Going south
January 26, 2009
The bedding is airing under a sheet of blue sky and I have flung open every door and window to blow away three months of fustiness.
Olhao is in quiet winter mode. It is bliss to bask in radiator sunshine and sip meit de lait coffee by a limpid sea. There are a few weathered fisherman in thick socks and wellingtons, the odd back-packer clasping a beer, and small children dressed in sensible woolly hats and gloves, like children used to be. Fashion backwater this is, there are headturning sights: finely figured gypsy men and women in black suits and swirling skirts from head to toe, could have stepped from a boho peasant advertising shoot. In the unseasonal cold, dark glasses and heirloom furs hauled out of the wardrobe for the aged devotees of Sunday mass look very la dolce vita or whatever the Portuguese equivalent would be.
The winter rains have tested my samples of limewash mixed with pig fat. The results are encouraging. Where I have patched up areas of faded limewash, the sticky animal cum mineral mixture has stuck well. A very effective defensive membrane against the elements, and the salt which weeps out of Olhao’s old walls. The recipe is mediaeval in composition: roughly 40kilos of lime to 3kg pig fat (buy from the butcher) for an oil drum load. The process involve gloves, and standing well clear when the the lime bubbles like a caustic boiling soup on contact with water. Left to mature, the mixture, soon ressembles soft ice cream, and the liquid it sits in is like the milk used by fresco painters
I had hoped the works for the room on top might have begun, but unsurprisingly the camara says that the entrance door must be moved because it is too close to my neighbour, even though the distance in question is a planning requirement for a house, not a room. The architect’s drawing make it clear that this 4 x 4 metre cube is hardly house or even flat sized, but together with a couple of other issues, it suggests that whoever has looked at the application has not attended to the detail. No matter, the revised application goes in next week. Meanwhile, more of the waiting, and because the euro is so strong against the pound I’m not exactly unhappy about holding onto funds.
It is Sunday afternoon. A flock of homing pigeons swoop and beat their silvered wings in fluttering unison. The house is breathing in fresh air and sunlight. I fill a bucket with hot water and clean the dust and dirt from windows and ledges. The streets are narrow here, and the close buildings create a comforting murmuuring resonance when you hear footsteps or passers by in conversation.
After the hard work it’s clams for supper. I buy them in net sacks from the market or one of the shellfish specialists on the seafront. Olhao is on the estuary of the Ria Formosa where 80 percent of Portugal’s clams are produced. They are therefore always fresh and sweet. I give the clams a wash and throw out any broken ones. I take down a flat pan and fry garlic in oil, add a splash of white wine, chuck in the clams and cook them for a few minutes until all the shells are open. Sitting under the stars in thick layers, a candle, and steaming plates of these fishy delicacies is my idea of heaven.
Iced gems
January 14, 2009
Just a few lines: I’ve been working on a presentation, tidying up after the teenage occupation over Christmas, and getting organised for a short trip to Olhao. In other words multi-tasking operations are in full swing. Not without rising levels of stress. I get so agitated when the server goes down or I can’t find my black felt tip.
A stint in the garden always clears the head, even if there are piles of dead matter that I didn’t quite get rid off before the big freeze began. Iced sugar plums come to mind as I cut the very last rose buds to put on the table. For the last month I have been delaying, but I must not put off the pruning any longer even for the sight of these pink gems.
It is grim to learn that Waterford Wedgwood has gone into administration – even though it looks as if there is a buyer for the 250 year old company. This isn’t just another casualty of the recession ( the long ailing Woolworths chain was hardly a great blow ) it is the erosion of a three hundred year old Potteries craft tradition. I have a great fondness for white Wedgwood porcelain plates, which not look beautiful but feel pleasing to handle. Let’s hope the new buyers can re-energise this great English name.
In anticipation of some grilled Olhao fishes I think I shall make some smoked salmon on bread. I could live on the combination of smoked salmon (try to use wild) cream cheese and a proper bread like sourdough. What makes it complete though is black pepper and good squeezes of lemon juice. This my family’s default treat for parties, picnics and weekend feasts.
Looking ahead
January 1, 2009
The new year feels like a fresh start as I walk through silvery streets in the early hours to meet daughter number two off the free New Year’s Eve night bus.
The garden is preserved in ice like frozen aspic. And the late rose I snip before breakfast, in thermal socks and clogs, is a frosted powder puff of petals. The earth is hard, but I’m not unhappy the squirrels find it challenging to dig up the tulip bulbs. I will be generous though and put out nuts and seeds for the undeserving beasts.
I don’t compile lists of new year’s resolutions because there are too many elements of my life that could do with fine tuning and better application. I am going to settle for just one: a bicycle. It will keep me fit and get me from A to B in a slow and carbon friendly way.
The bike must be the sit up and beg variety, even though it’s more the maiden aunt going out for a sedate pedal-look, rather than the groovy young thing on fast and smart alloy wheels. I’m going the secondhand route, but if I had the funds, I’d be on a spanking new Pashley Princess, complete with gold lined mudguards, ding-dong bell, leather sprung saddle, skirt guards and a wicker basket.
Dodging the sales crowds, and ten deep queues outside Yves st Laurent, on a trip into town the other day, it seems that Londoners are heeding mayor Boris Johnson’s declaration that it is our patriotic duty to keep shopping throughout the recession. I’m not so sure if it means yet another designer handbag. Even if it’s 75% off, what’s the point when there are already three more clogging up the wardrobe?
I think it’s the small luxuries, that cheer you up in hard times. Indeed, recent sales figures from the world’s big cosmetic companies, L’oreal, Beiersdof and Shiseido, confirm the so-called lipstick effect has returned with consumers increasing their spending on cosmetics even while economising on everything else.
Barry M, No52, lip paint (shocking pink) and a good read are favourite pick-me-ups. I am gripped by Wendy Moore’s Wedlock an intricately researched tale about the terrible marriage made by the Countess of Strathmore. It lives up to the blurb on the jacket ‘how Georgian Britain’s worst husband met his match’ with bloody duels, great hairstyles, abduction, deception and betrayal in every paragraph.
The Maurice Sendak inspired drawing is fabulous in An Awesome Book by Dallas Clayton who encourages children and adults to follow their dreams of rocket powered unicorns, and magic watermelon boats rather than mobiles and matching sets of silverware.
There is pear and ginger cake for pudding:
CAKE
125g softened butter
125g caster sugar
125g self raising flour
2 large eggs
4 tbsps ginger syrup
4 knobs preserved ginger, chopped
9-16 inch cake tin
SYRUP
90g butter
90g sugar
2 tbsps ginger syrup
4 large pears
juice 1 lemon
1 Melt the butter in a saucepan and add the syrup and sugar. Beat until creamy and a pale toffee colour. Pour into the cake tin lined with grease proof paper.
2 Peel, core and slice the pears, turning them in the lemon juice. Arrange the slices around the base of the tin .
3 Pour all of the cake ingredients, except the ginger, into a mixer and whizz until smooth. Add the chopped ginger and spread the mixture over the pear slices.
4 Bake at 190C for 45 minutes (approximate, as this will depend upon your oven). If the top browns reduce the heat. A skewer plunged into the middle will emerge clean if the sponge is ready.
Remove from the heat and cool on a rack. Serve with lashings of cream , creme fraiche, or ice cream.
