13 June 2011

Home Grown, Local, Delicious!

Flash back two days. It’s Friday and I should be packing my suitcase to leave on holiday tomorrow but the sun is shining and I’d rather be outside. As I pull overgrown rocket from my raised vegetable bed I am serenaded by the rhythmic clucking of my neighbour’s hens and the sultry afternoon warble of a blackbird in the Juneberry bush.

My list of preparatory tasks is long and includes taking out the compost and picking the red currants growing along the fence behind my amazing potato patch. After once again using my trusty Thermomix to speed up the composting process I grab a flower pot and begin filling it with ripe, juicy, shiny red currants. [Perhaps I should inform you, Dear Reader, that the compost bin, potato patch and summer fruits are all in the same corner of the garden, behind the shed. So now perhaps, it makes sense.]

I am doing well in my tasks and I now have a huge bag of home grown rocket leaves and a big bag of home grown salad leaves as well as a big bag of home grown coriander. Not to mention a bowl of fresh red currants and a bonus of some raspberries, all from my back garden.

Going only slightly farther afield – about a half mile down the road to be exact – it was time for Bob’s Hogs and his Farm Shop where I supported local farming and filled my freezer with the tastiest and freshest sausages I’ve ever eaten, plus several other unusual cuts of pork.

Fast forward 36 hours and imagine that the suitcases are packed, the car is jam packed with stuff, and we have just woken up in one of the most beautiful and peaceful places I’d care to be. Breakfast is Bob’s Hogs sausages and a Home Grown Thermomix smoothie. Home grown red currants, home grown raspberries, and an organic fair trade banana, blended 3 minutes/Speed 10 to blitz the raspberry pips into blissful nothingness.