WOOD SMOKE AND MIST

It was lovely to have an extra hour in bed this morning and I really made the most of it. I had the foresight to take a few cookies up to my room last might and I ate them with my morning coffee while watching the news . I was a quiet morning and when I opened the curtains a fine mist softened the view across the pane to the woods.

For our breakfast I baked a batch of blueberry muffins and as my sons friends arrived for their Sunday game each one joined us, I had made two dozen so there were plenty to go around. The boys set of to the pub and I went out for a breath of air. It was unusually quiet, so still in fact that as I sat in the orchard I could hear the leaves falling around me and from my neighbours garden sweet wood smoke wreathed through the now almost bare branches of the old apple tree.
My tame robin joined me sitting upon the back of the oak bench silver with age, I know I should give it a coat of wood preserver but somehow I cannot bear to spoil its silvery sheen. For the first time this Autumn the robin was singing his winter song, sweet and poignant, nothing like the full throated warble of his summer song, it fitted perfectly with the drifting smoke and the falling leaves and I felt the peace of the place settle upon me as I sat there.

The sudden appearance of the cat broke my reverie and caused the robin to give a quick call of alarm before flitting into the fig tree. He need not have worried, Twiggy tore down the grassy path and climbed to the top of the apple tree in one bound then down she came , fled up the garde path and climbed the ash tree by the potting shed after which she ran to the damson tree and took up her station in her tree house where she sat down to wash her face. Peace retuned and so did the robin, the three of us sat for a while longer sniffing the wood smoke until Twiggy decided to chase a few falling leaves and I decided that I had better see how Pa was getting on.

After all the baking of yesterday and because I never know what time my son will return from the fabled land he and his friends inhabit on the weekend I decided to make some steak burgers for dinner, there were some nice fresh buns and I made caramelised onions, salad and hash browns, quick and simple to cook from scratch in thirty minutes once the burgers were made.
SUNDAY BURGERS
1lb steak mince
6 oz fresh granary bread crumbs
1 teaspoon garlic salt
Quarter teaspoon of freshly ground nutmeg
1 tea spoon of ground coriander
fresh ground black pepper
1 tablespoon of tomato purree
1 teaspoon olive oil.

Put all the ingredients in to a bowl and mix really well, squashing the meat and crumbs together until you have a dough like ball. Then divide in to either 4 or 6 pieces of equal size. Roll each one in to a ball the place on a flat surface and flatten with your hands turning one to make sure hat both sides are flat. Repeat for the remaining burgers. Chill in the frefridgerator for an hour or so .
Using either a large frying pan of a griddle cook the burgers in a little oil for around five minutes each side if you made six and eight minutes a side if you made four. Alternatively brush with a little oil and grill for the same amount of time.

Caramelised onions
4 large onions thinly sliced in to rings
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1 oz of butter
1 dessert spoon of demarerra sugar
pinch of salt
Heat the oil and add the onions to the pan, cook slowly until the onion are soft but not brown, if they begin to brown add the salt and continue cooking. Hen the onions are soft add the sugar and continue to cook stirring often so the all the onions are coated in the sugar and so that they brown nicely without burning.
They should be golden brown and slightly crisp when they are done.

Hash browns

You can cheat and buy these but if you want to make your own you will need

half a pound of cold cooked potatoes per person
salt.
A little flour for coating.
Oil to fry

Hash the potatoes roughly, they should not be smooth like mash, then shape into rounds , squares or any shape you like. Heat the oil in a large pan and when hot fry the hash cakes until they are golden brown and warm right through.
They can be seasoned with a little garlic salt, onion salt or herbs. I often add a little crispy bacon and serve them with grilled chicken of with baked beans for a lunch .

During the afternoon I carved our pumpkin mask for Halloween, we get some wonderful trick or treaters here , witches and ghouls of all sorts but they will only visit a house if there is a pumpkin in the window to show that they are welcome. We give them home made cookies or sweets and sometimes a small gift, a brightly coloured pencil say or a tiny note book. I usually make a skeleton too which we hang by the front door but this year I have not had the time which is a pity because the children love it. I hope for a fine Halloween as we are holding the last bat walk of the year on that night. These walks have been very popular and have certainly raised the profile of these wonderful little creatures in our area.

I wonder if we shall have snow soon as we did last year, the weather is so similar ans I hear that New York is having snow just now. We are almost ready for the winter now, the hitch curtains are in place and the draught excluder’s have been found, the radiators have been de fluffed with a good hoovering and we have all put our fur throws in a handy spot where they can easily be reached if the night becomes chilly.

We each had a fur throw for Christmas last year and found they wonderfully warm, it meant that we could turn off the heating at night which saved us a fortune, Pa's room is the exception and is always kept warm. The throws washed nicely and were welcomed like old friends this year, I need hardly add tat they are very popular with a certain little cat of my acquaintance.

This has been a long blog so now I shall bid you all a good night and a good week ahead.