Monthly Archives: July 2015

The Sourdough Session

The sun was shining, the temperature has once more returned to sanity and the venerable yogis in the centre were saying “om”. I don’t think they would object to the word venerable for although it contains overtones of age it is also a mark of respect. Anyway, some of them are quite old (one is over 90) and a number of them do have to sit down to do the exercises. That’s actually quite a worry for me as some of them, though 20 years my senior, are a great deal fitter and more supple.

In the distance goats bleat, birds sing and the the chirruping of the guinea fowl can, like the song of the biblical mourning dove, be heard throughout the land. At the kitchen a group of people have gathered to bake sourdough bread and eat pizza for lunch. To this end the outdoor oven is smoking gently and salads are in preparation.

This is the sort of day that you rarely experience, the sort of day that calls for the sound of leather on willow and John Betjeman talking of muffins on the Light Programme.

It’s a pleasure to come to work on a day like this and a temptation to post a “this is the view from my office window” picture on Twitter.

The group is baking sourdough today, and in the lull where they wait for it to rise they are going to make pizza and cook it in the outdoor oven. The Bread Lady is in charge today; so many people call her that now in recognition of her great bread-making knowledge that I have decided to go with the flow. In passing, I shall mention that I am known as the Fat Man these days, though in truth I have no special knowledge of lard or polyunsaturates.

Bread Lady and sidekick

That, at least, was the plan. The bread-making, as you can see from the pictures, was a success.

Air kneading

Cutting the dough

The finished article

So was the salad selection, including foraged green salad (though it may be slightly immodest of me to say so) and the salad dressings seemed to go down well too, particularly the blackcurrant vinegar. Expect more recipes to appear soon, and and a bit more in the Wild Food section.

Mallow, Fat Hen and Nasturtium with borage, flowers, chive blossom and daisy and marigold petals.

The pizza oven fell victim to the farm’s command structure and parsimonious attitude with regard to wood, which, I must point out, DOES grow on trees. Once again we were faced with inadequate temperatures and long cooking times (so long that most people gave up and cooked them in the oven).

Despite this it was an interesting session and as I said to the Bread Lady afterwards, it’s amazing how well the group has gelled and how far we have come in technique in just a few years. This is proved by the way that they have worked so hard to run the catering at the last two Open Farm Sundays. (Do you think the word “proved” could look a bit like a weak pun in this context – it wasn’t intended).

She said: “You’re only saying that because they gave you free pizza.”

The words “Bread Lady” might convey the impression that she’s a softer, crumbly version of the “Iron Lady”, but as you can see, she still manages to be both tough and accurate.

The Captains and the Kings depart

The tumult and the shouting dies

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Last night was the peak of our current workload, with just two more weeks to go before the school holidays create a lull. All the other groups that are coming are well within the boundaries of what our equipment can cope with (we ran out of forks last night for some reason – I know we used to have over 40 but don’t know whey we only have 32 now) and we’re quite looking forward to it.

It’s just after lunch and, having done part of the clearing last night, I’m still waiting for the assistance I was promised. That’s about par for the course, and that, if only you knew it, is a very appropriate expression. In case you are confused, the farmer has gone to play golf (hence the “par”), and when he does that the farm staff all regard it as an excuse to have a holiday. Seems like me and Julia are the only idiots left working.

So I’m relaxing with a bit of Kipling, refusing to do the old music hall joke, and contemplating the next hour of washing up.

It’s amazing how much debris a BBQ generates, and how much greasy dirt lurks in corners. I’m also surprised (aghast may be better) at the various places people leave their discarded plates, cans and glasses. At least the water butts were full after a stiffish cloudburst earlier on in the day. That means people don’t tend to treat them as rubbish bins, which has happened at previous events.

Banana, sugar, Mars bar = calorie overload and horrendous time washing up!

We used compostable paper plates so we could show off our green credentials. I’m not sure whether this is better than using our clapped out selection of second hand plates (or “upcycled crockery” as we also call it) but it did save on washing up. One of our helpers (and I use the term loosely) decided to also hand out non-compostable ones then made herself scarce when it came time to sort through the used plates and separate the two sorts.

It’s been an active morning (apart from one of the community gardeners who appeared to be impersonating a scarecrow) with egg collecting, pig visiting and upcycling milk containers. You can see some of this on our Twitter page (@QuercusCommy) or have a look at these photos.

Upcycled milk carton

Pigs are happier now it’s cooler

Talking of Twitter , we now have just over 900 followers – it was 902 but now it’s 901. Someone unfollowed me, but when you think I accumulated around 100 followers last week (no I don’t know how) it’s hardly surprising that some go. Many of them are about music, youth or “love” so I’m torn by indecisiveness now. Ddo I take the easy way out and keep pressing on to the magic 1,000? Or do I start paring my followers back until I only have ones that I consider to be a good fit?

Tuesday night on Tuesday night

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If this was a hard-hitting and controversial blog I’d probably write about how we’d hosted a group tonight where few of the kids had any manners (as in a complete lack of “please” and “thank you”). but as it isn’t, I’d probably have to go on to say that it probably wasn’t their fault, but that of their parents.

Yes, I’m nice. This isn’t natural, I’ve have been using relaxation techniques and such stuff and I can now look at them with a fond smile and think “I really hope this karma stuff works because you’re coming back as a pustule, young man.”

Don’t get me wrong, the majority were nice affable people you’d be happy to meet at any time and one or two were so pleasant and friendly it was a true pleasure to meet them. But, as with rotten apples, it only takes one to spoil things. They are the ones you remember. I will say no more, but as part of my mellowing process I am growing more Wodehousian, and there were one or two tonight who were absolute blisters.

On the plus side, we’re getting better with the wood-fired oven and one of the pigs has had eight piglets. We’ve normally managed more, but eight is still good.

Monday blog on Tuesday morning

A gift of chamomile

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I walked out of the house a couple of days ago to find this by the side of the step. It’s not the most luxuriant, or the straightest, flower in the street, but neither were many of the others we’ve been given over the years. When you think that our gardens at the farm are mainly grown from gifts, it’s amazing what a few donated flowers can do.

We’re very lucky having a neighbour across the road who gives us plants on a regular basis – her donations must exceed every other source of plants we have, and this was one of them. I’d been moaning that I’d had to pull some chamomile out of the allotment and that the weather wasn’t conducive to transplanting.

This bed here is almost entirely flowers that have been donated, rescued from compost or grown from cuttings. And poppies. WE have a lot of poppies.If the sun comes out again today I’ll take an up-to-date shot to show you how it’s coming along.

So what I’m saying, I suppose, is thanks to the people who help us, we couldn’t do it without your help. That includes everyone who reads the blog, because it’s about encouragement as much as anything.

Screveton through the Looking Glass

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Well, that’s the paperwork up to date. I can clear my desk with a clear conscience now and feel virtuous until we start tomorrow morning – that’s a whole 17 hours.

I’ve been struggling with the organisation of the Lammas Fun Run. The two things (one being an ancient Anglo-Saxon festival of Loaf Mass) and the other being a twenty first century celebration of people looking uncomfortable whilst running. At least Loaf Mass does what it says on the tin. Fun Run isn’t fun, and it’s barely running. Now, I’m no athlete, as you might have gathered from my comments on food, exercise and youth, so I do admire fun-runners: I just don’t understand them.

It’s also another example of the Random Events Generator that seems to be in use round here. Lammas is about loaves. We normally do a couple of wheatsheaf loaves (complete with traditional mouse) – though that’s more a harvest festival sort of thing. Last year we also made soda bread straight from the field (and had it back to the combine crew in time for lunch) and did a couple of plain loaves which were used in the Communion service.

having mentioned it I’m seriously thinking of building a random event generator – that’s for “Events” as in Open days and such, rather than just things that happen. What with guinea fowl and goats we have enough randomness in everyday events not to need any more. No, this is Over 60’s Limbo Championship territory, plus the Santa Fire Walk and Full Contact Knitting. We already have Breakfast and Yoga next Saturday and Doga in a couple of months. That’s Yoga combined with dog walking – I’m told it can be a bit lively when the dogs get together.

Yes, it’s like the Through the Looking Glass version of The Office working here.

Fortunately I’m not in it for the money or the glory, I just like a laugh and the feeling I’m doing a bit of good.

So let’s see what the next week brings.

And watch out for the further adventures of Farmer Ted…

Beware – introspection in progress!

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I suppose it’s time to admit a few things.

The willow water, for instance, has not proved to be a success. I took two sets of mint cuttings, putting one set in water, and one set in willow water. After around five days the ones in willow water started to look a bit sickly. When I took them out, the bottom couple of inches had been eaten away. I’m going to say that my experiment indicates that standing in willow water doesn’t make mint cuttings sprout roots quicker. The ones in water were much healthier and hadn’t been eaten away at the bottom.

One on the right is Willow water

It might be too strong, as I’ve just seen someone recommending that it should be diluted to half strength. I’m going to try this when I take cuttings on Monday. This time I’ll use rosemary.

I’ve also managed to kill the kiwi berries and badly scorch the tea bushes; it’s just been too hot in the tunnels and I haven’t been active enough in shading things.

Finally (which isn’t the final confession – just the last one I feel like making at the moment) the accidental permaculture bed is having problems. You may recall that we improved half the bed by layering it with pig manure, wood chippings and used paper towels. The half that was treated has grown a massive crop of fat hen, which is now interfering with the beans. The half that wasn’t treated has grown a sparse crop of fat hen and allowed room for self-sown rocket. The beans? So far the runner beans have been uniformly poor due to a week of cold winds that coincided with them being planted out. We probably put them out too soon, but we wanted a good show for Open Farm Sunday.

Broad beans and French beans have been good

Actually – more confessions while I’m in the mood – the New Zealand spinach I used to fill gaps all died in the cold wind and the four-year-old runner bean plant is looking sickly, as are the year one plants (see above comments on cold winds).

My experiment design skills are clearly leaving something to be desired.

However, it’s easy to be negative. And it’s easy to take the wrong attitude about failure.

I don’t want to get into pseudo-science here but I know people who are frightened of failure. To me it’s either of no consequence or it’s a step on the way to something else.

As Edison said:

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

He has so many quotes on persistence listed that I don’t know how he found time to invent things.

I have failed many times. The failures listed above don’t even begin to cover the mistakes I’ve made. Occasionally I have a night where I can’t sleep and all my failures come back to haunt me, many in painfully sharp detail. A few dead plants don’t even make it into my top thousand failures.

I learned a long time ago that it’s better to think about the future than the past. I’m going to plant beans later next year. I’m going to move the kiwi berries outside. I’m going to design a new willow water experiment.

Not only that, but I’m going to plant wild garlic this autumn, get some peach trees and train standard gooseberries.

I’m going to spread my wings and do a thousand things, including misquoting lyrics from musicals.

And I’m going to concentrate on remembering the things that went well. Like the good beans, or visitors who think we’re doing a good job.

Smiling visitors mean we’re doing something right

What a difference a day makes

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It’s been a busy week. We had lots of people through, as you may have deduced from the blog, and pictures of pizzas. The pigs had the best idea, as you can see in the photo – just sunbathe and let the world pass by.

Our usual Quercus groups were in on Monday and Wednesday (with an adult pizza-making class in the evening as well), seated yoga on Thursday, school on Tuesday, school on Thursday (fitted round the yoga as much as we could) and group with mixed disabilities on Friday. There were 62 kids making pizza on Tuesday, meaning we were taking the pizzas out of the oven, washing the trays and handing them over to the next group while they were still warm.

Pizza as far as the eye could see

And more pizza…

Wild flower mix

That was the good stuff.

Sadly, that sort of throughput, plus a few other odds and ends, brings a lot of problems too, and when you don’t have time to stop and deal with them they can pile up and spoil the atmosphere. The heat hasn’t helped either, with petty arguments among the group members and a constant refrain of “It’s too hot.”

That’s the difference a day makes – a few degrees cooler and with a few hours to sit down and do things the whole outlook changes. A miserable Friday night has changed to a happy Saturday without much effort.

It’s a lesson I learnt a long time ago. Unfortunately I’ve never managed to memorise it for future use.

I’m also suffering a crisis of confidence about the blog. It was meant to be about Quercus Community and our activities, but as somebody said a while ago, it’s all over the place. I can’t remember the exact words, which were kinder than that, but the truth is that there is no central theme.

My initial aim was to write about the group, the members of the group and what we do. Unfortunately it isn’t easy writing about people who might read what you say about them (I am not always tactful even when I have time to think about things and edit them) and when these people are vulnerable adults the difficulties are magnified. That’s when it became a bit of a gardening, cooking and sustainability blog, followed by the blog that complains about modern life.

It’s a miracle that I actually have any followers when you think about the mistakes I make. Does anybody have any ideas on a direction to take? I’m thinking that it needs to get away from my opinions and back to Care Farming (though I seem to be the only Care Farm about when I search other blogs). That could take in outside care, gardening, foraging, composting and cooking so it wouldn’t be a major change. Might include a few nature notes too – we’ve been getting some good butterflies and have enough jackdaws lurking round for pig and poultry food we’re beginning to resemble the set of The Birds – had a flock of around 70 last night and frequently have 40-50 round the pig pen.

Greetings from Procrastination Central

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We have a half day off! Yipee!

I say “off” but Julia is out watering flower baskets and preparing for this afternoon’s visit and I am wrestling with the dinosaur that has been foisted on me as an office email system. Not a proper dinosaur (because that would result in a tremendous spike of schools wanting to visit) just an old clunky system. It’s probably unfair on dinosaurs to use their name like that, but life isn’t fair.

If life was fair I’d have a sleek modern email system that wasn’t currently frozen…

On a more positive note, this allows me time to blog without feeling like I’m skiving. Though it doesn’t alter the reality that I am, in fact, skiving. I’m also going through my Inbox and catching up on a few emails. The oldest goes back to April, though in my defence I must say it’s an invoice I sent that was “lost” by the recipient, who has a slow payment system at the best of times.That’s why I only started to chase it two weeks ago.

So, catch up on emails, catch up on paperwork, write two new pages for the “website”, design Farmer Ted marketing campaign and get ready for the visit this afternoon.

Oooops, they just arrived.

Farmer Ted picking fruit

quercuscommunity

Life after the Care Farm