pumpkinstrokemarrow

I was reminded of the chap in TB who claims to have eaten crow in his poverty stricken youth in the fifties (of the last century), his father being given them from time to time by a farmer he did odd jobs for and his mother stewing them up in a large stew pot which was kept going from one week to the next. Cleaned out on quarter days and name days. The connection being that a small pheasant is a lot smaller than the average chicken and one is much more conscious in consequence of eating a small animal. Plus there are lots of bits and bobs. Crows are rather smaller than pheasants so presumably one would be even more conscious. Not to mention all the small birds caught in Brueghelian bird traps (see for example, 'Winterlandschaft mit Schlittschuhläufern und Vogelfalle'. Bottom right) and the four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie. Presumably you need that many to make a decent pie. And perhaps the people that ate them just crunched all the bits and bobs up.

Cherries from Spain and Braeburns for desert. Cherries excellent - big fat jobs from the regular Epsom market - but the Braeburns - although they had a good texture - tasted a bit thin, either after the cherries or after the Pink Ladies in the days before.

Followed by a stroll in the garden to inspect the water lilly, recently savaged by a fox. We had another flower, full out in the sun but with curiously bleached & streaked outer petals, which rather took away from the flower as a whole. No idea what would have done this.

Later in the afternoon felt the need for a top-up and tried the large white bloomer with small black seeds we had bought, for once in a while, from the market. I have bought bread from this chap before and not thought too much of it, but this loaf was fine. Fresh with a properly chewy crust, not too hard. Will I ever learn to make bread like this? Presently reduced to making wholemeal along, I believe, with many other home bread makers.

Planning to tuck into crabs' legs with bubble & squeak (from the veg. left over from lunch) shortly.

Pheasant & salad sarnies for tomorrow's picnic.

All in all, Epsom market did quite well out of us today.

I close with some botanical factlets, new to me.

First, orchids are named from the Ancient Greek for balls or testes, from the shape of the roots of some varieties.

Second, the very large orchid family belongs to the asparagus order. So the orchid is really a sort of asparagus.

Third, the lettuce like object which you might use to make a crab salad and which I call endive - and which I do not remember seeing for sale - is the adult version of the juvenile - which I do remember seeing for sale. Illustrated above.