We're going on a...
Lavender expedition!
Gosh I’m late to begin writing to you today! Such is the way with a summer’s morn! There I was early yesterday, with the Lavender Harvest Workshop ahead, congratulating myself on having the garden watered and the entire house shuttered against the heat by 7.30am; the Dairy set and all in place in time for the arrival of my lovely (and exceedingly keen) mother/daughter duo by 10.00. Today, with no expected arrivals but a self-imposed deadline to begin writing by 10.00 (or 11.00 at latest and there’s a fail!) a high predicted temperature has had me not procrastinating, but simply trying to do everything! At once!
A productive garden, a sensory garden…the care of and making use of (its bounty) makes for…an absorbing way of life. While there are always deadlines in life to be met, appointments to be kept, whether for work or pleasure; accountability to nature, to produce, presents a deadline of an altogether different kind. And at this time of year, those deadlines are inclined to arrive at a veritable rate of knots. Ignore them at peril (or waste). Their need to be met cannot be controlled, held back or postponed. One needs to act and quickly.
And so it is that this morning, while I did have the house shuttered by 7.30 and some of the garden watered, I’ve been out picking fine stems of rhubarb (108 no less!) that are a complete surprise for this time of year. A lovely flush thanks to last weekend’s storms and I simply could not leave them to bake in the heat - by this evening they’d be nothing but a sunburnt mess. Their leaves are in the compost now, their stems in the fridge and I’ll deal with them tomorrow.
Then, as we walked back yesterday from the field, I noticed that the elders had a whole new fresh flush of flowers brewing. Do I need another batch of Elderflower Cordial? Well after yesterday’s sojourn in the field…where shaded by a large umbrella, (having scythed our way through bundles of lavender stems), we sipped refreshing glasses of cordial to the drone of bees, the song of cicadas and chirping birds, immersed in the pure reverie of a soporific lavender haze…I think yes, another batch of cordial is called for!
So I’ve just picked 24 huge heads of elderflower, pared in the rind of the last 3 lemons stored in the fridge and tossed in a handful of lemon juice ice cubes (remember I froze a lot of the juice as I couldn’t think of any other way of keeping it?). I’ve just poured over a kettle of boiling water and now it’s all sitting quietly on the kitchen bench, the room filled with its heady aroma.
But I had another dilemma this morning too: I can’t write to you and carry out a lavender distillation! I haven’t yet carried out my own - yesterday was the first (and probably only) workshop - but I need to distill my own and I’m keen to pick some big bundles before they too, go over in the heat. And I’m not sure if this afternoon will bring a storm (apparently possible) which could be the catalyst to send the lavender over. What to do? Well…I’ve just scythed a vast amount of stems! Whether I’ll bundle it up, let it dry, or perhaps distill it tomorrow I’m not sure. I’ve never allowed material to sit prior to distillation (that idea sounds very commercial / industrial!). I believe in field to still (just as with the produce we eat - it’s literally garden to plate), so at worst I have a haul inside to admire in a bundle, should all hell break loose and another opportunity not present!
How divine it was though….to spend half a very hot hour amongst the stems. In an ideal world I’d have plunged into the pool, then gone pitter-pattering around barefoot on the cool floor of the Dairy, quietly snip-snipping and filling the space with that calming aroma. But not today! Nor did I treat myself to linen wrapped glasses and chilled cordial under the umbrella! But I’m content now instead, to be here with you!
I also spoke with Bonnie early this morning. “What are you going to substack about today Ma?” she asked. “No idea”, I replied! I never do…and probably you would get an entirely different set of tales and tangents per post, if I chose instead to write yesterday, or tomorrow. Although there are a couple of specifics I want to relay, this time of year always has me fixated on play of light, impact of heat and the way we live. I’m delighted to relay that it wasn’t me who raised this topic yesterday, but instead my guest (I do sometimes worry I sound like a broken record!). Which got me thinking (not for the first time) about the ‘running of a house’ and the way in which our forebears…particularly women of course, bore the brunt of responsibility of doing just that. It’s a topic on which I could get myself into a great deal of hot water, so without getting into a long winded discussion about women’s rights etc…let’s put all that aside and think on the house itself. Afterall, the running of a house is where I’ve spent most of my career…pretty colours are all well and good and form a huge part of any (interior) design process, but it’s in the actual running of a household, that my core interest lies.
I truly hate air conditioning, although like anyone, am grateful for it when the temperatures become ridiculous and I could probably fry an egg on the kitchen bench! It’s an unnatural kind of chill though and I really hate being divorced from the actual weather, in a contrived bubble. Also, it’s electricity I’d rather not be gobbling up. So in a modern-day version of forebears living in a hot country, I take enormous pleasure in allowing the early morning chill to spill in through wide open windows with the pale light of dawn, then as the sun creeps up over the hill I close them tight shut…pull down the blinds, and close and peg the external shutters. I begin with the openings facing east - a part of the house I don’t much need to revisit during the course of the day, then carry out some other tasks and return to close and shutter those windows facing north. The west facing openings can wait ‘til later in the day, though during severe heat, it bounces up off the sandstone courtyard quite early, so it’s best to get ahead of the game. To me, all this represents the rhythm of the house…the beat of living in a hot climate.
Yesterday, my guest relayed how her grandma would hang wet sheets at the windows to cool the intensity of a heat with which she was unfamiliar. First generation migrants quickly learned to adapt. It reminded me that my Dad once told me when he was a boy, they’d hang wet hessian on verandahs to catch the breeze for the same reason. Can’t think why I haven’t tried that one! Though as we giggled yesterday…one can do more damage dragging around wet lengths of cloth than any of us may be prepared for these days!
All these things bring me back to light, atmosphere and how weather, just as perfume, has the power to trigger memory. On a morning such as today, though I’m a relatively long way from Sydney; and was immersed, head down, gripping my scythe firmly with one hand and holding bunches of lavender stems decisively in the other, my mind wandered to another time and place: I know exactly how Sydney looks and feels on a day such as today - the streets, the buildings, the suburbs familiar to me, the particular way the light falls on facades and plays in certain gardens; how the harbour sparkles, the ferries plough, a sailing boat tacks here and there. I know exactly how my favourite beach looks on a morning such as this, the smell, the sound, the form of the waves as they spill gently onto the sandy shore; the depth, colour, texture, volume and magnitude of the water, should I venture out beyond where I can stand. With lavender in my actual vision, I’m a child with all the anticipation of a promised visit to the beach…waiting for my grandparents to pack everything we need…the stripy umbrella, the reed mats, fringed towels, hats, coconut oil (yes…I mean coconut oil!), my bucket and spade. And then the short drive in the car that was stuffy after being parked overnight and already the temperature had climbed by the time we were ready to go. We’d wind down the windows and I’d lean across my grandfather’s legs to put my face in the breeze (my grandma always did the driving!) as that unwieldy car (they were rather large back then!) made its way along the familiar roads. Cars all had bench seats back then too, so I’d sit between them in the front. Then to find a parking space…even back then it wasn’t a sure thing! The walk, my grandparents carrying what they could in one hand while each of them had one of my hands in theirs. Then at last…we were there. Bliss! I can see it all now, on a morning such as this. All that would be different today, is that I am no longer that child. The light, the atmosphere…would be exactly the same, if only by some magic I could transport myself to that very spot.
Last week I promised you the recipe for Rum & Raisin Ice Cream in good time for Christmas! So now is a good opportunity! Why oh why do I always think there’s another week before that special day is upon us? I thought this year I was doing rather well but no…it’s nearer than I think! Today marks that expectant 12 days before…so I should be putting up the tree today too! Once upon a time I would have been adamant to do so - I’d have promised the girls we’d do it as soon as we got back from school and would have had all the tissue-stuffed bags and boxes at the ready for the minute they dumped their bags at the door. Alas, they are no longer children either…(or at home!) so if I’m a day or two late, that deadline is neither here nor there!
Rum & Raisin Ice Cream
For the rum-soaked raisins:
begin this at least 24 if not 48 hours in advance
a couple of good handfuls of raisins
enough rum to cover
the aim is for the raisins to soak up the rum…they will become plump. I’m not giving you precise quantities because I’ve never measured them out - just use common sense which I’m sure you have in oodles. As a tip - if you’ve poured in too much rum and the raisins still haven’t gobbled it all up after 48 hours, pop it into a bottle to use for next time and label as such - don’t be tempted to put additional liquid into the ice cream recipe! This act alone will make your kitchen smell wonderfully Christmassy!
Ice Cream Ingredients
300ml pouring cream
60g rapadura sugar
1 egg, separated
Method
Chill the bowls and utensils you’ll use for a few minutes in the fridge before you begin
Whip cream and sugar together with a hand held electric beater ‘til solid and weighty (don’t overwhip)
Put the egg white in the fridge and beat the egg yolk
Fold the beaten egg yolk into the cream mixture
Fold the rum soaked raisins gently through the cream mixture
Spoon and scrape into a container with a lid and pop into the freezer
Exactly one hour later: whisk the egg white ‘til firm (but don’t over-whisk)
Tip the cream contents from the freezer into a chilled bowl
Gently but thoroughly, fold the egg white through the cream mix then scrape it all back into the container, fit the lid and pop back into the freezer
Best to make this a day (or more) in advance so it’s ready and you don’t need to think about it, but take it from the freezer about 5 minutes before serving so it isn’t too hard to spoon and the raisins relax a bit after being so frozen! You can easily make a week in advance…it does keep, but remember it has no preservatives - you know exactly the ingredients, so it’s a better idea not to leave it for months!
I will be very surprised if I hear you haven’t made a second batch after making this for the first time! And try not to eat it all yourself…it’s very tempting on a hot afternoon with a cup of lapsang souchong!
The garden has been quite overwhelming with its unstoppable growth this last week, brimming with fecundity, mostly thanks to those glorious storms we enjoyed last weekend, followed by steamy heat. Remember I said there could be something brewing as I was tip tapping away here at my desk? Well…that cloudbank dissipated which was a bit disappointing, but at 4am next morning, distant rumbles developed into a deeply satisfying thunderstorm and steady downpour. I honestly thought we’d wake to a clear morning, but instead a heavy, grey, foggy, misty, humid day ensued, with plenty of unexpected showers of heavy rain. Bliss. I simply adore that kind of weather and it sets off a spiral of growth that is quite transfixing - one where you almost can watch things grow before your very eyes!
Tis the case everywhere one looks…whether in the Field looking towards the creek…
Or back up through the now rampant roses to the almost obscured (from that angle) Hayshed…
From the unbridled kitchen garden…
To the sheer explosion of embryonic, magenta hued fruits spilling with profusion from their newly opened spathe on the Jelly Wine Palm, Butia capitata.
From that point it takes not long for their form to evolve along the inflorescence, into tiny fruit dangling from squiggly stems.
We’re back in the tropical territory now of last week’s post, which makes sense at the front of the house and between the wings; and although not perfumed, there’s been an explosion of colour this last week that fills me with pure delight!
For beneath the canopy of bamboo slats that Thalia and I tied just those few weeks ago, bathed in dappled light, we have something akin to a jungle…or at least the prolific growth is working towards one!
The pots at the front take the glare of morning sun, then revel in shade as the sun goes around to the north, allowing them to relax and their colours to fall in with those on repeat, set deeper back into the shade.
The coral tones in this little pocket evolved, as with most things, almost serendipitously. They occurred as the Agave, Strelitzia, Crinum and Shell Ginger story unfolded…a period I’ve referred to many times now as the creeping-in of the Sydneyesque (my joy at discovering I could indeed grow specimens that I thought I’d not be able to when we first arrived). It was at about the same time I became mildly obsessed with these plants, that my fascination with the banana family began too, and in particular, Ensete ventricosum or the Abyssinian Banana Palm. More readily available to buy now, at the time I could not get hold of one anywhere…which of course made me even more fixated! I envisaged one large specimen in a pot directly outside the gallery and newly built dressing room window! But could I find one?
Which reminds me of a peculiar little tale. Are you ready?!!
Way back then, we’d been invited to stay with friends in Scotland and developed a plan for what we thought would be a rather fun and inspiring fortnight around that proposed interlude. I’d been reading about the Lost Gardens of Heligan (quite newly found and resurrected then!) and we’d long wanted to spend a few days in Cornwall to explore gardens and landscapes and seascapes etc. So we’d thought to drive the length of the UK, from one tip to the other….beginning on our own and finishing with our friends (with a few more enroute). Well…why not? And then the world turned to chaos after September 11. I baulked and refused to go. The girls were young and it just didn’t seem right. So instead of boarding a plane during those looming school holidays, I remember we went to Kiama for a picnic in lieu of Cornwall (funnily enough not that dissimilar if you picture that white lighthouse, craggy rocks, sea spray and rolling green hills into the sea…squint and you can imagine it so anyway!); and we drove up through the Hunter Valley and those broad, bare hills to Nundle, where we had a couple of days in lieu of our intended visit to Scotland (again, in some ways not dissimilar!). And we went on a little garden visit to Bronte House. Although I’d visited previously, Larry hadn’t and we knew Leo just well enough to ask if we might please come and quietly have a look at the glorious creation he had made. At Bronte, Leo had some very fine specimens of Ensete ventricosum, amplifying my burning desire to have just one! The Bronte garden visit also, formed part of making up for my lost visit to Cornwall!
Roll on another couple of years and we reinstigated our original travel plan. In the meantime I had tracked down my longed for Abyssynian banana and it was growing well…I’d even found a gigantic terracotta pot into which to plant it for maximum growth allowance! It sat now, smack bang outside the gallery window which aligns with its position too, directly outside our dressing room window. I was thrilled to bits.
When we arrived in Cornwall I was SO excited to visit Heligan at last. It’s on a greater scale than I’d imagined and to be honest, it’s really the Kitchen Garden there that I am so enamoured with…rather than the vast, rolling park and cascading ravines of exotics which although romantic, just don’t tick my personal box of rapture! But Kitchen Garden aside (which I’ll come back to another time because honestly…it is one of my absolute favourites on earth!) there was a surprise in store that I could not have imagined in a million years. The kitchen garden at Heligan has an array of buildings…of potting and tool sheds, hot houses, greenhouses, glasshouses….a little enclave that wreaks of productivity…of barrows being wheeled along, shovels, compost, heavy boots and banter. Imagine then, as a finishing touch to one stone building…an individual, glass-paned section with its own glass roof and its very own door. What do you think was growing inside? Can you imagine? One very fine specimen of Abyssinian banana! My eyes were out on stalks!
The pair you see in the image above are not the original, which lasted a good many years then sadly exceeded its use-by date. I replaced it with a rather splendid Yucca that did brilliantly in its place, though it too, has now expired. This pair are on a kind of permanent loan! A young gardening friend, inspired by her own memories of regular visits here as a child, thought to try growing them in her first, newly married garden. She’s becoming an excellent gardener but insists she could not find a place for these to thrive! So one day, she delivered them to me and I am beyond delighted to have them here…although there are two and I have just one enormous pot! In return, she has many bits of the garden here now growing with her (well…that began before the bananas arrived here one morning in a bout of frustration!), but how I love the bond that gardening creates across generations. If I have time I’ll try to recall what year it was we eventually got to Heligan and see if I can find the photo of that banana!
Found it! A subsequent second visit…think the first visit was pre-digital!
Of course the main excitement this week has been the build-up to the very anti-social timing of the Lavender Harvest Workshop! To me the timing matters not…I could think of nothing more delightful than whiling away my days in a sea of lavender, but unfortunately the entire point is for others to have the opportunity to enjoy the experience! And others…have a whirlwind of pressing matters to attend to at this time of year, so the timing for a run of workshops…is clearly not ideal! If peeps can carve out a day though…truly, it’s perhaps the most completely immersive day of escapism you might imagine! A perfect one for friends to catch up or, as yesterday, a glorious mama/daughter experience shared.
I did all my cooking and gathered together the essentials on Wednesday…a year since the last lavender harvest workshop, I had to cast my mind back…is the umbrella in working order? Where’s the scythe? Gathering the sacks, the little folding stool, the basket for glasses and elderflower cordial…for (aside from setting up inside for later) a lavender harvest workshop is a bit like going on a very small expedition…an adventure! The walk down to the field puts me in mind of a trailer for a Merchant Ivory film…with hats on, long sleeves, carrying folding furniture, as with baskets over our arms, we set off through the gate, under the canopy of peppercorn trees, passing waves of tall flowering fennel and carrot as we go, for a morning’s activity!
Once the work (it’s only gentle!) is done, then back we trundle; bundles of lavender wrapped in hessian and ready for preparation. Ceiling fans on, shoes off…cool feet, busy hands, quiet chatter and secateurs snip, snip as a mound of lavender heads build on the work table.
Then we weigh and make little hills of 100g each, as I set Hildegard to a steam clean in preparation for what’s to come.
We enjoy a little lunch in the shade of the loggia, before packing the column and filling Hildegard’s belly to the max.
I screw her pipes tightly, and bandage her seams, attach her tubes, and switch on the pump. As the condenser bucket fills, submerging the inner coil with constantly moving water, Hildegard comes to life…a splutter, a gurgle, a gentle splish-splosh; and then I fire her up. An air of expectation ensues…a hush. Already everyone is swept up in the mesmerising process, only amplified by the sense of calm that lavender’s natural compounds bring to bear. As the needle on the temperature gauge slowly rises (it’s a slower process when the column is involved and a greater amount of material is contained within, as the steam makes its way slowly through the densely packed botanicals) a hint of aroma emanates from the spout. We take it in turns to lean in, noses close to the point of release. Another few minutes and a pungent burst of aroma escapes, and there it is…the first drop!
Lavender can take awhile to complete distillation…the more material in, the more water out, the longer it takes, so I have another treat or two in store for participants. By the end of the day…there are bundles of stems, a litter of flowers, bottles of pure botanical water and….whatever other treasures we’ve thought to pick or pluck or share as the day has progressed…so many touch stones…flurries of thought and inspiration to take away, to mull over. The end result? A day captured in a bottle.
And on that note I’ll leave you! How I hope you have a lovely weekend ahead. I have a lot to do in the garden although…I failed to mention last week and I’ll not dwell here as it’s too boring, but I’ll no doubt lose tomorrow morning waiting in the doctor’s surgery to have stitches out of my shin and only hope it’s all OK. Last week I slipped on a loose stone on the kitchen garden path and hose in hand, tumbled down a step onto the one below. I usually recover quite well from mis-steps but not this time…my shin took the brunt with a large, deep gash and I knew instantly I’d done damage beyond fixing it myself. Of course I was here alone - isn’t it always the way? I hobbled, blood everywhere, back to the kitchen, found a long bandage and tied it as tight as I could, sat down, elevated my leg and took awhile to gather my thoughts. Was it really that bad? I took a peek. My heart sank. Nothing for it but to drive to Camden emergency. Ugghhhh….. Anyway, I’m here to tell the tale but I’ve been treading a little more carefully this week…that was, once I could walk much at all!
So hopefully…tomorrow I’ll be gardening!
Mickey x
ps horrified at not having enough time to edit as much as I’d like…and hoping this doesn’t read like a dog’s breakfast!
pps I’d meant to give you some other recipes from the Sailing event but now they’ll have to keep too!
Productive garden notes:
Eating from the garden:
Last lemons. Rhubarb (a new flush since the stormy weather), parsnip, asparagus. Coloured chard, lettuce, beetroot leaves (new flush from recent sowing but finished our globes) rocket (new flush). Fennel fronds, mint, rosemary, thyme, chives, lovage. Fresh fennel seed and fennel pollen. Tiny cucumber flowers - I’m inclined to pick them off ‘til the vine grows as I want to strengthen the vine and those flowers with tiny fruit attached are delicious. Potatoes - new! And I forgot to mention leaf amaranth last week…it’s popping up all over the place and although I prefer using it as a micro-green, the next stage is proving to be useful while the new coloured chard forms up as the old goes to flower.
And…the dried Speckled Cranberry Borlotti Beans! I realise I’ve failed to mention all the way through since winter, that the oven dried San Marzano tomatoes feature a couple of times a week on our plates here!
Going / gone: lemons, nasturtium, warrigal greens
Seed saving: radish, nigella (love in the mist), coriander
Sowing: beetroot, parsnip, carrot, beans, corn, zucchini, cucumber, watermelon, rockmelon, rocket, parsley, basil, sunflower and zinnia.
Planting: lettuce, tomatoes, aubergines, capsicums, cucumbers and zucchini seedlings
Ornamental garden notes:
Picking for the house: random frangipanis, roses, fennel and carrot flowers. I could pick hydrangeas…but how loathe I am to do so ‘til Christmas!
Perfumes and aromas: Burmese honeysuckle (going), Crinum lily, Buddleja and still the lingering aroma of dry cistus leaves. Summer wisteria - while it doesn’t flood the atmosphere because the flowers are fewer, plunge in your nose and the fragrance is divine. Salvia turkestanica and…although it was a freak bloom, with the last rumbles of thunder it was if the atmosphere was all too much and ONE early flower on the tree gardenia opened its pinwheel petals! I’d been (very slowly) trudging back and forth to the kitchen garden all day on Sunday with no particular perfume to pique my interest, when all of a sudden on my all but last approach to the house, a huge perfume rushed at me! My brain did summersaults…I was engulfed…and then I spied the source up on high. One, just one Gardenia thunbergia! And one is all it takes! I don’t expect the proper flush for some weeks…
Pruning and other: Thalia finished pulling a lot of the ivy off the old stables roof and walls. She also removed all the spent lilac flowers while she was in that vicinity and then took all the withering, yellow leaves from the Acanthus mollis whose tall flower spikes are going over now too. She did a big sweep under and clipped some long tendrils from the Chinese Star Jasmine which has finished this flush. I tied up all the tomatoes and continued my battle with the slaters and bower birds in the kitchen garden…I couldn’t achieve much else!
Oh Andrea!!!! 😂 Well...welcome on board this domestic, seasonal odyssey! It's lovely to have you here :)
Glad you're enjoying the productive journey Merice! Mx