Tastes of Summer

Along with the lengthening days, mentioned below, comes time to chill out and do some of the things I love doing - but which I often don't have time for.

If you open our cupboard right now you'll find:

* home-made strawberry jam (you won't taste better)
* home-made grapefruit & orange marmalade (chunky style)
* the "fixings" for lemon curd
* first canned tomatoes of the season

And you know what? Those make my heart glad! I'm really a housewife and farmer-girl at heart, but unfortunately no-one will pay me to be that so I have a day-job too. I love doing things from scratch, knowing what's in my food and realizing I can make many things myself. Most things from food to furniture, a garden to home decorations. Curtains to clothing. Doing those give me a sense of both pride in my ability to learn, and appreciation for the effort that's gone into it. I get to choose the natural elements that go into each thing I create, revelling in textures and tastes.

The mouthfulls of summer in my cupboard right now will carry on throughout the year. We're still using frozen pasta sauce from last season - created from our deliciously organic tomatoes, home-grown basil and local olive oil. It has a fresh taste that you simply won't find in the mass-manufactured variety. I know what went into both growing and cooking all the ingredients.

Summer weather is perfect for making huge loaves of crusty bread - the dough rises quickly and reliably, and there's nothing like a slice straight out of the oven, smothered in real butter (also awaiting incorporation into abovementioned lemon curd) and home-made jam. The natural slowing down of the year gives me ample time to get my hands into a lump of dough and kneed out my frustrations or the year's stress.

And then there's the summer crop of strawberries, one kilo of which went into 3 bottles of jam this weekend. The remaining kilo is sitting quietly alongside a container of thick cream from a nearby farm in the fridge. Once the lemon curd is made, we're making meringues from the leftover eggwhite (free-range grain fed, of course), which will be served up with whipped cream and strawberries.

Man I love summer! And now I'm all drooly... :)

-image credit