Winter is here, Barley Broth to comfort and sustain!

The start of December and snow lies all around, not deep and crisp and even but sparse and slushy and slippy!  We have had two snow falls in the last fortnight here in west Aberdeenshire but so far the temperature has still been warm and to my delight the garden and polytunnel are still yielding produce for us.  I spent a few minutes rooting around the other day and picked enough to make a big pot of broth, one of our family favourites at this time of year.

I used everything apart from the cavalo nero, which I saved for the next evening's supper.

Ali's Winter Barley Broth

1 tablespoon of olive oil

2 onions 

a Handful of carrots (probably around 3 medium sized ones)

2 sticks of celery

3 leeks

Big handful of parsley

1 cup of barley, soaked overnight in plenty of water

Approximately 1.5 lt/3 pints of chicken or veggie stock (I use homemade)

Some leftover chicken (from the bird used to make the stock, I buy local free range chickens so always use every bit of them)

Salt and pepper to taste

1. Chop the onions, and start by gently softening them in the oil in a large soup pan or casserole.

2. Once the onions have started to become translucent, add the chopped carrots, celery and leeks.  Give this all a good stir and cook away until the pot starts to sizzle.

3.  Add your stock and barley at this stage, followed by as much chopped parsley as you fancy.  Bring everything to a gentle boil.

4.  At this point I pop a lid on the pot and put it in the bottom oven of my Aga for a good hour to gently simmer away.  I don't season at this stage as I always wait until the barley has become soft and toothsome before I do.  On a regular cooker just reduce the heat until you have a low simmer and cook for about the same time, stirring regularly.

5.  The broth is cooked when the Barley has plumped up but still has a bit of bite to it.  This is when I season and then add the pre-cooked left over chicken and bring it all back up to a rolling simmer for about 10 minutes before serving.  We eat this with oatcakes, it will stick to your ribs as my Mum used to say!

I make many variations of this soup, sometimes with lentils, split peas too and depending on what we have in the garden, but I have to say that this version with barley in is my favourite.  Just the thing for the dark and short days we have at this time of year.

I got this lovely shot of Brooke our Shetland pony coming in for some hay last weekend.  I am trying to keep the horses out this year, as we now only have one 'big' horse, Brea, and two little ones, Brooke (above) and the even smaller MissyBell who is an American Miniature Horse.  As the herd are all getting on a bit I'd rather they keep moving, eating ad lib hay whenever they want than stay in stables at night, however, the condition of our fields and quantity of mud is always the deciding factor.  I much prefer cold, sunny and frosty weather and I think the horses do too!

Wondering if this will be my last post for 2015?  Perhaps it is, but I hope to return more regularly in the New Year.

Wishing you and yours all the very best for the festive season and a happy and healthy 2016 to us all!

Ali
x

Growing and eating wishlist for 2013

Happy New Year!

It's been mild, dry and windy so far.  A brief respite from the mud and rain for our animals and a chance to get out in the garden for us.  Yesterday Paul started clearing the old chicken run area out, we moved the chickens to their free range area a couple of years ago and the old run has been left vacant for a while.  The plan this year is to move our existing fruit bushes into it.  At the moment our raspberries, blackcurrants, redcurrants and gooseberries are in the same part of the garden as the chickens and last year became overgrown and neglected, however, they did provide a lovely space for Fiona, our Cream Legbar, to lay all her eggs, it meant I was crawling about under scratchy plants trying to find them, not much fun.  By moving the plants we will be able to give them all more space and light, resulting in more fruit (and less lost eggs!)this summer.

Getting in the garden on the first weekend in January has also made us keen to plant and eat as much as possible this year.  Last night we feasted on a stew made from the last of our Cavalo Nero (loosely adapted from a Nigel Slater recipe), I cooked pancetta, onion, chorizo, tomatoes and some chunks of potato in red wine and stock for about 30 minutes, then added a couple of tins of butter beans, and some huge handfuls of roughly chopped Cavalo Nero - cooked for another 10 minutes to let the kale wilt and then seasoned with smoked paprika, a splash of red wine vinegar and topped with some parsley (we still have some growing in the polytunnel).  I have to say it was the best dinner this year (;-)).  So with the thought of making the most of our garden I have decided to list things that I would most like to grow in the garden (sadly trying to remember that we don't live in the south of the UK and are very much restricted by what we can grown up here in the far north).

Vegetable Garden Essentials 
(things we already grow, and eat and can't live without)

Cavalo Nero (of course)
Kale (the bigger type than Cavalo nero, can't remember it's name)
Onions and Shallots
Broad Beans
Garden Peas
Tomatoes
Courgettes (especially Gold rush, beautiful yellow sunny ones)
Spinach (the perpetual one works best in our garden)
Lettuce - Romaine, Cos, and Rocket (although not sure if Rocket is a lettuce?)
Beetroot
Rhubarb
Horseradish
Swiss (rainbow?) chard
Chili Peppers (inside the house, bit of a cheat but I love them)
Flat and curly parsley

Nice to have 
(have grown them before and want to grow again)

Purple Sprouting Brocoli - for some reason it hasn't done very well last few years
Pink Fir Apple Potatoes - had a potato free couple of years, but these are my faves
Strawberries - I grow the alpine ones in the herb garden but grown the 'big' ones for a while
Runner beans - taste great, hard to grow up here
Sweetcorn - grew in the garden once (a hot summer) then in the polytunnel but not very succesfully
Brussel sprouts (grew them in our last garden but they take up a lot of space)

Dream on...
(if only we didn't live in Aberdeenshire)

Aubergines
Squash - any kind, especially wee patty pan ones
Bell Peppers (especially those light green ones you get in Spain)

last year in the hen's free range garden (old raspberry canes behind their shelter)

As ever living up here, I think the worst of our winter weather has still to arrive (usually after my first snowdrops have appeared), but I love spending the long nights planning what to do when spring does arrive.