Friday 17 May 2013

Free asparagus

The asparagus I was given Wednesday had its ends cut off and stood in cold water overnight to refresh it. I made some chicken and vegetables in a white sauce (minus the cobbler)via this recipe chicken and vegetable cobbler

The nice ends of the asparagus were lightly cooked and added to the sauce. We had half last night with some pasta:
and the rest will be served tonight. The end bits were lightly boiled then whizzed up, strained through a sieve and the resulting stock used to make some vegetable soup:
The soup also had chicken stock cubes, carrots, pepper, potatoes and onion in it plus some tarragon and a dash of spicy chilli sauce in the bottom of each bowl. We have enough left for another meal tomorrow. Also on the go today is another 900ml batch of yoghurt.

On the kitchen windowsill, I am growing some cress and radish seedlings (the cress is slower on the left). When ready they will be a useful addition to a salad or sandwich or something 'snacky':
Finally, despite the weather, the garden is springing into life. Here is a picture of our front gravel garden, taken through the window in the north facing lounge - brrr...



10 comments:

  1. Delicious way to use your Asparagus. I haven't grown Cress since I was a childminder and the littlies would grow it on cotton wool on a little saucer, it made great hair for the salad faces lol

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    1. Have never tried that although when DS was at school, they used to grow hair on blown eggs with faces drawn on.

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  2. Both the pasta and the soup look delicious. Your garden is looking really lush. It's amazing how quickly things green up and grow with a bit of warmth and some rain isn't it?

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    1. Thank you and yes it is an amazing difference. Can almost see the changes every few days. Hope the same is happening in your front vegetable plot.

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    1. Oh dear, best you have a cup of tea or coffee and a biscuit!

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  4. I have just discovered your blog and this photo of your garden with the gravel and the bench is exactley what i have in mind for my new garden , this part of the garden is walled and would look really good simlar to yours , xxx

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    1. The front garden has been many things in the past including a vegetable garden combined with flowers. We have trouble here with horsetail so decided to take up all the plants and lay down weed suppressant fabric over the whole garden. We then put everything back in where we wanted it and covered the lot with around 4 tons of gravel. It has a ton added every few years as it slowly disappears through the holes and into the soil. Things still managed to grow though in the gravel. With East Anglia being the driest county, the gravel helps to keep the moisture in for a while.

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