More Autumnal Than Falling Leaves

Being able to cook truly seasonally is one of the big benefits of growing your own, though careful shopping can bring the same end - some things like decent culinary pumkins, Jerusalem artichokes and British apples are not always easy to find.

I just got back from spending a happy half hour of my lunchtime picking stuff from our allotment, the day job of writing magazine articles having taken up my morning. Conscience about getting back to it is nudging me gently in the ribs now. The three carrier bags of veg brought home hold turnips, beetroot, kale, apples, runner beans, parsnips, Jerusalem artichokes, leeks, the final pair of tiny pumpkins, and a load of courgettes and patty pan squash. The last two tell a tale perhaps about how our climate is changing: summer squash are now harvested through October and even into November if we're lucky.

Last night's main was venison sausages, potato-pumpkin-and-turnip-mash, roast onions and apple sauce. As autumnal as the brown and gold leaves carpeting sunny Fulwood. More so, as the leaves have been falling since late summer, possibly because it was unseasonably dry then. It may well be my imagination, but I feel more at one with the universe having indulged in something in keeping with our place and time than if I had eaten asparagus from Peru, for example. The Dear Leader lit candles in the dining room, we drew the curtains on the dark night, and the house had a sense and apple-rich scent of the season.

Tonight though the meal will be different the results will, I trust, be similar. Steamed kale with anchovies, garlic and pepper on toast as a starter, a thick vegetable soup with leeks at its heart as the main. To lower the tone somewhat (hugely), no Jerusalem artichokes till the weekend, as the DL is giving a workshop ("Death Rays and How Best to Develop Them," I think) tomorrow, and were she to fart loudly and repeatedly as she addressed her adoring audience of master criminals and dictators it would mean the gulag for me. Again.

Time's Cruel Quirks, and Kinder Ones

As I speed through the third decade of my thirties time, its benefits, passing and cruel jokes at our expense has begun to assume more significance than it did in my salad days (accompanied in the Sixties and Seventies of course by Heinz salad cream). With experience has come a reasonable knowledge of restorative beverages, and the money to pay for a decent standard thereof. But annoyingly once we are of a certain age the body's tolerance for alcohol reduces, so an evening of anything more than mild conviviality can leave one feeling delicate next day. Thus we try to drink well rather than lots.

A new quirk of maturity hit me recently. Enjoying a night's sleep a month or so back I began what seemed destined to be that very rare pleasure, a sex dream. I make no apologies for my subconscious. Several (it would appear said subconscious is decidedly ambitious) of my wife's former colleagues (attractive female ones) were seated around our table with the Dear Leader, all dressed somewhat inappropriately for the March weather, though despite them being seated at a round table I could only see their backs wherever I stood. I sported an apron, and nothing else.

Tragically the dream took a diversion. For their meal I was preparing pork sausages (way ahead of you Sigmund) fried then sliced on the bias and the flat faces browned, with apple juice added to the pan to caramelise and create a sticky jus. The dream had become culinary not carnal. I focused on what heat would be needed to keep the apple flavour but make a nice syrupy sauce to grace the meat, and if it needed herbs (I now, fully conscious, think a touch of sage). Even in the dream I felt this was missing the point, but was seduced by the simple recipe idea, rather than as might have been hoped the company.

Carpe diem seems very brusque, however rapidly time is racing. Whatever the latin for embrace in place of seize seems more inviting. We did that yesterday by planning for the promised sun. A lamb shoulder on a generous bed of sliced leeks (picked the day before on the allotment) and bruised garlic cloves went into a very low oven (110 celsius) mid-morning, a bottle of Christmas-leftover Babycham (the Dear Leader enjoys retro sometimes too) to keep it all moist. A lidded pot let the whole steam gently. When we ate in the garden mid-afternoon the sun shone, the meat fell off the bone, and the sweet mushy alliums and a big serving of steamed Red Russian kale were ideal partners. As was a half-bottle of Rioja. Should we regret not having the head anymore for a full midday Sunday bottle, or celebrate having the nous to construct such a pleasant hour?

Sweet & Sour Power

Those neat little packets of sauce are so tempting: sweet and sour, black bean, Thai green curry... But a look at the ingredients list often reveals one reason not to buy, and the price for what you get is another - 99p, £1.25, for something you can whip up in seconds.

Last night we had a Chinese banquet, big on veg from the allotment - braised beef with our turnips, steamed kale with chilli and soy sauce, braised courgettes in a simple thickened sauce made with stock, and sweet and sour chicken. The last item was made because I overdid the quantity of sauce for the courgettes (cheaty vegetable stock powder with soy sauce, plus some cornflour to thicken it). A dollop of Heinz, a tablespoonful of sugar, and a big dash of red wine vinegar and it had changed character, coating the stir-fried chicken and red pepper strips deliciously.

The Chinese food we eat here (except in a few restaurants) is for obvious reasons very anglicized, which tends to mean meat-based dishes predominate. When I travelled for work in China and Taiwan banquets and business meals had plenty of vegetable dishes: simple steamed greens, braises, some stir-fried mixes. For a meal at home it is very easy to prepare such things, and healthy, and it means you end up with more dishes on the table so it feels like a feast. The extra colours don't hurt either. Taste and colour highlight for me yesterday was (a tin of) bamboo shoots cut into matchsticks, stir fried till they began to turn light gold, then braised with soy, sugar, a slug of sherry and boiling water until the liquid all but disappeared. Left until cool they were so tasty. A special touch for well under £1, when a packet sauce would have cost more.