painted, were previously upstairs at my dressing table and the desk in the spare room. I fancied a change so I swapped them around, and like the white against the new paint colour. All the other pictures, curtains, books, plants, pots etc we already had and I just love how refreshed they look in a different room against a newly painted wall. We spent money on paint, wood, MDF and the new set of fairy lights.

This is the view from the kitchen door. 

I smile every time I walk into the room.

* This was my first time using this paint and I like it a lot. It's not cheap but the quality and depth of colour are incredible. We only needed two coats to paint over both the grey and white walls, meaning we could buy a smaller pot. I know from experience that a cheaper brand would have needed three coats. I would definitely use them again if I wanted a strong colour but probably wouldn't bother if I was just painting pure white.