Moroccan chicken

I had one of those times tonight when I knew what I wanted to cook but I hadn't quite got all of the ingredients. What transpired in the kitchen could only be described the Russian roulette of cooking - you don't know if it's going to be a hit or a miss, especially with fussy children to please.

I wanted to make Tana Ramsay's Moroccan chicken with couscous from Family Kitchen or Delia's Moroccan baked chicken with chickpeas and rice from her Winter book. What I needed was peppers, chicken and prunes or olives. What I had was a huge bag of carrots, three chicken breasts and the second half of a bag of wild rocket.

The carrots made me think of Nigella's The Rainbow Room's carrot and peanut salad which is my most favourite of all salads (it's in Forever Summer). So what I ended up making took inspiration from that and the other two recipes.

I sliced one each of red and white onions (recently harvested and currently drying in the polytunnel) and softened them in a pan with a glug of olive oil.

Meanwhile I sliced the chicken breasts and tossed them in Moroccan-style spicings - the end of a jar of Ras el hanout, a tablespoon of toasted and ground cumin seeds and a couple of grinds of black pepper. I added these to the pan with two chopped cloves of garlic (from the poytunnel ditto the onions) and then added three carrots - prepared carrot salad-style which is scrubbed and run through the chips cutter on my food processor (or you could cut them julienne style if you have the patience or are less lazy than I am).

When that lot was browned and softened I added a pint of chicken stock with a good pinch of saffron strands and a sliced lemon (both Delia's idea). Then I put on a lid and left it to simmer slowly until the chicken was cooked. Then I checked the seasoning and added about a tablespoon of honey to taste. It should be salty, sweet and sour.

I piled it into a dish on top of the couscous (prepared in the usual way) and sprinkled over a handful of salty peanuts (back to Nigella's salad idea again) and served the rocket on the side.

It was, for a dish created by a veritable committee of recipes, surprisingly delicious and got the thumbs up. I might in the future, when not catering for H9 who can spot a whiff of heat at a million paces, add a bit of sliced red chilli - I like the hot, sour, sweet, salty spicy combination. A final scattering of chopped fresh coriander wouldn't go amiss either.

The Big Bread Bakeathon #2: Malted Grain Bread

Recipe number two in the River Cottage Bread book is Malted Grain bread. Daniel Stevens says it is 'like candlelight or a soft-focus lens, it is flattering - the Don Juan of home baking'. Don Juan or not, it did seem to be a well-tempered dough. I had time to rise it twice which improves the flavour. This time I divided the dough into two, one for my new 800g tin, the other to be baked on my trusty paving slab.

We scoffed it fresh from the oven with bowls of homemade spicy lentil soup. It got a resounding thmubs up again, especially for its really tasty crusty crust.

Next: White bread.

The Gallery: World Photography Day

I haven't taken part in The Gallery for a while - not because I have taken any photographs (I've taken nearly 700 in August alone) but because they have all been specific to things other than the Gallery prompts. But this weekend included World Photography Day so I had to include an entry.

Saturday saw butterflies everywhere in my garden and on the farm. Lots of tortoiseshells, peacocks and red admirals. Butterflies are a frustrating subject to photograph. They're beautiful but elusive. I only have a compact camera with a small zoom so focussing on the buggers butterflies can be a frustrating business. I got this shot though (it took only about 15 attempts!)

Coincidentally on World Photography Day I also got to order my birthday present for next Sunday - a second hand Canon Eos DSLR*. Hopefully photographing the butterflies in my garden will be a less frustrating business from now on.

* There's a story behind this. I regularly used a Canon Eos 35mm camera when I was a reporter to take pictures when the paper's photographer wasn't available. The editor knew I was competent enough to get a good shot. It's quite a thrill to see one of your photographs blown up to fill a broadsheet page or on page one. (I photographed the Queen once and she bought a copy for the Buckingham palace collection). So when I finally saved up for a DSLR I went to the self-proclaimed Canon experts at the camera shop in Carmarthen for advice. The wide boy behind the counter treated me like an imbecile and told me - when I asked about DSLRs - that I could have 'a compact camera for sixty quid'. I felt my Canon Powershot  - I always carry it in my handbag - shudder. Offended, I left, and bought my DSLR elsewhere (from a woman).

Carreg Cennen Castle

We made a visit to 'Wales' most romantic ruin' on Friday - Carreg Cennen Castle, which is just south of Llandeilo. It's a fabulously imposing privately-owned castle perched atop a high rock which is reached by a short but strenuous walk through the owner's farmland. It has a tea shop on the way so we refuelled there first with tea and cream scones.

We had another motive for visiting the castle which was to have a look at these sheep. This is a Balwen Welsh Mountain sheep and is a breed we're considering converting our flock to. We've only got 20 ewes now and I've always felt that it would make more sense to have a pedigree flock. In the past we trialled Llanwenogs but they didn't really suit our terrain. I quite like the idea of having a dark-fleeced breed and Balwen, being originally from Carmarthenshire, are our nearest. I very much like the white-tipped tail, the socks and the blaze on the face. The next step is to find a local breeder and have a chat.

Carreg Cennen is also famous for its Longhorn cattle. When I was farming editor for the local paper I used to see Bernard Llewellyn and his cattle at shows (in fact he used to write a column for me many years ago in the farming paper I edited, Farm & Field).

This little chap has a way to go in the horn growing department.

The castle dates back to at least the 13th century but archaeological evidence has been found both of the Romans and prehistoric man. Despite being a ruin it is still an incredibly imposing structure.

The views from the top are spellbinding. The castle sits at the western end of the Beacons Way long distance path,  a 95-mile walk through the Brecon Beacons National Park which ends at the Holy Mountain.

The castle has a natural cave which you can visit by clambering down a steep path. It gets darker and steeper towards the bottom. We chickened out when we ran out of light - you really do need a torch for the cave itself.

Pretty little harebells growing high up on the ruined castle walls tossed their heads in the breeze.

We loved Carreg Cennen Castle. It's been turned into a tourist attraction with the help of Cadw but is unspoilt. We loved the freedom to scramble around and find our way about with occasional help from the unobtrusive information signs. If we didn't know what things were there was a discreet sign ('kitchen above' and 'later musket loop' being two examples). The rest was left to our imagination, which is exactly as it should be.

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Back at home and a picture of Itsy to show just how gorgeous she looks in the summer. H9 has been brushing her coat and combing her mane and she's bursting with health at the moment. Here she's naughtily leaning over to steal hay from Bullseye (we wondered why he'd lost so much weight! Oops!). He's now putting weight on his injured leg, thank goodness, and seems to be making a speedy recovery.

The Big Bread Bakeathon

I was reading the lovely Village Fate blog a few days ago where Kitty announced she was cooking her way through Pam Corbin's River Cottage Cake handbook in a sort of Julie/Julia project. Ah ha! I thought, I'd like to do that too. I don't have a copy of Cake (although I'd dearly love one) so I can't exactly join Kitty but then I do have River Cottage Handbook No. 3, Bread by Dan Stevens. Genius! I'll cook that.

Me and Bread are good friends and I have cooked quite a few recipes from it already but in the interests of this bakeathon I plan to cook all of them, in order, including the vetkoek and doughnuts which require (shudder) deep frying.

Bread is a good book to choose because you have to start it from the beginning. In fact Dan warns you, should you dare to enter the chapter entitled 'Beyond the basic loaf' that if you skipped the 'breadmaking step-by-step' chapter 'you need to go back and unskip it'. Ciabatta mustn't be attempted until you've had a certain amount of practice, he scolds.

So I began with the basic bread recipe that I make regularly, but one slips into sloppy habits so I went back and followed it through, step-by-step. Dan's very detailed about what each stage of the alchemy of breadmaking entails and I have found that if you follow each step exactly, the results are amazing.

The basic recipe gives you options, it's the technique that's all important here. So my options were: Flour - two thirds strong white, one third strong wholemeal; liquid - water; extras - sesame seeds; fat - walnut oil; coating - sesame seeds with a few cumin seeds tossed in for interest.

I baked it on my bakestone (a paving slab from Wickes) and these three loaves were the result.

I made a vegetable soup for dinner and we ate this loaf with it. Delicious.

The next chapter is variations on the basic bread recipe which begins with malted grain bread.

The best laid plans...

Today we were supposed to go to Folly Farm. We've been planning this for a while, a family visit, with Daddy on his day off from work so we could all go on the Dodgems at the same time and on the flying swings and the carousel and see all the animals (especially the adorable armadillos).

I made sandwiches, packed a flask of coffee and some cartons of juice. Then we drove the few miles and encountered The Queue from Hell at Folly Farm. Ah. I think it was Peppa Pig Day or something. We could see a tsunami of mummies and buggies, angry dads queuing in hot cars with fractious kids in the back seat. The queue to pay to get in was a quarter of a mile long and who knows what it was like inside. We drove past, noting the tailback of traffic to the Begelly roundabout, accompanied by a disappointed silence.

We headed for Carew instead but on the way my homing instinct for Lawrenny kicked in and we found ourselves on the quay again - the second time in two weeks. Brian hadn't done The Walk yet so it seemed a good time to show him the route. We grabbed our sandwiches and dashed out of the car to sit scoffing them overlooking the boats moored at the marina. I pointed out all the boats that looked like Sea Dance and where she used to be moored and Brian, H9 and R7 humoured me (they've heard it all before, but I do like to reminisce).

We headed into the cool woods and on, down into Lawrenny.

The wall by the church is covered with blackberries. R7 and I tested them. The first we've had this year. Then we continued on the walk in unseemly haste...

...and found ourselves in the tearoom.

It was packed (but everyone was outside. We'd already been bothered by a wasp so we stayed indoors in the cool, almost on our own. It wasn't this empty for long.)

G9, R7 and I felt it our duty to tackle the strawberry and raspberry cheesecake. Doesn't it look pretty on its Cath Kidston plate?

Brian sampled the delights of the Lemon Thing (its official title) which is served on a white plate to avoid risk of a colour clash.

By this time it was a quite lovely afternoon. The tide was way out and we crunched about at the edge of the water on piles of mussel shells. We found teeny tiny crabs burying themselves in the soft mud and popped the bladder wrack with our feet. Three oystercatchers flew past followed by a cormorant and the usual gulls. We ambled round the edge of the estuary back up toward Garron Pill and found a quiet place to sit to watch mullet flipping their fins in the shallows. Little boats buzzed to and fro and a Chinook rumbled overhead.

This little shore bird was poking about in the shallows. I think he was quite annoyed at us disturbing his dabbling.

It really was a beautiful day and, according to R7, almost as good as going to Folly Farm.

Raspberry chocolate crumble

I'm a huge fan of raspberries. I think they are my favourite fruit and we're fortunate here in having the conditions they love. A few years ago I planted some Glen Ample canes and now they romp around the garden like weeds. The back vegetable garden is divided up into raised beds with paths in between but this hasn't put off the raspberries which happily pop under the paths and reappear in neighbouring beds. In fact I've just noticed that they've popped up in the small polytunnel which is right over the othe side from where they were originally planted.

Sometimes we get a glut of the tart scarlet berries and I fill plastic boxes and hide them in the freezer. I found one on Sunday and immediately thought 'crumble!'

I first encountered raspberry crumble in the concourse at high school in the arms of my friend Jane who had just made it in home economics. I didn't get a taste of that one because she took it home on the bus to her lucky Mum and Dad but I've been making it ever since. On Sunday, though, I took inspiration from a tart I ate at another friend's house. Nicola's wasn't home made but it was delicious - a crisp chocolate case studded with raspberries (and if you want to take that short cut, you'll find it in the Tesco Finest frozen dessert section.)

Anyway I combined the two. I just made my basic crumble recipe (six tablespoons of flour, three of butter, three of caster sugar, all rubbed in together, adjust individual components until it's right) and added a generous tablespoon of cocoa powder (Tesco Value fat reduced is cheap and excellent.)

Sprinkle it over the raspberries (I don't bother to thaw the fruit first if it's frozen) and bake in a moderately hot oven (I was cooking a pasta bake at gas mark 5 at the time so this went in on the shelf below).

Bake until the top is just beginning to brown and the fruit is heated through and just beginning to collapse into a fragrant juicy muddle. 

Serve with custard, cream, ice cream or all three. Eat the leftovers for breakfast the following morning with plain yoghurt. The chocolate crumble was a huge hit and I'm thinking that a pear version might be a lovely autumnal Sunday dinner treat.