Posted on 10 December 2011
Our free range, organic turkeys come from two family farms. Tom Copas and Paul Kelly’s birds are of exceptional quality and a world away from dry, flavourless, mass-produced birds. Look at their happy little faces as they gossip and amble about on Tom Copas’ fields.
The turkeys are treated like royalty – romping around open countryside eating an organic diet for six months. They are raised to the highest welfare standards.
Because they are reared to full maturity, they have a natural layer of fat which means you don’t need to baste or cover them in bacon to retain moisture. Your bird will be hung for two weeks (which develops the flavour even more). The result is a fabulous texture, superior fat cover and outstanding flavour. They might cost a little more but nothing quite beats an organic turkey at Christmas.
Interesting turkey fact we learned when we went a-visiting: turkeys are very stupid, and very good at bumping into things. Also, they like a good bit of call and response (the girls respond to one noise, and the boys to another).
Posted on 1 December 2011
Last Friday we had a right jolly knees up at our Festive Foodie Do. Loads of you lovely lot travelled from far and wide to be there, and so did loads of the brilliant farmers, bakers and makers behind your Christmas food this year. They came laden with gifts. And moustaches.
Andrew Skea, potato expert, and our Ben (what a marvellous pair of moustaches). Andrew came all the way from Scotland for the do, and his amazing Arran Victory potatoes are the special spuds gracing the Christmas Day Fruit and Veg Box this year, as they’re so very perfect for roasting.
Jody from Copas, clever turkey carver and very lovely lady. Their turkeys are slow grown, and free to romp around the Berkshire fields.
Poppy and Rosie from What on Earth. They’re two of the very good treat seekers who found such delights as our Chocolate Yule Log (and loads more). Read more >>
Posted on 4 November 2011
What a happy appler (even if that is a pear). That’s what happens when you have a day out at Paul Ward’s orchards.
Remember Murphy, Paul’s labrador? More a very hungry caterpillar than a black lab. In the short time he was banished to the office while we all ate our lunch, Murphy ate:
A sponge
A carton of milk (full)
50 serviettes
A bag of sugar
A note pad
All of Sara W’s bananas
Min 10 apples
1 pear
Silly lab!
From little trees…
Come many of these.
And (after Rachel wiggles her magic fingers) loads of lovely chutney.
Some cooking demonstrations from Rachel…
And a souper lunch, too.
Posted on 21 October 2011
Getting into the spirit of Hallowe’en isn’t hard. Delicious food, dressing up and carving pumpkins? Easy peasy pumpkin pie.
Carve your pumpkin and upload your work of art to our facebook page.
Our favourite 10 will get a prize (of the dark chocolate mini cookies variety).
Here are some spooky pumpkins from last year for a bit of inspiration. Think you can do better? We’d like to see you try (yes, we really would).
P.S. Competition closes Friday 4th November.
Posted on 21 October 2011
Preparing your winning conker
Drill a hole in your conker of choice (take care at this stage, and most definitely only grown ups should do this). Thread your string through it and tie a knot to keep the conker on the string.
There should be 20cm (8 inches) between knuckle and nut when you’re dangling the conker ready for your first strike.
The Rules (as developed over many years in the playgrounds of England)
- Decide who’s going to go first by tossing a coin or getting your opponent to choose which hand has a conker in it. The winner of the toss or choice decides who will strike first.
- A distance of no less than 8 inches or 20cm of string must be between knuckle and nut. None of this two inches of string nonsense, this is a game of skill.
- Each player takes three alternate strikes at the opponent’s conker. The striker wraps his/her conker string round their hand. Then takes the conker in the other hand and draws it back for the strike.
- If the strings tangle, the first player to call ‘strings’ gets an extra shot.
- If a player hits their opponent’s conker in such a way that it completes a whole circle after being hit – known as ‘round the world’ – the player gets another go.
- If a player drops his/her conker, or it is knocked out of their hand, the other player can shout ‘stamps’ and jump on it; but should its owner first cry ‘no stamps’, then there should be no jumping.
- Each attempted strike must be clearly aimed at the nut, no deliberate mis-hits on your sister’s knuckles, boys.
- The person holding the conker must hold it still. The conker that survives the onslaught is the winner. A small piece of nut or skin remaining on the string doesn’t count, it must be enough to mount an attack.
- Any nut knocked from the string but not smashed may be rethreaded and the game continued.
Scoring
A victorious conker assumes the score of all its victim’s precedent foes. Thus, in a contest between two fresh conkers, the winner would then have a score of 1 (known as a ‘one-er’). If it then beat another three one-ers, it would become a four-er.
You will of course be needing conkers for this game. Enter our tombola and see if you win some here.
