Rose Hip Syrup

 The best cold remedy EVER.. Rosehip Syrup! 

On my recent quest to eat locally and seasonally, I mentioned previously that I really wanted to make Rosehip Syrup just like my grandmother made for my Dad and my Aunt. 

Above is a picture of my boys (a good few weeks ago) harvesting all the ripe Rose-hips. We found a number of Rosehip bushes in the hedges surrounding our fields. We found out rather quickly too that you need to wear gloves when you harvest the fruit as the Rosehips have little 'hairs' on them that act like itching powder. 

Once we had collected what we hoped was 1 kg in weight, we took them in to the kitchen. 

Here is a copy of the recipe we followed. 

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Ingredients

1kg Rosehips

3 litres of water

500g sugar

Bring to the boil 2 litres of water.

Chop rosehips in food processor until mashed up, then add to boiling water.

Bring water back to the boil, then remove from heat and allow to steep for 20 minutes.

Pour rosehips and liquid into a scalded jelly bag and allow the juice to drip through. Gently squeeze the jelly bag to extract as much liquid as possible. Be careful not to rip the bag.

Add rosehip pulp back to a saucepan containing 1 litre of water and bring back to the boil. Then remove from heat and allow the contents to steep for another 20 minutes before straining through the jelly bag as in Step 3.

Add sugar to the strained rosehip liquid and dissolve, allow to simmer for five minutes, then pour into hot, sterilised bottles.

Store in the fridge and add to hot water with a slice of ginger for a great cold remedy, dilute in cold water for a great kids drink ,or pour over pancakes or waffles..even chocolate cake for a fragrant sauce or topping!

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It was surprisingly quick and easy to make. 

My only problem was, what to do with the pulp? We ended up throwing it away which seems like such a waste. I need to find a purpose for it for next year. 

I've used the syrup as a hot drink, cold drink and even poured it on my porridge so far. 

Around this time of year, I'm always the first to get a cold in our house. This year I'm the only one who hasn't suffered a cold (yet!) and I'm the only one really drinking the Rosehip Syrup... Oh well, more for me. 

http://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/foodanddrink/make-a-pig-of-yourself-with-a-bowl-of-bacon-porridge-8293532.html

12-11-12 

Bacon and Porridge?! 

So, first New York, then London and now... Waungron! 

I really fancy the idea of this! 

http://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/foodanddrink/make-a-pig-of-yourself-with-a-bowl-of-bacon-porridge-8293532.html

It makes perfect sense to me... combining protein with the slow release energy of the oats for breakfast, perfect! 

Guess what's on my breakfast menu in the morning...

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13-11-12 

Well, I did make it for breakfast and this is what is looked like. 

I have to admit I added some sugar to it. 

Someone suggested adding maple syrup, that would have been a good idea. 

It was nice and I would prepare it again, maybe not something for every day though! 

www.tysiriolpork.co.uk

Ding dong, it's Ty Siriol calling!

Delivery Service 

We wondered if we could make our offer even better and thought it would be a good idea to   offer a delivery service. (Also, we're trying to keep those food miles down so it's better for us to  make one journey to various places rather than everyone travelling to us individually.)     

We thought we would start off by offering delivering within a 10 mile radius for a small fee of £2.50 delivering between 6-9pm. 

I think every customer that we delivered to on Friday thought the £2.50 was worth every penny for simply not having to travel out in that awful weather! 

What a wet year!

It's been incredibly wet this year and our fields have really suffered for it.  

We invested a lot of time and effort creating hard standing areas and shell paths for us and for the animals to get them out of the mud and to try and preserve some of the ground. 

 

The horses have come in for the winter and the sheep are still 'on-holidays' with the Ram so the land is having a good, well deserved rest. 

Let's hope we have a better summer in 2013!

Sausages

It's British Sausage Week this week! Ours are Welsh does that count? 

We keep our traditional pork sausages very simple by using just the basic (and best) ingredients! 

Here's what goes in to our sausages... Home reared Pedigree Welsh Pork, rusk, water and seasoning. 

The sausages are then handmade and packed by us. 

www.tysiriolpork.co.uk

Eating Seasonally

How hard would it be to eat seasonally for a year...?

What would the health benefits be?

What would it mean to our local producers? 


These are some of many questions I've been asking myself recently. I'm considering trying to eat and feed my family with only what is fresh or available locally and monitor the benefits. Will it be hard work? what will the benefits be? I stumbled upon a Sophie Dahl book recently and it inspired me seriously consider just that!

We started the process by the children and I gathering blackberries from our smallholding for the past few weeks. We have made pots and pots of blackberry jam and this past weekend we attempted our first 'Blackberry Syrup' which we've been using as an alternative to squash (it was delicious). 

So now I want to try more...

For years we have had Rosehips growning in the the garden and fields and I've never known what to do with them. I'm ashamed to admit I didn't even know they were edible! After speaking with my 80 year old aunt (Aunt Peg) she advised me that I could also make syrup out of the Rosehips and that she and my Father drank the syrup as children when thier parents couldn't buy squash. She also told me that you have to wait until the first frost before you harvest them. Apparently that is when they are at thier best. She's got 50 years more experience than me so I'll take her advice. That's next on the list to try so I'll post how we got on. 
   

The ewes have gone to visit the ram... his name is Roger

A few weeks ago Martyn and I went to visit friends who had bought-in a new Pedigree Lleyn ram. We went with a view to hiring Rogers' "services" for our Lleyn flock of ewes. Our friends are approx 2miles from our small holding, now that is buying local! 

Roger is only 18 months old, so it will be his first season of tupping. Roger will be wearing a harness that incorporates a wax pad, so there will be a visible mark on the ewes if they have been covered.  We'll be visting the ewes regularly to check on them and look for signs of the wax on their fleeces.