Madame Bovary buys Rhubarb for an Easter Dessert…..

by Karen B

A sunny day, a ditsy dress and one glimpse of some pink rhubarb stems in my local store sees me turn into a modern day Emma Bovary in less than 5 seconds. Just as Monsieur L’Heureux provided temptation, with his Parisian luxuries, which the ill- fated heroine, Emma, could not resist, the sight of these tender, tart stems sees me wanting rhubarb as if it had just been featured in Vogue magazine!

Very happy to have won First Prize for my Summer Rhubarb in the local produce show.
‘Fulton’s Strawberry Surprise’ Rhubarb and Sweet Cicely

This is special rhubarb on the shelf; delicate, fragrant and available earlier than the varieties in my Kitchen Garden, because it has been forced into early growth.

Forced rhubarb starts arriving in the shops from January onwards and it is a long and costly process to produce these delicate shoots. The rhubarb crowns are grown in the fields for two years then carried gently, into dark, windowless sheds in around November, after the first frosts. The lack of light draws up the stems taking energy from the roots, creating a tender crop with a sweet flavour which is harvested by candlelight so that the stems do not turn green.

Today, spring is in the air and I want to make something special with Rhubarb for Easter, so I greedily place 3 slender bunches in my basket… I pass the dairy counter and see a pot of custard so luscious and luxuriously tempting that I almost tear open the pot there and then and drink it from the carton! Emma Bovary had custard for her wedding feast, “Yellow custard in great dishes, which would undulate at the slightest jog of the table, displayed on its smooth surface the initials of the wedded pair in arabesques of candied peel.”  This custard is a sign! So I buy it and hurry to my car. The excitement of the rhubarb and the custard has made me feel quite heady and I need to get back to the soothing shade of the kitchen. This sun has gone to my head!

Driving home, my thoughts are still with poor Emma and the disappointment of being married to Charles whose “conversation was as commonplace as a street pavement”, no wonder she needed the clothes and plenty of custard!

I am going to make a dessert from the two ingredients I have bought; a dish with the classic combination of Rhubarb, scented and sweetened with Sweet Cicely and with custard fragrant with vanilla.

Perfectly easy to make and so pretty to serve; a sweet fancy to cheer our day and blow away the cobwebs of our “bourgeois lives”. And fit for an Easter Feast.

 For the recipe for Rhubarb and Custard Pots, please click here.

 

Fabulous; it’s Friday……

by Karen B

 BLUE; the colour of the sea, the sky, of Forget-Me-Nots and Summer Cornflowers

and a little gift of serenity and calm from me to you.

 HAPPY WEEKEND!

 

The Seeds of Friendship…….

by Karen B

 “The Seeds of Friendship or discovering how the joy of gardening can grow from a gift of just a few packets of seeds.”    sweetbabyveg     

Fat, pink blossom buds hang heavy over my bowed head as I kneel on the ground to till a new little patch of earth. I smooth the soil with my hand and this simple action rolls back the years so that it is now my own, five year old hand that I can see patting down the seeds and soil in the infant school garden.

It was in that little garden, edged with terracotta tiles that I first grew big orange pot marigolds and lettuce. This was special; something outdoors where magic could happen. At the end of the summer term we were allowed to take home left over seeds, flowers and vegetables. Handing over this produce to my Grandma showed me the joy and love which can be spread by the gift of a few blossoms and some seeds.

Every packet of seeds and every garden holds the possibility of growth and transformation and every gardener knows that. So when I plant my seeds or turn over a bed I am part of a family of gardeners all over the world who share the same journey each season; so many people who are getting back to the soil and growing their own produce the way their grandparents did before them.

Those who work the soil have always shared and exchanged seeds and plants and passed down knowledge over the years. Making seeds grow is gardening alchemy and the Seeds of Friendship or discovering how the joy of gardening can grow from a gift of just a few packets of seeds is a secret we all need to share.

Sweetbabyveg has introduced me to so many new friends with a love for nature and life and I would like to thank you all for the connections we have made. I can not send seeds to you all, but I can send you the gift of this beautiful poem by Muriel Stewart and ask you, if you can, to pass on a little packet of seeds to a friend.

Let’s start a quiet revolution……

 

The Seed-Shop

Here in a quiet and dusty room they lie,
Faded as crumbled stone or shifting sand,
Forlorn as ashes, shrivelled, scentless, dry –
Meadows and gardens running through my hand.

In this brown husk a dale of hawthorn dreams;
A cedar in this narrow cell is thrust
That will drink deeply of a century’s streams;
These lilies shall make summer on my dust.

Here in their safe and simple house of death,
Sealed in their shells, a million roses leap;
Here I can blow a garden with my breath,
And in my hand a forest lies asleep.

Muriel Stuart

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sweet, Restful Sleep……

by Karen B

Nestled amongst cosy blankets and quilts, his thick fur tousled and a little unkempt, my sweet cat Ossie enjoys a sleep after a period of illness where he has lost a kilo in weight.

 He has trouble breathing and has lost his sense of smell, so he can no longer recognise food and was refusing to eat. I tempt him with warm chicken, his favourite food and at last, he is eating it!

Fabulous; it’s Friday!

by Karen B

 

Carrot Purees and Morrocan Chicken Jan 2014 006 - Copy

These tiny Brussels Sprouts seem to grow out of the painted leaves in this soft and serene still-life. This accidental pastiche takes this scene from flat to spatial and gives a most humble nod to the fabulous transformational work of-

Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972)

http://www.mcescher.com/about/

HAPPY WEEKEND!

More Sweetbabyveg, less Sturm und Drang….

by Karen B

The telephone rings and a soft, lilting Scottish voice on the other end says “Is that sweetbabyveg ?”

And little bubbles of joy rush from my toes to my head and “My heart is like a singing bird” because here it is, the moment when all aspects of me which had nowhere to go and were channelled into my blog have finally become something real, something with a name to it. And that name is SWEETBABYVEG!

The lady on the phone is waiting for an answer, so I cry an enthusiastic….”YES”. This one little word of acknowledgement of my new identity wipes away the sturm und drang of the past two years and fills me with hope and happiness.

“Are you still there?” It’s the lady on the phone again. So I do it, I place my first order for stock for the next stage of the sweetbabyveg story.

Would you like to see what I have ordered?

 

Flowers; sent with Love…

by Karen B

Tussie Mussies March 27th 2014 004 - Copy

 

In Hanakotoba (花言葉), the Japanese form of the language of flowers, the Anemone represents Sincerity and Pinks…….LOVE!

 HAPPY MOTHERING SUNDAY!

 

The Tomato Dream…….

by Karen B

 

I wake up early from a dream where I have grown some lovely, fat, red, ‘Marmande’ tomatoes. I know it’s a dream because I can’t grow them on Dartmoor. But this quirky tomato induced fantasy has left me with a yearning for all things colourful.  As I toss seed packets and brochures off the duvet I wonder if I might be suffering from an overdose of subliminal stimuli and I conclude that I really should not fall asleep whilst studying the vegetable section of the harlequin coloured Edwin Tucker and sons (Ashburton, Devon) seed catalogue.

And yes, it is that time of year again, when choosing, sowing and nurturing seeds (with their fabulously coloured packets) borders on the manically obsessive. And yes, I am a patient gardener. Well, I was until I had the TOMATO DREAM. Now I want the passion and joy of colour and I want it now!

But the day is grey and the wind cold-blooded and sharp; too cold to garden. I hit the jumper drawer and settle for something the colour of pale antique rose poppies and decide that if want colour and passion on this bleak March day then I am going to have to cook it!

I settle on a chicken dish bursting with Moroccan warmth and passion, using Rose Harissa paste, coriander and honey. The colour will be lustrous and jewel-like and the flavour as tempting as anything in the Arabian Nights.

Settle down and just soak up that COLOUR!

For the recipe for Moroccan Chicken, please click here.

 

Flower Power…

by Karen B

Pansies in shades of moody violet and mauve overhang the terracotta edging of my garden path as I stoop down to pick their gentle, floppy heads and place them in a container. I scatter water droplets on their friendly, fragrant faces, the way my mother taught me to do to keep flowers like violets fresh for longer.

I know of a special little shop in Exeter, where inside, amongst the brocante, and French style home and garden ware, the owner displays linen aprons in shades of soft lavender. When she first opened, her business card came adorned with a little tube of Parma violet sweets and last time I went is she wore a violet coloured cardigan. The shop is called Violette and these softly scented Pansies belong there!

I carry them into town in my basket and hand them over as I pass by. This spontaneous gift is met with such delight that she gives me a hug in thanks.

Flowers can do this, as fragile as they are they carry a message of hope and joy and it is no coincidence that they have their own language. And in the language of flowers the Pansy stands for thoughts.

This little tale illustrates the power which flowers have to touch others and ourselves as they scatter their magic and meaning on our world.

This truly is Flower Power.