Consumer Information

It is feeling so autumnal here, cold, grey and blowy - I can't get chutney off my mind. there are certain tasks, I associate with the seasons - Marmalade is Winter, Knitting and Chutney are Autumn, Strawberry jam and Elderflower Cordial are summer, seed sowing is Spring.
So as I am too early for the green tomato glut, I am going to make some Rhubarb and Ginger chutney. I already have industrial quantities of vinegar that I use for cleaning, and a store of empty jars, and I bought a mega-bag...

This is the 21st century after all! Man has been to the moon, animals have been cloned, babies born from a test tube conception, and you can use a mobile up Kilimanjaro - but can I do Popmaster between Gloucester and Swindon? No I cannot. Can I hear the play on Radio 4 between Knighton and Newtown? No I cannot.
The digital switchover is, by all accounts a bit of a lame duck, and FM can be brilliant - so come on radio stations - get boosting!!!

I love this time of year because roses are my favourite flower. I go round the garden taking one flower from each shrub to create multicoloured (but Oh! So subtle) posies. I wouldn't be without the ancient (lineage wise)and healthy red rose of Lancaster (actually deep pink) Rosa Gallica Officianalis. If you only have space for one - I recommend it. This year I have been slowly constructing raised beds from old sleepers, that I intend to use for cut flowers a la Sarah Raven (on a small scale)...

I'm a bit disheartened by the response to a post about getting paid more by a company than you should have been, and whether to refund. I seem to be a lone voice in thinking it right and fair to be honest.
When I first left my sleepy hometown, to live in the Big Smoke, I found a little slip of paper in my luggage when I unpacked. On it was a poem my father had written and I wish I still had that slip of paper. It may be tucked away somewhere, mislaid in one of the twenty odd moves since....

Failed in my attempt to keep it tight in the first half of the month. Here we are half way through and I am strapped! See, I succumbed to the Parmesan - but it goes so well with Asparagus!
I did have to buy Tesco's entire stock of Spelt Puff Pastry. Puff pastry is, to me, the Holy Grail of wheat intolerant living, and DH can cope with spelt. When I say entire stock - three packs - two in the freezer and one baked under a layer of farm shop Asparagus - so of course I had to have Parmesan..........