Friday 20 September 2013

Allotment and Smallholders Hot Cider Punch.



You don't need to have a smallholding or allotment to enjoy this.  But I think you would appreciate it after an hard few hours weeding or tending to the livestock.  There are lots of apples about at the moment.  Why not use them to make this drink?

Have a go at this recipe for a great warming alcoholic drink:

4 small apples
1 Lemon
1 Lime
1 Orange.

Cut them into quarters and remove any pips.  Add half a Cinnamon stick.  About ten Cloves.  Two tablespoons of Sugar (white or brown), 2 tablespoons of Honey and 4 litres of Cider.  Cheap stuff will suffice.  Warm slowly until it starts bubbling.  Taste it and add more Sugar or Honey if it needs it!

Enjoy.

Do you have a hot punch recipe?

17 comments:

  1. Sounds just the job coming in from a cold days weeding, might be tempted to try it on a cold miserable winters day, and sure there'll be plenty of them coming soon.

    Hot punch is something I've never made, the only thing I like warm and alcoholic is Irish or coffee, with the added ingredient of a splash of Tia Maria (home-made). Never tried it with honey, usually brown sugar, but one to experiment with. Squirty cream is the easiest but double cream is the best once you get the hang of floating it on top of the coffee; you drink the black part through the white part, just like the other famous Irish drink.

    Cold and windy here today, not actually raining but it looks like it soon will be.
    Hoping for a dry day tomorrow, could do with a bramble-picking expedition, they're in fine fettle at the moment, seems a shame not to use a few pounds to make a gallon of bramble vodka or whisky.

    Raggy cat in early this morning, and out again this afternoon, then back in to see if any goodies have materialised in the bowls, then back out again. Rack of ribs for supper with a glass of Bordeaux, so plenty bones for it to pick tomorrow and a couple of days.

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  2. I hate hot alcohol
    And cinnamon
    And I am not a lover of cider


    But this sounds lovely
    Lol

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  3. Hi Cumbrian. The cider punch gives you a real warm and uplifting glow to your face. Rather like a whisky punch does. It's a cheap drink and really easy to make it a few minutes.

    Bramble vodka and whisky sounds great.

    Supposed to be nice weather next week. Hopefully I will get back to doing some serious weeding. Not many enthusiastic volunteers here. Terrier will follow me to the the field. She stays around for a few minutes and then disappears. Think I will break to the weeding routine into an hour a day. This usually works. Been reading (Internet) about Redshank in Kale. Most farmers seem to recommend killing it all with weedkiller and spraying it before sowing.

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  4. Hi John, mulled wine would work instead of cider and you don't need to add the cinammon either. It's a really cheap drink and it goes a long way.

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  5. Just had a load of apples donated, 3 bags full, guess about 30 lbs, mixed mostly cookers, some windfall and some direct off tree.
    Apple sauce today with the medallions of pork fillet, I can feel a days apple preparation coming tomorrow, apple chutney and another try at apple wine.
    Might even get some cider and try the punch.
    And (never start a sentence with and) a batch of Irish Stout to put in keg, 2 djs of blueberry to rack and a batch of plum wine to strain into dj.

    Bramble picking rain stopped play, there's plenty about, but need a half dry day and my wellies.

    Raggy cat in this morning, asked to go out after dinner of chicken remnants, and not seen since.

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  6. Glad you enjoyed the cider punch,Ronnie.

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  7. Scrumpy cider would be a good idea for all those apples, Cumbrian. I have tasted some great and some not so good cider in Somerset and Herefordshire.

    There are lots of hedgerow fruits about at this time of year.

    Still busy fixing up the cow shed and doing the dreaded weeding. Hoping to start feeding the Kale to the cattle at the weekend. We will strip graze it with the electric fencer and give them a round bale of straw in the round feeder. That's if I get it weeded. Think it rains on Thursday.

    Thanks!

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  8. Yes, the scrumpy did occour to me, but there's not really enough to make much of it, and I don't have a press and don't know anybody who has locally, cider isn't a North country drink.
    Used to visit a place called Burrow Hill cider farm at Kingsbury Episcopi in Somerset, 160 acres of cider apple trees, the cider still made with old wooden equipment from the late 1800s, fascinating place, buy it on draft from huge wooden casks. Also make cider brandy, like Calvados, started about 25 years ago, I got a bottle from each of the first five years production intending to build a collection up from every year; no doubt my charming ex-wife enjoyed drinking it.

    Hedgerows full of brambles and rose hips, but nobody bothers with rose hips any more, we used to collect them and weigh them in at the village school, 4d per lb, a nice little pocket money earner in those days.

    Keep at the cow shed, that'll pay dividends in winter, and the weeding if you get the weather.

    Your mizzle here today, not quite as cool, seems a bit milder, but everything still damp. Noticed a field in windrows yesterday, must be getting a second cut.

    Raggy cat in this morning a bit damp, that damp that clings rather than soaks, had some chicken carcase remnants and milk, now on our bed, it's moved there the last couple of days, Mrs checks it for bugs and says it's very clean, so that's OK.

    ReplyDelete
  9. The Somerset cider farm sounds an amazing place, Cumbrian. I have visited a few in Somerset, Herefordshire, Devon and Cornwall. I always wanted to live in the Southwest of England. Cork is very similar to Devon and Cornwall with its mild climate, the Gulf Stream, apple pie shaped fields surrounded with Fuschia hedges. Apparently the Fuschia came from Chile in the Ice Age.

    Cowshed nearly constructed. Number one son is a wizard with a welder and text screw drill attachment. We just have to sheet the doors and then it's the headfeeders and gates inside the building and to get it wired.

    Did some more weeding yesterday. Can't say I am enjoying it either. I can see why so many farmers just grow grow and use weedkiller. I wonder if there is an organic selective weedkiller on the market? I have never heard of one.

    Mizzle here too. Leaves are falling and it's dark at half seven. There's not a lot to be said for winter. Some times wish I lived in Portugal or Spain. But what would you do for a living. There doesn't seem to be many rural jobs except for silage and slurry contracting. Perhaps this is why there are so many holiday homes and weekend houses? The people have to move to the big towns and cities to find a job.

    It sounds like the field of windrows was getting a second cut. Some farmers here get a third cut. They hammer their field with slurry and fertilizer.

    Raggy cat isn't daft.

    ReplyDelete
  10. The Somerset cider farm sounds an amazing place, Cumbrian. I have visited a few in Somerset, Herefordshire, Devon and Cornwall. I always wanted to live in the Southwest of England. Cork is very similar to Devon and Cornwall with its mild climate, the Gulf Stream, apple pie shaped fields surrounded with Fuschia hedges. Apparently the Fuschia came from Chile in the Ice Age.

    Cowshed nearly constructed. Number one son is a wizard with a welder and text screw drill attachment. We just have to sheet the doors and then it's the headfeeders and gates inside the building and to get it wired.

    Did some more weeding yesterday. Can't say I am enjoying it either. I can see why so many farmers just grow grow and use weedkiller. I wonder if there is an organic selective weedkiller on the market? I have never heard of one.

    Mizzle here too. Leaves are falling and it's dark at half seven. There's not a lot to be said for winter. Some times wish I lived in Portugal or Spain. But what would you do for a living. There doesn't seem to be many rural jobs except for silage and slurry contracting. Perhaps this is why there are so many holiday homes and weekend houses? The people have to move to the big towns and cities to find a job.

    It sounds like the field of windrows was getting a second cut. Some farmers here get a third cut. They hammer their field with slurry and fertilizer.

    Raggy cat isn't daft.

    ReplyDelete
  11. The Somerset cider farm sounds an amazing place, Cumbrian. I have visited a few in Somerset, Herefordshire, Devon and Cornwall. I always wanted to live in the Southwest of England. Cork is very similar to Devon and Cornwall with its mild climate, the Gulf Stream, apple pie shaped fields surrounded with Fuschia hedges. Apparently the Fuschia came from Chile in the Ice Age.

    Cowshed nearly constructed. Number one son is a wizard with a welder and text screw drill attachment. We just have to sheet the doors and then it's the headfeeders and gates inside the building and to get it wired.

    Did some more weeding yesterday. Can't say I am enjoying it either. I can see why so many farmers just grow grow and use weedkiller. I wonder if there is an organic selective weedkiller on the market? I have never heard of one.

    Mizzle here too. Leaves are falling and it's dark at half seven. There's not a lot to be said for winter. Some times wish I lived in Portugal or Spain. But what would you do for a living. There doesn't seem to be many rural jobs except for silage and slurry contracting. Perhaps this is why there are so many holiday homes and weekend houses? The people have to move to the big towns and cities to find a job.

    It sounds like the field of windrows was getting a second cut. Some farmers here get a third cut. They hammer their field with slurry and fertilizer.

    Raggy cat isn't daft.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Yes, the cider farm, it's the only one I've seen, fascinating place, apples by the ton, just washed then crushed, he had big wooden tanks, about 10' diameter and maybe 15' high, 120,000 gallons in each.
    The draft sales came from big casks, with wooden taps, sweet, dry or medium, the medium just mixed.
    Very popular with the locals, they came in with their earthenware demijohns to fill up, you can buy it in plastic, but it doesn't keep very long, it takes on a horrible plascicy taste.
    He also makes all kinds of other appley drinks, I think there's a web site somewhere.

    Nice to have a useful son, my No 2 son's the same, I'm hopeless with weld or mechanical things, but he seems a natural.

    Never heard of a selective organic weed-killer, only "armstrongs patent" as we call it.

    Same here leaves starting to fall, dusk about 7 o'clock, surprising what a difference a couple of hundred miles makes at our laditudes.

    Never seen 3 cuts here, two is a rarity.

    Raggy cat not in yet, not a bad morning, dry and cool with no breeze and overcast.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Hi Cunbrian, Don't know why it keeps publishing my comments more than once.

    Totally agree with you about plastic containers and bottles. I also hate polystyrene cups and instant coffee. I haven't seen a glass milk bottle for years. I also get dismayed with plastic packaging. Even so called organic food comes wrapped in plastic. Which we must pay a fortune to buy it and then to get rid of the awful stuff.

    The cider farm sounds an amazing place.

    I'm not brilliant myself with mechanical things. A hammer or a shovel and that's about it. Oh and I can just about use a computer. Although I do have a good imagination and I can see things in my head before they are constructed. Number one son is very practical. Oh how I wish there were apprenticeships. Nobody seems to take anybody any more.

    I can't see why there isn't selective or organic weedkillers. It would make gardening and farming so much easier.

    The new thing for dairy farmers is 'zero grazing'. The farmer brings the grass to the cow and doesn't have to drive the cattle along the road. Plus they don't contaminate the fields.

    Wettish day today. All doors finished on shed. Just the wiring, make head feeders and gates and a good sweep and pick up everything and we are ready for winter.

    Thanks!

    ReplyDelete
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Onion Set Planting.

I still managed to plant up two of the new planters/raised beds with onion sets in the rain yesterday. Notice the white root sock in the com...