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Saturday 28 May 2016

VISITORS. been and gone .......

19th May
A lovely sunny day for our visitors - no need for me to have been stressing about rain.
An air traffic strike meant that their plane had to fly via Ireland, this delayed them by several hours so of course they were tired when they arrived. We just chilled out and I cooked pasta for dinner with my very authentic tasting, squeaky Halloumi!!!!

20th May
We stayed on quinta and just relaxed, ate and drank all day!
I used the whey from the 'chevre' cheese I made the other day as the liquid for a cold pumpkin soup we had for lunch (the whey is sweet and creamy so it worked a treat).
As the chevre was not a great success I thought it would be nice to let Sarah and James help me make some more; Sarah said it was like children helping an adult cook! James got to measure two tablespoons of mesophilic culture while Sarah refused the responsibility of 'one drop of rennet'!
Tomorrow we are going to spend the day in CB town center.

21st May
I was up by 6.00 (I've been waking early all week).
The cheese had set over night, so I drained that ...... it looked much more creamy than last time.
Then I printed some peacocks onto one of the dresses I made last year. I had printed birds on it but they have faded and Brett thinks it looks stained; so I was trying to cover the marks.
We went to CB; we did the castle first, fabulous views. Then to the square for lunch at the Presunto bar - we shared two plates of tapas, two sandwiches, olives etc. It was good. Next we did the gardens with the statues and finally we found the craft shop Karina told me about - it was shut!
Back home we slow cooked the huge leg of lamb we'd taken out of the freezer (that hadn't thawed!), made salad and hummus - for wraps; then sat out on the decking drinking G&Ts! It was an altogether lovely day. Tomorrow we go to Belmonte (James's choice).
Update on Chevre: it's got a weird rubbery consistency and doesn't hold together - I'm doing something wrong!

22nd May
I didn't get up until 7.00 today (slight headache!).
It's great, the car that Sarah & James have hired is big enough for us all to travel in, so we don't have to drive.
First we went to Sortelha, a walled village with lots of boulders (like Monsanto). Next to Belmonte where we had a boozy long lunch, then walked up to the castle. And finally Centrum Celas, a building with no information/knowledge of what it was.

23rd May
We were invited for breakfast at the cottage with Joyce, Sarah & James - then they left (sniff .....). It's been really lovely having them here.
We took the keys back to Vince & Lola (to save J, S & J time) and had a nice natter with them.
I actually did some gardening today (a bit of weeding and planting sweet potato slips).
The vegetable garden looks ok in certain areas:
Potatoes

Strawberries

Globe Artichokes

24th May
Brett went back to his block work and I gardened.
I built a structure, to support my beans, out of rebar (one day it might even be welded); then planted out five types of beans, purple podded peas, cucumbers and onion plugs.
Bloody hell Facebook has just suggested someone as a friend for me (we have no mutual Facebook friends); a relation that Brett contacts occasionally (that I don't know, I've met once); he uses a completely different email address to the one I use for Facebook - how creepy is that? Big Brother is watching you!!!!

25th May
Our car needs it's MOT (or Portuguese equivalent), road tax and insurance by the end of the month, so we went into CB for the MOT as rain was due today. We came home from CB without having had our MOT inspection as we were too early - we have an appointment for Friday.
We did buy tines for the tractor, a hat for me, shorts for Brett and two fabulous blue hydrangeas for the decking.
Look at the wonderful BLUE, I hope they don't turn pink

I tried making Chevre with lemon juice; it's good the consistency is better, and the flavour is fresh & creamy - but not much reward (6.5 ozs) for four pints of milk (80 fluid ozs)!
However ....... we had fried Halloumi (I made it over a week ago; it's been stored in brine & whey, in the fridge) and salad for dinner - it had the right flavour, texture and SQUEAK!!!

26th May
Brett worked hard on the studio/workshop, while I did lots of gardening.
The car insurance ran out today but we couldn't renew it as it was a National Holiday and all the shops were shut!

27th May
Back to CB to get the car inspected (MOT equivalent) - it PASSED!!!
We're into our decking atm, and having animals and birds on it is annoying (they leave poo everywhere!), so Brett is going to make some gates and we bought some 'twig screening' that we're going to fence it with (we also bought two more hydrangeas!).
Then we dashed to Penamacor for the insurance and road tax - the car is legal for another year.

28th May
Rain ........
Had another bash at Chevre: 4 pints fresh milk, 1/2 drop rennet, 1/4 tspn CaCl2 (30% solution), 1 tbspn Mesophillic culture.
This afternoon heavy rain and a thunder storm. Brett watched rugby while I carried on printing my dress (different green colours).

Thursday 19 May 2016

RAIN, RAIN, GO AWAY. .....we've had enough now!

6th May
Raining and the 10 day forecast is for rain every day - I'm worried about J, S & J's visit!
1.5L (most ever!) of milk this morning but (there's always a but...) our pump was struggling to start with; Georgia stood for an extra 5 minutes until it suddenly kicked in (she was fine, she was eating!), so now we're worried the pump is going to die on us - today's job order a spare pump.
I've solved the CaCl2 problem; I'm going to get it sent to Sarah and she will bring it when she comes in twelve days time - 500g of white crystals in a plastic bag, what could possibly go wrong (Brett thinks Joyce should carry it as she looks less like a drug mule!).

7th May
Still raining!
We made Halloumi and Ricotta cheeses with fresh milk we've been saving in the fridge - Halloumi still isn't rubbery and squeaky, we don't know what we're doing wrong.
I played with acrylic paint and stencils, doing some monoprinting. Interesting technique using two pieces of glass.



8th May
I'm getting fed up with this wet weather, the dogs are going stir crazy and everything is damp; everytime we go out we get wet, but our clothes aren't drying out - we're running out of clothes!
And of course the solar is low, despite the new batteries, as there's no sunshine for charging.
We had some Halloumi for lunch - it was definitely squeaky!

9th May
And more of the same! Today we had rain, hail and thunder storms.
We decided to invite C&D and Andrew for dinner (all vegetarian). I made gnocchi for the first time ever,
very easy but time consuming, which I mixed with broad bean pesto (every bean hand peeled by me!); we started the meal with fried Halloumi on a bed of green salad and finished with goat milk ice cream sundae.
Andrew managed to get me some glycerin from CB so I'll be able to make some fabric paint (acrylic paint, water and glycerin); so I'll be able to do some printing over the next few days.
The meal was a great success; lots of compliments and everything eaten - I will definitely add gnocchi to my menu repertoire; it's really easy, if slightly time consuming.

10th May
And still it rains, though the sun did come out for a few hours this afternoon; the garden however is far to wet to walk on.
I picked masses of wild plants that I would like to use for printing (I'm pressing them atm to try and make them more 2D, as some are a bit thick) - umbellifers (Queen Anne's Lace, Hog Weed), Shepherd's Purse and Quaking Grass (I love the heart shapes), Wild Oats and a host more ..... for some reason my tablet corrected Hog Weed to Howled and Quaking Grass to Quacking Grass!
6.45 this evening there was a very strange light outside; black clouds and bright sunlight - the photos don't do it justice.

Then at 7.00 we had an impressive storm (very windy, very wet).

7.15 the sun was out again ......
I hate my gas oven (I know there's always something!); it haphazardly turns itself out and it burns everything from the bottom up. Karina suggested I put tin foil around the bottom shelf, so I tried that and it practically stopped cooking - there doesn't seem to be a happy medium, the choice is either raw or burnt!

11th May
As the weather was still rubbish we went into CB for some retail therapy. I bought stuff for my printing phase and Brett bought clothes and sheep food - it wasted a few hours.
This afternoon I carried on with my monoprinting experiments.




12th May
Another wet, miserable day.
I made cheese (Halloumi and Ricotta); I saved five days worth of milk in the fridge, so I didn't need CaCl2. The texture seems much more like the Halloumi we're used to - I stirred it continuously for 40 minutes (before we stirred occasionally) and I pressed it for longer and with a heavier weight. I still can't get it to fold without cracking, but that could be because I'm cutting it into pieces that are too small - can't wait to try it, it looks squeaky!
The logistics of Rebecca's wedding is stressing me out; there's so many different venues, miles apart, and I won't have any transport, booking accommodation (at nearly £100 per night single occupancy!) is a worrying factor, then trying to work in visits to Will and Hen - I'm getting rather anxious .......

Friday 13th May
Happy Birthday Jane Xxxx
The sun was out this morning, we still had plenty of rain, but the sun was around.
I made a Gelli Plate
to print off (cost about 7.50€); 2 cups of glycerin, 8 pkts gelatin, 2 cups of boiling water - it made a plate 13.5" x 9", a similiar size ready made would cost about £50. I spent the afternoon playing at printing.

Did these two with a paper stencil I cut out

It disintegrated after the first print!

Printing on fabric, love this design

14th May
A bit dull, but no rain today.
Thomas and Diane came to pick up one of the piglets, so I made lunch - Thai beef salad, Diane brought a Paleo 'ice cream' made from blitzed up coconut, pineapple and strawberries, sprinkled with chocolate.
Brett watched rugby while I did more printing. I cut out a stencil from a very thick acetate using my wood burning tool - I was very impressed.

I've sent for a thinner acetate which Sarah will bring together with the 'drugs' (Calcium Chloride) and acrylic paints that I've bought this week - it's great having visitors!

15th May
At last, the sun came out today (our batteries charged to 100%).
Brett spent the day mowing and strimming; tidying up outside in preparation for our visitors.
I did the washing (it's the first time we've been able to use the line for a while!) and made (last year's) Christmas presents!!!



Poor old Hazel is on heat; she was being pestered by the Billy, the male kid and the horned ram; then Billy and the ram started head butting one another, Billy's head was bleeding - so the ram was segregated to the field (he wasn't happy), obviously it's Billy we want to mate with her.

16th May
I think we can safely say summer has arrived!
While Brett went back to his block work I prepared olive fly traps. We bought five traps that have a dry bait impregnated with pheromones and an organic insecticide, but we need more for the amount of trees we have. I have researched (googled) homemade olive fly traps and, as it's not possible to get some of the ingredients suggested (torula yeast being one), I kept searching until I came up with my final design - 2L bottle, with 5mm holes in shoulder (made with my wood burning tool), a bright yellow ring painted around the bottle's circumference (acrylic paint) and filled with an ammonia smelling bait, which attracts the female fly, - urine!!!!! So I'll be peeing into a bucket for a couple of days!
Brett is trimming the sheep and goat's hooves (only one or two an evening as it's quite physical with some of our rams); tonight we did the horned ram, my job is to kneel on their neck to keep them still, he's very heavy and strong - I have an impressive (and painful) horn gouge up my shin!

17th May
A dull but dry start to the day, then the sun came out about 11.00.
Brett borrowed P&M's Karcher (jet wash) to clean the decking then I used it to clean the rugs - it was very impressive.
I did lots of cooking in preparation for our visitors; ice cream, lemon curd, fudge and chevre cheese. The cheese should have taken 6-16 hours to form curds, mine had formed in an hour!!!! Which means I've done something wrong, on 'googling' I think I put in too much rennet - 1/4 tspn rather than 2 drops; who's have thought it would make that much difference? It's chemistry rather than cookery! I left it for the minimum time it could take to set, then set it to drain.

Brett strimmed and made the area around the house and the decking look good.
Have I mentioned that I HATE my oven? Tonight I cooked toad in the hole (one of Brett's favorite meals); I managed to overcook (burn) the bottom of the batter, whilst the top stayed unrisen and under-cooked! Whilst the squash (on the top shelf) was practically raw; it was not a nice meal!
By 11.00 p.m. the cheese still wasn't drained enough - so I went to bed!

18th May
Another lovely day .......
First thing (after doing all the animals, milking the goats and returning P&M's Karcher) we 'nipped' across to Spain to buy a few bits of tapas type food. Of course Spain is an hour ahead so we only just made it (phew).
I carried on cooking and cleaning, while Brett rotovatored between the vegetables (we have such healthy weeds!).
My Chevre cheese is not a creamy cheese, it's crumbly but it has a good flavor and will work well in salads (next time I'll be more careful with my quantities). However the whey is brilliant; full of protein with a sweet creamy taste, I used some as a base for a chilled pumpkin soup, the rest went to the pigs.
Today's HATE goes to ....... Clingfilm that doesn't cling! Why do 'they' make it? What's it for? Can I stab someone with it? I don't want to wind it round and round my bowl, so it clings to itself - it's supposed to cling to my bowl, and even if I did want to I can't turn a bowl of liquid any which way - spit, spit, spit!

19th May
Sun, sun, sun ......
I was up early (way before 7.00) as today we have VISITORS and I have lots to do.

Thursday 5 May 2016

THE SUN CAME BACK FOR A WHILE ......

14th April
Torrential rain .......
Brilliant ...... I've been feeling crap for a couple of weeks; stressed, achy joints and muscles and very tired. Last week I got, what I thought were, bites on my scalp (raised, itchy, bumps in my hair); then I got a very painful lump a bit lower down and yesterday I started with the sudden jabbing pain (like electric shocks) in the area ...... a quick 'google' and I've diagnosed myself - some kind of virus, possibly Cranial Shingles considering my Bell's Palsy history; I'm just hoping it doesn't trigger a BP attack - I'm really depressed.
Brett took C&D and Alfie into CB (to the vet) this afternoon; I stayed at home,in front of the fire.
C&D gave me a big bag of lemons, so I made some lemon curd.
This evening: our second attempt at Halloumi; yesterday's wasn't squeaky - and according to Andrew (who is Greek), if it doesn't squeak it's not Halloumi....... OK our curds are too soft (it could be because we freeze the milk or the nature of our goat milk) so now we have to source Calcium Chloride (CaCl2) which will firm up the curds.
Soft curds

The Ricotta worked

15th April
Wet ......
Lunch at A&K's and dinner as C&D's, which should have been a nice relaxing social day; but as I'm still feeling rough I just wanted to be at home!
A&K gave us a bag of 'truffles'; I don't know their proper name, they grow under the soil like real truffles. They've given us enough to eat and plant.
First strawberries (from the polytunnel) of the year picked today - they tasted a bit 'earthy' (disappointing).

16th April
Wet ......
At least I had a genuine excuse for not going to class today! We had to go into Penamacor to buy animal food and a few bits from the supermarket; I elected to stay in the car - Pam, Lou and Janet turned up at mini-P while Brett was shopping, so came to say "hello" to me. I said I felt 'crap' and (no nonsense Northern) Janet says "yes, you look crap"!
Brett had to take C&D and Alfie back into CB (to the vet) this afternoon; I stayed at home and watched 'Joy' (recommended by Pam).

17th April
Mark texted last night to say he was visiting today. As I'm still feeling bleugh Brett prepared lunch, I didn't even bother to tidy up (it was only Mark!); then he turns up with Amelia (his Portuguese friend) - great, the house was a tip!!!
Amelie brought us a present - two ducklings (about 3 weeks old, very cute), apparently they are called Leo and Mona. We put them in with the chicks; they were fine but the chicks freaked out - they'll have sorted themselves by morning.
To add insult to injury, today I got electrocuted! I was stoking the boar, he accidentally touch the electric fence which earthed down through my right leg - it bloody well hurt! And now, somehow, I have a very sore buttock and hamstring ......

18th April
A bit of sun this morning, but the ground is far too wet to do any gardening (I'm not up to it anyway, but my head is feeling a bit better).
The ducklings have settled in nicely with the chicks.
I was mortified by the state of our house yesterday, so today was the start of Spring Cleaning - my goodness it's slow progress when you're not feeling up to parr.
Brett did some building work while he could; there's more rain forecast this week.

19th April
It rained hard all night and was still raining this morning.
On a positive note: our pea and bean seeds have started coming through (I was worried that they might have rotted) and I'm feeling a lot better today.
But then it continued to rain all day, so now the peas and beans are under water - the well is fuller than ground height, the water is gushing out of the hole the pipe goes through, along the furrows, creating a 'lake' in the corner, where the peas and beans are planted!
The goose under the crate, who has been sitting for eleven days, has been flooded out; she was gamely trying to sit on her nest, which was submerged under several inches of water - we had to force her off and take away the eggs.

20th April
Dry but dull, for most of the day, then it started raining again late afternoon and most of the night.
We haven't had that much milk from the goats lately (typical just as we're getting into cheese making!); we got less than 1/2L from Georgia today. The problem is all the wet weather; the goats spend the day sheltering and the kids spend the day drinking OUR MILK!!!

21st April
Dull, damp, slightly drizzly ....
Hooray, confirmation of dates from Debbie & Dave - they're visiting in June. And Joyce, Sarah & James arrive four weeks from today.
The goats don't want to be put away overnight (they dig in their heels and pull back as we lead them), so we left them in the field tonight.

22nd April
A bit of dampness first thing, then blue skies and some sunshine!
Still too wet to go on the vegetable garden, but I planted out some herbs in the herb garden.
Brett strimmered and mowed (with the tractor!) the verges along the track.
Oh dear we missed our Amazon Spain delivery (thermometer) today - the email informing us (in Spanish) said we need to telephone the courier (Spanish) - neither of us want to do it!

23rd April
The sun was out today ........
No milk from the goats this morning; we're considering shutting the nannies in the shed over night, leaving the kids in the field - they should be weaned at about this age.
Hooray our Amazon Spain order came this morning with BOTH thermometers (so we don't have to phone the couriers!). I went to order some Calcium Carbonate from Amazon Spain 2.65€ for 500g, which I thought was nice and cheap, but 26€ postage!!!!!!!!!!! So I didn't order it .....
As I can't work in the vegetable garden yet (it's still boggy) I spent the day in my herb garden; at the moment it's full of mint and rocket - I've got to steel myself to get rid of lots of it ......

24th April
Sunny start to the day ......
Brett went straight out to carry on blocking - he's 17 blocks at the back (about 3.5m), it looks very high.
I've offered my spearmint on Facebook (free, for collection) and I dried a load in the dehydrator; (my first attempt at using it), I put some carrots in one tray to make carrot crisps.


After three hours one bucket of fresh mint became two Kilner jar (1L jars) of dried mint. The carrot crisps took four hours ...... they don't taste very much like crisps, Brett says they're like orange cardboard!

25th April
Another sunny day; it looks like this could be the start of summer (24.5 in the shade).
The garden is still rather wet but I managed to do some weeding and pick two buckets of fava beans.
Brett carried on with the building.
OMG we've just bought another four goats!!!!!! I answered an advert (in a dull moment) last week and the guy got back to us today. They're an eight year old nanny with her two, month old kids , (one male, one female) and an eighteen month female in milk. They are Erzgebirge, an old German breed kept for milking. They are being delivered on Wednesday.

26th April
Sun, sun, sun .........
First thing (well 10.00 a.m.) we took 3/4L of milk from Georgia (there was masses left for her kid) and 1/4L from Hazel (funnily she only needed it taking from one side), so a whole 1L - hopefully we won't need to milk this evening. Georgia milked much quicker than normal, as we were milking both sides; Hazel always milks fast, once she starts she gushes!
I need to keep reminding myself that I used to have to hand-wash and hand-wring all my washing (including sheets and duvet covers), so wash days now are not a chore - I have a twin tub, it's a luxury!
Brett carried on blocking.
Over the door is full height for the front, the back goes up another metre 

I love my windows .....
I gave away four carrier bags of spearmint (with roots) today; there's still an awful lot left!
I spent the afternoon in the polytunnel (well most of the time I was outside the door it was far too hot for more than a couple of minutes in there) sowing legumes.

27th April
A bit dull today.
Wow 1L off Georgia and 3/8L from Hazel (again one side).
The guy delivering the goats was running late so we nipped into the supermarket to get some food. Got to the checkout and all the lights went out - a power cut; stood around for ages waiting for the electricity to come back as nothing was working without it (not even the doors!) and of course there was no way we could be checked out manually.
Our goats arrived; they are very placid, well they were with us, but once we put them in the field with the rest of our flock it was another story - the one with horns ran at our sheep, so they gave her a wide birth, and reared up and butted our goats, who were more inquisitive. We left them to sort themselves out.
The new goats are the dark brown ones

The garden was drier today so I sowed (using our seeder) several rows of onions and carrots.
This evening the new goats came into feed with the rest of the flock; the horned nanny had a trough to herself - they are very wary of her.

28th April
Today I made hay while the sun shone;
I had to mow down a field full of wild flowers

(lavender, purple viper bugless, field marigold, yellow lupin, blue lupin, chickling vetch (purple/red, red, white), scarlet pimpernel, blue pimpernel, chickweed, wild rocket, ramping fumatory (I just love the name!), cranesbill, flycatcher, mayweed, chamomile, bladder campion, queen Anne's lace, purple toadflax, orchid, Mediterranean linseed, tassle hyacinth - and that's just the ones I know the names of!).
The new goats have made themselves at home very quickly; they come in to eat with the rest of the flock and will eat out of our hands.

29th April
I finished mowing the field this morning.
Brett blocked.
This evening we started raking the cut grass into lines - it was hard physical work!

30th April
Another lovely sunny day and I was up early as Lola and I were going to Diane's for the day, to make beauty products. I came home with a cream for my feet (they crack in the summer) and a creamy body mousse, plus all kinds of other goodies that Diane generously gave me - we had a fabulous day.
Meantime Brett was making hay rakes (he kindly made one for me too!); so when I got home I had to help rake the hay into rows (admittedly he had done most of it while I was out).
It was getting dark as we finished!

1st May
Sun for the next three days, then on Wednesday we get a rainy period - so lots to do ....... turn the hay and gather it in, plant out tomatoes, pepper, aubergine, tomatillos etc. Setting up the tomato cages, and the difficult bit - digging the irrigation channels (the ground is already hard). I also want to make a climbing bean support from rebar - I would like an arch but the rebar is already bent into a V (to fit it on the lorry).
As usual I didn't get half of what I planned done, but it was still a shattering day - we rewarded ourselves with a visit to Bar do Club, with Chris & Di (first of the year).

2nd May
Off to Fundao to buy plant plugs (tomatoes, aubergine and peppers) and some osteospernum then to CB to pick up our repaired rotorvator - unfortunately the English speaking guy wasn't there so I couldn't ask for the complaint's book; our rotorvator was bought 4 months ago, with a 2 year guarantee, but the cable that broke wasn't covered, so they charged us 38€ for a new cable (probably cost less than 5€) and kept the machine for 7 weeks!!!! I'm so cross, but there's nothing I can do about it.
I'm exhausted after planting all the plugs and turning the hay - sitting down waiting for a well earned beer!

3rd May
Bloody hell it was hot today 30+ in the shade and we had to get the hay in. It took most of the day, we are shattered, but we have a good sized hayrack.
And the field looks good.
Looking forward to lots of well earned beers, but first I have to make something to take to book club tomorrow - I made fudge .......,

4th May
I woke up with a stonking headache, I think it was all the sun yesterday (no, not the beers!); so I didn't get to book club - which is just as well as we didn't finish milking until nearly 11.00 and then I had all the sterilising to do (this milking lark takes lots of time).
We went to the planning department and got a 90 day extension for our build, then we went to Finances to ask why we hadn't had our land tax bill (we've had one for the last 3 years), apparently if you have a yearly income of less than 15000€ you are exempt this year.
We had to milk Georgia on one side this evening, which means we had our best ever milk yield today of about 1.75L.

5th May
And today it's raining .........
An enforced day off, just pottering around the house.

A selection of our wild flowers ........
Purple Viper's Bugless and Field Marigold

Tassle Hyacinth

Chickling Vetch

Scarlet Pimpernel and Blue Pimpernel




Mediterranean Linseed
Purple Toadflax