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One more look.....
17 June 2013

 I`m  as besotted with my garden as the bees are sated on sweet nectar from the  starry alliums.  It feels almost electric with activity:  bursting glossy pink roses, voluptuous  peonies  shedding  brilliant carpets of petals and crowds of  bees,  enough, if there  were such a thing for a bee club night. I get up close, eye to bee pollen sack with  black and white striped ones,  fat yellow ones,  small bobbly hairy ones,  brown fluffy types as if they`d had a cut and blow dry.

Growing, budding, flowering,  seeding on a still warm  June afternoon the garden seems  more dynamic than the brains in any government think tank. Only joking, but as  George Eliot suggested "If we could hear the squirrel`s heartbeat, the sound of the grass growing, we should die of that roar" .

 The garden soothes, me with its it`s distractions and needs.  What better way than to work off writers block or  parking ticket annoyance with the  physicality and sense of purpose that an hour`s weeding gives.  The fact that  nature is ambiguous, that she is neither all good nor all bad, that she gives as well as takes away, also  puts life outside the garden into perspective.   Contentment with green fly free roses, fury at the  bullet headed snails who strafe the  rocket, it`s all about the ups and downs and the getting on with what is thrown at you.  A dancing in the rain approach., rather than waiting for the storm to pass  I suppose.





 Pink rose love: gorgeous Constance Spry with a scent that almost knocks you out in a perfumed stupor.  I  cut them for a jug on the table and take bundles  tied with string to friends` as a  summer offering.





I`m  glad I ditched climbing beans having lost them to slugs over the last two summers, and went for the sweet pea option to pole dance around  the wigwams of willow sticks.  Snug in their flowerpots in the shed at the bottom of the garden they began to sprout  towards the light way back in the winter. In early may I prepared their summer beds with shovels of home produced compost and set about planting. For the first week so it was touch and go as to whether they would survive - the leaves went pale and flabby as if they were homesick . I think that the energy was going into putting down strong roots and sure enough, they`re leaping skywards now and putting out brilliant bursts of scented colour.





Each summer, my mum`s peonies, lifted from her garden after she died, produce more and more pink memories of her and my
childhood .








On the subject of the colour purple, it`s the most wonderful colour to go with the  greens of the garden.  Purple alliums, as you might have noticed are my latest crush.   I could never have predicted this after been subjected to years of  school uniform in a particularly brash shade of the colour , which topped with a  hideous purple  berets marked us out as targets for ridicule at the wild and untamed  bus stops of South London.



Tags: garden, summer, alliums, purple,


Early morning garden
14 June 2013


There`s so little show of summer,  I`m feeding you  some  visual energy  with these  garden-in-the-early-morning -sunshine snaps.


 7am , camera in hand: My feet  bare on cool brick and the  sweet grass smell give me that  country in the city feeling.   I am accompanied by the cat, who  pads the  frothy chive edged paths  swishing her tail contentedly, caught in the  shafts of light  it looks  like  liquid chocolate flecked with gold.







Heavenly  allium "Gladiator` , a heavenly pit stop for bees.







 I like to think about  morning tulip petals  and shimmering green  lavender  rather than breakfast radio gripes  and  bumper to queues on the South Circular. See below:









Tags: garden, summer, pink, alliums,


Garden moods
31 May 2013


My garden has moods and textures that change with the time of day, the quality of light, and whatever the  elements are supplying.
  
On a late afternoon in May the garden is a visual intoxication of light and shade: low long beams  track the brilliance of the tulips, the green gloss finish of the grass, and the bees that dangle and dodge on the highways of rays.

Like a sleek well fed cat sprawling  in the sun, the garden seems to exude a kind of contentment which washes over me as I weed, plant or sit by the shed thinking  about nothing in particular.





Late afternoon  tulips in the sunshine curl and unfurl  in a siesta of translucent languorous petals.





The alliums shimmer and fizz in purple brilliance,  edible  pompoms for feasting bees





I want to eat it up, the deliciousness of the garden;  it primes the appetite for taste and smell for the visual and the sensual.  This is the time of day to sit under the blossom of the apple tree in the dappled shade and  eat meringues, cream and raspberries.





NB the wallflowers - especially the lipstick pink ones, see below - are spectacular this spring!








  Garden Mood 11
 On the other hand, or perhaps I should say something more garden-like like spade, or trowel,  the dullest no-show-of -sun-day, gives the garden  a rather wonderful saturated matt quality, like a fabric or a Hockney landscape.  And all  the  colours  and textures of leaves and petals seem to advance and intensify  against the grey canvas of sky,  see pictures  below




 

  Beetroot ripples and stripes of  a `Triumph` tulip,  below






Silvery green grey Globe artichoke foliage is on my  list to become a Pure Style paint colour





  Over the last day or so  my moveable feast of a garden is more a green and purple scene  of alliums, nodding and swaying in the breeze as the remaining tulips wither and shrivel .





A grey day, but  the rich colour  of Mr Campbell`s bluebells almost sings in contrast.

NB Mr Cambell`s bluebells are the descendants of those that were  flowering  here in the garden when  the previous owners Bernard, and his parents did all the things that people did  before technology, like taking  afternoon tea in the shed,  or sitting  in deckchairs in  Flannels waiting for Cook to ring the bell for luncheon.




Tags: Pink, garden, spring, colour


Market notebook
22 May 2013

Sunday morning market in Estoi a few miles inland from Olhao.  It`s hot by 11,  I need my hat (a pleasant need it is too)  and the breeze carries a richly textured  smell of churros frying, horse dung and spring flowers, from the sprawling market site on the edge of the village. Everyone is here: gypsies in black waistcoats with black flat caps and thick beards; farmers from little fincas dotted about the countryside; children; dogs; lovers; groups of men in hunt of jamon and beer from one of the many food stands.




In contrast to the  piles of bright kitchen plastics , ribbons and trimmings, and rails of trashy print dresses, the salt cod bachlau and garlic stall is a sea of cool whites and is the one I  head for first of all.  Slabs of creamy fish and bundles of papery white garlic bulbs streaked with purple, are  assessed by customers who will later cook up a rich fish stew with these staples of the Portuguese kitchen.  I like to slice raw salt cod very thinly (after rigorous soaking to get rid of the salt) and serve with thin slices of orange for a simple tapa.








 



I also gravitate to a  van wreathed in baskets. The stall holder employs her mother and others who still know how to weave in the traditional way  .I imagine quiet industry with bundles of dried grass on tiled floors in village houses where orange blossom scents float over whitewashed walls.  Baskets like these  feature heavily in my house- for storing vegetables in the kitchen , winter bedding on top of the wardrobe in my bedroom, and for accessories stowed away under the bed. I shall be looking out for the baskets and the van at one of the other local  periodic markets - any excuse to top up my basket supply.





And there`s more: trays of vegetable seedlings,  fruit trees,  caged chicks, hens,   even  a sorry  looking pair of swans. The highlight for many- including me  are beakers  of red wine , grilled chicken,  jamon, or  cheese at makeshift  restaurants with dark awnings that give the scene the look of one vast  outdoor Arabic souk.


Tags: Olhao, spring, garlic, market


Tiip toe through the tulips
13 May 2013


Took these pictures a week ago, and didn`t want to leave it too long before I uploaded to show you all how exuberant  the tulip show has been this year. The combination of cold and rain this winter seems to have encouraged particularly lush grown in all areas of the spring garden: the bluebells are bluer and the forget -me- nots  more  luminous and  pale blue porcelain-like than ever.





I had  moments of heart in mouth when a shoot came and the child models used the tulip patch as a football pitch. Only lost three specimens  (see salvaged Match Point tulip example above) but it`s an  aspects of house hiring  that brings out the rant in me. 





  There`s the excitement of the apple tree coming into blossom at least a month late, but oh so worth it for the froth of white and pink petals which may be  a harbinger of plump golden apples if frost stays away. 







Writing now from Olhao where the final whitewashing, brushing up and dusting down of the house is in progress. Really pleased with a junk bench  stained in glum brown varnish  that after  sanding and painting white  reveals its  good looks. That`s the fun of  tracking down old junk  of trying to visualise its potential. Heading home tomorrow  and hoping that  weeds and snails have not taken over.




Tags: spring, tulips, flowerpower, pink, colour


Garden portraits
30 April 2013



 My tulips are  shooting up with the youthful vigour of  favourite children. Foreground:  Matchpoint with frilly trim. Background, Lilac Perfection.



"Spring Green` fresh green and with a kind of summer salad look about it.






`Flig Flag`:  soft purple flamed and  white detail is if from a  Dutch painter`s still life.





Petals and buds line  up in the garden playground.




`Matchpoint`  in full bloom,  pink and frilled like a party dress.
So pleased to note that there`s been  a nearly 100 percent show from the net sack of bulbs I planted last november. Well done  Rose Cottage Plants! I`ll be ordering again this year.

Tags:


Chive pesto and first tulips
24 April 2013

The Japanese arrive as  the cherry blossom froths in next door`s garden.  It`s a shoot for   Mrs Magazine    Japan`s oldest womens` publication.  I am Mrs Pure Style cooking with herbs from the garden and sharing my recipe tips with the enviably porcelain smooth face of Mrs Magazine, actress and singer,  Miki  Imai.
Some things are  lost in translation, but  east and west  over tea and  lavender shortbread have a mutual feeling for the simple and beautiful.  Photographer  Okemi Kurosaka neat and  efficient as her glossy black fringe snaps until the shadows are long and we have picked  the bones clean from very English spring lamb cutlets with rosemary and garlic.





  Chive pesto also goes down well on my Japanese date: chop a handful of chives  and process  in the hand whizzer  with pine nuts, garlic,  olive oil,  grated Parmesan , salt and pepper.




Getting orders for the borders!!! and Press, too... Here`s the latest thumbs up from Living Etc  who also feature  them on the Editor`s  front page  of ` Inspiration`





Loading up Richard`s  van for delivery to Olhao. I have my first holiday  tenants soon, and want them to enjoy crisp  sheets and soft pillows, floaty cotton  awnings, and lanterns.  Seems mad to to be sending mats, chairs, folding beer tables  two thousand miles south when you think  items as prosaic as these might  be found locally. They can... and they can`t if you`re picky, like me and get get stuck  on wanting  what feels/looks right  not what is  simply available.  Fussy yes, but  would you want stacking plastic loungers  at Pure Style Portugal? .





Not so much flat calm, but rippling : wavy black and white  linen/cotton for another take on the stripe theme





Together with   the  unfurling of the garden`s first tulip, I receive  green fingered excitement  from  the forthcoming Chelsea Fringe  alternative garden festival.  Masses of events: sign me up for  a walk on London`soldest nature trail at the Horniman museum and the drawing and sketching classes on Hampstead Heath.





Lunch break. A gorgeous painterly arrangement of salads and salmon by location caterer,  Laurence  Mash has just landed on my desk. The crew downstairs is enjoying the tastiest and most  visually appealing  shoot grub that has appeared in my kitchen for a very long time.

Tags: spring, homecooking, tulips. Japan. location shoots


Clams and wild flowers
15 April 2013


Clumps of grass between the cobbles and pantiles sprouting wild flowers show  winter  in Olhao was as extreme in rainfall as in the chill we endured here.  So releasing to peel off  wool layers and sun bathe under  blue sky spring busy with  swallows, tweeting sparrows  and swooping  nets of silvery homing pigeons . We trundle to the market and load the  Rolly Rolser with armfuls of wild flowers, eggs, asparagus and oranges.











So good to eat with  sun on the  face sea in the air. This demands something celebratory like buying a net of amejoias boa  for  clam and tomato pasta.  I shower and soak the shells in the sink, picking out any  broken ones.  They feel smooth and cool, with a promising weightiness like solid chocolate eggs.









I chop tomatoes, garlic and fry until soft. Some pepper, dregs of white wine from last night, and then the sauce is ready for the clams. Steam under  the saucepan lid, shake frequently and after seven minutes or so the clams  open like buds in a speeded up film to reveal  tender flesh and juices with a  fragrant shellfish taste 





We spoon clams and sauce over bowls piled with tagliatelle, although spaghetti or any other long type will be right.  This is an athletic dish: twirling  strands of dripping pasta around one`s fork, sucking the last bits from the  shells.  It takes me back to being 18 and the spaghetti vongoles of my first Italian summer.









Tags: Olhao, spring, market, homecooking,


Spring break
04 April 2013


The wind continues to cut like iced knives, but at least there`s some green shooting going on in my shed. These are the sweet pea seeds  I planted last autumn, and I`ve been pinching out the top leaves so that side shoots are encouraged to grow. Look at them stretching towards   the light.





Good Friday.  I make hot cross buns from the recipe in my book. My version only requires one proving of the dough which means they`re heavier than buns made with two.  But less fuss to make, and  delicious  toasted and spread with butter.  The mighty mxing bowl, my favourite , is part of an order  to replenish stocks of house kit that has worn out or gone too far gone to repair. The last bowl met a shattering end on the kitchen floor.
















A clump of self seeded violets  in my vegetable patch is  visual treasure. The flowers are edible, too.





New  white towels, are almost as exciting.






A  friend back from Fogo  has saved my toes from  more destruction by chilbain with a gift of  slippers  handknitted by islanders





Hoping that this won`t be the last of the rhubarb!



Tags: spring, natural fabrics, homecooking, garden,


Where is Spring?
25 March 2013

 It`s all  bare branched silhouettes  against grey and being  stung by wind chilled with the remnants of Arctic  icebergs.
Where are the  greening buds and bursts of blossom? 

If spring is on hold outside,  at least  I can feast my colour starved eyes on what`s inside.   Egg yolk yellow  Bennsion linen  and  pink rhubarb stalks  are a mood enhancing  combination,  visual  SSSRI.  I  spread a length of the cloth across the table for a  lunch of  roast lamb and the  rhubarb baked and fragrant,  topped with crumble. 

 Who isn`t fantasising about  the feel of  spring  grass under  bare feet?  The  seasonal upset  is  confused more so  by my  client Country living who is shooting all things autumnal and mellow fruitful  at my location house.  Good to see  that they use the  Quince border , see below.







If the  tulips in the garden are all but a few  tentative leaves,  it`s good to find buckets with tight pink and purple buds at
Brixton  market.





 Sending out more samples  of  my Colour Band  borders : wrap,  stick, label, and pack. Good to keep moving  in this  draughty old house. Am most reliant on    hand cream and  bedsocks at  night.   The cat , of course, has got it sussed  stretched like a chocolate coloured  draught  excluder  across the  radiator
 Warm  enough places  to discard  my top layers  are the cinema  ( Side Effects, a gripping thriller and Arbitrage   cyncial, grim, ) the sauna,  and my father`s nursing home where for once the airless fug seems  bearable.
.




The potted hyacinths  are visions of the spring pinks that I hope are closer to emerging from  their  earthy beds  for next week will be April and the park gates close at 7pm.



Tags: spring, scent, flowers


Things I like this week...sources of deliciousness
12 March 2013


 Aromatic and comforting, toast and marmalade is good for perusing the first printed issue of  The Foodie Bugle  .  Thus I`m inspired by Charlie Lee Potter`s  piece on  book and food pairing,  fruitcake with Sense and Sensibility,  don`t you know?  Other rich pickings in this ,matt look, beautifully illustrated  foodieodical  include  truffle hunting in Dorset,  the pleasures of Yorkshire  cider, and how to cook outside on something called a Kotlich.



Can`t miss my Sunday morning amble round Brixton Farmers` Market. "Yes, you do talk about it rather"  you probably think.  I  never tire of the  wholesome market visuals, the chorus and clapping from The church of Divine Light above the Halifax, and my shopping bag laden with deliciousness: plump cabbages, glistening scallops, proper bread.  This is my kind of down to earth heaven.







   I  taste samples of the sweetest  biodynamic apple juice from Brambletye Fruit Farm  and  can`t resist a bottle for the fridge.









Good to  know that the eggs come from the hens that peck under the  trees from which the apples are pressed to make the juice. 





  And  see how golden  and yellow the apple nutrient infused  yolks are for lunchtime scrambled eggs.




Tags: winter , home cooking, simple,


Blue highs
04 March 2013


The psychoblurb where blue equals down, miserable.... blah blah blah is daft, really. When I get the blues,  it all feels rather ragged London pigeon grey. Rippling cobalt blue sea or a  first day of spring blue  sky can only help to lift my mood.   So pleased to see on the  Style Court   blog  that although the Pantone  colour of the year is Emerald green, there`s much to get excited about blue, too. How about the new blue and white ceramics exhibition at the Boston Museum of Fine Art,  the cobalt blue cover of the new Anthroplogie spring collecton  or  Cornflower  one of my new Colour Band borders - see above ?




 More highs:  his little pot of grape hyacinths is just as I found it at the local flower shop perfectly co-ordinated with blue plastic pot  for 1.50 and, so far, 10 days of indoor Spring beauty.




  Cobalt blues on old Portuguese tiles,  a street feature in Olhao  as everyday as grilled sardines .




Funny, isn`t it  that this gorgeous sludgy blue in my sitting room is called Parma Gray?   At night it feels snug, along with the heat from the new Morso  woodburner.  (Yes, yes, yes, pluck me from the  Periodic Table of the  Middle Class Handbook ).  During the  day this colour is serene, all very period Dutch domestic interior, like being in a scene from the Girl with the Pearl Earring.  Nothing depressing about that.


Tags: colour, spring, blue, paint, bulbs, colour band


Things I like this week ....
19 February 2013

Email with  Silvana of the Foodie Bugle who`s finding it hard to track down artisan kitchenware made in Britain; too much manufacturing  has gone East. I`m also on the case for home grown products such as this simple, functional pouring bowl I  picked up at Herne Hill Farmer`s market by local  potter Jan Pateman. (website coming but I have an email contact)  Sheer beauty for 8.00, far too cheap really. Definitely, one for your shop Silvana!




The first snowdrops, on dogwalk at Lyte`s Cary, Somerset





Simple faux tongue and groove panelling painted with white emulsion knocked up by  Keith the builder for a new bedroom at my location house.




Emma Prentice is the girl to go to if you want hip   sari silk shirts in great colours.





Since  writing a  recent piece for Elle Decoration on Danish architect Pernille Arends`  home with its` covetable retro Danish look I wouldn`t say no to eating my daily  toast and jam beneath a classic PH Snowball lamp by Paul Henningsen from Louis Poulsen  





Another family birthday, and therefore no excuse for buying flowers and making coffee cake.



Tags: winter , colour, danish design , simple, functional,


Rhubarb Salad
08 February 2013



`I Like a nice bit of rhubarb`  says the barrow lady  stuffing a handful of pink and crimson stalks into my shopping bag.  I do, too. Especially these vibrant and tender stems- see below -  from the `Yorkshire Triangle `. Roughly  bordered by Leeds, Wakefield ,and Rothwell,  this is an area of long established forced rhubarb growers. Unlike outdoor varieties, forced roots are grown in fields for two years where they store energy and are moved into forcing sheds after November frosts.  They are then grown in darkness, and even harvested by candlelight to avoid photosynthesis which would turn them green.
.




We  think of crumbles and fools and other sweet rhubarb puddings, but in Niki Segnit`s Flavour Thesaurus she writes about an Iranian recipe for thinly sliced cucumber and rhubarb tossed and left to stand for a while in salt, and then mixed with rocket, lemon juice and a little mint.  I tried it, see, first pic  above, sans mint and rocket , and it`s delicious. Segnit also describes how rhubarb might work in the sweetly spiced, fatty tagines of north Africa.

Last night I had one of the prettiest fish dishes ever   under the railyway arches at    Maltby Street : a row of diced rhubarb perched on a fillet of smoked mackerel. Pink on amber/brown fish skin a beautiful colour combination, and the tartness of the rhubarb goes so well with the rich oily fish.










Here`s my favourite take on rhubarb: baked in the oven at 150C  with sugar and orange zest for about 20 minutes . Delicious with cream.










Tags: colour, winter, simple, home cooking, rhubarb


A splash of colour
29 January 2013

I feel starved of colour . The tide mark of mud on my shoes is the perfect shade of  Drab for January. Varifocals magnify the general dreariness: consumptive shoppers under supermarket glare,  greasy pavements spattered oil slick black. But a fifteen minute dog trot from home, the florist  is an oasis. Dog pokes her nose hungrily amongst cheery buckets of tulips and and I choose bunches of cut hyacinths in brilliant Yves Klein blue.






There`s birthday cake for tea. A chocolate and coffee layered Victoria sponge that looks suitably partyish dressed in day glow orange ribbon. Now that`s  a good splash of colour on a depth of winter day  The cake stand is one of our best buys declares my son not usually known for  complimenting his mother`s choice of purchase. Bought from a shoot, I have to say, said cake stand elevates even a pile of currant buns to greater  visual pleasure.



















Tags: winter, colour, simple, home cooking, chocolate


 
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