The British Larder Inspirational recipe diary

With the summer predicted to be a scorcher it’s best to be prepared. It’s time to sift through the recipes, select the winners and be ready to move when the sun finally arrives.

Walking through the fruit and vegetable department of my local supermarket this morning I realised how many different citrus fruits are available. All imported of course, as we can not grow citrus fruits successfully in England due to the lack of sunshine.

It’s time to confess! I do not really know the difference between clementines, satsumas, tangerines and mandarins. Time to do a bit of research and make a contribution  to my personal bank of food knowledge.

Basically I now understand  that  satsumas and tangerines are the same, just called different names in different countries.

The satsumas in our shops might sometimes have a green blemish on the skins, but this does not affect the taste, as

My newly planted garden is one year old and contains a multitude of plants. I am incredibly impatient and cannot wait to fill the baskets with raspberries, blackberries, strawberries, gooseberries, mulberries, rowan berries and many more. As the bushes and trees are  young they will only fruit sparingly this year  so I visited the local PYO Cammas Hall Fruit Farm. This was truly inspirational as I was amazed by different fruits  that were available.

I went armed with wellington boots and a few empty baskets. I got carried away in the rows of raspberries and was spoiled for choice with all the mouth watering varieties on offer. At first I thought, a raspberry is a raspberry, who cares what it’s called. But oh boy was I in for one pleasant surprise! I started by tasting the raspberries  one variety after another. I could taste the difference, almost like a

Last week we went to Cammas Hall Farm to pick strawberries and gooseberries. Once we got home it was all systems go and we were fired up to make as many dishes from our harvest as possible. The Gooseberry juices where flowing and so was my imagination. I thought of plenty of recipes that I could try with these round hairy little numbers.

When mum announced that she will be visiting I asked if she could bring my grandmothers recipe book. It caused a bit of a stir amongst some of the relatives, but  mum brought the book  however she will be taking it back when she returns. We were paging through Grannies book and amongst the tears there was a lot of laughter as we came across some of the most bizarre recipes you could possibly want in one’s collection. From recipes to make soap, home made golden syrup

The short elderflower season is drawing to an end.

I’m feeling a bit sad as it means that this wonderful gift from Mother Nature is not going to be around for much longer.

I am very pleased with my 2009 batch of elderflower cordial. Last years was not all that great as I harvested the elderflowers too late in the season and they were past their best. I like to pick them early on to capture the fresh green almond fragrance,otherwise they are a too mature amd past their best.

I have a slight superstitious belief that I should pick the elderflowers before the summer rain kicks in, once it has rained the flowers drop and this encourage the fermentation process, as I said it’s all in my head!

Our local Cambridgeshire winery, Chilford Hall makes wonderful award-winning wines. I thought the combination of the English white wine and the