Wet but productive

 Still working on the 7am start...I don't like using an alarm, but it is a way of setting a pattern.

Today's main job has been chutney! Steadily tidying the greenhouse, sorting the green tomatoes, weighing them and adding other ingredients to the right proportions...windfall apples and homegrown onions to start with, then a mango that needed using, a handful of yellow sultanas to empty the jar, cayenne pepper, salt, four large chilli peppers from Carpenter's allotment, a large chunk of fresh ginger, golden granulated sugar and cider vinegar.

Work on this was paused while other tidying was done, neighbour called over, lunch, pirate rode the turbo as it kept on and on raining.....and then after his siesta we caught a short break in the weather.

I already have a bag of rosehips ready to use, now was the time to get some crabapples from a nearby field hedgerow...and we found pears this year too!

Ripe enough to pick, they are now in a shallow cardboard tray to ripen enough to use for juicing.

We saw some blue sky!!

Just after we arrived home, with damp trousers and jackets from the grass in the field and drops from tree branches...it rained again!!

No chutney process photos... too busy stirring!!

The four pounds of green tomatoes ended up as nine pounds of fruit ingredients!!

All the fresh fruit and half the vinegar cooked gently until soft, then the dried spices, sugar and the rest of the vinegar was added for the final cooking as the jars were warned in the oven.

Supposedly fifteen minutes according to the recipe, but actually half an hour, a quick five minutes resting then into hot jars, covered with waxed circles and two teaspoons of melted candlewax before the lids were shut.

It was satisfying eating supper, hearing the lids go pop as they cooled and the contents contracted!