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Archive for October, 2010
Wine tasting with Henry Butler!
Posted by editor on Friday, 22 October 2010
Following our amazing trip to South Africa where we visited vineyards and sampled some gorgeous wine, we would like to offer you the opportunity to come and try some fine wines supplied by Butlers Wine Cellar.
On Friday 29 October Henry Butler will be here to guide us ’round the world’ with eight different wines to taste from various parts of the world. This will include fizzy, whites and reds, as well as something sweet or fortified.
Henry will guide us through different grapes, countries, styles and prices. He has a fantastic range of wines in his cellar: he is a great character and passionate about his subject so this should prove to be a fun evening!
The Butlers Wine Cellar – www.butlers-winecellar.co.uk – is a family run, independent wine shop that was established in 1979. Henry Butler and his mother, Gillian, aim to provide knowledgeable, personal service and stock a wide range of interesting, affordable wines as well as wines for special occasions.
”We try to break down the stereotypical snobbish attitude that is often associated with wine by making our service informative and fun. Wines are stocked from most countries; we tend to focus on wines made by smaller producers as opposed to large brands – wines that excite us or have a story to tell.”
The cost is £20 pp, with the tasting session starting at 7pm until 9pm. Spaces are limited, so get into practice for Christmas and book early!
Get into the autumn mood…
Posted by editor on Sunday, 17 October 2010
To get us all into the autumn mood, we’ve decided to open The Garden House for FREE on the afternoon of Friday 22 October. We’ll be offering demonstrations on seasonal tasks like propagation and bulb planting, with useful hand-outs to take away with you.
We’ll also have a variety of bulbs for sale, also tea or coffee and homemade cake for sale (£4.50 pp). Do come along with a friend – the open afternoon starts at 3pm and finishes at approx. 6pm.
The same day, local artist Jo Sweeting will lead our evening workshop, showing us how to create a unique and personal pumpkin carving – and what could be more evocative of autumn than a carved Halloween pumpkin?
Jo typically carves stone but her pumpkins are a sight to behold! Think of making a carved pumpkin ‘soup bowl’, a richly carved table centerpiece – or a pumpkin, beautifully carved and lit from within!
Do book now, as the course is almost full – cost: £42 (or £40 each for two people booking together) – to include a pumpkin (of course!), and a delicious light supper and a glass of wine. The Pumpkin Carving workshop starts at 6.30pm and finishes at approx. 9.15pm.
Location: The Garden House, 5 Warleigh Road, Brighton BN1 4NT
We’ve converted to Rooibos tea!
Posted by editor on Thursday, 14 October 2010
On our recent travels around the Western Cape of South Africa with a group of GH friends and enthusiasts we visited a Rooibos tea plantation. Rooibos is a fynbos species, a scruffy little bush endemic to the Clanwilliam/Cederberg area from where it is processed, packaged and despatched worldwide.
Although in origin and cultivation completely unlike the tea we are more used to drinking, South African bush tea or red tea has so much going for it – it’s a delicious infusion packed with antioxidants and reassuringly caffeine-free.
Elandsberg Eco Tourism, run by Chris and Annette du Plessis, operates an independent Rooibos tea estate with its own processing plant. Chris talked us through the whole process of Rooibos cultivation – from propagation (we learnt that propagation from seed is certainly not an easy task!), to the processing of the plant, to the final packaging…
Aside from tea, all manner of useful products are now made using Rooibos as a key ingredient – soaps, body creams, therapeutic creams to ease muscular pain – even bread! Annette du Plessis made the tastiest Rooibos bread for our lunch – she was kind enough to email us the recipe below:
Annette’s Rooibos bread
- 875ml wholewheat flour
- 500ml bran
- 500ml oats
- 175ml sunflower seeds
- 125ml cake mix or raisins
- 2 sachets of Rooibos tea (we assume she means 2x tea bags)
- 5ml salt
- 10ml baking powder
- 500ml buttermilk
- 375ml milk
Preheat oven to 180 degrees C.
Mix the dry ingredients, including 1x sachet of Rooibos tea, but excluding bicarb and baking powder.
Mix the latter two with buttermilk and shake up, then add to dry ingredients.
Rinse the buttermilk container with the milk and add to the mixture.
Mix well and divide into two bread-tins.
Sprinkle 2nd sachet of Rooibos tea evenly over the mixture in tins and bake for 1 hour.
Enjoy…
Blackberry eating…
Posted by editor on Monday, 11 October 2010
I love to go out in late September
among the fat, overripe, icy, black blackberries
to eat blackberries for breakfast,
the stalks very prickly, a penalty
they earn for knowing the black art
of blackberry making; and as I stand among them
lifting the stalks to my mouth, the ripest berries
fall almost unbidden to my tongue,
as words sometimes do, certain peculiar words,
like strengths or squinched or broughamed,
many-lettered, one-syllabled lumps,
which I squeeze, squinch open, and splurge well
in the silent, startled, icy, black language
of blackberry eating in late September.
Galway Kinnell 1927-
The Garden House in South Africa…
Posted by editor on Thursday, 7 October 2010
Dear readers – just a taster of what’s to come…
We’re in South Africa with a group of Garden House friends and enthusiasts travelling around the Western Cape area, visiting the wildflower fields of Namaqualand and touching on many of the other flora and fauna, sights and scenes that this extraordinary area has to offer.
Later today we’ll be visiting the world famous Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens just outside Cape Town. We will be guided by specialist Val Thompson – and come rain or shine, I’m sure we’ll all be filling yet more memory cards with amazing photos!
On our return we’ll be updating you further on our journeys…so look out for further Garden House in South Africa tales over the next few weeks!