Marrow & Jammin

Yesterday was another horrible day at work but was more than compensated for yesterday evening. Mel had taken her giant marrow from the plant and so last night we had a marrow feast. We cooked up a bolognaise sauce using some left over sausages from the BBQ, a tin of chopped tomatoes, the inside of the marrow and some cheese (It doesn't sound very exciting as I list it now, but believe me it was great!). We cut the marrow in half longways, scooping out the seeds (for next year) and some of the flesh which was added to the bolognaise, and baked each half with some olive oil in the oven skin side up. We then turned over the marrow and filled each half with bolognaise, sprinkled cheese on top and baked for a little longer. It was lovely, the marrow had a sort of nutty sweetness to it. I've had stuffed marrow before and I have to say the first marrow didn't really taste of much but this one was really nice. The next vegetable that is ready for harvesting is the 1 Swiss chard that made it through, but I haven't got a clue what to do with it (if anyone has a secret Swiss chard recipe up their sleeves now is you chance to unleash it, if not I guess I'll have to turn to google...)

After we had feasted upon miles or marrow I set off into the garden to gather redcurrants. I think I may have caught them just in time as it looked like they were starting to go over their best. I stripped quite a few bushes of them and made a jam, which I then strained to become redcurrant jelly. I got 7 jars of clear set jelly which is excellent planning as my special Christmas leftovers pie requires redcurrant jelly in its gravy (as well a a great many other nice things). If I remember when its a bit closer to the C word I'll post the recipe as its a great one to share.

All I seem to have talked about in this post is food but there is a great deal of other stuff going on at Rose H.Q I am knitting like the fury. I finished the stained glass window scarf and only have one ball left of that yarn from which I intend to make a skinny version to be given away at the festive period, I'm also starting to make a little shreddies hat for Michelle's baby (you basically knit in a straight line & fold over so said child/adult resembles a kosak gone wrong. I knitted my uncle Martin, who resembles Rubius Hagrid one of these last year and I have to say he carried it off with style & class!) With Michelle's little one however I'm not sure how big to make it so will have to research that. I'm also finishing off something for David (an old friend from uni) and to top it all I went into Mason's for some extra yarn and once again fell victim to their bargain bucket, I am now the proud owner of some purple mohair (its really gorgeous sort of purple, pink & black). I'm going to have to think about designs for that really carefully as mohair doesn't take well to being ripped back. Croperdy (a folk festival run by 60's folk stars Fairport Convention) starts today, but alas I'm not going, hope the weather improves for those that are though.