Cars

I was brought up in an era of mechanical unreliability. Cars were always breaking down, punctures were commonplace, engines consumed and leaked oil, a grease gun was part of the maintenance kit, and passengers were sometimes required to help push a car up steep hills. So just to make cars work was part of life, despite the advertisements of the day showing happy people driving around an ideal countryside with hair in the slipstream and smiles on faces. It was not usually like that.

I suppose because they needed so much attention, and there were comparatively few cars about, they seemed to form personalities of their own, sometimes volatile ones. You loved them or hated them, but you could not ignore them. Or if you did so, it was at your peril. Even people with no bent for mechanical matters, soon acquired some essential knowledge of how cars worked and how to deal with trouble.

A good example was my first car, a twenty year old 1929/1930 MG Type M Midget, given to me by a cousin. It was open, sporty, and just the kind enjoyed by girl friends - except when it broke down. I had to learn how to cure an oil leak from its overhead camshaft, about its SU carburettor, the Autovac, and how to treat the slipping clutch by squirting fluid from its Pyrene fire extinguisher into the clutch housing. To own it was an adventure too far. So, as it had been a gift, I gave it away to a Norfolk family of friends, where it may still languish in a shed or barn.

 My brother was an engineer who knew a man who made up Austin 7 cars from bits of others. I asked if he would make me a sporting version, which he did. Two seats, crab-tracked, lousy brakes, and hot exhaust burns if you were not careful when climbing in or out, it was a fun car, except when I was once just managing to pass a lorry of cows when one of them relieved herself and soaked me.

Then came a wedding where I entertained fellow ushers on the way to the reception, when a lamp-post jumped out in front of me. I left the car where it fell. Recovered somehow, it became unstable at speed. Not even Colin Chapman, of Lotus, could find anything wrong. So I sold it to a suited man from the City with fear that he might sue me for something. He did telephone to ask about some aspect of the car. I asked how fast he had managed to take it, to be told that it was something like 35 miles per hour. 

I was painting from nature, often from the banks of rivers. And selling the results rather well. So I thought that a vehicle in which I could transport a fibreglass pram dinghy would be an ideal way to explore and paint river scenes. It might also be good as a camper. So I had a coach builder make a body to fit onto a Volkswagen flat-back. It was a job to handle the dinghy in and out of the van, and river banks often consist of deep mud. It was a failure and had to go.

As a stage designer I was asked to join a man, called van Bunnens, to paint pantomime scenery on ice. It was a cold job but I had retained my wartime flying boots. At least my feet were warm. The pay was good and I had spare time to buy a clapped-out builder's Ford 8 flat-back, and create a streamlined body with ply and canvas roof. In mind was a camping grand tour of Europe. As this proposed journey was in the summer, and hot, I fixed two air scoops on to the roof - the kind of ventilators on old-fashioned ships to cool the boiler room. When wet, the scoops would be turned to point backward and two corks sealed them off. I added a mighty air-blasting horn (the kind used in intercontinental lorries), a compass and an aircraft altimeter that told of the car's altitude and also acted as the weather forecasting barometer. The seat of canvas-covered foam rubber was canted up in the front, and the back rest leant backward. It was made to measure (for me) and extremely comfortable. For liquid effluent a funnel lead to a tube that lead to the road beneath.

Toward the end of the grant tour, the engine was reluctant to start in the mornings. So it was necessary to park for the night on steep downward slopes for a rolling start each day - which also meant me sleeping at the same angle as the car.

Although the space in the wheel arches that I gave for the wheels to rise over bumps in England were quite adequate, for the dreadful roads in Europe at that time (1952) they were not. So, often the smell of scoured rubber would follow the noise of tyres hitting the wooden wheel arches. Yet, after three months and three days, with 5,227 miles of driving on the clock, there was no sign of wear on the Michelin tyres. I sold the car to a titled Scottish laird, and for all I know that car is still frightening the hell out of highland sheep.

The Citroen 2 CV that I next owned I loved for its simplicity and originality. Air-cooling was sensible, centrifugal clutch, clever. The suspension, when the front wheels told the rear ones what to expect, was mightily original, even if it tilted the bodywork when negotiating a corner. And if one changed the two spark plugs each autumn, it started first time in all weathers.

Needing a bit more space for painting kit I moved on to an Ami 8. This was simply a 2 CV with a station wagon body. Rust was its only problem.

A Volkswagen Golf Cabriolet came next. And what a lovely car it was - in all weathers. The only snag was driving through pools of water of unknown depth in the road. A good splash allowed water to reach the electronics, when the engine stopped. I gave it to a son who, I believe, crashed it.

Lastly came an automatic Toyota RAV 4. This is still in the family. And after 24 years of life on the road has not missed a beat.

So, from a 1929 MG M Series to the automatic RAV 4, I have experience not only a lot of highs and lows, but the pleasure of seeing an enormous advance in automotive engineering. 

Food and Wine (haphazard, meandering recollections) Part 2

 I used to plan solo trips through France, Spain and Italy to pass through or stay in wine-growing areas, making notes on the growing of vines, their grapes and the results of vinification methods. My notes were to help me eventually establish a vineyard in England.

To eat I would buy a drink at a well-established café and ask the waiter to where he would take his family out for a meal. It was a great way to discover sometimes unmarked establishments that might not have a menu or even cost of dishes displayed. But they would invariably be excellent and modestly priced. 

One meal started with a dozen oysters, another with cauliflower, garlic and toasted breadcrumbs. Yet another set out with some raw baby artichokes, which I had no idea about how to tackle. I still wouldn't. And so on.

I now find the ordinary wines of Bordeaux to be disappointing. It is extraordinary how the same area can produce among the finest wines in the world (at a price) and also some of the dullest. But I was there in happier times and took up residence in Bas Médoc (now just Médoc). My room was a hut at the edge of woodland, and when asking where I might find 'le toilette', was directed in the general direction of the trees. The establishment actually did have such a facility, but it was, shall we say, nasty.

Food of a good simple kind was available, but only if either the mother or daughter of the establishment were not occupied with more carnal skills. The house red wine (practically no white was made in the region at this time) was delicious. It came from the co-operative in Prignac. I went to investigate to find a winery thick with fruit flies. But I ordered a hogshead to be shipped to London, where we bottled it and drank a red that coloured the mouth and tongue a bright purple colour. It was delicious. To import a hogshead of wine from France in those days was comparatively easy, but not a bone. Having enjoyed a wonderful rib of beef in a railway station café I asked if I could take the bone back to England for a dog. NON. The law about taking food away from restaurants forbade it. But by underhand means I did get the bone back, much to the dog's delight.

It was much later, when I had established two experimental vineyards and gathered enough information of growing grapes and choosing and importing wine that I started to write on the subject for newspapers and magazines. In so doing and sending my printed words to the people who mattered, I was asked to join an elite band of writers on wine.

I was now invited to travel and eat and drink wine in opulence. But whereas my fellows were interested in the upper layers of the market, I was concentrating on the lower end. So with the grand offerings I asked to taste the local 'ordinaires' - sometimes lowering the tone, I fear. My wines were of interest to the supermarket buyers, and it was for them and their supermarket consumers that I was writing. This was a great learning curve for myself and for those who read my columns. Actually, the high life did have its drawbacks. Nouvelle cuisine was in vogue. After a meal, when we might have been offered such as a prawn in a sea of blackcurrant juice with a few sage leaves floating around in it, it seemed obligatory to shake the chef's clammy hand as he walked around the table to be congratulated.

It was seeing grapes entering a winery in Cahors that were covered with blue copper spray that determined me to find grape varieties that needed no spray at all. I managed this before giving up wine-writing, also at a time when others realised that their readers did not all drink fine wine.

But not all venues for us privileged writers were grand. In Pisa we were taken to a sort of souvenir shop near to the leaning tower that had a small restaurant at the rear. That was when the only wine on offer was local, which was delicious and just the kind I like.

When on my own in Italy and determined to reach Certaldo where Boccaccio sheltered from the plague and wrote the Decameron, I not only found the lovely villa on a hilltop, but saw that in almost every doorway sat old ladies weaving rushes around Chianti fiascos. I bought two large ones for washing water. By soaking the rushes in water the contents of the bottles cooled down by the latent heat of evaporation.

Later, in Sienna, I was given most wonderful red wine made by the patron's family of the café were I was eating. So I returned to my camping kind of car - a vehicle that I designed for the voyage - emptied the fiascos of their water and had it replaced with the café's red wine.

With the old car breaking down every so often in Spain and Italy it was a lovely experience to meet helpers and kind people with natural mechanical skills. 

That was the way it was.

My writing on wine needed no expert knowledge, unlike my fellow wine writers. But over the years I had kept my eyes open with a view to one day establishing a vineyard. I had tasted many a wine and imported quite a lot in cask from France and Spain to bottle at home, study and drink. I possessed an acute sense of smell - for wine and even people. And I had written several books on the subject and countless articles with the theme of "wine is natural and healthy, Let's learn together".

Of course wine and food can be treated in a most exulted manner by anyone. But really wine is just a very nice drink with food and food with wine - especially in Italy when one seems to be made to go with the other. Any wine you like will surely go with any food you like. Balance is necessary. Your body accepts it and will be tolerant, as mine has been for 95 years. 

Food and Wine (haphazard, meandering recollection in two parts)

 Part 1

Cooking for wife and children to fit in with the other facets of my life, has dictated that my dishes are of a simple kind - "throw in this or that" and, if the results do not always look like magazine photographs, the taste would be fine. So the French style of simple café and peasant cooking (small, plain, separate and unadorned) has been my theme at home and in both of my cookbooks.

This was exemplified when, looking after a recuperating friend of a friend, he announced at a meal: "This is peasant cooking." He was right.

As a child in the country, cooking was done for me. When even during those times of depression we were able to breed, harvest and preserve much of what we ate. Our chicken farm provided birds and eggs, and I was allowed to shoot or snare rabbits and decoy pigeons. Food was nourishing and plain with neither of my parents taking much of an interest in it. Wine was sparingly drunk by my parents. My father drank  "Tolly" beer, and we children were surprisingly allowed to drink cider - which must have given me a lifelong interest in alcoholic drinks.

I knew how to paunch, skin and cut up a rabbit and was astounded when my very grand grandmother, who came to stay, rolled up her city sleeves and did the same. I had the feeling then that handling meat might be in my genes. We never did find out about her Irish origins, wondering if she might, among other things, have been a butcher's daughter.

I was not inspired by school food, except for sausages. So, when I was living on my own during school holidays, I mainly ate fried food (eggs especially) cooked in butter over a gas ring. Oil was never used.

Food in America (where I learned to fly in the war) seemed wonderful and plentiful after UK rationing, but it palled after a while, through its blandness. I think that much of it came out of tins opened in the airfield's kitchen.

Back in peacetime England we were allowed out of the country with £20. And it was with that modest amount of money for hotel room and food that I could escape rationing and come to know and really enjoy the simple, if repetitive menus of French cafés.

A salade tomates was always a delicious way to start a meal. Then came steak (tough skirt as a rule), pommes frites, pork chop, tête de veau, boudin noir (always cooked in a tomato and onion sauce), fish, simply served, casseroles and a limited but excellent choice of main dishes. Vegetables and plain lettuce salads were always serves separately, which to me make sense. Plain salad with cheese, eaten with knife and fork, and Roquefort beurre, when one minced the two together on the plate to eat with bread, I offer to this day. And Mont Blanc (chestnut purée topped with sour cream) made a fitting end to many a meal. The house red was the only one ordered. This was either the cheapest plonk or a wine with which the patron was well acquainted with and proud of.

Eating out was special, but most food was consumed either in the room or in the Jardin des Plantes nearby. It was baguette bread, saucisson sec and red wine.

The hotel that I favoured in which to stay, usually with a current girl friend, was situated opposite a school. Carved into its wall in large capitals was: LIBERTE, EGALITE, FRATERNITE, DEFENCE D'URINER. 

The hotel, although without restaurant, did have a connection with food. A man kept his mistress there, and each Friday on his returning home he would stop off for his liaison. His mistress, beforehand, would well fry an egg and pin it to her blouse. He would appear, take a levered fountain pen from his pocket,  aim it at the egg and squirt the ink at it.  The pen would be returned to his pocket and he departed. 

Acting

 I could never be an actor, firstly because I would be unable to remember my lines, and secondly because I could not spend my life being other people. And yet, I have been a "professional" actor twice.

The first time was having been at Art School, the Old Vic School, and painted scenery at The Royal Opera House, I took my first job as set designer at High Wycombe Repertory Theater. Being weekly rep, I would have to read a play three weeks in advance, draw up a ground plan and model of the set for the producer, select and paint flats, and later, as prop master, before each Monday's "curtain up", assemble and decorate the scene(s) with rented or borrowed artefacts. As you may imagine, for one person to do all this was quite a job.

For a particular play the company was short of an actor. So I volunteered, and even had my name in the programme. I was "second ambulance man". If not exactly Oscar material, at least I didn't drop my end of the stretcher.

The second time I was an actor was on much grander scale in a Peter Greenaway film.

As I was at that time writing a weekly wine column for a newspaper, and knowing that the scene I was to be involved in was eating and drinking, I thought it might be of interest to my readers to know what film stars actually drank on set.

All that was required of me was to dress in a dinner jacket and appear at a certain location, there to be transported with other extras to studios in North London. No payment was to be offered.

For the part I was to play, the requirement was to sit at a dinner table with a few others and pretend (act) to eat, drink and talk. As we did so, the famous principal actors argued over their meal and came to blows with one piercing the other's cheeks with a knife, or perhaps it was a fork.

The food I was supposed to be eating was a single freshwater crayfish, looking rather small on my plate and which smelled pretty horrible when we started filming. It gave off the most dread smell by the end of the day's "takes".

Filming over, and five minutes of actual film accomplished, I discovered that the liquid offered as wine to the famous actors was apple juice for white and Ribena for red - which was not much inside information for my readers.

Then we were all given fish and chips in paper bags and thanked for our contribution. We would be invited to a preview of the film. Was stardom beckoning? 

When the film was screened some months later, I think I saw the back of my head  - well, I'm not sure it was my head. 

And I can still smell that rotting crayfish.

Acting is not for me.

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These Times (a very limited, fragmented, personal and idiosyncratic view)

 I often wonder what defines the period in which we live.

Obviously, as I write, the Covid-19 virus that almost instantaneously surfaced around the globe defines this particular period of time. The virus lasts, and probably mutates because no one knows much about it or how to combat it. Even if inoculation and vaccination work, it has a head start on us. It manifests itself even in the bodies of people who hope that by keeping distances apart, washing hands and wearing masks will be of help in avoiding it. At least these prophylactic measures are things we can all actually do.

With the virus has come the demise in the use of paper currency and coinage, and with it the reliance on internet banking with all its pitfalls - like scamming theft. 

At this time, computers and mobile telephones have become even more important in business and at home. We no longer wonder why people seem to be talking to themselves in the street, or suddenly stopping mid-pavement to concentrate on a telephone conversation.

With this reliance on the computer comes awareness that we are in the hands of powerful forces about which or whom we know little, except that in dealing with the internet we play into their greedy hands. Their gadgets cause much unhappiness, time-wasting and frustration. The electronic items seem to fail too often, with the users needing assistance, consuming yet more time. And when at home or office there are all those connecting wires to sort out and deal with. 

More and more the "takeaway" takes over from proper home cooking. Pizza reigns. At least there are few  short cuts when consuming alcoholic drinks, some of which contain elements that are clearly beneficial to health.

The art world continues to be run by the power of the salesroom, gallery owners, promoters, critics, and often gullible customers. Thus, some second rate artists are boosted far beyond their real worth.  But the buyer is wise - until coming to sell the objects bought. Sculptors shine, certainly in the form of work by Gormley and Kapoor. But large does not alway mean good.

Architecture prospers more in countries that are willing to take a chance in the lust for progress. Except in London for Renzo's Chard, it must be committees of old codgers that turned down the building of Libeskind's V & A extension yet allowed the monstrous National Gallery extension to go ahead. For imaginative architecture one must look abroad. I still like the I.M. Pei Bank of China Tower building in Hong Kong for its simplicity and power.

It is fashionable at this present time for young men to sport beards. They may think that they look more distinctive with one, but they are beginning to all look  rather alike.

As for women's fashion, originality is essential in their world, but most women only keep an eye on high fashion, buying clothes, with a nod to fashion, that suit them personally. Most must be glad that there is not an overwhelming style to almost have to follow - like "the new look" was in its time.

Fossil fuel is becoming a dirty word, with renewable energy sources and non-polluting methods of power and heat much to the forefront. Wind farms and windmills, natural gas, solar panels, pollution-free wood burning stoves, heat pumps and hydrogen are all promoted. Electricity suffers from difficult storage and heavy batteries. I favour hydrogen power from water to make electricity, and using geothermal heat when right below us is an endless source of power if we could only tap it economically. But the two inventions that would surely make the world a better place are: extracting hydrogen from water easily and economically, and creating compact, lightweight, and easily produced storage for quantities of electricity. 

Air, sea and land travel will continue to lure business people and holidaymakers toward foreign lands and customs, despite there being conflicts of one kind or another throughout the world. But plagues, like the present virus one, will make people more aware of the pleasures to be gained from their own countries and be only too pleased to have an excuse for avoiding the palaver of airports, customs, handling luggage, currency, mosquitoes, unpleasant creatures, and diseases that are rife elsewhere. 

When overburdened with the cares that surround us at every turn during this period of civilisation, I believe that it is essential to completely relax once in a while. This means sitting or lying still and eliminating all thoughts from your brain and, at the same time relaxing every muscle in your body. We might call it total relaxation or mindfulness. The Dutch call it 'Niksen'. 

Art and Light in the early 1930s

I have been thinking about art and that any painting worth its salt must be one of imagination on the artist's behalf and on that of the viewer. Also, that the composition of the work, whatever form it might take, in any age, needs the utmost compositional skill on the part of the artist for a successful reward. 

As I spend many hours of composing with drawings before the actual process of painting (now in pastel), I was thinking about how my art had changed over the years, other than from 1960 working from my head rather than my eye. So I thought it might be of interest to look at a watercolour that I did in 1932 when I was seven years old. This work was in the form of a Christmas card. The subject of which as Father Christmas on his sleigh delivering presents at night.

If I gave myself the same task today, there would be striking similarities. 

There was a simple band of white for snow on which a sleigh, laden with parcels, sported the prow of a Viking ship. The sleigh of goodies was drawn through a black night with a full moon by a single reindeer. Santa, holding the reins, sits on a chair. I would have a job to improve on it as a Christmas card. But there was one main and interesting difference between then and now - the lamp on the sleigh. In the painting, this sleigh light does not carry far. It stops rather suddenly in the blackness of the night - why?

Unlike modern battery and generated electricity vehicle lights, that can shine, blink, and illuminate the path ahead, this one does not.

In a time when we made our own gas to light the downstairs of our house (electricity had yet to reach us), and used candles to light our way upstairs to bed, carbide lamps were used for the road.

In a carbide lamp the lower part was the container for dry carbide. Above it was another container for water. And in between was a device to allow drips of water to fall on to the carbide to produce acetylene  gas. This inflammable gas was emitted through a ceramic jet and lit with a match. Behind the flame was a reflector. By present day standards this form of lighting was abysmally poor. But with it we could ride a bicycle at night. And if it was good enough for bicycles then, it was also good enough for Santa's sleigh. 

Duffus

The war had ended. My services as a pilot were no longer of importance and, in the shockingly cold winder of 1947, through lack of heat and food, I had contacted TB. So instead of being demobilised when my service time was up, I was invalided out of the RAF. As a medical student later I was struck down by the same affliction. 

I had little money and no prospects.

I took a room in the less salubrious area near Victoria Station, where, having left it for two council rooms, fellow pilots came to see me, only to be told: "he's gone". They presumed that I had died of TB (there was no cure at that time). Miraculously for them (and I suppose for me, too), I re-appeared alive years later on television, doing a Gardener's World programme for the BBC.

I obtained the two very small council rooms, possibly because of my poor health or war record. The one (living) room looked out over the railway lines of Victoria station, the window of which was never opened because of smoke from engines parked beneath and the noise of steam jets punctuating the air day and night. I even added to the existing pollution of soot and smog by heating this room, by the only means  available then, from a coal-burning fireplace. But I am a cook, and could happily feed myself and friends for a week or so with several recipes using a cheap pig's head. The rooms became known as my "Murky Chambers". Fortunately, my grandfather, who had been knighted, left a wife who was not averse to flaunting her title. Through her, I suppose, my name was added to a social register - or something of that order.

Rich parents, with often plain daughters, were keen to give parties and balls for their coming-out, debutante offspring. For these occasions there was a need for young men of "breeding" to be part of the scene.

Johnny Coates (later of Yellow Submarine fame), being a relation of Lord Rank, was also on the same register. We became "party" friends. Many an invitation came our way. All we needed was a dinner jacket.

Because of my menial abode I was quite unable to return this welcome hospitality. I could offer cheap Algerian red wine aplenty, but a pig's head, though delicious, was hardly adequate fare. And the murky chambers were far too small.

The one invitation that we enjoyed especially, came from the debonair Duffus of Dalclaverhouse.

It so happened that to make these parties more fun, I would sometimes adopt the name of Sir George ffortescue-Williamson, Could Duffus, with his splendid name, be doing the same?

Duffus lived in Knightsbridge where he presided over his generous hospitality.  We liked him. Later I learned that he was deeply in debt, borrowing on the strength of his name and the prospect of a great inheritance that never materialised. Which was a shame. And he really did own his grand, Scottish name - unlike my own: Sir George....

So I thank Duffus very much. And if he still lives (most of that generation "have gone") I wish him well.

Public Speaking

 I have managed in a long life to avoid speaking in public - except twice.

The first time was for the editor of a newspaper where I had a weekly column. He asked me to give a talk to his club. I think it was called The Lions. I did my best to decline, but we were friends and the continuation of my column was important to me. So I agreed.

For my talk I wore a country-designed jacket that incorporated several ordinary pockets and two large poacher's pockets. 

I was expected to talk about wine, which was the subject of my column. So I started off with a bit about the nonsense of wine language by critics and the blurb on bottles, and that wine you like will almost certainly go with the food you like. This debunking approach to the subject was expected of me. 

Then I manoeuvred my talk around to food, singing the praises of a classic tomato salad, an ideal dish with which to start almost any meal. "You may," I continued, "like to know how to make it the way they do in France."

From one of my poacher's pockets I produced a large plate. Then from another pocket a thin bladed and very sharp knife, and from the third, a large tomato. These I placed on a tall stool that I had arranged to stand next to me.

I halved, cut away the firm centre, and then thinly sliced the tomato. There was a slightly astonished look on the faces of my audience.

Next from the pockets came two small pots of pepper and salt, then a bottle of home-produced vinegar, and one of olive oil. With these I dressed the tomato slices (being generous with the oil and frugal with the vinegar).

From yet another hiding place I produced a small onion and chopped some of it finely before scattering some of the small pieces over the tomato slices. 

Lastly out came a bunch of parsley and scissors with which to cut a sprinkling of the herb over the lot. 

That was the end of my "speech". There was laughter and much applause.

Then I produced every fork that I owned so that my audience could sample the result of my talk.

The second speech was in quite a different setting, and very much grander.

There were so many of my paintings in an exhibition at Guildhall Art Gallery, where other contributors were given single offerings, that I was asked to give a speech and formally open the exhibition in front of friends, critics and the public.

The show was a commemorative one concerning Tower Bridge. And as I had lived in dockland, painted and written books on it, I had many a tale to tell. But not liking the idea of a major speech, I practised and practised it for weeks beforehand. I even dreamed of it. I could think of almost nothing else. But I was committed and had to go through with it. Could I remember my 15 minute oration? 

Before my speech was due I was preceded by a Guildhall official who was very much an accomplished speaker.

My turn came. I was introduced on to the stage. I was off.

My tales were obviously popular and were greeted with laughter. Then I forgot my story plan and stopped talking, soon to take up again and reach the end, when I cut the tape and pronounced the exhibition OPEN. There was much applause. One listener thought that my mid-speech stumble was done on purpose for effect.

I hope never again to go through such an ordeal, but should I have to - at a wedding for instance - I have a story planned. It will be directed at the groom to illustrate that as much as we men love women, some take a little understanding at times. 

The Life of Trees

 In the garden of a house that I bought near Andover, in Hampshire, there were two larch tree saplings growing wild in an unsuitable place in the garden. So I moved them to an out-of-the-way spot where they could grow, in freedom without overcrowding or casting unwanted shadows. Though small, they were staked firmly and planted fairly close to each other.

When they had grown into real trees, one bore beautiful little blue flowers on its branches, the other none. So, presumably, they were female and male. 

When I last saw them from the nearby lane, they looked very grand, very tall, and very fine. I felt the pleasure of having become a successful larch tree matchmaker.

A friend of some years ago was dying of cancer. Before she died she turned strongly religious. She died.

Before that she gave us a small cutting of a bay tree. This was planted in a suitable pot and allowed to form a five foot high bare trunk with its fragrant leaves on top. 

Because she was so keen on God, we named her "Elizabeth's Tree" and formed the top into a cone shape, like an arrow pointing to heaven, where she presumably went.

Perhaps because of its position it thrived initially but went into decline. So I moved it, still in its original pot to another place in our small London garden. In doing so I pruned it with excessive vigour into a proposed ball-shape. This it loved and has now become a thick ball of aromatic leaves atop its bare trunk. It is a fine tree that enhances our garden in its new position.

I don't know if there is any religious significance in all this - me being an atheist and all. 

Waiting and Luck in the war

 In parallel with modern-day waiting, like for deliveries, taxis, post, queues and such, a lot of my war was  waiting, but on a larger scale, mainly for the nsext posting on my way to becoming a pilot. Tedious it may have been but, in looking back, it was often accompanied by good luck.

On returning from America to join the RAF in 1942 in a convoy when we were attacked by German U-boats, I was accepted into the AF, given a number and told to wait.

Just that I managed to get back to England instated and in one piece was luck. The RAF was much in need of pints at that time, but conditions for learning to fly in England were meteorologically not conducive for novices. So I had to wait for a pilot-training vacancy abroad where the weather was free of clouds.

Not yet in uniform, I took a job as a farm labourer to help, in a very small way, to feed the nation. And in doing this very manual work I came nearest to the enemy in the entire war. Weeding in the middle of a field one day, a German Ju88 twin-engined bomber flew low and so close to my head that I could see the pilot and gunner quite clearly. They were on their mission to bomb the railway station at Reading. That I am able to write this is that the gunner failed to pull the trigger and shoot me dead. That was a real slice of luck during a wait.

My next job was as a prop-swinger at the RAF Theale. Dangerous I am sure it was in starting aeroplane engines by swinging the propeller and falling back at the same time. But through good luck I not only survived but also had the luck to obtain flying experience in the second pilot's cockpit when it was available.

Wait over, I was at last in uniform and flying my first solo flight at RAF Shellingford, which consisted of no more than a farmer's grass field.  No luck was needed there as I now had some experience in the air.

The next wait was, I suppose, the most dangerous.

To give trainee pilots a taste of real combative action was to farm us out to operational RAF stations to experience the real thing. My first and most interesting posting was to RAF  Davidstowe Moor in Cornwall to fly in the second pilot's seat in twin-engined Warwick aircraft. Each sortie was to fly out over the Bay of Biscay to find and then drop a lifeboat to save downed aircrew. Whereas pilot, gunners and all were looking down at the sea, my job was to keep an eye out for German, four-engined Condors for which we were no match. I did see one before they saw us. We were slow and poorly armed by comparison, but escaped unhurt. That was a real stroke of luck.

After another wait, I was posted to RAF Skellingthorpe, in Lincolnshire. This was one of the airfields from which Lancaster bombers left to bomb Germany at night. I took the place of a rear gunner in an engine-testing flight up to Scotland and back. Except for the remote chance that a German raider could intercept us, it was a case of not needing much luck, but luck it was.

Another posting was to RAF Hornchurch and another wait, where I volunteered to mend slate roofs in   Plumstead that had been broken in German bombing raids. 

One of the first V2 rocket-propelled bombs to land in England fell within earshot. It was luck that I was a good distance away, just as I had been from Buzzbombs falling in central London when I was on leave.

At last the Hornchurch wait was over and I was off to America to become a pilot in Oklahoma. 

This was my third wartime crossing of the Atlantic by ship in a sea thick with Nazi U-boats. Not to have been torpedoed was real luck.

I write this just after the 75th anniversary of VE Day, the television pictures of which I found very interesting and joyful. Referring to my logbook I see that on that particular day in America we were given a day off, flying in formation the day before and in the Link Trainer the day after.

Pilots were no longer needed in Europe, but for the Americans the Pacific war was very much in progress. Fortunately there were enough of our skilled pilots to fly in the fight against Japan, so novice pilots like me were redundant. Luck again.

I returned to England by sea and became a Photographic Intelligent Officer until my turn came to be demobilised. My task held no risk as it was a desk and stereoscope job concerned with why the Germans had taken so many aerial photographs of oil installations in the area close to the north of the Caspian Sea. During this wait period I qualified to become a medical student but on release from the RAF it was found that I had TB of the lung (then incurable). So my luck rather ran out then.

I never liked having to wait so much in wartime.  But I did like the good luck that seemed to coincide with it.

And I have always thought that had I been born a year earlier I would almost certainly have been killed in flying operations over Germany, such was the mortality rate of aircrew. So perhaps all this waiting did, in fact, help to save my life. 

That's luck alright.

Crossing the Atlantic by Ship in War time

 I crossed the Atlantic Ocean four times during World War 2. Well, the last time was when the European war was over but the Pacific war raged, thus making the fourth Atlantic crossing a safe one.

In 1940, when I was 15 years old and at school, my mother heard of an American family who wanted to give safe shelter to an English refugee. Fearing a Nazi invasion and what went with it, she thought that one of our family should survive and asked me if I wanted to go. I did - and went.

THE FIRST CROSSING (10 days)

On the 24th of July 1940 I took a train alone from London to Liverpool, there to board a liner, The Duchess of Richmond, bound for Canada. We sailed right away.

I shared a cabin with three others, mentioning in my brief notes that there was a very pretty girl next door, that we were all seasick, Camel cigarettes were 7 1/2 for 20, and we passed two envoys at sea. After four hours navigating the scenic St Laurence River we docked in Montreal on the 4th of August 1940, where I was met by kind Mr and Mrs Killorin, who were to care for me in the USA.

So my first crossing of the Atlantic had been uneventful. Although German U-boats prowled the ocean, word had it that the speed of our ship offered safety. Anyhow, a Canadian destroyer kept us company as we neared Canada.

I noted briefly that it seemed funny not to be carrying a gas mask, no air raid shelters were to be seen, and that no one bothered with blackouts. Somaliland had fallen to the Italians. I was far from any conflict, in a peaceful environment and, surprisingly, in a very foreign land.

I met much friendship by those in the New World. Sent to Taft School, peopled by rich American boys, I did not fit in at all. Penniless, I sold magazine subscriptions in my spare time to have enough cash for ice cream and fizzy drinks.  An occasional censored letter arriving from England was my only contact with home.  Not being a smart American, I was sent to a trade school, where I learned how to draw teeth for cog-wheels.

Fortunately I got to know another misfit who played the clarinet and sculpted in wood. He lived nearby above his family's garage. His rather Bohemian life appealed to me. I treasured a friendship that may well have had a bearing on my future life.

At last I was old enough to return to England to join the RAF with a view to becoming a pilot. 

SECOND CROSSING (28 days)

I joined a three-island, Swedish passenger cargo ship, the Axel Johnson, in New York on the14th of June 1942. We sailed north up the East Coast of new England toward Nova Scotia, in Canada. The engine failed off Cape Cod, but we got going again, arriving in Halifax to have a new crankshaft fitted. We then formed up with around 40 other ships on the 29th of June to become part of a motley convoy to cross the Atlantic. Guarded by a Canadian destroyer, we set forth at the speed of the slowest ship (probably one of the old coal-burning vessels).

Having been fairly safe off the American coast, we were now about to venture through seas inhabited by active wolf packs of German submarines. The destroyer returned to Canada. We were unprotected, more so when we broke down yet again and the convoy pushed on over the horizon. But we got going and caught up with the rest. However, our position was now at the outside of the convoy, and thus vulnerable.

I returned for bed on the evening of the 6th of July. On turning up for breakfast on the 7th, there was much commotion. During the night we were attacked by submarines. The passengers and crew boarded the lifeboats and there were many explosions. I had slept through the lot. Many ships with supplies for the UK were no longer with us, presumably sunk with, I'm sure, terrible loss of life.

An English destroyer saw us into Liverpool docks on the 12th of July 1942. I noted in my diary that two years away was "a mighty long time". I was home and about to sign up for action.

THE THIRD CROSSING (9 days)

I was now in the RAF as the lowest form of human life and destined to complete my flying training back in the USA, this time in Oklahoma in the mid-west.

I sailed from Liverpool on the 30th of December 1944 in the New Mauritania as the airman in charge of  the fruit store. It was a cold job, but with plenty of fruit to eat after having experienced strict rationing in England. Again, our speed saved us from falling victim to U-boats, but had there been disaster, my chances of getting out of that fruit store would have been much like getting out of a safe. But all was well. We arrived in Moncton, New Brunswick, on the 7th of January 1945.

In America I was awarded my wings and, fortunately, not asked to join the war in the Pacific. There were many more experienced pilots to do that.

FOURTH CROSSING (6 days)

Now, as a pilot and officer, it was wonderful to be on a great ship. The Queen Elizabeth.  She had been turned into a grey troopship, adorned with no frills whatsoever. Now, with German U-boat captains having surrendered and been sent home, there was a great feeling of satisfaction and relief by all on board. We sailed from New York on the 4th of September 1945 and docked in Southampton on the 10th of September. This last stay in America had, for me, been a very satisfactory milestone in my life, and a fourth Atlantic crossing to savour.  

The last day of my week as cook (Sunday)

 I got up around 6 o'clock, glanced at the studio work in progress, dealt with ablutions and prepared breakfast before walking down the road to buy the paper.

I took breakfast, a dish which might vary from day to day, to Margreet in bed, where we read some of the paper and discuss the forthcoming day. If I haven't a new idea for breakfast, or leftovers to manipulate, we generally have toasted, home-made bread with butter and Marmite.

I go back upstairs to make a mark or two with pastel, then go down to do the washing up from the day before or even longer. This washing up will be of plates, glasses and bowls that will have been soaking in detergent water and thus almost clean already.

I peel potatoes for lunch and boil them for 10 minutes before adding them to the baking tin in which already lies half a free-range chicken coated in yoghurt, garlic and turmeric. The spuds are coated in oil (I use groundnut oil) and pepper and salted to be ready to be cooked in the oven later for lunch.

In the garden I take another look at the sport section of the paper and watch unseen zephyrs of wind moving individual vine leaves, and feel the draught from a bumblebee's wings. We both admire the runner beans - large, no longer for eating, but growing still for next year's seed and, in their dried form, for stews and finger-eating when boiled and coated with garlic and olive oil for "bites" with drinks. 

Margreet had returned the day before with lots of apples from her sister's garden which she peeled before I cut off the "meat". This went into a saucepan to be heated down to pulp with sugar and lemon juice. The pips, cores and skins went into another saucepan to be heated down with brown sugar and sieved to form a coating for the  pies.

Then I made the short crust pastry to line three tins (one pie to eat and two to give away). Into them went the white pulp, and on it was poured the brown, sieved juice. 

Actually I shouldn't have added any baking powder or sodium bicarbonate to the pastry as it rose too much when cooking, which forced up the pulp when hot and absorbed moisture from the pulp when cooling.

I peeled some home-grown shallots, given by Margreet's niece, and added them to the potatoes around the chicken.

It was time for a cold beer in the hot garden.

Oven on. the pies came out after 25 minutes to cool down, and the chicken later in time for Sunday lunch.

After lunch it was snooze time, before watering the plant pots that were suffering in the heat and take the kitchen compost bin down to empty into the large garden bin. To be emptied the following spring, the nicely smelling compost will improve soil quality and provide nourishment to plants.

I tried minimal heat under a frying pan to sear the green part of chard leaves in garlic and olive oil as "bites" for evening aperitifs, but without great success. I'll try again.

In the evening warmth we enjoyed a glass of cold white wine from Eastern Australia and tested an ordinary Rioja. Both were adequate, but not special.

Our supper dish was complicated. It started earlier in my week as a lovely beef stew with tomato juice as its liquid, became a curry, and finally for this evening a stew with stuffed vine leaves added. It was excellent although the vine leaves that I had stuffed a few days before were a little on the chewy side, being made with older, summer leaves. The stuffing was good, using Arborio rice, minced lamb, lemon zest, lemon juice and chopped mint.

We ate some of the apple pie, which was better than I thought it would be.

It was time for bed. I wanted to watch a Formula 1 Grand Prix on television, but racing cars just going around and around send me to sleep. And 95 years olds do need rest.

Tomorrow it will be Margreet's week  to cook. 

Toad-in-the-Hole

Historically, toad-in-the-hole is an ancient British dish. My Dutch wife had never even heard of it and, I imagine the French would turn up their noses at the very thought of toad-in-the-hole (despite relishing frogs' legs) because it is connected with that dreadful reputation of culinary ineptitude in Britain that was once the butt of international jokes. 

Toad-in-the-hole was a favourite of my youth.Now, because of a recently established tradition, it has become the expected main course when a friend is invited to dine with us each year on Christmas Eve.

The snag is that trying many varieties of sausage every year and not being as I really wanted it to be, it is only recently that this hearty dish of sausages in batter has become a total success.

This success is partly due to a piece in one of those coloured newspaper supplements where the cook/author had made a simple dish of it far too elaborately and time-consuming in preparation. But it had a most useful tip concerning the batter.

The search for a successful batter and how to cook it is not the advice once given me by a Yorkshireman, who said that it should be put together just before the dish was to go in the oven. That it should rest beforehand, learned from this article, would seem now to be essential. So make the batter at least an hour or more before cooking the toad. Let's deal with the batter first, based on my own pancake mix. The volumes are enough for two people, with possibly some batter not consumed, which can be heated up and eaten later. 

In a bowl put three and a half dessert spoonfuls of plain flour, a pinch of turmeric (for colour only and not at all essential) and a little salt. Whisk it together. Make a well in the middle and into it break two eggs. Break up the eggs with the whisk and slowly add a quarter of a pint of milk as you whisk it. The batter will be formed. Make sure that you beat out all the lumps. Put this batter aside to rest and, should you pass by it, give it another whisk for good measure.

Now for the sausages. Before it became fashionable for sausages to be filled mostly with meat and be rather solid, the old British banger was harder to find, blander, and made of finely minced pork, plenty of fat (lard) a few spices and a lot of rusk. I buy a packet of Richmond 12 Thick Pork Sausages. These complement the batter as the batter complements the sausages.

Now you will need a baking tin in which to put plenty of oil (I use groundnut) and, if wanted and available, some lard (make sure that the sides of the tin are coated as well). Add and arrange the sausages (two a person) on the oil. To cook the dish you will need to remember only two numbers 

- 20 and 200. 

That's it. That's all. 

Re-Cycling

We tend to think that re-cycling is suddenly of importance. In fact it was far more prevalent when I was younger.

In the late 1920s to early 1930s in the country, our bottles were always returned to the wine merchant who had delivered them beforehand. They were re-cycled.

After the war (WW2) I bought my wine from Berry's, Robert James, The Army and Navy Stores, but mostly from Lyons. These merchants chose their wines carefully, importing them in cask, as most did, and bottled them in the UK.  For example. Take J.Lyons (of Lyons Corner House fame) who had premises in The Hop Exchange, Southwark, London. They, like others, bottled from cask, corked, labelled and capsuled at this London headquarters. They had the knack, or expertise, of choosing extremely well. Their Chateau Cantanac Brown 1959 was the best red wine that I ever tasted, and, accordingly bought and stored as much as I could afford.

Those who dealt with these splendid people at The Hop Exchange, always returned the empty bottles. They had the labels soaked off and were washed in a great circular machine that made a lot of metallic, glass and water noises. The labels, usually supplied by the makers of the wine, were stuck on to the bottles by the hand of a lady who used cold water paste as glue (most did as bottles were used again, and the label thus came off easily). Capsules (tin/lead - this soft material prevented the bottle inadvertently chipping the rim of a glass), to cover the cork were, again, added by hand, before the bottles were stacked in readiness for sale.

The bottles were English heavyweight, with the diameter beneath the neck being greater than that near the punt. These had the disadvantage of having to be stacked one layer above another with a slip of wood beneath the lesser diameter end. This was to stop them from sliding forward and crashing to the floor. The cold water paste used for the labels enabled the wine's origins to be altered easily by just cooking them off in a bath of water. Then the bottles could be re-labelled (there were no rules then), as when plain Hock could lose its modest provenance and have the royal insignia label substituted for its grander consumption at the Palace. Hotels and restaurants did not have time for staff to select and re-cycle their empty bottles, so left them outside to be collected by an East End organisation, who sold the acceptable ones back to wine merchants and smashed the rest. They did quite well, as the bottles were free to them and they made good money by re-cycling those in demand.

I know this as I had imported a hogshead of Rioja from Bilbainas, in Spain, and needed 350 bottles. The re-cycling merchants wanted too much money for them. So I did what they did, and around 4 in the morning cruised the restaurants and hotels to select the bottles I wanted.

I was very lucky to have lived through the 1950s and 1960s before the wine departments at supermarkets really got going. It was a time when drinking the occasional bottle of really good Bordeaux from the most famous vineyards was within one's means, and minor chateaux claret was one's every day wine.

Then in came bulk wine, disposable lightweight bottles, supermarket abundance, and bottling abroad. 

As wine selling is now a major business, so the re-cycling of bottles for it no longer applies. Bottles are now just glass, possibly to be re-cycled but more probably buried as landfill.

But at least I did re-cycle wine bottles when it made sense and it really mattered. And there was something really nice about handling an English heavyweight bottle and knowing that something delicious was lying inside. 

Dealing in Shares

 I am innumerate - so much so that almost anything involving a number goes into one ear, gets mangled and scrambled somewhere in my brain, and does not reappear in an intelligent form.

We all have our strengths and weaknesses, numbers happening to be one of my major failings. But I am lucky by nature. 

Years ago an uncle started a factory that made hurricane lamps. I was told that he could flood the world’s markets with two weeks production.

The company had shares, and I must have been given or bequeathed some of them. I certainly never bought any. Once or twice we did get a modest dividend. So I viewed the shares as pretty well worthless and rather forgot about them.

I am told that private companies are run mainly for the good of the owners, so I never expected much from my holdings.

However, the present owner wanted to have all the shares held within his immediate family, and bought me out. With no skill whatsoever, I did well.

Robert Adeane, (later “Sir”) was a collector and patron of art and, I believe, Director of the Tate Gallery. He may have had a vote when the Tate bought one of my early dock landscapes for the Ministry of Works (now The National Collection) from the Leicester Gallery. He became a friend in Art School days, and when I told him that I was selling my ex-bombed-out house and going around the world to draw, he advised that I invest the money in certain shares, which I did. On my return a year later the shares had at least doubled in value. So I was able to build a studio house in the country. That very successful share dealing had nothing to do with MySky  skill in financial matters.

I had at least an hour or two to wait in a queue at Lord’s Cricket Ground to see a day’s play of a Test Match. Beside me was a man with whom I got on very well. As we were about to enter the ground, he said, in a loud voice: “I like the cut of your jib. Why don’t you buy some shares in my company?”

Something told me that the important part of dealing in shares was knowing when to sell. So I asked him and he told me.

A few years later when the target price had been reached, we sold and spent the money on a holiday in Sicily. We sent words of thanks to him from the magnificent open-air Greek theatre that overlooks the belching Etna volcano.

So, for someone with no ability whatsoever in dealing with numbers, I have, in a small way, done rather well with my share dealings - an occupation that I believe is best left to professionals.

Blue Paint

Our front door in London is coated with Oxford Blue paint. It is good paint, and one to be used with great care because it is so penetratingly blue, and thus hard to be rid of if falling unwanted on any surface. For that reason I handle it in surgical rubber gloves and with apprehension.

With it I aim to obtain that lovely crusty surface that adorns the streetside woodwork of Berry Brothers and Rudd, those venerable wine merchants in St James' Street, London, where the paint and overpaint may have been applied since the 18th century.

On a summer's day, when watching cricket, I sat next to a house painter who gave me the great tip of how to prevent a dried surface from forming on the top of the contents of a tin of opened paint by simply storing the closed tin upside down. This has stood me in good stead, that was, until the following episode.

After I last painted my front door, I stored the blue paint, for some unknown reason, not right side up and next to my household tools as usual, but with other paints in the loft that were all stored upside down. 

It was springtime, and possibly after our 2019 red wine harvest had passed its malolactic fermentation

in our loft, we decided to bottle the modest vintage. After using a ladder to recover the demijohns behind the pots of paint, I found that the lid of the blue tin had not been closed adequately and that some of its contents had not only leaked out but almost glued the lid to the boards beneath. So, when moving the pot, the lid stayed behind where it had become stuck, allowing what paint remained in the tin to flow out and all around the place. I had to think quickly. 

Perched on the ladder it would have been almost impossible to tackle the disaster on my own. So Margreet brought me some surgical rubber gloves, a basket lined with a refuse bag liner and countless balls of crumpled newspaper. So the mopping up was under way. Tins were wiped and moved, a bag of painting kit put on newspaper to dry, and the paint mopped up.

Bottling the wine had to be abandoned until a later date when the spilled blue paint would be dry.

And we managed it all with only a dab of paint spilled on my wrist and another on Margreet's hand - both of which were dealt with using white spirit.

It was quite a colourful saga I can tell you. 

What do you want to do ?

New mail

Food from two cultures

I count myself lucky to have a Dutch wife. And as we take alternate weeks to cook, another culture's cuisine dominates our menu ideas every seven days.
Margreet's approach stems not from personal experience, as her past in the Dutch Foreign Service deemed that others did the cooking for her. So dishes are as she remembered them from childhood, when shortages were part of post-war Dutch life - difficult times, but very Dutch food.
However, like birds making the same kind of nest as their parents, and with no instructions, so types of national cooking would seem to be inbred.
My first experience of eating her kind of food was as a supernumerary on Dutch coasters. And very basic it was. The cook, sober or not, kept a sort of missionary's cauldron full of meat chunks in liquid ("jus"). This was served up in quantity with boiled potatoes combined with the liquor in which the meat was cooked. Sometimes another vegetable came as well. But whatever was served, it was covered in grated nutmeg. That was about it, and not very satisfactory if the sea was rough.
When briefly ashore in Holland, the crew and I savoured those specialities that can make eating there a wonderful experience. This trio of delights were - and are - raw herring (when in season), smoked eel, best in skin and both eaten in the fingers, and pancakes (bacon ones being my favourite).
Generally, though, plates of food are piled high, often mixed, as once in a restaurant when all three courses were served at one time and on one plate.
Quantity is the Dutch theme - I suppose to fill their large selves and keep out the cold and the rain.
So Margreet, probably without really knowing it, piles the food high, often in such quantity (and mixture) that leaves plenty over to chop up and add to our ever-changing and excellent soup.
My own upbringing in England was one where I took little notice of food. At home we had a blackened anthracite-fired range that supplied hot water and cooking facility for the house day and night. On it, Constance, our maid, turned out staid and solid English fare of roasts, pies, overcooked vegetables, suet puddings, dumplings and cakes - the latter made with many eggs as my father had a chicken farm. We children could have what we liked for our birthdays and always chose roast chicken. In those days chickens were all free-range, ours roaming around our fields. Our choice was sensible English. We did not know much about fancy foods anyhow.
RAF food in the war was substantial and plain, changing abruptly in the great post-war freeze-up of 1947 when anything to eat was scarce, so much so that I contracted TB, probably through lack of it.
But revelations in the enjoyment of food were just around the piecetime corner when we were allowed out of our severely rationed country to reach France and eat as though the war had never happened. Café fare was served separately in small quantities, varied, unadorned, delicious and simple - the style of which I have tried to adhere to ever since.
So, roughly speaking, for now it is hearty and filling one week and light and simple the next.
This could hardly be bettered. Vive la difference!

Brushes with Farming

I was the son of a sport-loving farmer. I inherited his love of sport, but was farming in my blood?

After agricultural college my father went to Egypt (then a British Protectorate) to, I believe but not know, to teach how to irrigate the desert with Nile water.

The evidence he left indicated that he spoke and wrote Arabic.

When the 1914-1918 war was about to break out, he returned to England, joined his territorial regiment, became an officer on Salisbury Plain and was sent to India. From there he fought in the very nasty Mesopotamia Campaign, was badly wounded, and returned to England to recover.

He started a chicken farm.

I was born in 1925 and spent, I suppose, an ideal childhood of countrypersuits on that farm.

The great depression descended upon us. Cheap eggs from Poland destroyed the chicken and eggs business. So he abandoned chickens for mushrooms - without success. He was unaware of successful business practice, so times were hard for us. He died through being given the cure-all of the time - radium.

The 1939-1945 war came. I went to America and returned when old enough to join the RAF as a potential pilot. Having been enrolled I had to wait for flying training. So, with the views I could help with food production in that time of rationing and that I wanted experience in farming, I took a job as a farm labourer. The constant worries of weather, dealing with cart-horses, rather primitive machinery, cattle and all the rest, convinced me that a post-war future in farming was not enticing.

I obtained a job as a prop-swinger and gained enough piloting experience to know that I would make a good pilot and a poor farmer.

The war over and, seeing the kind of person applying for permanency in the RAF and some of the bloodiness of returning aircrew from raids over Germany, I chose medicine. But two bouts of TB put an end to that.

Living now in the country, I was befriended by a farmer well known for his skill in making a fortune from hard-nosed farming combined with journalism. We would meet almost weekly to drink red wine and swap ideas. Through his auspices I wrote for a national newspaper and conducted a Gardeners' World programme on my garden and vineyard for the BBC.

The thought of farming never entered my head again, despite watching television programmes of lovely people with lovely farms and friendly animals making a farming life seem so pleasant.

I had not found it to be such, and glad that I never chose it as a career.

Life in a Day (Part two, pm)

My afternoon job (pleasure) is to prepare food for our evening meal. It was interrupted today as I take, as a blood thinner, Warfarin (used also to kill rats - or did). A doctor at my health centre tried to wean me off it and on to a substitute called something like Rivaroxaban. This sent me to two stays in hospital because of constant and unpleasant bleeding. As soon as this new thinner was stopped - so did the bleeding. I have now returned to old-fashioned Warfarin, which unfortunately needs a blood assessment every few weeks. So the doorbell rang and my doctor, standing outside on the pavement, changed into a sort of medical space suit. She then came in doors just to jab my finger and take a little blood sample. She then put the finger-pricking device into our kitchen rubbish bin and returned to the pavement to disrobe and put her protective outer clothing into a plastic bag for disposal. I am no expert, but feel that the operation could have been conducted on the windowsill outside with less cost, trouble and risk of virus infection. But rules are rules, I supposed. And they must be adhered to.
I like to cook beans, and in these times of difficulties they seem to me to be a most important source of nourishment. From my supply of dried red kidney beans a quantity is soaked overnight in water and pressure cooked for 35 minutes. They are then used in such as soups, stews and chilli-con-carne. I make the chilli-con-carne powder by mixing in a bowl the following: 3 measures of powdered cumin, 1 measure of chilli powder, 3 measures of dried oregano, 4 measures of paprika, 1 measure of garlic powder, and 1 measure of salt.
First courses are often made of lettuce, garnished with sardines, tuna, or brined anchovies - for  visitors (in those days) the latter on little slices of bread fried in olive oil. Barely cooked mushrooms "a la Grecque" is a popular dish, as is cucumber or cooked beetroot in chopped shallot, oil and vinegar. One of our constant favourite hors d'oeuvres is tomato salad. This is simply sliced tomato, garnished with chopped shallot, pepper and salt, vinegar and olive oil and topped with (it should be chopped parsley) fresh coriander.
For a large chicken (in non-virus times I buy them from a Halal butcher in the market) my procedure is thus: I cut off the legs with thighs and bag them for the freezer for roasting, curries, and stew type dishes. I do the same with its wings, cut from the carcass with some breast meat. From the remainder I carve off one breast for roasting and the other for frying. The carcass is then broken up and pressure-cooked in water and spices for at least one hour - usually more with a stock cube or two. The stock it makes is strained and used for the start of or topping up of soup.
I had to make space in the rather too small deep freezer part of our drinks refrigerator for a chicken treated as above. For this I removed a box of fish fingers. These we enjoy with home-made mayonnaise. I have made mayonnaise for years and only once has it failed. I find that any temperature of the ingredients work together happily. In a small bowl goes an egg yolk and half its quantity of Dijon mustard. With a wooden spoon and stirring in the same direction I add a steady stream of olive and vegetable oil (I use groundnut - for everything). When the mayonnaise has reached the thickness desired, a little lemon juice is added and a dash of cold water. Job done - with ease and pleasure.
In the kitchen we have a lidded compost bin. When a bit heavy, this is emptied into the larger bin at the bottom of the garden. Compost-making is such a pleasure, with all compostable kitchen waste put to good use. Early each spring I empty the bottom part of this large bin of friable and plant-nourishing compost and distribute it around plants and soil in the garden - and all from unwanted waste.
Then there was the fruit bowl to top up. This bowl is covered with a plate, kept in the refrigerator, and contains any fruit in season, covered in spirit, sherry, vermouth or such. A spoonful of its contents makes a wonderful dessert. And it is a fine way to use up any old spirit that may have been given as a present and seldom used.
Which pretty well brings us to evening drinks time - always welcome and taken by us in the shed if the weather is warm. We like just a little to eat with our first glass of white wine, or Pernod. Most popular are crisp rice crackers with Roquefort beurre on top. This topping was always on café menus in my student days in Paris but now seems to have disappeared. It is simply Roquefort cheese with butter, blended with a fork. It needs to be taken out of the refrigerator well before use, just to soften it.
Other festive drinks are taken in our shed are Champagne cocktails. These are simply put together on a large lump of ice, adding a measure of Cognac, four or five dashes of Angostura bitters and topped with any sparkling wine.
In our shed it is food, drink, radio music, laughter and talk before the routine of retiring, television, pill-taking, reading, ablutions (don't forget the bidet) the undoing of the bra and sleep until the early morning. As usual it has been quite a day.

Life in a Day (Part One, am)

Even with people we know well we are unaware of their activities from waking in the morning to sleeping at night. Except for the ablutions part of the day's routine, an old artist's day might be of interest. So I made notes on a day's activity which I will now try and put together.

From the very early hours I lie in bed and think of the present painting and possible writing, waking and possibly rising at around 6 o'clock - nearer 5 in summer. From my bed I have already listened to the local church clock and from its sound and resonance guessed the wind direction and air clarity.

In dressing gown I go to my studio at the top of the house to look at the previous day's painting (actually pastel) and stand by the window for some time looking outside.

I have always been keen on the weather, especially since my days as a pilot when one's life could depend on it. I look at the clouds, condensation trails left by passing aircraft, rain, wind direction, wind speed, the direction in which aircraft and birds are landing, birds sorting out their territories, signs of frost, people's clothing and visibility. I might then do a bit of art or writing (like this). It is a wonderful time for me - no noise, no interruptions, clear thoughts (hopefully) and clear air.

Then it is ablution time. The bidet is a wonderful object. When one has used them one wonders how you could ever have done without them. This particular model came from a near neighbour who thought them to be disgusting and was throwing hers out. I took it and had it plumbed in. 

As I always cut my own hair, I check it, and cut off more in hot weather. Then I dress, take my pills and fix hearing aids - matters that arrive with old age.

Getting breakfast comes next. On my way down I check the water level in the vase in Margreet's shower toom. I aim to always have a flower there in a vase that is narrow at its top, so the water level drops fast.

There is tea to be made in excellent Dutch insulated tumblers, and toast, made with our own bread on to which I try and vary flavours. But Margreet likes Marmite on her toast, or inside Arab bread. I might then fry my toast in olive oil, or fill the pitta bread with marmelade devilled eggs, bacon or sausage. I have just made pancakes out of some leftover flour from coating fried chicken the night before.

Actually it made four pancakes, two of which we had for breakfast and two were wrapped around cheese, later to become lunch. Today there is cooked batter left over from last night's toad-in-the-hole. I heat it up a little in a frying pan and spread some Marmite over it. I like to make a surprise breakfast for Margreet every so often.

Another lovely breakfast surprise is clear tea with slices of our own lemons, harvested from the garden. When cut, a lemon will scent the air all around it. 

As for that toad-in-the-hole, I have, at last mastered it. For two of us the batter should be made at least an hour beforehand and consist of 3 1/2 dessert spoons of plain flour, a pinch of salt, two eggs and 1/4 of a pint of milk. Beat it all together to rid it of any lumps - however small. Then, using the cheapest English type sausages that contain plenty of fat, rusk and some head meat, place them in a baking pan with plenty of oil and give them 20 minutes in the oven set at 200 degrees. Then, after giving the batter another whisk, add it over and around the sausages. After another 20 minutes your toad will be perfect. 

It is time to wake Margreet and we eat in and on the bed, waiting for the paper to be brought to our doorstep, now by another kind neighbour as the first one had to isolate because of her contact with a carrier of the Covid-19 virus. 

I might go into the garden to water it, keeping an eye on all plants and making sure that the large birdbath is full with clean water.

The paper arrives and we read it on the bed, which we have made together now that Margreet's arm is stronger. As she still can't reach it, I have to hook up her bra - and get a kiss for my trouble.

Aside: When I started this blogpost I thought that I could get it all complete in one piece. Now I see that it must be the first part of two.

For some of her relaxing time, Margreet has started a very complicated jigsaw of a map of Greater London. I am delighted if I can fit in a piece when passing by.

I have an interest in this jigsaw, as when finished (if all the pieces are there), I plan to turn it over and paint something on the reverse - as another jigsaw.

To provide a friend with a mother of vinegar, I delved into my red wine vinegar jar (3 litres) and found only a sulking mother at the bottom of it. There were no expected daughters to give away. So I tore off part of my mother and put it in a jam jar for her. I just hope that this gluey/rubbery piece develops into a proper mother and turns wine into vinegar, and that my own mother survives my surgery. The recipient collected her piece later.

I get lunch (normally we have one week each at cooking), but with Margreet's bad arm I am doing most of it. Lunch is always soup, which is kept on the hob and varies depending upon what leftovers go into it. This was Margreet's own make, and is delicious. With it we eat cheese (the Dutch cannot live without it). Today we added a home-made cream cheese, made with curds (from a mistake) mixed with salt and cream. It is a bit bland. Today it was wrapped in a pancake, as mentioned earlier. I have a small beer with lunch to help me snooze in the afternoon.

I will have done the washing up at any time, often singing my little protest song of "Putting away, putting away, dad is always just putting away" to clear away the dried plates and cutlery beforehand. It has been my lot in every household to have to "put away". The actual washing up I don't mind at all, which I do only having soaked everything well in detergenty water well beforehand.

After lunch we retire for a short snooze and I may read some of Hilary Mantell's third and rather overlong book on Cromwell. After Margreet's favourite show on television, I start the second half of my day. 

Garden under Virus

Had it been another time of war, I would have lifted the flagstones that almost cover our four paces by 16 pace London garden and turned it into an allotment. But at the present time of virus it will stay as it is. With this virus that no one seems to know much about, I might well have to make it more productive.
As the soil beneath the flagstones must be much the same as a 1' wide strip of soil up to one side that I first encountered 30 years ago, it would take even more compost from our excellent bin to get it into a condition that would grow anything at all. Thirty years ago this strip of soil was black and dead from absorbing years of coal-smoke-laden pollution. Now, thanks to our compost, it is light and friable. So I would have to work hard, possibly turning the recovered soil into a potato patch at first, to be able to use it productively.
As it is, I continue to grow flowers and trees in pots, some stacked high on occuloni and ironstone bricks once used to store heat, but culinarily unproductive.
On the north-facing wall, where a flowering quince is doing well in a space where a flagstone has been lifted, I have now planted shallots and garlic - in the hope that they will survive and grow without sunshine.
Some rocket that lasted the winter is our only green leaf vegetable. Its leaves are barely enough for a very small salad, but its simple four petalled flowers are a delight to the eye and insect life. For herbs we grow the flavourings of mint, rosemary and bay leaves to enhance the repertoire of our cooking.
Our lemon tree would not contribute much in a pandemic emergency, but the fruit, when harvested and freshly sliced, exude the most wonderful aroma and taste, and then become just an ordinary sliced lemon by the next day.
Above all, and of most importance to us, are runner beans. We make much of them as they climb up vertical bamboos and over a "roof" of the same material. I grow them from seed gathered the previous year in pots on the kitchen windowsill, and then plant them out when they are able to climb unaided.
We eat their large crop initially as 4" beans, only top and tailing them before giving them five minutes in boiling water. They are usually served with butter and garlic, and are a real treat.
Each year we purposefully miss picking some of the runners that would normally need stringing and chopping. We let them rip. As long pods containing large fat beans, we harvest them before they start to rot on the vine, and then dry them on racks in the kitchen. When crispy dry they are podded.
These dried beans are eaten in the winter after an overnight soak and 35 minutes in the pressure cooker. Eaten as a first course with, perhaps chopped shallot and vinaigrette, they also find their way into stews and soup. As for taste and texture they are as good as beans get.
And what do we drink with our produce? Red wine, of course, and from our own vines.
In an emergency I would return to the configuration of our predominately Triomphe d'Alsace vine that covered our arbour and garden walls. We once made 66 bottles from this arrangement. But now, because of age, I fear I have reduced coverage to just the arbour, and make but a dozen or two bottles of red from it. But it is excellent wine, known by others as Hammersmith red, but to us - just our red wine. If the virus takes over, we have plans. 

"Mothers"

We make our own vinegar with a "mother", using a 3 litre, wooden-tapped jar for red wine vinegar and another like jar for milder vinegar. Both vinegars are superior to anything you could buy.
Nowadays I wait until the red vinegar is sharp and the cider one soft and easy, then bottle one and a half litres of each in various shaped bottles for home use and gifts.
I write on this wonderful practise as a friend has just asked for a "mother".
Mothers produce daughters who become the new mothers. I have to dispose of the old ones every so often to keep them from clogging up the tap. I have to roll up my sleeve to do it, delving in and selecting the old for disposal.
To select a gift sample I was surprised to find only one mature mother - sulking at the bottom of her jar. Perhaps I had neglected to feed her with fresh wine. So I had to act the surgeon and tear off part of her body.
I now hope that the gift piece will generate vinegar and produce daughters as it should, and that my own crudely torn mother will recover her normal circular shape and virility. I have faith in her. 

A Virus Day at Home

At the time of writing we have no idea about the Covid-19 virus and how it will affect everyone's and the earth's future.
Already it has altered nearly all of our lives.
Because of age and health issues we have self-isolated, but for how long? What one can say is that for many people life has worsened a lot. We consider ourselves to be among the lucky ones.
With our 8 pm Thursday recognition of all those fighting for other people's lives, we have not only clapped hands and rung bells, but have met at our door, in a deserted street, and keeping our distance, new friends from the vicinity and exchanged ideas and gossip with neighbours.
Entrance to these open formations is simply to arrive with a glass and a bottle - that is, if you are allowed out.
Our house is not as clean as before because our once-a-week cleaner also has had to self-isolate, but the garden, where we weed, trim and exercise, is as smart as it has ever been.
One imagined that there would be less lawlessness in the present circumstances, but a disguised bottle of Champagne, left on our doorstep for half an hour as thanks for the kind lady who delivered our newspaper, was stolen. It seemed to be an inappropriate misdemeanour in these times of extra friendliness and consideration.
Some modest stores, kept by us for a possible far off emergency, now remain untouched as, because of our priority we have been given a supermarket delivery slot. The "alternatives", supplied because of shortage, have only added to our interest and imagination.
If it really ever comes to the pinch, dried sausages (pemmican) that have hung in the kitchen for some 30 years as real emergency rations, will be consumed as last resort nourishment.
Garden colour, in the form of emerging roses and pelargoniums, brighten the landscape seen from our octagonal glazed shed, but the usually bought seedlings of Busy Lizzies and New Guineas will be missing from it this year.
For some reason there has been a shortage of bird life in the garden this spring, but there are plenty of cantankerous goldfinches and large wood pigeons clinging like trapeze artists to bird feeders to amuse us. They have become garden mobiles. 

Hair Clips

We are self-isolating during the plague of Covid-19 virus. For me life is almost as usual with art on the go, writing, cooking and mucking about in our small garden, which has seldom been as neat and tidy.
Margreet has embarked on a horribly difficult jigsaw puzzle of Greater London.
Due to age and lung problems we have managed at last to obtain a supermarket delivery slot. So we have enough to eat and drink.
Just before we voluntarily locked ourselves in, as we were all told anyway, Margreet wanted a hair clip - one of those multi-toothed, fake tortoise shell, sprung clips. Primark sold them, not singly, but many on a card. She bought the cardsworth - at the expected cost of a single clip.
At that time I was sealing up partly used plastic packages of such as dried beans, frozen peas and other things, and clumsily using large paper clips to do it. Then along came those hair clips. They have turned out to be quite wonderful for the clipping together of partly-used plastic bags. I recommend them. 

Bell Noise

In self-imposed isolation to, in turn, isolate the Covid-19 virus, it was time to show how appreciative we all are of those who risk their lives to save others. It was 8 pm o'clock on a Thursday evening that we ventured to open our front door to clap - not that many would hear us but the gesture was a good one.
As we only clapped our hands, a TV presenter living nearby was making far more noise with the help of kitchen utensils.
So when the following Thursday came around, I intended to make more sound, this time with a bell from the garden, used to tell birds in freezing conditions that food was being put out for them.
And true enough, my bell made a wonderful sound. But the handle had rotted away, and after a few rings, I was left with the handle in my hand and the bell part rolling down the road. I de-isolated myself to retrieve it.
It is a strange bell, with the striker hitting the inside and the bell itself rocking on a now rusted and broken spindle in the handle - a double action. So how to mend it? Difficult.
I tried to rejuvenate the old handle with nylon cord, waterproof glue and bits of wood. It was not possible.
So I cut a handle from some broomstick-size dowel rod, used a bow saw to cut a wide groove in one end, and drilled holes to accommodate a brass screw that would pass through the wood and a hole in the bell's casting. Then it was a case of adding glue, inserting the casting and screwing it all together.
Now it is just a bell, screwed and glued to a painted handle. It is certainly not as fancy as before, but it makes a good sound and will, I hope, last for many a "noise of appreciation".

Wine Blends

I have been writing on wine, growing grapes and making wine for some years. Many wines are blended at source, so we blend wines as well - mainly in a two-bottle carafe.
In our last virus-related delivery slot some "near" substitutes were included, one being a recently-harvested Australian Shiraz. We found that it was too sweet for pleasurable drinking.
In our bin of "daily wines" was the final bottle of Hammersmith, Triomphe d'Alsace red of our 2010 vintage. This we knew to be a bit too dry for pleasurable drinking. The blend of the two was excellent - most pleasurable.
When so much blending goes on in foreign wineries, why are we, as customers of it, so loath to, in our turn, do some blending as well? We should. 

Mistletoe

It is usually with apprehension that I have written in past blogs on my desire, since childhood in the country, to establish mistletoe on an orchard tree. All my attempts had been failures.
Now I have come to the final episode of this saga. It goes like this.
Trying to get mistletoe to grow on either or both of my London apple or pear trees in pots has been a constant quest, but a fascinating one.
In about 2008, I used fresh mistletoe seeds from Christmas decorations, forcing the berries into the base of fruit spurs, using tape, and combinations of string, glue, rubber solution, roofing sealant and earth. Hoping for a sign of any "taking", I had no luck. I tried the same in 2009 - still no success. I gave up.
In 2010 I was passing a rubbish skip in March and saw a bunch of discarded mistletoe that was covered with dried-out berries. Why not try them?
Using what I thought was the most natural-looking method, I tied them in to the base of many spurs, using string, rubber solution and earth. This surgery blended in well with the trees' bark and was almost invisible. 2011 came and went. 2012 passed. I had failed again. I gave up once more. 2013 came around, and to my utter disbelief a mistletoe sprout appeared at a topmost spur on the apple tree. We drank Champagne. For me it was a gardening triumph.
Next year, 2014, another sprout appeared halfway up the tree. And in 2015 a third growth appeared low down.
But there were no berries to be seen despite the flower-like new growth at the tip of each twig. However, in some 12 years I had achieved success. That was enough.
Then, just in time for Christmas in 2019 two berries appeared on the lowest bunch of branches.
I'm so happy, and rather pleased with myself.

Shed and Virus

We have a garden shed. It has eight on sides, six of which are glazed. We love it as an escape place, almost as a second-home-in-the-country, like the owners of such who are now using theirs to escape the coronavirus plague.
In this garden retreat of ours, other than in the cold weather, we eat, drink, write and listen to the radio. From it we look out onto a small, walled, London garden, its arbour of vines, flowers, trees in pots - and our pets.
Having no dog as an excuse to go out, we have chosen self-imposed isolation, as is recommended for old and vulnerable people during the period when the dreaded virus is rife. And because we have no tame pets to exercise, we take extra pleasure in our wild ones - animals that look after themselves (with a little help from us).
Our garden robin shares our shed where it eats grated cheese, goldfinches guzzle niger seeds from two feeders, a pair of great tits nest in a box each year, wrens, blue tits, blackbirds and wood pigeons visit and, nest nearby. I rather miss meeting the fox on my way to get the paper at 7 am, now that I am not allowed out.
But we do have one unusual pet. One day, I heard squeals from across the road where a dentist friend found a toad on his doorstep. I put this creature in our garden, intending to ask around if anyone with more space and a pond would take it. But it disappeared.
A year later, as we sat in our shed during a downpour, what should appear but our pet toad. It marched across the garden over wet flagstones. Then it disappeared until the following year, appearing once again in a rainstorm. And we  saw it again the year after that.
It lives somewhere among the loose bricks and cascade of flowerpots, eating, presumably, slugs, worms and snails.
It is a useful pet, and happily oblivious of the goings-on around it that are peculiar to the human race.
It could even outlive us.

Virus

Writing in early 2020 as the Coronavirus is engulfing the world, I think of Vesuvius and Titanic when the people involved were oblivious of what was to come. They enjoyed their food and wine in the  normal way, not knowing that the end was nigh. Today we can but guess what might occur, be it a hiccup or cataclysm. In so doing, I certainly have doubled my enjoyment of the food and drink available.
Nature has a way of balancing unsustainable populations by reducing numbers with a plague of this or that. So this particular plague in which we are involved is really a natural, global, phenomenon which, in its way, should be welcome.
How was this virus so clever as to almost instantly spread itself around the globe?
What did we all breathe or handle about the same time? To my mind the availability of cheap travel is one, others are currency and the post. We may never know. But by whatever means it has been a very clever virus.
Outcomes will be both good and bad. Bonds, especially self-isolating us, we have been both surprised and delighted by so many of our near and not so near  neighbours offering help. Such generosity of people's time and the risks they have taken, have been examples of human kindness at its best. We give them our heartfelt thanks.
These really are fascinating times. 

More Dreams

I was a new reporter for a local newspaper.
A theft had occurred in the local village hall where a wedding reception was to be held on the following day. I was sent to write on the present position.
Lined up with the cake were lots and lots of glasses, half of which had been drained by the thieves and the other half still charged with Cognac and Angostura bitters in readiness for cold sparkling wine to be added for them to become Champagne cocktails for the wedding guests.
The local policeman was already in the hall, apprehending the usual suspects, any of whom he hoped might admit to the theft if having the smell of alcohol on their breath.
I wondered if the thieves might have also have drunk from the charged glasses and substituted water for some of the Cognac. So these had to be tested.
It occurred to me that if I drank too much, then my piece might become incomprehensible. But that would be fun to do. So I tested a few and wrote my report containing slurred words and drunken phrases. And to add some legitimacy I added, as if from the editor, the fact that I was not available to answer for my drunken effort because of a monumental hangover, and that my bicycle had been found abandoned in a ditch. He printed my piece word for word.
Readers, used to the usual dull reports, laughed and loved it. My reputation as a journalist, and, even humorist, had been established. 

Dreams

I suppose that I have dreams much the same as anyone else but dismiss them as of little or no consequence. But if any amusing ones turn up, I make a point of remembering them to tell Margreet. Two such have surfaced recently.

I was investigating the current plague of Coronavirus and inspecting the dead body of a man who had died of it. I noticed that there was a black substance between his toes, so had a sample of it added to a petri dish of the live virus. The black stuff killed the virus immediately. I became very famous and immensely rich - two states of life that I will do my very best to avoid.

We had a bet. I said that there was no rail link between England and Ireland. Margreet said there was. On looking at my map of the UK, I saw a dotted rail line across the Irish Sea. I'd lost.
We took the train to Ireland. It was through a single-track tunnel, just wide enough for the human frame. We sat, each on a board, one behind the other. The driver pulled on a string, which rang a bell to tell those in the half-way central station under the Irish Sea that we were on our way. Two hours later we arrived at that station to find the train from the Irish half of the system had already arrived, with its Irish passengers waiting to take our vacated seats to continue their voyage to England. "All change". Our original driver changed ends and pulled the string to ring the bell in England. They were off. We boarded the vacated train for Ireland. The string was pulled, and two hours later we were in The Emerald Isle, where we were greeted with steaming mugs of tea and currant buns. 

A Cabbage and Frankfurter Dish

Around my way greengrocers' market stalls offer part of their stock in metal bowls at £1 a time. This was, I believe, originally to sell their fruit and vegetables to those who do not know our language. So no words were needed to buy goods. This is fine, as any purchaser can now see exactly what they are getting for their £1.
It so happened that I saw two fine cabbages in such a bowl, and bought them. With the cores and outer leaves discarded and put in the compost bin, the cabbages were cut up finely and put into an iron casserole with salt, pepper, olive oil and white wine. This mixture was turned around by hand until all the cabbage was glistening.
It also so happens that our German-owned supermarkets sell excellent frankfurters at a very reasonable price. So all those from a packet were laid on top of the cabbage and a layer of chopped potato placed on top of it all.
Into the oven went the casserole, and two hours later out came a most delicious dish or two, or more.
Any cabbage left over became the start of a soup. 

Recipes

It so happened that immediately after penning my return to blog-writing I wanted to describe our first dinner - nothing special but nice. This is it.

The main course consisted of king prawns and brown rice. The prawns came from a fishmonger in my nearest market. They are fresh (his most popular item), delicious, ridiculously cheap, and shelled for you on the spot (6 each is enough). They bear little in common with the supermarket, processed variety.

I cook them in a pre-cooked sauce of olive oil, grated fresh ginger, grated garlic, powered chilli and salt. They were served with brown rice (some rice leftover became the basis for the salad the following day). The prawns in their sauce took but a few minutes to cook, and the rice 25.

That was preceded by a tomato salad. This particular one was made with cold, fried, halved plum tomatoes cooked in olive oil, covered with plenty of chopped, peppered, salted, a dash of home-made, sharp red wine vinegar, and topped with flat parsley leaves.

To finish was our oft-enjoyed dessert of seasonal fruit, chopped into a bowl, and steeped in spirit (any). We are, at present, using a gift of Cointreau for its liquid content.