Mulligatawny Soup.

 

J found a tub of this soup in the "Specials" section in Lidl today.  They must be just selling for the run up to Christmas.

It is one of those soups that you place in the machine that goes "ping" for two minutes.

It wasn't bad.  I think I might have a go at making it from scratch some time.

Mulligatawny sounds like the name of a town in the West of Ireland.

Mulligatawny Soup could be the name of a prog rock group?

I have lit the stove and we have snow forecast for tonight and tomorrow.

It is definitely soup weather.

I think I will make some of my homegrown and homemade leek and potato soup tomorrow.  I could add some parsnip, onions and tomatoes?  🤔

Anyone else buying soup or even making it?

Have The Supermarkets Been Reading My Blog About Freezing Onions?

 We went Christmas shopping the other day before the world and the wife descend on the shops.

Remember back in September when I posted a blog about us slicing and chopping our organic home grown onion bags an placing them in small freezer bags and putting them in the freezer?

Well we noticed now Dunnes Stores are doing the same and selling them for a Euro.

We made a chilli last night and took a bag of our readily frozen chopped and sliced onions and placed them in the pan.

We are getting like M &S with our ready washed and chopped veg.

Do you freeze your home grown onions and vegetables?

Oriental Turkey Plates And Thinking What To Eat For Christmas Dinner.

 We washed our turkey old serving  plates I told you about on Sunday:

 

Willow Pattern.  They originate in China but a lot were made in the Potteries in Staffordshire in England.  Farmers and Industrialists realised the land had a lot of clay.  This was/is not ideal for growing vegetables but ideal for making pottery like our plates.  There was also no shortage of coal to heat the kilns.

This red one has Japan printed on the back.  On further online research this tells me it was made between 1921 and 1941 and made for the American market.  So it is at least 80 years old maybe an hundred.

Some of the blue willow pattern plates look very old.

If only they could speak?  I wonder how my Christmas turkeys have been served on these plates?

It's a shame we are not big Turkey eaters and we don't believe in leftovers  or Turkey sandwiches and Turkey  curry for days.  Any meat left over the dogs get it.  Any vegetables the pigs get it!

What are you having for your Christmas Dinner?  

We will probably have steak again and an all day hot and cold buffet.  We have even had a chilli and a curry one year.  Oh one year we made homemade pizza with a curry topping. 

Hope you like the plates?  I think I will sell them some time or get plate hangers for some of them and hang them on a wall.  If I can find some vacant wall space that is?

We placed them in sealed polythene bags and are resting back on top of a cupboard.  

I think I am a bit of treasure Womble or maybe a Jackdaw?😃 Perhaps I should live in a second hand shop? Only trouble is I wouldn't sell anything I liked.

Some Of Our Oriental Collectibles.

 GZ over at Ook blog feaured an Oriental box on her last post.

Here's some Oriental items we have collected over the years from flea markets, car boot sales and charity shops:

Very old Tea urn.

Geisha girls and my reflection.

Mount Fuji.

Oriental vases.

We also have 4 or 5 large willow pattern serving plates.  Big enough for a big chicken or Turkey.  They are very old.  I will dig them out some time and wash them and show them you.

Any one else collect Oriental items?

Tight Wad Tea Choice.

 Here's how I picked my tea for tonight.

We walked around Tesco and went to their Reduced Section.  Here's what I found and I made my meal choice by looking at the price label:

Stuck for a food idea for tea?  Have a trip to your supermarket and look in the Reduced section.

Do you go looking for food bargains?

The Deposit Return Scheme Seems To Have Been A Success.

 

Earlier this year the Irish Deposit Return Scheme was introduced into supermarkets and shops in Ireland.

Here's a receipt from the machines on one of our latest shopping trips:

The paper receipts can not be recycled I think because of the ink?

There are 13 EU countries participating in the Deposit Return Scheme. It's a pity that the UK chose Brexit and they could have participated in the re cycling scheme.

I wish someone would invent a machine for pet food cans, cooking oil plastic bottles and glass bottles.

Do you think there should be a Deposit Return Scheme introduced in other countries like the UK and the USA?

Warsaw Zoo Revisited.

I spent an half an hour looking at old photos I have posted on blogger since I began writing on here in 2010.  If you want inspiration for new post ideas look at your old blog posts.

Here is a fantastic photograph J took of a Siberian tiger eating Elderberries at Warsaw Zoo in 2013.  I think this is the third time I have shown the photograph on here.  I think it is fantastic:

 I will post another favourite photo or two another time.

November Garden Flowers On The Irish Riviera.

 It's been very mild weather here the last few days and the plants in the gardens seem to think winter is not on its way yet:

Geranium.

Hebe.

Myrtle.

Fuchsia.

Hypericum.

Surfinia.

Soapwort.

Shasta Daisy.

Bergenia.

Nasturtium.

Cape Daisy or Osteospernum.

The days and nights are getting colder but the plants keep putting on a show.

Is your garden flowers still performing?

Time To Harvest One Of My Parsnips.

 Do you remember when I pre germinated my Parsnips seeds back in April by placing them in between a damp paper towel and placing them in a plastic Tupperware box and put the lid on?  They germinated in less than a week.  Normally they take up to 28 days to germinate.

The old gardeners books use to tell you to sow them outside in February.  I find the weather is too wet and cold so I waited until April.

Then I sowed them in a small plant pot with a cut off bottom and full  full of compost and placed it in a large plant pot filled with compost in the polytunnel.

I left them to grow vegetation for a few weeks then I planted them outside in the veg plot.  Today I decided to lift one of them:

Parsnip growing in large plant pot.

Me holding one of my Parsnips.  Not the best in show but definitely a success.

Parsnips are from Eurasia and the Romans and Red Indians are said to have grown them.

Anyone else grown Parsnips this year?

I will leave Jack Frost and his wife to paint the rest of the Parsnips and turn the starches into sugars.  

A Early Birthday Christmas Present For The Veg Plot And Me.

 It was raining on a Sunday morning but we still went to a car boot sale to have a look around.

I saw a brand new four prong (Darby Tools) digging fork for sale and I treated myself and paid 15 Euros for it.  They are usually 44 Euros.  So it was quite a bargain.

A new gardening help.

The car boot  seller gave me 5 Euros change from a 20 Euros note.  He said and smiled:

"I hope ye have lots of luck with it".  

I laughed and walked away with my new trusty long handled gardening and smallholding pal.

It will be used for digging over the potato beds and for filling wheelbarrows of well rotted fym to fill the repurposed oil tanker raised beds.  

What garden tool or equipment would you like for your birthday or Christmas present?

I want a petrol woodchipper to shred shrubs and use it for compost and shredded bark paths.  I have a small electric shredder but now I am ready for something more industrial and petrol driven.

Turf For The Stove.

 We went for a spin the other day and I bought 5 fertilizer bags of peat or "Turf" for the stove.

I paid 5 Euros a bag for the turf in bags.  We bought 5 bags in total.  The seller had only got five left.

In tourist shops in Killarney you can buy little thatched cottage incense burners that you light and they give off an aroma of turfy peat.

I put it in our lit stove and we smell it all night long.  Especially if you go outside and smell the smoke coming out of the chimney.

The smell reminds my wife of when she was a girl  going to her grandparents in Mayo and getting off the ferry in Dublin and the first smell that hit her nostrils was the smell of burning turf from the house chimneys.

My dad's first job when he left school at 14 was to cycle to a turf bog and didig turf all day and ride his bike home again.  He left Ireland for England during the "black fifties" and returned here before he died.

Bags of turf.

Turf in the Scuttle.

What a sight?

Enjoy the video.

I would love to go back to those times when everything was organic.  Man's been digging and burning turf for thousands of years.

Wild West Cork Buffalo Greek Style Cheese.

 I was in Aldi food and beer shopping and I noticed there was West Cork buffalo greek style cheese for sale.  I decided to risk it for a biscuit and put some in the supermarket trolley:

A new cheese for us to try.

We tried a piece each.  It tasted creamy and I thought a bit salty.

It was very reasonably priced I think it was 2 Euros fifty nine.  I recently paid nearly 5 Euros for some Lancashire Creamy cheese in M &S in Killarney.

English cheeses are something else I find to source along with English beer like Newcastle Brown Ale here in little ould Ireland.  I blame Brexit.

Any way or any road.  I looked up the buffalo cheese website.  There is a West Cork farmer in Macroom who owns an herd of buffalo.  "Oh give me an home where the buffalo roam.."  "You"ll get big piles on yer carpet!"😀

In the early seventies West Cork had it's own version of Woodstock in Macroom and the likes of Thin Lizzy and Rory Gallagher played a music festival at Macroom castle and put Macroom firmly on the map. 

 Now I think an herd of 500 +buffalo are doing the same! 

Check out their website and video.

Anyone tasted buffalo cheese?

Have Azada Can Dig.

 "Fool In The Rain" by Led Zeppelin began to play in my mental jukebox.

I had been allocated another hedge to plant and  it was a typical Irish mizzle day.

 I went over to a friendsWest Cork farm and set about clearing vegetation and digging holes and planting more Griselinia hedging that I grew from cuttings and planted in homemade compost filled plant pots last year.

The You Tube videos and gardening books and gardening  posts online tell you to get a mini digger and clear the vegetation with a mini digger.  

Not me though I use my shovel and trusty Azada clearing hoe.  I have always been good with shovels and mattocks.  If you have an overgrown allotment or garden invest in an Azada.  Apparently it means " hoe" in Spanish.  They are that clever in Spain.  Even the kids can speak Spanish.  That's an old one!

When I worked on a golf course in England many moons ago.   My work colleague and beer  supping friend would say to me: "Dig Minotaur".  I would dig ferociously with my shovel or mattock swinging in the air.  I was half man half bull with a mattock or shovel!

 Here Is my trusty Azada having a rest:

Azada having a rest while I took the photo with my mobile phone camera.

Perhaps I should call my blog: Azada Dave?

I planted 87 plants in the rain.  "November Rain" by Guns N Roses started playing in my head.

Do you have songs playing in your mental jukebox when your grafting in the garden?

My back is aching after my hedge planting toils.  Here's a picture of a piece of the hedge I planted:

New hedging planted and my Azada is having a lie down.

Now is a good time to plant hedging.  I grow mine in pots but you can buy it bare rooted and plant it from now until March while the plants are dormant.

Anyone else make their own hedging or planning to plant one?  

Anyone got a gardener  vacancy somewhere warm like the Algarve for the winter? I am very reasonably priced and hard working and a  organic gardening anorak.  My favourite is bringing up compost in conversation with the younger generation.  You have heard of the "pub bore" well I am the "gardener bore".

Beautiful Prog Music On A Thursday.

 I found the following You Tube video yesterday featuring David Gilmour and his daughter Romany.  I can't stop playing the track over and over again.

I have seen Roger Waters live performing the Wall.  Snowy White was his guitarist who I saw way back in 1981 with Thin Lizzy on their Renegade tour.  I wish I had seen Pink Floyd in their prime.

David Gilmour discovered Kate Bush and recorded her magical voice.  All these years later I think he's found another Prog Rock star in his daughter.  Superlative words like masterpiece  and Magnum Opus (Kansas  song title) come to my mind.  I would love to see them at a festival like A New Day or Cropredy next year.  Enjoy:

Did I see you playing your "air guitar" or was it the house brush🎸?

Fava Beans Planting And More Leaf Mulching.

 At this time of year I find it a problem sourcing seeds.  My German garden centre and food and beer providers seem to have put gardening stuff away for the winter.

Luckily my other cheap gardening supplier: The Range still continue selling gardening supplies like bulbs and seeds...

Now Fava or Broad Beans are the last thing to sow before winter.

I bought a packet of them for just 75 Cents and I sowed two fish boxes of them in the polytunnel today:

Broad Beans or Fava Beans originate in China and the Himalayas.  They were probably brought to our shores thousands of years ago.

It will be good to see something growing through the winter.  Beans are Legumes and the extract nitrogen from the air and release it through their root nodules.  Instead of taking out goodness they add goodness to the soil.  Like the banana, beans are full of potassium.  Which is very good for your blood pressure and your heart.

Have you planted any Broad Beans yet?

I am always weeding my raised veg beds and I scattered to big buckets of leaves around my leeks.  Hopefully they will suppress the weeds and feed the soil when they break down?

Any once else mulch with leaves?  I also mulch with straw.  With the leaves I am imitating the rich  leaf blanket of the Autumn floor and feeding the worms, beneficial anaerobic bacteria and much needed plant food like carbon.

Newly mulched oil tank (repurposed) raised bed.

MY Hydrangea Cuttings Are Flying It.

 French Botanist Philibert Commerson first discovered the Hydrangea in China in 1761.

If his ghost visited my West Cork polytunnel.  He would find over fifty newly rooted cuttings like this one:

I grew my shrub cuttings in homemade compost in plant pots covered with  plastic bottle cloches.

I will eventually pot them on into bigger plant pots and I will eventually plant some in the garden and sell them at a carboot sale next summer. 

 That's if old Jack Frost and his wife don't get them of course.  I think they will be OK residing in the polytunnel.

I only have to wait two years for them to flower. I have seen them for sale in Lidl for 10 Euros.  Mine cost me nothing!

Any one else busy propagating shrubs?

Retail Therapy At The Carboot Sale.

 I know how to give our lass a good time.  We put some motion lotion in the van and J, Bronte the Golden Retriever and me went for a spin to a carboot sale.

We were not going selling this week.  We wanted to buy stuff.  It was very busy and well attended.  What a difference a dry day makes.  Here's some of our purchases:

New bar stools for the breakfast bar.  The ones we have a lovely rusty speckled patina on them.  Muzz Muss seems to have taken a liking to them.  We paid ten Euros for both of them.  I know.  But you have to put the boat out sometimes!

A brand new pair of wellingtons or the " rubber boots" that they call them here in West Cork.

My steel toe capped wellingtons split a hole in them when I was planting that hedge the other day. On Saturday I donned a carrier bag tied on my leg inside the wellington boot.  On Sunday I treated myself to a new pair.

The bar stools costs 10 Euros and the wellingtons 25 Euros.

Anyone else been car boot shopping recently?

A Beautiful Birthday Card From Vietnam.

 It was a birthday for J the other day.

One of her birthday cards came all the way from Vietnam and bought by a relative on a visit there this summer.

 It's incredibly beautiful and the Vietnamese lady is a hand  paper cut and it stands up in the middle of the card:

It's a card that will not be placed in the stove to keep us warm.  It will go in a drawer no doubt.

Wouldn't it be good if you could buy hand cut cards where we live?

Hedge Planting.

 I spent Friday morning digging holes and planting forty Griselinia hedge plants I grew last year from cuttings for a friend:

They will (hopefully) eventually camouflage a concrete panel fence.

The best thing about planting the hedge is that I was able to bring the plant pots home.  I will spend a few hours soon filling them and making more cuttings.  

It's good to have a propagating hobby which eventually financially rewards.  

Do you grow hedging or plants for an hobby?

A Flying Orb Ghost Story For Halloween.

Click on the sign to read please.

The small building on the left is the Hell Fire Club.

Cloisters windows where the orbs flew through.

 Regular readers will know we like visiting ancient sites in Ireland.  

I know there a lot of people on the Internet  who do not believe in God or the devil or even the living dead.  But this is what happened one late summer day to us:

The above photos were taken in 2017.  Google photos reminded me of the date the other day.

There was my youngest son, my wife and me.  We had seen the tourist signs for an old Franciscan Priory, a castle and an Hell Fire Club.

We were the only visitors walking through the grounds.  The three of us immediately very uncomfortable and that someone was watching us.

I walked along into the ruins and a white round orb or like circle of mist passed over my shoulder and out  the cloister windows.  Then several more flew passed me.  

It felt like we were in a room full of people. Yet only 3 of were present in broad day light.

We all felt really scared and couldn't leave the building quick enough.

I have seen ghosts before and wrote about them on here.  I have watched many ghost programmes and read about white orbs and also pyschometry when things or events get stuck in water like rivers etc.

The Hell Fire Club was built the same year the Franciscans left the Priory.  Hell Fire Clubs were mainly drinking clubs for rich aristocrat types.  But there are tails of them trying to rise the devil.

I have also read that Cromwellian soldiers or Roundheads ransacked the Priory and people were murdered there.  

We definitely felt uneasy and picked up on the tragedy of the place and that spirits were not at rest. None of us ever wish to visit the place again.

Have you had similar ghostly experiences or do you know of a haunted building near you?

Here's a song that we should have been singing: