Watching the hay making, from our chairs in our gorgoues garden.

 

The vege garden

The veg garden is coming on in spades at the mo....

The photo below is a cool little courgette garden Andy whipped up one morning using an old pallet, 2 bags of dirt, some bamboo and string.  To keep the courgettes off the ground and grow them vertically.  It's next to the old house so you can't see it from the terrace (he thinks it's ugly but I think it's clever).

Below, he made a little garden in a garden for a tomato plant that was a bit crowded and is stringing it up with bamboo and string.  The far 2 right buckets have Jerusalem artichokes.  We will paint the buckets. The far garden has herbs and the rock garden has carrots, chillies, salsify, parsnip etc growing from seeds.

The herb garden

Below, tomatoes,  rock melon, tomatoes, peas, beans and broad beans all being trained to grow vertically.  We also have fennel and celeriac, pumpkin and butternut squash.

Below, leeks, courgettes, more peas, beans and broad beans.

Below, pumpkin plants at the end of one planter are being trained to grow over on to the ground where we are making a little compost area for them so they don't crowd out the garden.

We've been planting extra things around our boarders and are creating 2 flower beds along part of the boarder from seeds which are shooting up loads of little shoots.

 

Me and Niki

I absolutely adored her.  Thank you Andy for this.  You managed to get a bad photo and highlight it.  

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3-4 week old nettle juice

Terrible photo.  But we had 1kg of nettles which we picked up the road and we mashed down with 1kg of natural sugar.  Shoved it in the dark for 3-4 weeks.  Then strained it.  It's supposed to be amazing for the garden.  It smells good.  Acidic.  Like a good sweet vinegar.  It's a thick syrup consistency.  

 

Saucisse de Montbéliard risotto with butternut squash and Pere Joseph tuille

This was a gorgeous risotto. Using Montbéliard sausage, butternut squash, roasted butternut squash, butternut squash puree,  

Montbéliard stock (I cooked the Montbéliard in water to create a stock) The idea of cooking the Montbéliard in water to create a stock was from Raymond Blanc. Then using the sausage as you like. I chopped it finely and added it to the risotto at the beginning.   Fresh herbs from the garden, a little finely chopped cabbage.  Properly roasted butternut squash with skins, butternut squash roasted seeds.  A good brie underneith for creaminess.  Finished with a tuille of Pere Joseph cheese.  It is a cheese from Belgium and has incredible history (and taste).  This is NOT a traditional risotto.  But it really did taste amazing.  It had the textures and the viscosity of risotto, with some extras.  Yum.

 

The best day..... Nudge's 4th birthday, lunch of scallops with butternut squash, dinner of roast chicken

We went to Chaumont early and bought loads of cheeses, nice meats and other bits and bobs for a stock up.  For a treat we bought scallops for a lunch on the terrace.  It was Nudge's 4th birthday.  We hadn't cooked scallops for ages and I was racking my brains as to what to do with them and decided something with butternut squash.  I made a puree, toasted some seeds, crisped some of the skin, made a beurre noisette with capers and small diced butternut squash, crisped some sage leaves.  Andy cooked the scallops to perfection (they were soooooo fresh.  Very sweet.  Stunning scallops).  I plated up topping with fennel fronds and viola, a lunch from heaven. 

We potted around in the garden, then for dinner made roast chicken, roasted tomatoes, a fresh tomato and herb salad, onion puree, flat breads, roast potatoes and lettuce.  Absolutely delicious.  We love the chicken here, it's so tasty and the skin is dry.  Chicken elsewhere seems to be wet and disgusting.  

Andy's rock vege garden is almost finished.  We bought more dirt so we can fill it up and plant some things.  We will do a variety of carrots.  We don't eat carrots often but plan to grow some different coloured ones.

In Chaumont we also bought a huge box of apricots so I'll make some jam.  I like lovely tart apricot jam.

Little Nudge had a good day too.  He plays with us in the garden.  He follows us everywhere when we are in the garden.  And he had his favourite - a piece of good cheese as a birthday treat.  I'd give it to him more often but I've read it can be a bit hard on cat's stomachs so I only give him a little bit.  He goes nuts over cheese.  

The garden.....

We love our garden

The hydrangeas are about to pop out.

Every single lavender will pop their flowers out within a few days

The sage, we are going to chop it back now because it's so huge, it's heavy on itself.  I actually used to buy sage as a treat in Dubai!

Our vege garden, a work in process....

Little Nudge looking slightly pissed off