Kitchen Garden Forum

Well i’m sitting down in the house, trying to cool off a little…..had some hedges to cut this morning, then went straight over the allotment to do a little watering…..now, shall I have some pan fried red snapper, or a cheese sandwich…

The Snapper sounds nice, with a couple of new potatoes and some salad?

The cheese sandwich won, as I had to do it….

Thank you, OH. And the cheese sandwich sounds relish - I trust you had with some red onion jam or home made pickles?

When we had the allotment and grew lots of red onions, I always made pots and pots of red onion jam, always very popular for selling at village fairs etc.

I had Clive’s favourite, beetroot in the cheese sandwich….but mine were off my own ground….

...and so were mine tonight, Chioggia, KG magazine enclosed packet, from the back garden

.......had a 'run out of ideas' tea last night...tin of rice pudding and a scone...!


Mighty hot one again today...rather refreshing though was the temperature drop into the evening.

C.

We are currently sat a very pleasant 15 degrees but no breeze so feels a bit muggy, not planning on doing anything strenuous so should be fine.

Farnborough air show next week and the planes which will be flying and on show have been practicing flying over the airport and town.This has led to road closures,because of Shoreham,which seems a bit silly when you have the likes of a 777 and large military planes flying over housing estates between 500-1000 feet!!!

A couple of years ago we invested in one of those automatiiic roll out sun awnings over ur patio whixh gets the sun until around 3pm. We,ve been rolling it out ariund 7 am in this weather and it,a made such a difference in keeping our downstairs living area cool in this hot weather as it keeps the patio slabs cooler too and stops them throwing up heat.

W haven't had a hosepipe ban yet so veggies are watered early morning or late evening and we keep a bucket otside the kitxhen door for waste water rather Than flushing down the sink so thar gets used for non edible plant watering. Haven't yet resorted to sharing a loo flush but nothing will get ruled out if things worsen.

And curtains kept fully closed until any evening breeze arrives when window can be opened. Beds left left open to air after hot sweaty nights.

Brings back memories of 1975/6 when we had those drought summers, I was stood in the middle of the Hampshire Avon on the Royalty fishery trying to cool down on my annual holiday visits back then.

Not to mention our Heath Robinson attempts to rig up a long hosepipe siphon through our upstairs bathroom window to siphon off our bathwater to water our plants, only to be chastised by a grumpy elderly neighbour living next door to the effect that the use of hosepipes was banned!

We had a family holiday in late summer 1976 in Toddington, Gloucs. It was mighty hot and dry and travelling there in the Allegro rumbling along one of the concrete sections motorways across the Midlands was torture, especially for mum and my then 6 year old brother in the back seats.
Then one middle of the night the mother of all thunderstorms...right overhead..such a flash and bang,. very close, sent me into some almost sicky shock with the sudden awake.
Some years later chatting to a colleague at my former lawnmower world employment it turned out she was camping not far up the road at the same time, again a family holiday and could vouch for the summer weather breakdown.

I remember us finding a little stream and sitting on the bank to dip and cool our feet....it was so relatively cold that we couldn't keep our feet in many seconds..

C.

Lovely memories….
I think over the next four days, it might make my straw hat go a little crispy…

A few years ago on a works outing to Chatsworth, we spent a few mins in the shop there and in a bit of sillyness I tried on a nicely brimmed hat that for once, with my big head, fitted perfectly....

What did i do...I put it back on the peg as I spotted a box kite that reminded me of one I had as a child and bought that instead...years later the box kite is still in its packing behind a chair in the front room. ..and I couldn't half do with that well fitting brimmed hat.!!

C.

Now I thought it was only me that did such things, Clive….brilliant.