Can we reduce the amount of sugar we use when cooking rhubarb? Well, we can try adding an orange. But oranges come from Spain if not further afield. How do we know where sugar comes from, I mean whether it's cane sugar from the tropics or sugar beet from East Anglia? We are also trying adding small quantities of a herb called Sweet Ciceley which we have growing on the allotments at Orchard Street. But how many spoonfuls of Sweet Ciceley equals one spoonful of sugar? Ah, so much we don't know about the food we eat.

Squash

We grow a lot of squash, and have experimented with many varieties, but have decided now to stick with butternuts, for their good yield of orange flesh and ease of preparation. They, along with most of the winter squash family are usually good keepers, but this year we have lost quite a few and have resorted to freezing some which is pre-prepared.

We have found several recipes that make delicious use of this vegetable or maybe it's a fruit?

I've got about a dozen or so going begging - well, more like forming a collapsing tower over my Microwave.

Any takers?

Tel 07812 400 838

Monday dinner in the 50s

Thanks to John Boxall for alreting me to this story on the BBC web-site. It's about a Scottish family trying to live on ony food produced in Fife. You can find it at

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7152009.stm

I love the USA notion of 'locavores' - people whose diet consists of local produce - but it is such an ugly word, don't you think?

So how's about Froomivores? I am assuming we can then adopt something like the Farmers' Market definition of '35 miles around Frome'.

Will be pleased to hear other people's ideas about this.

Apple Relish

Fine Frome Food

For some years, the growers of Orchard Street Community Allotments in Frome have put out trays of apples from their two mature apple-trees for passers-by to help themselves. Here’s a recipe from one of our users – Joy King. She says the original recipe came from a Dorset WVS (Women’s Voluntary Service) recipe book. I can confirm it’s really tasty and tangy – with bread from John the Baker’s at Badcox and Keen’s cheddar cheese from Sagebury Cheese in Cheap Street (see photo).

Rhubarb Crumble Cake

14 oz trimmed rhubarb
7 oz butter
10 oz SR flour
3oz pale muscavado sugar
4 oz caster sugar
1½ oz chopped hazelnuts
1 orange
2 large eggs
½teaspoon ground cinnamon

For the nutty crumble topping:- Sift 4 oz flour into a bowl- add 3 oz butter, rub in roughly, stir in muscovado and nuts, set aside.

Cake mixture:- Slice rhubarb into 1-inch chunks and finely grate the rind of orange over it.