Elderflower cordial is a wonderfully refreshing, non-alcoholic summer drink that is easy to make at home (provided, of course, you have access to fresh elderflowers!) Unlike most purchased sodas, it doesn’t contain any artificial colours, flavours or preservatives.

Fortunately, elder trees are common here; in fact, the elderflowers for this cordial were collected from the back of our allotment!

The cordial is a concentrate that is diluted with water when serving. How much water you add is personal preference, we typically use about one part cordial to five or six parts water. Either still or sparkling water can be used, though it is especially nice with sparkling water.

This recipe is from my FIL’s brother’s wife, Anna.

1. First collect the elderflowers. You can cut the elderflower heads off, but the disadvantage to this is that you reduce the number of elderberries later in the season. A better way is to collect the elderflowers directly from the trees. Choose heads whose flowers have fully opened, but have not yet begun to turn brown. With one hand, hold a collecting container under the flower head (I used a jug, as having a handle made it easier), then with the other hand, gently pull the flower petals off into the container. I’ve discovered that the flowers are easiest to collect from elderflower heads that are fully open, if you choose heads whose flowers are not all fully open, the petals don’t come off easily. The flower petals from twenty elderflower heads will be around 500ml dry measure.

2. Zest the lemon and set zest aside. Cut white pith from around the lemon and discard. Cut lemon in half lengthwise and thinly slice.

3. Boil the water, and dissolve the sugar in it. In a large heat-proof glass or ceramic bowl, combine the sugar water with the elderflowers, lemon zest and slices, and citric acid. When cool, cover with cloth or cling film.

4. Stir daily with wooden or plastic spoon for four to five days.

5. Strain through a colander lined with muslin, and transfer to sterilised heavy glass bottles. (Sterilise bottles by swishing with boiling water, but make certain bottles are heavy glass or they may break.) Store in a cool place. Once opened, keep in fridge.

6. To serve, dilute with water to taste.

Makes about 1-1/4 litres (42 ounces), enough to make about 7-1/2 to 9 litres (8 to 9-1/2 US quarts) of prepared beverage.

On the same day as I made the amazing banana chocolate chip muffins, I had another fabulous cooking success. What are the chances? The cooking gods must have been looking down favourably on me that day.

I wanted to make something quick and tasty for tea (i.e. “supper”. Don’t ask me why the evening meal is called “tea” here, it just is). Pasta sprang to mind, though I hankered for a creamy sauce instead of the usual tomato-based one.

For this dish, I decided to use one of the four small packages of veggie shrimp that I brought back with me from my recent trip to the homeland. Also some broccoli that was in the fridge patiently waiting to be used.

I started with this recipe, though I had to change it a lot to veganise it. Also, I didn’t have any angel hair pasta, which I think would have been better with a cream sauce, though it was still delicious with the rotini that I did use. It also would be awesome with some homemade fresh vegan pasta. If you’re using a very quick-cooking pasta, you’ll want to prepare the rest of the recipe before cooking it.

I used a few prepared products in the cream sauce, namely vegan sour cream, cream cheese and hard cheese. But you only need small amounts of each of them, so the dish isn’t too expensive to make. Of course, it doesn’t clog your arteries or harm your karma like a dairy-based sauce would.

Enjoy!

1. Melt two teaspoons of the margarine over low heat. Add flour and cook for two minutes, stirring constantly. Slowly whisk in the soya milk to make a smooth sauce, and simmer until thickened. Whisk in the fresh basil, cream cheese, sour cream and one clove of the garlic until smooth. Then add shredded Cheddar, and cook gently until it melts into the sauce. Stir in tomatoes, salt, pepper and Worcestershire sauce. Continue to simmer on very low heat while you prepare the other ingredients.

2. Bring a large pot of water to the boil. Salt the water, then add pasta and cook according to package directions.

3. While pasta is cooking, steam broccoli for 3 or 4 minutes, until tender but still firm. Drain.

4. Melt remaining one teaspoon of margarine and gently saute remaining two cloves of garlic for a minute. Then add the veggie shrimp and cook until they are heated through. Also add the steamed broccoli to reheat it.

5. When the pasta is finished, add it to the sauce, and top with the veggie shrimp and broccoli.

Makes two servings.

I made these muffins two days ago, and have been walking around in a happy little fog since then because these little vegan morsels of yumminess are so incredibly AWESOME.

Light and tender, moist and chocolately, what more could you want in a muffin? If I had a cafe, these would be on the menu every freakin’ morning.

I adapted a recipe found here. I cut the sugar to 2/3 cup, and they were still really sweet, so next time I’ll cut it to 1/2 cup.

1. Preheat oven to 200C (400F). Grease a muffin tin, or use muffin liners.

2. In a large mixing bowl, stir together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt until well mixed. Set aside.

3. In a medium mixing bowl, add water to the powdered egg replacer according to the package directions for the equivalent of one egg. Whisk mixture together until foamy. Put the yogurt, oil and vanilla into a measuring cup and whisk with a fork until emulsified. Then whisk yogurt mixture into egg replacer until well blended.

4. Gently fold wet mixture into dry, just until evenly mixed. Do not overmix. Fold in mashed bananas and chocolate chips.

5. Spoon into prepared muffin tin.

6. Bake for 22 to 25 minutes, rotating tin halfway through, until a toothpick inserted in the centre of a muffin comes out clean. Cool five minutes in pan before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes 12 incredible muffins.

I LOVE gardening!

Last year we hit the gardening jackpot and became the proud keepers of an allotment (after a two-year wait). For those of you unfamiliar with them (which probably includes most everyone outside of the UK), allotments are areas of land owned by local town councils, which are divided into plots and rented for a nominal fee to town residents. It’s great for those who don’t have enough space to grow much at home.

This year, we were given a second allotment which, let’s just say, needed a bit of a makeover.

The new allotment hadn’t been worked in ages. It was an interesting mix of couch grass (an invasive grass which spreads rapidly by creeping rhizomes), bindweed (an invasive weed which regrows from the smallest segment of root), invasive wild blackberries (which at least have yummy edible berries), rubbish (tyres, old doors, broken glass, etc), huge piles of rocks, and some big trees (unusual on an allotment).

We’ve slowly been whipping this second allotment into shape, as well as continuing work on our first allotment. Hence the paucity of posts, dear readers.

And now, some photos!

This is our first allotment (17B) in spring of ‘08, before we did any work on it. Half of it was covered in couch grass, and at the back lay a thicket of blackberries and several large trees. (As well as the ubiquitous bindweed). The soil was rocky and clayey, the kind that bakes to a concrete finish in the sun.

The work begins! We decided to lay out most of this allotment with raised beds. Mr Thrifty constructed them out of old pallets and offcuts of hardwood flooring boards (both obtained for free, of course).

We seived the soil to remove the rocks and added horse manure, organic mushroom compost and various other good things. Didn’t Mr Thrifty do a fabulous job on the raised beds?

This is the strawberry bed. We decided to make it a tiered bed.

At the back, we dug out about half of the blackberries, and planted two rows of raspberries, and a tayberry. The compost bin was relocated back here as well. Mr Thrifty built a large box for gardening tools. (We put a lock on it because occasionally there are thefts at the allotments.) You can see the tool box in the background of the first three pictures above. The compost bin is in the foreground of the first picture, and the background of the next two pictures (we relocated it).

The tayberry — which had been languishing in a pot at home — went crazy once it was planted in the open ground, and sent out runners about 4m (12 feet) long. So a couple of weeks ago, Mr Thrifty constructed a tayberry trellis from an old broken garden arch, to give the tayberry runners something to climb.

This is the new allotment when we first took it on in February of this year. It’s situated 90 degrees to our first allotment, and the two plots form a large “L” shape. The wagon wheel is from my FIL, he was going to take it to the tip, so we took it off his hands. The side boundary of our plot is where the green compost bin is. The bit at the left edge covered in black weedcloth is the plot of our neighbour, Dr Potato. (He’s an MD, but last year all he grew were potatoes, hence the name. This year we will have to call him Dr Potato-Tomato-Leek-Courgette-Runner Bean. Or something like that.)

The big green mound that goes from the centre of the picture to the right edge is a thicket of blackberries. For now, we’re going to keep them. The plot extends behind the pallets/fencing, all the way to the trees (and including the trees).

We are building a dry stone wall at the back, under the trees, in front of the fence. It’s a way of getting rid of some of the enormous quantity of rocks that are on the plot, and it looks a lot more attractive than just heaping them up in a big pile.

Here is the plot at the beginning of May. Along the edge that borders our first allotment, we planted some fruit bushes — gooseberry, white currant, red currant, black currant. The strip that’s dug out was planted with potatoes.

Eventually we’ll probably do this new allotment with raised beds, but there really isn’t any time this year.

Here are the bean teepees we just constructed on 19A. They’re made from 8ft bamboo canes. There is a winter squash planted in the middle of each teepee;, the idea is that they will be trained out of the teepees to trail onto the ground in front of them. The rope encircling each teepee has been sprayed with salt water as a snail/slug deterrent. (Note: this deters snails but doesn’t harm them. Our allotments are no-kill zones!)

That’s the potatoes growing behind the row of teepees, and the fruit bushes behind them (which are kinda hard to make out). The strip of grass divides our two plots, so plot 17B is in the background.

And coming back to 17B…

Here is the support Mr Thrifty constructed for the grape vine. We don’t expect the grape to grow very big this year, so we planted cucumber and peas along with it.

Another shot of 17B. Onions & garlic are growing in the front bed, potatoes in the bed behind it. To the right of the potato bed we’ve planted oca, and behind the oca is yet another potato bed (we planted LOTS of potatoes this year).

And how are all your gardens growing?