Autumn Bliss

I have had the most lovely of weekends pottering about the house and garden.  If pottering were an Olympic sport I would be a strong contender for gold - and I've enjoyed myself so much!  Alastair was working in Newcastle on Saturday afternoon, and I had to take him to the station for about 10am, after which I had to do a few errands (Tesco, B&Q and the bike shop in Coxhoe, for those of you of a curious disposition).  After that, I planned a whole weekend of cooking and gardening.

It started with coffee, a biscuit and a list.

Thus fortified, I started off my making some pasta sauce - pork, pepper and olive.  Yum!  It was delicious.  I made four portions - one for my lunch, and three for the freezer.

While that was simmering away on the cooker I went out into the garden.  It was one of those gorgeous Autumn days where the sky is bright blue and you can feel the heat of the sun on your back as you're weeding...bliss!  I had a session of weeding and tidying the entire garden, including my epic fail of a salad bed.

I couldn't tell what was weeds and what was salad and ended up letting it all grow out of control!

On a happier note, I was thrilled to find that one of my Autumn Bliss raspberry canes had survived last winter's cull. 

I loved my Autumn-fruiting raspberries - I adore Summer fruits and really miss them when Summer's over so having raspberries into December was such a treat.  But last December they got blight and the man in the garden centre advised us to pull them up, and all the books threatened dire consequences if they weren't pulled up.  We duly pulled them up, but one survived...and is beautifully healthy and blight-free.  Dad told me I shouldn't have pulled them up, and he was right...as usual when it comes to gardening.  Sixty years of experience is worth more than books! 

I did another cooking/gardening session this morning - I planted some bulbs and gave buddleia a bit of a prune.  Over the past few years I've been in the habit of buying bulbs before the planting season then forgetting about them.  One day earlier this year I gathered them all together.  The only bulbs I had to buy this year were the daffodils!

I was supervised while gardening.

Finally - and also in between the gardening - I cooked again.  Fish pie for Alastair...

...and vegetarian chilli for me (and the freezer).



I also made this...

...it doesn't look like much, but it is a taste explosion of considerable decadence.  Salted Caramel Sauce...the recipe is from an American blog that I like, and is too good not to be shared here (measurements translated).

Salted Caramel Sauce

2oz butter

1.5oz light brown sugar

1.5 caster sugar

150ml double cream

0.5 teaspoons sea salt

Melt the butter, stir in the sugars, bring to the boil, stirring constantly.  Add the cream and boil for two minutes, still stirring constantly.  Remove from the heat and stir in the salt.  Cool.

Alastair had it over home-made vanilla ice-cream.  I had a Weight Watchers Belgian Chocolate Brownie - whilst polishing my halo!

I have just put a batch of soup - Leek, Lentil and Butternut Squash - on to boil, and am now alternating a couple of housework jobs with blogging (rather more blogging than housework jobs!).  If I post every night next week I might get up all the recipes I've created this week and a proper garden update!