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Autumn has had a little baking flurry today. First she made courgette and carrot muffins, recipe courtesy of the I Can Cook programme on cbeebies followed by chocolate chip cookies. Tonight we had home made flatbreads with our own pork burgers and salad and then pancakes with yet more chocolate and cream. Gosh all that chocolate that sounds really bad from a nutritional point of view doesn’t it. Still she did have a huge fruit salad at a cafe this afternoon and has only eaten one of the cookies! Jackson would have absolutely loved all of that, we think of him always. Tomorrow, weather permitting, Autumn has asked to go outside to do some much needed work in the vegetable garden and sow some seeds (indoors of course first).

I purchased a shop bought french stick today for the first time in at least 6 months as we have been making all our own bread, crumpets, naans, flatbreads etc. The last couple of loaves I have made I don’t think have been as good as some of the previous ones, so I was interested to see what the family thought as to how it compared visually and tasted. I was some what relieved to hear their comments.  We all felt it was disappointing to say the least, too light, fluffy, anemic looking and with no taste. I will go to a ‘real’ bakers to taste theirs too as I am sure there will be a gulf of difference between that and ‘supermarket made’ but it confirmed to us there’s nothing like making your own…

To everyone who is following 4 Pairs of Wellies either on Twitter or via our website.  I know it has been a few weeks since my last communication but the reason is as some of you may know, that our son died suddenly towards the end of November and it has been impossible to think about work. Jackson was always such a positive little boy so I am trying to follow in his footsteps and pick up work again.

I hope you are all enjoying the new year and managing to keep warm in these icy conditions.

Making onion marmalade this afternoon, just time to write this article whilst it thickens and the jars sterilise. The room right now has a definite aroma which I am sure the children will comment on when they come home from school! All the main ingredients used have come from the garden so quite pleased with that. Be even more delighted if it tastes good too!

Need to move on to the beetroot one next followed by the chilli jam. Guess what we are giving as Christmas presents. They will also be available to buy from the website too. More details to follow.

We are anxiously waiting to hear feedback from the panel following the taste test in the Food and Farming Industry Awards 2009. Following the initial entry we were then asked to provide samples…… eek!

I went to a local Women in Rural Enterprise (WiRE) networking event and met some friendly people and listened to an interesting talk from Vic Hird at the Brackenhurst Campus of Nottingham Trent University on enterprise and the rural economy. He made some very useful comments about how they can hep rural businesses. I will certainly be arranging a meeting to see how they can help me.

I have also been asked to do a sausage tasting at the January meeting so that will be great to share our lovely sausages with some new people.

We are busy getting ready for the food fair at Tuxford Windmill on Sunday 13th September. Our new sausage flavours have gone to the butchers; 100% cacao, intense herb, zingy garlic and simply seasoned pork so looking forward to getting those back for sampling.

Perfecting the packaging for our handmade gourmet pork sausages has given us a headache; we know what materials we would like to use, but sourcing them has not been easy. Hopefully we have found a supplier now so we can say goodbye to our temporary packaging.  More on this to follow.

We are exhibiting at a farmers market on Sunday 13th September at Tuxford Windmill so excitedly planning our next lovely sausage flavours. If you are in the area why not pop along and see us.

We have made some more lovely bread to wrap around our delicious free range pork sausages. Even my daughter ate all hers so that must be a good testimonial!

In the past, home made bread was something we enjoyed now and again but in the last few months it has become the only bread we eat. I can’t see me going back to buying it (unless perhaps from a ‘real’ baker) as I love knowing exactly what has gone into it and its obvious freshness.

We are considering adding bee keeping to our small holding so Gary is excited to be attending a bee keeping course this weekend. This is something we have been thinking about for a couple of months so it will be interesting to hear how it goes.