Mushrooms again

Today’s catch was a single saffron milk cap, Lactarius deliciosus. Most of the milk caps in the forest were very much past their best:

The prettiest mushrooms by far were the poisonous ones:

That one was admired but not picked.

One milk cap was in very good condition:

I’m still eating as a way of confirming my identification, so I only ate two slices. However, so far so good.

The main event was actually harvesting pine cones for the kids to decorate for winter solstice, which will be upon us before we know it! Mission accomplished:

Winter Solstice preparations – orange pomanders

We spent the afternoon today making these beautiful decorations from oranges and cloves.  While it would be more awesome if the oranges were home grown, sadly we bought these.  They still smell delicious though and look very festive.  And Mme. Four had a lovely time helping to make them.  M. One, however, did not have as much fun – he found and ate a dropped clove.

Happy Summer Solstice!

In our aim to celebrate the seasons as they come, here is an oak wreath I made from a nearby tree as decoration for the summer solstice.

Even though the solstice was yesterday, we will be celebrating the longest day tonight with a special meal with friends.
Hope you all had a lovely summery day!

Winter Solstice

This post is a bit late, but we celebrated the Winter Solstice this year.  The solstice was June 22.  Now that we are trying to grow food seasonally, it feels fitting to mark the passing of the seasons of the year and to celebrate the return of the longer sunlight hours.  This should also mean that our chickens start to come back on the lay, or for those who haven’t laid yet, come into lay.  Laying is linked to sunlight exposure, so the return of longer sunlight hours is definitely cause to celebrate.  We have not had one single egg since the end of May!  We have had to go back to buying supermarket eggs!

We had some friends over for dinner and cooked up some goat in the weberate and ate food from our gardens.  We exchanged preserves from our Autumn harvest – pickled green tomatoes, pickled chillies, lemon butter mmm… And it seemed very fitting!

The younger kids had fun roasting marshmallows over a fire, while the adults (and nearly adults) mulled wine (here is a link to the recipe – it was just stunning).

Apparently I was having too much fun to take photos on the night but here are a few of the preparations – making the lemon butter, lemon candles and the the yule log themed table centerpiece.

All the ingredients for the lemon butter

Simmering and thickening the lemon butter

Liquid sunshine

Lemon candle - made from the left over lemon skins

And a couple of the Yule log. I know traditionally you are supposed to burn the Yule log, but I liked this idea better.

Winter colourful greenery from the hedge trees between us and a neighbour