Jam, Set and Match

It's a jam thing 

It's all about strawberries these days in the Holly Cottage. We've been watching them since February, minding them, more watching them, feeding and netting them, and so on it goes in the gardening way. And now that it's all happening, we're finding it hard to keep up with the harvest and keep ahead of the host of centipedes, slugs, ants and blackbirds that have suddenly appeared in a feasting army to unleash the magical strawberry elixir. Even Holly has been caught raiding the strawberry beds in previous years - she's being extra good this year though, although maybe we just haven't caught her in the act yet ;) 

What to do with this bounty? Well, the obvious delight is the jam thing - the easiest thing in the world since cutting a slice of homemade brown bread or a delicious fruit scone and making a cup of tea, all the things that go so well with the sweet, sticky magic of strawberry jam. And all while one is partaking in the entertainment that is Wimbledon and tennis - they take their strawberries straight - no mixers - with cream there (hence the Jam, Set and Match spin). Take a kilo of fruit, a kilo of sugar, all in the pot - melt the sugar down on gentle heat, then bring it all up to a boil and simmer until setting point is reached. The setting point can be a make or break moment, but if you really get it wrong - how bad? Strawberry sauce in a jar to pour over vanilla ice cream in the depths of winter - mmmm. If you have a lot of rhubarb to play with, like we do, then make a half and half batch of both fruits - its a really nice combination especially for those nervous of the rhubarb variety. 

dreamy, creamy, cheesy, strawberryyyyy....

The other creation of the day is a strawberry cheesecake, based on a blueberry cheesecake recipe by Rachel Allen. Take your favourite biscuit base - digestive and a melted butter was easiest for us this evening. Top this with freshly picked strawberries and leave to chill while you making the topping. For the top - now this is a half of the recipe since it's just the two of us - 225g cream cheese, 75g castor sugar, 2 eggs, half teasp vanilla essence all whizzed up together until smooth and creamy, mmmm ;) Pour this sweet and cheesy creamy promise over the biscuit and strawberry base and into the oven at 180deg for 40mins.....the result is waiting for us as we speak! It always shocks me really when I see the price of a slice of cake in shops and cafes especially when they taste so good straight from your own oven, and I guess what you're really paying for is service and atmosphere. Take my favourite cafe of the moment in Dublin city - Keoghs on Trinity Street - there's always a buzz of people coming in and grabbing coffee to go or one of their amazing selection of scones (brown raisin and cinnamon, and vanilla and pear deliciousness). And there is always a strange and eclectic mix - from the Samuel Beckett quotes on the wall to the cross section of native Dubs having their morning sugar fix. I like to think my odd splurge there is helping a bit to sustain places like that, however small that might be, but these small shops are the remedy to the one size fits all type of franchise cafes that seem to be squeezing out the last of the  brave, individualistic types. 

Shades of summer 

Having said all that and nodding my head to the buzz and vibrancy of an early morning coffee on the streets of Dublin city, there is such enormous satisfaction in being the master or mistress of your own sweet selection, and savouring each mouthful as you watch the sun gradually descend in the sky on the last day of June. Especially in the knowledge of: i. passing your practical yoga class exam the day before (phew), ii. having all the rooms in the Holly Cottage painted, iii. having all the outside windows and sills cleaned down and painted, iv. all the rubbish and clutter built up over the longest winter cleared, v . the array of colours in the garden - purple seems to feature a lot! vi. the first potatoes of the season dug and officially the best tasting spuds ever (again) and blissfully clear of blight (yay) and vii. it's lovely calm Sunday evening again ;) 

It's the simple pleasures that we bask in here...and oh yes, there is that deliciously creamy, dreamy, homemade strawberry cheesecake waiting to be to cut into as well.......

Standing to a Rain-Still

Before the rain - Holly on the go-go

It's a quiet and calm Sunday evening in the Holly Cottage. Quieter and calmer than the usual mellow Sunday as chief noise maker - Holly - has gone to visit her cousins in Cork. She's a bit of a wandering dog and seems to love nothing better than leaping into the back of the jeep or the front of the noisy van to head off out into the unknown. As long as she knows the food has been packed as well of course ;) She's never been beyond the island's limits in her tender three years, but she's probably been in more counties than some proud Irish natives. I guess it comes from her pair of nomadic guardians who seem to be rarely in one place  in any given week apart from those cherished non-driving weekends. 

During - somewhere between
Nawlins and Memphis it rained...

And so I am guardian of the cottage and it's stately 0.25 acres of (now) tamed front garden and flourishing vegetable patch out the back. And somehow, with Holly's departure, the sunshine has faded and I am banished to the indoors as the rain has come and put a stop to all my dry weather plans. Oh well! I can't say I'm that disappointed really, as my knees were starting to rebel against the endless  weeding and transplanting, the thinning of carrots, turnips and beetroot seedlings, the tying of wandering peas and beans and the general tidying and admiring that one tends to do when the sun is browning our Irish necks. 

When the good weather was with us (I won't say when the summer was with us, as there is still a future in this summer of 2013), we were flat out with all those jobs listed above and then there was the sheer joy of seeing the sun that we just had to make the most of every moment. The BBQ was out every evening for all sorts of delicacies marinated by the Holly Cottage head chef (also sorely missed this evening), the lakes were visited, the woods explored and ice-cream finally tasted as it should - think 99 with syrupy raspberry 'stuff' and other treacly green 'stuff' topped with 100s and 1000s and the prime seat of that stunted piece of Flake chocolate - WOW! (I've provided a link for non aficionados of the 99 phenomenon...nom, nom, nom, nom). 

And so, the rain has come to remind us that there is also a time for indoors. And a welcome chance to catch up on all the words that have been rattling about in my head as the sun lulled us into any other activity than that of writing indoors mode ;)

During - handy to have a spare shoe
in case it might rain in Catalonia...

The Irish rain of course is not for the faint hearted or the weak of spirit. It is different than any other kind of rain. Different from the downpours of Barbados and Madagascar that can wash entire roads and hillsides of exposed soil away in a couple of hours; different from the pounding rain in Cuba when even our acclimatised horses had to take shelter in a friendly farmer's shed out in the tobacco fields; different than the warm rain of New Orleans where you could even call it pleasant to stand in a heavy shower for a break from the summer's heat; different from the blocks of ice that fell from a Roman sky in June; but similar enough to the rain in May that fell far from the plains of Spain...just to remind us of home as we splashed our way (in flip-flops) through the streets of Girona. 

The rain in Ireland is different from the rain in all those other far and exotic places around this blue green planet. Different because unlike all those other demonstrations of nature's prowess and force, the Irish rain is soft and steady and certainly lasts longer - think Duracell bunny but multiplied by a factor of 1000. I often wonder how the streams of tourists cope - as they bravely manoeuvre the narrow roads of the Burren in the the soft Atlantic mist or the bogs of Mayo in the horizontal pounding of a July's rainy day. What must it be like to them? Of course there's half the rain in Dublin city so that makes it easier for them and the locals to enjoy a cappuccino on a busy cobbled alleyway off Grafton Street. Even the capital is not without its 800mm of water falling out of the sky in any given year and/or in any given season. But, double and sometimes triple that amount and we have the western shores....and somewhere in between is where we lie - here in the Holly Cottage HQ, and it certainly feels that we are more western than eastern, most of the time. 

But what would we do without it? When would the stories get told, the songs written, the analysis over the late pints attended to? The great literary works written or the great humour and wit unfolded? Or the  chocolate made or the designer fashion crafted? I'm far too easily distracted by the sunshine to bring my pen to paper or fingers to keyboard, and I'm sure I'm not unique on this front. 

So, I welcome the rain for what it is...a chance to slow down and grind to a physical halt. A chance to empty the thoughts onto the pages, and document the time unfolding and rapidly passing before our eyes. And lest we forget the rainbows...

...And after -  Galway painting al fresco

We come to the longest day next weekend, and really - where did the time go since we celebrated the passing of the longest night? Time to slowdown, time to be rained to a standstill after all that running. If it brings a need to play one of your more preferred songs by U2, then you and I are in the same boat - Running to a Standstill has been the theme to the week - the theme to the arresting force of the rainclouds when we were forced to stand in the stilling power of the rain, when we did what we could between the showers, and the welcome reminder that music at anytime - even just the melody playing in your mind - can ease the restless hurry of time. And when you're six and a half moths pregnant and there's less and less time between you and that impending event they gloriously call labour, well - you're certainly happy to slow it down anyway you can...

Letting the light back in

We held our breath for such a long time here in Ireland. We waited, we hoped, some prayed, others took to soul searching. Some took the approach of positive outlook while others grumbled and were ready to take the pain, again. Whatever the outlook you can never be sure until the moment has truly and finally arrived. What is that I hear your curious minds asking. Well, summer of course!

Evening summer sun -
it has to go to come back!

It all started about a month ago really - around the last time I wrote to update on the floral developments in the Holly Cottage garden. At that time - about four weeks ago, a lifetime in some ways - I was embarking on a bit of a tour of Ireland. There was Mayo for wonderful wilderness and Dublin for trashing out EU policy for Biodiversity, and then Cork to catch a plane off this rich and green island. That second week in May was cold and wet in Mayo, with torrential showers mixed with hard winds. I was dressed to the last in winter wet gear. It was great though - you can't beat a trip to Westport and lingering looks across Clew Bay in the morning light. But, yes, it still felt like the wintery summers of the last four years. Then a skip, hop and a jump to the capital and it seemed like the residents there were starting to warm up - people eating on the street and not shying from buying and wearing summer t-shirts and sandals. It was looking good. I spent two days in the regal Dublin Castle with a gang of heads from all over Europe - it seems strange to be setting research targets for biodiversity conservation and restoration inside a cold and regal building - not a butterfly or wildflower in sight - but I guess needs must?

My kind of motorway ;)

That was when we abandoned ship in the bid to find summer elsewhere. After tucking Holly in with two new friends - a cantankerous chihuahua and a less threatening looking King Charles, we boarded a cheap flight in Cork and set off for the foothills of the Spanish Pyrenees. After a worryingly wet first day in Girona for the festival of flowers, we were quickly reminded of how summer used to be in Ireland. The hedgerows near our rented house on the back roads half an hour from anywhere were filled with poppies and borage, wild grasses and plantains, and butterflies frolicked in the quiet back roads and tracks that criss-cross the Catalan Hills. It brought me back to childhood days when it was time to bring the hay in and the only shelter from the heat of the Irish summer was behind three bales stacked in wig-wam style and thirst was quenched by bottles of orange flavoured water out of mi-wadi bottles. Now that was summer ;) More on the wonders of the Catalan countryside and coastline for another day but let me give you a flavour of what happened on our return...

Well, summer happened! For the last two weeks morning begins at 4.30am when the darkness in the room begins to lift and the birds outside in the hedges and gardens and across the road in Charleville Estate provide us with a cacophony of dawn chorus - deafening in ways, but rivalling any Vivaldi piece on summer. From about 5am onwards, we are blessed with blue skies and early twenties in temperatures up until at least 11pm at night. And we have the longest day yet to come! There's no more heavy fleece getting into the car to go for work, no more socks (happy feet!), no more bracing the wind at the morning walk in Lough Boora and the promise of food cooked outside on the BBQ every evening, nicely charred and wonderfully flavoured and appetising with the taste of the summer evening outdoors. 

And all that glorious light is reaching every part of us that has been covered in darkness and cold for the longest winter in a long time. And we might even forget the difficult cold and damp days, and the struggle to keep our heads up and spirits lifted. The light has a way of doing that, it brings us back to ourselves and everything is illuminated. A time for revelation. There is of course a time for the dark of course - and I welcome that too, but everything in balance! 

The garden is coming on in leaps and bounds everyday - early spuds are flowering, broad beans are scaling lofty heights and packed with flowers, peas are looking a lot greener than last year's sickly yellow, tomatoes are tucked into their cosy growbags, cucumbers are trailing, basil and herbs are packing flavour and aroma in every corner, rocket has..well, rocketed, and lavenders are providing a sweet hang-out for bees and all sorts of things creepy crawly. The strawberries are not quite there yet but we will definitely have to make some room amongst the bags of frozen broccoli to preserve their sweetness for the year ahead. There's talk of a polytunnel to help bring things forward a bit next year, but we'll have to see....

Lilac dreams

And what about Holly? Well, true to form - having recovered from the shock at being dictated to for a week by a dog the size of her head (the chihuahua) - she is just basking in the glory of the summer heat and taking every moment as it comes. We still get to walk in the cool green of the Charleville woods every evening until late, and the bluebells and wild garlic are still packing a punch in the colour and fragrance departments. Long may it linger!

There's still work to do here (apart from the day job of course) - cabbages and sprouts to be transplanted and sunflowers to be re-housed, a spot of weeding (just discovered the back saving attributes of a hoe!) and of course everything to be enjoyed. More to come on our Catalan adventures and a few nuggets of wonder from Mayo and a day in Kerry where luck crossed my path in the shape of Rua the leprechaun...there's magic in Kerry you know! In the meantime, have a great weekend and be sure to soak it all up - word is there's rain on Monday, but just enough to refresh the daisies and down the dust ;)