Everyday Drinkers (12)

This is a real cracker.

Les Six - Cairanne (Côtes-du-Rhône Villages).

The 'Six' refers to the mix of grape varieties involved in its making: Grenache, Carignan, Syrah, Cinsault, Mourvèdre and Counoise. The classic Rhône varieties along with the rarer Counoise, most often associated with Châteauneuf-du-Pape.

You can read more about the origins of this wine here.

Made and distributed by Boutinot, it is a fabulous layer cake of fruit flavours, each revealing itself in succession both on the nose and on the palate in the course of a never ending finish. Tannins there are, but silky and unobtrusive. Freshness in abundance too, and despite the 14.5% ABV this wine remains light as a feather.

I would happily drink this wine every day - however it is a bit pricey to be a true everyday drinker priced at just under £16.00 at Chislehurst Wines (@chiswines).

But if you can, it is too good to miss.

Mussels, Beans and Two Veg, anyone?

Borlotti beans grown by yours truly

Alarming information from the BBC (article by Roger Harrabin) and others about greenhouse gas emissions arising from eating meat.

This has of course been known for some time. We're (we = humans) still eating meat, of course, and craving for more, it would seem. Meanwhile, the ice is melting, the sea is rising and getting warmer and all those nasty things are brewing which will make life much more difficult for us all ( = humans and most other creatures).

Are there any solutions, apart form turning the whole Earth into some sort of intensive meat production farm, producing bionic bovines emitting less methane, or searching for a laboratory produced artificial meat solution to satisfy our craving?

There are indeed, and one of them is to eat much less of the stuff. That is, if you are not completely disgusted by the thought that meat is, after all, the flesh of an animal which we have wilfully killed or had killed in order to eat it, and decide to not eat any at all.

I like my meat as much as the next human but it is not difficult at all to eat much less of it. Think of it as a treat and not a necessity; eat other things which are just as good for you (beans and pulses come to mind).

Eating something meaty and nice once a week, using the leftovers and gorging on vegetables, beans, peas, potatoes etc etc the rest of the time is also good for your personal health.

Add a few mussels (which require practically no input to produce a delicious meaty/fishy treat and store carbon in their shells) or other low impact shellfish and you have the sort of diet which will make you look ten years younger and about which you can be smug to your meat-eating friends who are destroying the Earth.

Give it a go.

Unexpected Visitors

One of the visiting Toads

We had unexpected visitors to our small garden recently.

Having decided long ago to turn this small space into a haven for wild plants and any creatures who might want to come along we felt elated when two toads dropped in one evening after sunset.

These are quite rare creatures around this part of London. It was therefore a joy to see them, and also a vindication for the unkempt (to some eyes) look of the garden.

Perhaps we shall also dig a small pond here as well. One is already planned for the allotment, and I will be digging this out in the autumn.

Ponds (even tiny ones) make small spaces even more attractive to different wild creatures.  We already see damsel flies and the odd dragonfly here even though we have no standing water, so the addition of a pond would be a benefit to these and other animals.

Everyday Drinkers (11)

I have recently been drinking (I feel like that character in the Fast Show played by Simon Day writing this) 2013 Côtes-du-Rhônes and have found them very agreeable.

Priced from £3.99 they offer exceptionally good value and are soft and fruity. Served slightly chilled they go down well with anything you care to mention and disappear disconcertingly quickly.

As to how the wine can sell for this sort of price, suffice it to say that these are bulk wines produced in vast quantities by co-ops all down the Rhône Valley.  In good years they are all very drinkable, made from reliable Grenache and Syrah cropped heavily, sometimes too heavily. This explains why some years too much wine is chasing too few buyers and why we as drinkers should take advantage while we can.

This particular bottle is on sale at a well known retailer, and originates from the Cellier des Dauphins in Tulette, with an ABV of 12.5%.

  

Stealthy Spring Surprise

Almost imperceptibly, but inexorably, Nature has been working its magic and hey presto we have had our first asparagus of the year, and our first globe artichokes.

I certainly wasn't expecting the artichokes.  The asparagus has been showing for a few weeks now, hesitantly, and then explosively, but the artichokes have been working away in secret, planning a well disguised artichoke strike.

This year we have seen wet Winter transformed into Summer all of a sudden: hawthorn, horse chestnut and elder in flower at the same time for example along with magnolia and fruit trees, without pause or transition for Spring.

Now of course I need to get cracking and plant potatoes, onions (red onions already in place) and shallots before it's too late, and prepare the ground for beetroot, carrots, salads, spinach etc.

Our little plot is generally in fairly good shape, and the cover I kept over the Winter months has protected the soil from the almost incessant rain, which would otherwise have washed much of the nutrients away. The soil here is silt, so not too rich in organic matter to start with. This green cover has now been dug in, to the accompaniment of regular visits by a couple of Robins, and a little manure added as a mulch, so we are ready for lift off.

Shed with patched up roof felt and beanpoles

The shed roof has been mended and is now more solid than it was and a new section of felt is keeping the rain out. The bean poles have also emerged ready to support the runner beans which are already chomping at the bit, having been sown inside a couple of weeks ago. I now just need to take all its contents out and give it a good clean, as well as sorting out the seeds for sowing and finding out what I am missing (can't remember if I have any cabbage seeds left for example).

Before...

...After

On a different note repairs have been made to the hasp and staple which a human intruder broke to gain access to the shed. I have no idea what they were looking for, as nothing was taken, but it is the second time this has happened.

To all you burglars out there, you will find only garden tools and other garden materials in allotment sheds, perhaps a few bags of potatoes or a few squashes, not much else.  So please don't bother breaking in, unless you want to borrow the fork and spade and do a bit of work on my plot.

I end my short garden report here and wish you all good gardening, if you have one, and good everything else if you don't.

Out of Hibernation

It's been such a long time since I've posted here.

My only excuse is that I have been in hibernation and have woken up to find that the world is being deluged, and that it's probably time to start building an ark.

Those trees in the foreground will soon be submerged

Parking the car can be a bit difficult just now

It's not that bad here. Many other people are up to their necks in it and have had to abandon their homes.

It will stop raining soon, and we will move on to the next extreme weather episode (extreme cold, extreme heat, drought?).

On a more positive note, in the garden, despite the damage to the shed - half the roof blown off in the storms - the Purple Sprouting Broccoli are doing well this year and the Rhubarb is forcing well.

Purple Sprouting Broccoli

Forced Rhubarb emerging from under the cloche

More posts soon I hope.