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Meadows

One problem with lockdown is too much time which leads to too many ideas, none of which a very lazy person such as myself wants to make work especially in the garden.

The third “step” in my east-west plot is a little bit dull, comprising one bed of beautiful pink roses, a lawn with a swing seat and bordered by a yew hedge. It’s not a big space and in an ideal world, I might put in another flower bed but that takes much more effort than I’m willing to put in and more than my partner can be coerced to attempt. Digging out the bed for the second rose bed was his last ever garden project, he says. Hmm.

Letting the lawn grow

But we both watched a programme that suggested letting the grass grow. It sounds like the easiest, laziest of projects but I’ve a funny feeling that it might be quite a lot of hard work. The kind of hard work that takes one a look at a lawn left to seed, decided it’s an horrendous mess and then has to scythe the lot back to a height that can be mowed.

Worth a go.

Letting the lawn grow

But I don’t want the whole lot just randomly left to grow. I actually have some practical requirements to be met that mean a couple of grass “paths” have to be kept mown as a minimum: one through to the very back garden step in the driest shade, one to the garden swing seat which is actually the best place in the garden for a morning coffee and one infant of the roses so that I can pick the flowers through the Summer.

What’s the worst thing that can happen?

Food

Acar (Indonesian Garden Salad)

Lockdown at home is dull. Cooking becomes an activity that entertains as well as provides, but rather than mains, the side dishes can be the more exciting part to eat, especially when as simple to make as this salad.

A busy Indonesian salad with a sweet ginger dressing highlights the crunchy sliced cucumbers and shredded carrots and ties this cool, crunchy side dish together.

photo of Acar (Indonesian Garden Salad)

ingredients

1/2 cup water
1/2 cup white vinegar
2 teaspoons crushed fresh ginger root
3 1/2 tablespoons sugar
3 teaspoons salt
1 yellow onion, cut in chunks
5 cups coarsely chopped cabbage
1 cup peeled and finely shredded carrot
2 cups julienne sliced cucumber

directions

Combine the water, vinegar, ginger, sugar, and salt in a small bowl. Whisk well to combine. 

Place the onion, cabbage, carrot, and cucumber in a large bowl. Drizzle the dressing mixture over then toss well to combine. 

Place the salad in the refrigerator for 1 hour to chill. Toss again before serving. 

Salad can be chilled for up to 8 hours before serving.

Home, London

Sunshine

The deciding factor for whether or not the house has a good or bad day, is the weather. Thankfully there’s a lot of sunshine around in this lockdown.

Violas

And the bedding bought just before Christmas, basically violas (pansies) has survived more or less to cheer us up.

Violas

I’ve lost some to slugs, and negligence, and even more to my cats scripting where they shouldn’t. But for once the Winter baskets have come good, and I have enough pots and troughs to brighten the corners as the pear blossom dies down from the tree and the wisteria has yet to arrive

Mostly my garden is based around purple-pink-white shades.

Tulips

Though to be honest , I could do with more vulgar pinks.

Down near the house where the bright red tulips just refuse to die, the house opinion is divided on the orange tulips. Maybe I should just have gone dark purple but now, inevitably, the brightest of reds and oranges are there forever.

Tulips

Since the closest I can come to tasteful, is the violets everywhere in amongst the paving, I should probably just embrace vulgar and be done with it.

Though if there were to be one show-stopper at the moment, it wouldn’t be flowers or even blossom, but the foliage of the little maple tree planted far too close to the house, long before we arrived.

Spring maple foliage

It may be more beautifully red in the Autumn, but the mix of red and green leaves with dappled sunshine is still beautiful.

Home, London

Space

Lockdown is a lot easier for the suburbs. People surviving lockdown with small children in cramped urban flats with no outdoor space deserve medals.

Hellebores

Meanwhile those of us lucky enough to have gardens have enjoyed some of the best Spring weather ever and with nothing but time to sit and enjoy the changing flowers.

Hellebores

From the hellebores going over, through the narcissus and crocus.

Rip van Winkle
Crocus

As one flower goes over, another arrives and though the garden seems to be dominated by certain showstoppers, the magnolia or the camellias

camellias
Magnolia

There is also pleasure in the smaller plants, the ones that find their own way into the garden, into the pavements, unplanned.

Primroses

And when the first bright stars in the garden pass, the blossom of the pear tree suddenly arrives like a waterfall draping over the hedge.

Pear tree

As an early example of urban planning, houses here were each planted with a fruit tree alternating pear and apple along the streets.

Falling blossom

So my pear tree is likely to be as old as the house, maybe older if planted on root stock.

Pear blossom

Which would make this tree more than 112 years old and still so very beautiful. Not that the cats care in the sunshine.

Tomcat
Spurge

Even the thuggish of plants, the spurge, is fizzing with lime green flowers and cheerful in the shade.

A number of late plantings from Autumn seem to have worked, from the leftover dwarf narcissus in barrels with forget-me-nots,

through to the bucket with a hole planted up with cyclamen, and the leftover narcissus

Having given up (finally) at trying to get rid of the ever repeating bright red tulips planted too quickly twenty years ago, the yellow and orange tulip companions planted in November seem to make them more comfortable, more deliberately planted.

tulips

Though like everything in my garden, it’s a basic scramble mess. I would love to be able to plant elegantly but have never been able to resist an overabundance of plants and colour.

In place of elegance and quiet contemplation, my garden is full of places to set and watch the business of bees, the mad scramble and competition as my thuggy plants fight it out of their borders.

Fritalaria & muscari

Never mind the impending zombie apocalypse: for the first time ever, my Spring baskets have worked and are looking positively cheerful.

Spring basket – violas

Thank goodness for a place to sit and a cat for company.

The best girl

Food

Marbled Tahini Cookies

Black biscuits will either sound wonderful or dreadful – if nothing else, try them for Halloween or use normal tahini from the store cupboard

  • YIELD2 dozen cookies
  • TIME1 hour, plus overnight chilling
Marbled Tahini Cookies

INGREDIENTS

  • 3 cups/385 grams all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
  • 1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt
  • ½ teaspoon baking powder
  •  Cooking spray
  • 1 cup/225 grams unsalted butter (2 sticks), softened
  • 1 cup/125 grams unsifted icing sugar
  • 1 large egg, at room temperature, plus 1 egg white
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • ¼ cup plain tahini & 3 tablespoons black tahini
  • ¼ cup/50 grams coarse black sanding sugar (optional)

PREPARATION

  1. In a medium bowl, whisk to combine 3 cups flour, the salt and baking powder; set aside. Coat a small loaf pan with cooking spray, then line with plastic wrap, tucking it into the corners and leaving plenty of overhang. Set aside.
  2. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and confectioners’ sugar on medium-high speed until fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes, scraping bowl as needed. Add the large egg and the vanilla; beat on medium-high until combined, about 2 minutes, scraping the bowl as needed.
  3. Add flour mixture; beat on low speed until combined; then increase speed to medium and beat until dough starts to clump together, scraping bowl as needed.
  4. Remove dough from bowl, knead lightly and form into a fat log. Using a bench scraper or knife, cut into two pieces, one about 1/3 of the dough, and the other 2/3 of the dough. Return the larger piece to the bowl, add the plain tahini, and beat on medium speed until fully combined. Remove from bowl and set aside. Add the smaller piece and the black tahini to the bowl and beat on medium speed until fully combined.
  5. On a generously floured surface, using a bench scraper or a knife, cut the white dough in half. Pat half the white dough into a 5-inch square. Cut the black dough in half, then pat half the black dough on top of the flattened white dough to match dimensions. Repeat with remaining white dough, then black dough, so you have four alternating layers of white dough and black dough. Cut in half crosswise, and gently knead and roll one piece to marble the two colors together. Repeat with the second piece of dough. Stack both pieces of dough together (they should be fairly soft at this point, so be gentle), and briefly knead the pieces together to form one dough.
  6. Press dough into prepared pan, and fold the plastic wrap over the top to seal. Gently press down to even out the surface as much as possible. Chill until firm, preferably overnight, or at least a few hours and up to 3 days ahead, or freeze up to 3 months.
  7. Heat oven to 325 degrees. Beat the egg white with 1 teaspoon water to thin it out. Spread the sanding sugar out on a small baking sheet. Remove the block of dough from the loaf pan and unwrap it. Trim the slanted sides and the top if you want them really square. Very lightly brush the outside of the block with the egg white mixture. Press the block firmly to coat all sides (except the ends) with the sugar, sprinkling and pressing it on to cover any bare spots.
  8. Cut the block into barely 1/4-inch-thick slices, and lay them out 1 inch apart on two parchment- or silicone mat-lined baking sheets. Freeze until firm, about 10 minutes.
  9. Bake until cookies are golden underneath, 14 to 16 minutes. Let cool a few minutes on the baking sheets, then transfer cookies to wire racks to cool completely. Cookies will keep in an airtight container at room temperature up to 1 week.
London, Rants&Rambles

Counting days

Life in lockdown is one of quiet tedium, for those of us lucky enough to have older kids, a big enough house for everyone to find some space and a garden to disappear into. The weather has been wonderful, warm and dry. The minute this is over, expect it to start raining and drop back 10C.

We’ve been isolated now for two weeks, and by isolation, I mean no contact with anyone outside of a single visit to a very quiet supermarket. By now, surely we’re disease free, yet paranoia about every cough, sneeze or sniffle is profound.

I’ve read that infection to death takes an average of 17 days. With more than that spent locked into our own home, we should feel relatively safe. For now.

Because covid-19 is pandemic, expected to become endemic. We will all be exposed to it, all of us catch it, sooner or later. Later is better not because it can be avoided, but because later means more health service resources available to keep us alive, more nurses, doctors, ventilators etc. It also means more chance of a vaccine though that’s 18 months away as a minimum and no one can stay in their own home, surrounded by their family for 18 months without going mad.

The UK coronavirus death toll is expected to continue to rise for at least two weeks, the government’s chief scientific adviser has said, despite encouraging signs about the rate of infections and hospital admissions. The official death toll understates the numbers because it only counts hospital deaths. Excluding deaths in care homes means the numbers can be misleading.

Pear tree

Sir Patrick Vallance told Thursday’s daily Downing Street briefing that the number of people to have died from coronavirus in UK hospitals had reached 7,978, after the deaths of a further 881 people. It is the second-highest daily total after Wednesday’s record 938 deaths.

Despite the slightly lower figure, Vallance said the peak of the outbreak could still be weeks away. “I would expect the deaths to continue to keep going up for about two weeks after the intensive care picture improves. We’re not there yet, but that’s the sort of timeframe I would expect.”

Presumably the people being hospitalised now, are likely to take a week or two to recover or die.

The chief medical officer for England, Prof Chris Whitty, pointed out that two weeks ago admissions to intensive care were doubling every three days. He said: “It’s now becoming not quite flat, but doubling time is now six or more days in almost every area in the country. That has only happened because of what everybody has done in terms of staying at home.”

Last week the health secretary, Matt Hancock, said the NHS was preparing for at least 1,000 deaths a day, at a time when scientific advisers were forecasting the outbreak to peak at Easter.

The peak was now expected to come in four weeks, after signs that the transmission rate was beginning to fall. New infections continue to fluctuate. On Thursday, 4,344 new cases were recorded, compared with 5,492 on Wednesday, but the day-on-day rise was still higher than three of the previous four days.

Again, the official numbers of new cases recorded in the UK is nothing like the total number, just the number hitting the hospital admissions and they tend to be the people with worst symptoms. It’s estimated that there are roughly 1000 cases undiagnosed for every one that hits the official lists.

James Naismith, a professor of structural biology at the University of Oxford, said: “It is a mercy that the number of deaths reported today is lower than yesterday but on its own, a single day’s number is of no value in judging the pandemic. The continuing volatility in daily figure of announced deaths [due to different reporting periods and delays] makes it almost impossible to identify any trend with certainty yet.”

He added: “If deaths are still following a rapid exponential growth, today’s new deaths would have been expected to be markedly higher than yesterday’s, and the total number of deaths to date would have doubled from that four days ago.

Most, if not all, the deaths reported today will have come from infections before the so-called ‘hard lockdown’. It does seem that the hard lockdown is, as expected, reducing the rate of increase in the number of new hospital admissions.”

But even with the hard lockdown, obviously infections within family groupings, locked down in close contact with each other, are likely to occur. Assuming an average family of four locked down together, infected in the first two weeks of lockdown will take another two weeks to recover or die – maybe four to five weeks total.

And then we have to expect a second wave of infections when we all come out of lockdown.

Though the UK government seems entirely unwilling to discuss how and when such an exit might occur.

With our PM in hospital, and the foreign secretary somehow promoted to take his place (how, why him?) with parliament not sitting over the Easter recess so very little by way of accountability, it’s becoming increasingly unclear who is making life and death decisions for the country in the event of likely conflicting medical advice on when to end the shutdown.

We have the world’s biggest crisis and no one apparently in charge.

Home, Rants&Rambles

Zombie Apocalypse

Am I the only person rethinking core skills for the zombie apocalypse?

Fritilaria

Medics obviously stay on the list but who really wants rule-breakers with a total disregard for health and safety on their team right now? 

I’m coming around to the idea that hunters are entirely over-rated as well – they wander about too much and take altogether too many risks vis a vis infection! 

Kitten

Give me some gatherers, organised methodical and likely to have stocked up on paracetamol long before the restrictions were even thought about. And thermometers too (though I know my partner is an outlier on this one).

Almost there…

& now that I’m thinking about it, that just describes mothers.

Plus the zombie apocalypse definitely needs pets. Dogs are good, but cats are better not because they’re practical because they’re mostly not. Unless you have a big dog, they’re really not practical for defensive purposes, and to be honest, there’s not so much defending as expected but lots more lurking in confined spaces 

Kitten and cactus

Cats, whatever their size and pedigree will at least chase rodents (mine won’t kill the beggars but they will bring them home gift wrapped) And they really excel when it comes to small space entertainment when they’re in the right mood and when they’re not, they’ll chill and relax the room right down.

Robin

Because the real problem with the zombie apocalypse is boredom so I’m going to reserve a place on my team for a storyteller or two, someone with rather less STEM and a bit more humanity.

Food

Cinnamon Rolls

Since we’re stuck at home, baking seems a good option and the only things worth baking are things to cheer us up.

For the dough:

  • ¼ ounce instant dry yeast
  • ½ cup warm water
  • ½ cup scalded milk
  • ¼ cup granulated sugar
  • ⅓ cup unsalted butter at room temperature
  • 1 tablespoon kosher salt
  • 1 egg
  • 3 ½ to 4 cups flour

For the filling:

  • ½ cup melted unsalted butter
  • ½ cup sugar
  • ¼ light brown sugar
  • 2 tablespoons ground cinnamon
  • pinch of nutmeg

For the glaze:

  • 4 ounces cream cheese
  • ¼ cup softened, salted butter
  • 1 ¼ cup powdered sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 to 2 tablespoons milk

1) In a small bowl, dissolve dry yeast in warm water and set aside. With a stand mixer (using dough hook), mix milk, sugar, butter, salt and egg. Add 2 cups of flour and mix until smooth. Add the yeast mixture. Mix in remaining flour until dough pulls away from the edge of the bowl and is easy to handle. Knead dough on lightly floured surface for 5 minutes. Place in a well-greased bowl, cover with a towel, and let rise for an hour or two until doubled in size.

2) Once the dough has doubled in size, punch it down. Roll the dough out on a floured surface into an even rectangle. Spread softened butter on dough. Mix both sugars, cinnamon and nutmeg and sprinkle over buttered dough. Starting at the bottom (on the long side of the rectangle), roll dough and pinch ends together to seal. Slice the roll into 2-inch pieces with a serrated knife.

3) Coat the bottom of a 9 x 13-inch baking pan with butter. Place the rolls close together in the pan and place in refrigerator overnight. (If you’re in a hurry, you can skip the fridge: Cover and allow to rise again for another hour until they double in size.)

4) Heat oven to 350 degrees and bake rolls for about 30 minutes or until nicely browned. While the rolls are baking, make the glaze by creaming the butter and cheese with a mixer until smooth. Whip in powdered sugar and vanilla extract. Add the milk 1 tablespoon at a time until you reach the desired glaze consistency. Drizzle the glaze over rolls while they’re still warm to make them extra gooey.

Home, Rants&Rambles

Reasons to be cheerful

It’s 20C outside and sunny.

Magnolia

The robin has finally learned how to hop across from the branch onto the bird feeder.

Spurge

The husband has finally learned to put the dishes into the dishwasher.

Viola

Finally my attempts at a hanging basket have paid off!

Narcissus

Everyone I know and love is well

Muscari & forget-me-nots

I have discovered interactive on-line bridge to play with three mates!

Happy days.

Stay well.

Home, Rants&Rambles

Lockdown

So three of us are locked down at home in the suburbs whilst the youngest daughter is still refusing to come home from university. The university has effectively closed but she still prefers to stay away leaving me with conflicted emotions, partly rejection and partly relief. She’s tricky and that wouldn’t play out well with the rest of us stuck at home.

My eldest and I are taking the allowed walk around the park, painting the careful 2m distance from any of the other people out in the sunshine. With the sun shining away it’s quite uplifting to be out, tempered with a fair bit of bitchy judgementalism when you see other people encroaching on each other’s space.

Magnolia

We’re lucky: we have a garden to enjoy and decent parks nearby that are not too crowded. I’m also one of those mad people who always overstocks the food cupboard and always books deliveries weeks in advance.

My partner is working from home, which is to say, holed up in the spare room (the child still at university) with a couple of computer screens and phone. It’s a relief that hes’ being kept busy and distracted from the “end of days” and from repeat counting of his thermometers.

Whether it’s true or not I can believe the stories of people coming out of family isolation in Wuhan only to immediately file for divorce. Enforced intimacy is a great way to destroy any relationship.

Fritilaria

Things which may end up in divorce or murder include (but are not limited to):

  • Getting up at the crack of dawn (loudly) and insisting on coming in and out of the bedroom looking for “stuff” instead of letting me sleep!
  • Failing to clean up ones own mess.
  • Stacking dirty dishes on top of the dishwasher, but not in the actual dishwasher.
  • Complaining about the noise (or anything else actually) whilst holding a video conference at top volume with the bedroom door open.
  • Constant temperature taking.
  • Failing to carry out their share of the agreed housework.
  • Flush the bloody toilet!

On the other hand there are plenty of reasons to be cheerful not limited to the fact that we’re all basically healthy or at least asymptomatic, that the sun is shining and the garden is lovely. We’re lucky to have enough space to afford each other some time alone and a garden that is a delight at the moment.

I have finally managed to rid every one of my toilets from limescale thanks to an acid wash specialist treatment or two.

Aside from that epic achievement, my gardener arrived yesterday convinced her job qualified as “key work”and absolutely refused to head home without completing all of the jobs she had planned. She gets paid weekly, and I was very clear (from a 2m distance) that she’d be paid whether or not my grass was mown, but she was insistent that clearing the weeds was an essential task and “Well I’m here now”

Muscari

I was left feeling both a bit relieved (my garden will look lovely) and incredibly powerless (unable to evict her from MY garden). In some ways it was a peculiarly British feeling, since I could obviously have shouted or otherwise insisted but it would have felt rude…

My cleaner has stayed home with her husband and kids. We’ll keep paying her weekly wage as well. The tennis club has closed this week and although I’d like to keep paying my coach the amount I normally spend each week, I don’t think that he’d take the money. His wife works so they probably won’t starve but it’s not clear that the club will reopen once the apocalypse is over.

Looking through the Imperial College model currently in favour, this epidemic wave should peak and collapse by August but will be followed by subsequent waves, all hopefully less severe. It is, as yet, unclear as whether this virus creates an effective long term immunity, or whether it’s likely to mutate into a more or less dangerous versions over the coming years.

It is endemic though which means it isn’t going away, ever, but hopefully the worst will be contained and the health service capacity for critical care will not be swamped.

Stay well.