Elderflower cordial

The children have introduced a new game to our in-car entertainment repertoire. Not one to be dragged out by us parents at the first "are we nearly there yet" to a chorus of groans. Oh no.

This game has captured their imaginations and taken over even our shortest journey. And the name of this game? "Yellow Car". 

Heard of it? I'm sure you will do.

Now, you might think a game that is so absorbing would be a winner, but let me tell you, if you're not already familiar, it absolutely is not. The premise is that every time you see a yellow car you punch/pinch the other passengers and shout "Yellow Car!". Not exactly rocket science. The problem is that we've become completely obsessed.  And there are more yellow cars on the road than you might think, leading not only to yellow cars, but also to a preponderance of purple upper arms where the bruises are...

We have ridiculous arguments about orange and gold cars. Do diggers count? (Cue "We're not playing yellow VEHICLES..." in an outraged tone). I understand that there is a variation called 'Yellow Everything', but, reflecting that every car journey would turn into some kind of out of control slap-fest due to there being yellow dandelions, buttercups and celandines adorning the roadsides, yellowing fields, yellow painted houses (Cardigan is a town of brightly coloured dwellings), I have banned it.

Yellow Car remains, though, and I find myself mentally playing the game when I'm in the car on my own, clocking where yellow cars are parked, retaining the intelligence for later in the hope of gaining the upper hand.  

Not that I'm competitive or anything. 

Last week, not only was I frantically on the look out for yellow cars, I was also keeping my eye out for elderflowers, and feeling increasingly frustrated as I either managed to miss the bushes (too pre-occupied with the cars) or didn't have anything to harvest the frothy, intoxicating flowers. Ridiculous, as it turns out we have 3 elderflower bushes in the garden.

There are many, many recipes for elderflower cordial around. I started with Sarah Raven's version in her Garden Cookbook, but made free given that I didn't have any limes (an unusual addition that I haven't seen in many other recipes) and Cardigan was all out of citric acid...

Elderflower Cordial

20-25 heads of elderflower
3 oranges
3 lemons 
1.5 kg sugar

Gently wash the elderflowers to remove any little bugs that have come home with you.

Dissolve the sugar in a large pan with 1.5 litres of water, then bring to the boil. Add the flowers to the pan, then when the water has come back up to the boil, remove the pan from the heat.

Thinly slice the oranges and lemons and put them in a large bowl, then tip the hot syrup and the elderflowers on top of the fruit, stir then cover with a tea  towel or somesuch. Leave to steep for 24 hours.

At the end of the 24 hours, strain the cordial into sterilised bottles or suitable freezing containers (it freezes very well), then enjoy. Oh, and don't discard the oranges and lemons - I've got something you can make with them...

There are many uses for elderflower cordial besides just diluting it with cold water (which is wonderfully refreshing). It tastes fabulous with gin, and is a great addition to any gooseberry dish you might be thinking of - and you should given that gooseberries are also in season.

Beef & Chorizo Casserole

Ironic, I guess, and perhaps not entirely straight, that while I have been posting about having been a year in Wales, I am, in fact, in London, with the kids, staying with a great friend. We are combining collective childcare, boxing and coxing with various work commitments, taking the kids out and about, and of course catching up and enjoying mutually supportive gin drinking... I've also been seeing something of my littlest nephew, who, conveniently, lives a 15 minute walk (with his parents - my youngest brother & his wife - of course) from my friend.

Our children (mine & my friend's) are similar in age and get on pretty well, so it's working out, and I think they are having a good time. Friend and I have also managed to stay on top of work that we couldn't complete in advance of half term, so everyone's a winner, although sometimes, it can feel a little crazy. As you can imagine, half term and museums in London can be pretty chokka. 


Early is good, but getting everything done and everyone organised and out of the house can be a mission. 

This morning, for example, between us, we'd reviewed a complex legal document (friend), scheduled social media posts for a client (me), knocked up a packed lunch for 6 and put a casserole in the slow cooker, not to mention negotiated breakfast, and the getting dressed, teeth brushing and leaving the house with 4 lovely but ever so slightly scatty under 12s, and made the train to Waterloo by 9.20 a.m. for a day at the Imperial War Museum...

Slow cooking is a total boon for this sort of day - when you return home culturally replete but, let's face it, knackered, all you need do is knock up some mash (or just soak some couscous, or slice up some bread) and bingo, dinner.

Beef & Chorizo Casserole

Serves at least 4 hungry children and 3 adults

1 kg casserole steak
plain flour
1 pack 12 mini cooking chorizo
about 20 shallots
5 medium carrots
2 cloves garlic
sunflower (or other) oil
2 * 400g tins cherry tomatoes
2 beef stock cubes 
2-3 tsp cornflour

Pre-heat the slow cooker. My friend has an infinitely superior slow cooker to mine, with a timer and a warming setting. Marvellous!

Put the steak in a bowl and sprinkle a couple of spoonfuls of plain flour and a couple of grinds of salt & pepper over it.

Halve the chorizo sausages, peel the shallots, peel and chop the carrots so they are similar size to the chorizo. Peel and finely chop the garlic.

Heat  a tablespoon of so of oil in a medium-large frying pan and start off gently frying the chorizo pieces. Add in the carrot and garlic and fry gently for 5 minutes or so before transferring to the slow cooker. If necessary add a little more oil to the an, then brown off the shallots and add to the slow cooker.

Finally, brown off the beef (use a little more oil if you need) in small batches, adding to the slow cooker. Boil the kettle.

Once all the beef is added to the slow cooker, tip in the 2 tins of cherry tomatoes, crumble the stock cubes into one of the empty tins, fill with water, pour into the other empty tin, then add the beefy, tomatoey water into the slow cooker, stir everything round, pop the lid on and cook on low for 8 hours or so.

Go out for the day.

When you return, mix up 2-3 tsp of cornflour with a little cold water, add in some juice from the slow cooker, then tip the whole lot back into the slow cooker for an hour or so to thicken up. Do not sprinkle the cornflour directly into the casserole or it will go lumpy.

Make mash potato, soak couscous, boil pasta, whatever you want to go with the casserole - frankly whatever you have the energy to produce - and serve.

Pour yourself a g&t if you haven't already...

The London Gin Club at The Star at Night

We went to the fair on Monday. 

Despite the rain that persisted, we gamely surveyed the stall upon stall of utter tat that lined Cardigan's main street - and some of the side roads too, before heading to the main attraction - the rides.

Now, somewhere along the line, in the last few years, I have clearly become significantly more risk averse and middle aged than I thought. I was, until Monday evening, labouring under the clearly false impression that I was still, essentially, about 23 at least in my outlook in life if not in the stomach muscle department. But clearly this is not the case.

I used to utterly love fairs. I'm not talking 'theme parks' here - tame beyond belief, however thrill inducing the ride - but travelling fairs. Here for a week, on to the next town the following week.

And what did I love? Well, where to start?

The noise: banging dance music, generators roaring, the exortations of the ride 'masters' to "scream if you want to go faster", (incidentally, I don't know if 'ridemaster' is the correct term, but it seems appropriate) - and, of course, the screams... 

The smells: of chips, of doughnuts, of diesel... 

The total visual overload - lights, people, the cool emanating from the lads operating the rides, spinning the Waltzer carriages whilst smoking fags and eyeing up the talent (not me - I hasten to add - I was never in the 'talent' bracket - my mum would never let me wear that much make up...), the hormones whirring round the teenage gaggles... 

And last but not least, the rides themselves. My goodness, but I loved those rides. The faster, the more spinning, the more screaming, the more adrenaline and risk of whiplash the better. 

But, apparently, no longer.

As I walked into the swimming pool car park in Cardigan on Monday night, transformed into a seething mass of humanity, I could only wonder in horror at the health & safety regime that means Councils ban games of conkers, and yet allow travelling fairs to cart rides like this around in pieces on the back of a lorry, to be reassembled in various small towns around the country.

Seriously, this thing was scary - a long arm with the seating on the end which rotated at the same time as the arm swung backwards and forwards high over the crowds. Despite a turn on the Waltzer, being spun by some nonchalant youth, screaming like a good 'un, despite the hook a ducks, the chips, the doughnuts, I spent the whole time we were there terrified that this construction would somehow collapse in the manner of some dreadful B movie causing tragedy.

It didn't help that the Husband started to tell me how his H&S colleague at work refuses to allow her kids to attend these kinds of fairs because the number of accidents are so high.   

So given that I am clearly now so blimmin' middle aged, a far more appropriate outing perhaps was my trip to London at the weekend to the London Gin Club. 

Quite a mission for me, involving a drive to Carmarthen, a train to Swansea packed with Welsh rugby fans and more cans of lager at 10.30 in the morning than you may ever have seen... (there I go again - so middle aged... could I purse those lips any more?), then another train from Swansea all the way to London, but which became like a different train once the lager and rugby fans were disgorged upon Cardiff... 

But one Gillian Flynn novel (Sharp Objects - very, very good), and a stop in Earlsfield for a few cuddles with my (unutterably cute) nephew and a reapplication of mascara  later, and I was in central London for a date with some of my lovely Hampshire friends, and GIN!

The London Gin Club occupies the Star at Night pub on Great Chapel Street just off Oxford Street.- "dedicated to tracking down the finest gins for your drinking enjoyment" I can certainly agree with that.

We'd booked a table to which we were duly escorted, provided with menus and given a brief introduction. It's a small, intimate bar and we were downstairs in a cellar like alcove. Very convivial for catching up and raucous cackling.

They have an impressive range of gins, served with your tonic of choice (Fever Tree in all its delicious forms, Fentimans and of course good old Scchhhhhhhhweppes, plus 1724 which I 'd never come across before) - and with tailored garnishes depending on the gin.

We all chose tasting menus to start with - I went for the blind tasting which entailed 4 different gins, 4 ice filled 'Copa' balloon glasses, 2 bottles of Fever Tree and a delicate dish of possible garnishes. As instructed, those of us taking this option tasted the gin neat on ice before adding the tonic, tasting again and then deciding on an appropriate garnish. All a bit of fun, you may say, but tasting the gin neat on ice and then with the tonic and actually taking time to think about what the gin tasted of instead of simply seeking a slightly fuzzy feeling on a Friday night, was a genuinely interesting experience. I also loved that the 4 gins on the blind tasting were very very different, and tasting them next to each other really demonstrates that gin isn't just  - well, gin. It was also a revelation how different garnishes can really bring out the different flavours of the gins. I'll admit that having the tray of potential garnishes made me feel a little like I was back in play school, mixing up 'potions' - but in a good way you understand.

As you might imagine, there was much chat, and sharing of glasses - I was a little disappointed that none of the gins on the blind tasting menu were pared with the herbs that I saw on the menu - you might not think that gin goes with mint or with coriander, but you'd be wrong. Pared with the right gin (in this case, Pickerings with lime peel and coriander, Becketts with mint) - totally, mouthwateringly, delicious. Forget travelling fairs, this is the kind of living on the edge I can handle.

Tasting menus done, we had time for one last drink before sedately (ahem) venturing out for dinner. The London Gin Club offers an array of gin cocktails which I'm pleased to say proved to be as delicious as they sound - as did my glass of Botanist & tonic garnished with lemon and thyme...

Now this was all very delightful - luscious gin served in great and convivial surroundings, with helpful advice and discussion with Sarah our waitress - but what about the cost. Well, it's a long time since I've done any drinking in London and I was prepared for it to all be quite shockingly expensive. May be I'd over-estimated but the blind tasting menu was £26 - that's £26 for 4 G&Ts made with premium gins and Fever Tree tonic, plus a tray of garnishes to play with in a great venue. It felt OK to me.

So the sights, sounds and thrills of the fair or the chat of good friends, the sound of tonic on ice and the tastes of premium gin. That along with the very tasteful and pretty visual spectacle of the Oxford Street lights and it's clear that what counts as a cracking night out has changed for me. 

But that's not necessarily a bad thing!

The best steak sarnie ever?

Last Saturday, I had the best steak sarnie I think I've ever eaten. That includes plenty of steak baguettes in the kingdom of delicious rare beef (or boeuf) that is France. Yes really.

And where was this little piece of carnivorous heaven? The Watership Down Inn in our old North Hampshire stomping ground.

Back visiting friends at half term, Saturday found us not exactly at a loose end, but having discussed with out hosts how we didn't expect them to entertain us, and how they were totally happy with that as they had jobs to get on with too, we decided that the weather was too good to do anything other than enjoy the Autumn colour and go for a long walk, taking in a pub en route.

We walked mostly along the road from Overton to Freefolk, pausing to take in the site (and sight) of the newly opened Bombay Sapphire Gin Distillery that has taken up residence in the beautifully restored paper mill at Laverstoke (sadly we didn't visit on this occasion, but hopefully soon). 

The Watership Down Inn is a little way on, along the main road - and to be honest it's not a great part of this particular circular walk, but now that I know a steak sandwich of such lusciousness awaits at the other end, well, I expect it's walk I'll be doing on future visits.

In truth, the Watership Down Inn has had its ups and downs over the past few years. When we first moved to the area, it was a bustling, lively pub doing great value family food. With the extensive gardens and climbing frame it was a fab place to go with kids. A change of owners (may be 2) meant that standards definitely slipped but it's been with the current owners for the last 18 months and it's definitely worth a visit. The decor is fresh, the chairs are endowed with lovely soft sheepskin, and everything about it sings "good place to be".

We were 4 adults and 3 kids. 3 of us grown ups had ciabattas, the Husband had gammon egg and chips ("but no tomato" even though it was part of the meal) and pronounced it very good indeed. Blue indulged in the burger - fashionably encased as so many are these days in a brioche bun, but definitely a heavyweight, tasty burger - 2 patties, cheese, proper decent garnish (Samuel L Jackson would have been proud), and the 2 younger girls in our party had the 'mini' pizza which was much better than anticipated, being actually a chunky piece of ciabatta topped with tomato sauce and cheese - no insipid frozen piece of pap that often gets served up as part of a 'kids menu'.

And my steak ciabatta. I asked for it to be rare expecting medium rare at best, but rare it was. There was plenty of the advertised watercress, and generous smearings of the mustard mayo. The ciabatta was soft enough to allow a delicious soaking in of meat juices, but still substantial enough to hold the sandwich together. And the chips? Nothing short of divine. Hot, salty (but not too salty). Good and chunky. Crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside... The kind of chip I expect every potato would like to become.

According to the men of the party, the beer was also good, and Fred the dog heartily approved of the bowl of dog biscuits available... It was so great that despite the lovely Autumn weather, we found it hard to drag ourselves back outside, and head up to the Harrow Way for the walk home along this ancient by way. But we did and it was great. 

Lovely friends, good times, great food. Perfect!

Gin & Tonic Loaf Cake

Did I tell you that I once won a whole case of Gordons gin? 12 whole bottles, all because I was bored on the East Coast Mainline, returning from an Employment Tribunal in Newcastle Upon Tyne to London? Well I did. I think I might have been the only person who entered the competition in the 'in train' magazine, because I also won tickets to see Stomp all from the same postcard entry form. In many ways, I think it's slightly unfortunate that I cancelled out my entire winning streak with one competition. I mean, I'm unlikely to win on the premium bonds now - I can't even win a tenner on a scratch card (not that I buy them - perhaps that's the problem? But no, I think even if I did buy them, or play the lottery, I just wouldn't win).

I do like a gin & tonic. You'd think that 12 bottles and I might have got a little bored of it, but no, although I have to say that Gordons is unlikely to be my gin of choice these days. I'm rather partial to Bombay Sapphire as a kind of 'day to day' gin - which makes it sound like I drink it all the time, which I don't (really, Mum, I absolutely don't). My all time favourite gin was one that a local wine merchant produced for me I went in looking for Hendricks, and came out with a bottle, one of only a dozen he'd managed to get his hands on (I didn't ask how), or gin distilled on the bay in San Francisco. I can't to my shame remember what it was called, but it was delicious.  I've never seen it since which is a great shame.




I've just come to the end of a rather delicious elderflower infused concoction by Warner Edwards, purchased at CarFest last year, and cracked open a bottle of Adnams 'Copper House' gin which a friend brought with her when she came to stay. She can come again.

The reason for cracking open a bottle of gin on a Sunday morning, which felt very decadent and not a little raffish, is this cake. You see, I like gin & I like cake. The lure of a gin & tonic cake must therefore be obvious to you.

I baked it for the July meeting of the Cardigan Clandestine Cake Club, on the theme 'Summertime'. because what could be more summery than sitting outside as the heat just starts to drift out of the day, drinking a gin & tonic. Fancy cocktails are all very well, but you just can't beat a great G&T. And I do love a lemon drizzle cake, ad this combines the best of both.

The cake calls for the weighing method for ingredients - my eggs weighed 250g which has NEVER happened to me before, but the resultant mixture was probably a little too much. I should have diverted some of it into cupcakes, I think. Somewhere in the region of 200g might have been better.




But when a cake has gin in it, you can cast aside any sense of caution. And this cake does have a lot of gin in it. A. LOT. Mostly in the drizzle. I tried to distribute the drizzle evenly over the cake, but I did still end up with a very gin soaked central part of cake, with gin becoming more subtle the closer to the edges and the bottom of the cake you nibbled. That said, if I hadn't been driving, I would have embraced the gin-soaked centre with enthusiasm. 

It was a real shame we were all, to a woman, driving, to be honest - because getting gently sozzled on a lovely piece of cake, well, it's a pretty enjoyable thought for a summer evening, really. Definitely a cake for the grownups, I'd say. One to make when you know you're not going to be driving anywhere.

My fellow blogger, Sarah, who's lovely bit of the blogosphere is A View from the Table was similarly interested in this cake, being a bit of a gin connoisseur, and so I'll be interested to hear what she thought of this cake.

My afternoon - with apologies to Edward Lear #sendgin

There once was a mother called Sally,
Whose children would drive her doolally.
She stifled her screams
as she cooked them baked beans,
and then urged them to bed, not to dally.