It's like Wuthering Heights here!

It is dark, and raining hard and the wind has started wuthering around the house ahead of Storm Eleanor, who will be arriving later tonight.  I was thinking of the Brontes today, as we drove to Gloucestershire and back to pick up some chairs we'd bought at auction.  For the life of me, I couldn't remember the titles of Anne Bronte's novels (I know, I know, I've remembered them NOW!)  I was a  few LOT short on Charles Dickens' output too.  For your peace of mind, this wasn't when I was driving, but when I had laid aside the book I had just finished - the first of 2018 - Felix Francis' "Pulse".  Nice light reading to start the year off - my brain was thinking about revisiting some classics in the coming year.  Instead, I have just started "Dunstan" by Conn Iggulden.  I bought it last year for Keith, but he said it wasn't his style of writing and quickly abandoned it.  I am enjoying it, however.

But I digress.  The weather was foul this morning - pouring with rain, and lowering cloud which didn't help matters driving on the motorway.  As it was the first day back at work after the Christmas and New Year break, there were VERY few (just a handful) of heavies heading out of Wales, and we had left after 9 a.m. to miss the early morning rush-hour.  I was glad Keith was driving as it wasn't nice.  I usually opt to drive home, which is the scenic route via the Forest of Dean, with an occasional obligatory stop at Waitrose in Abergavenny, so I can have a good browse of the goodies they sell which Tescopolis and Lidl don't.  Today I just bought vegetables, apples and some Cinnamon.  We use a lot of Cinnamon and Keith likes to have the better quality stuff (Barts).  He has some on his breakfast muesli and I use it a lot in baking.

We changed drivers at Abergavenny (Waitrose) and I was able to take in some of the scenery.  It was good to see the golden tassels of the first Hazel catkins, and I am sure the Snowdrops will soon be out, though they are slightly later in my garden than elsewhere (the earliest ones I've seen are at Newton House, Dinefwr Park). 

Even whilst driving, I had noticed the recent heavy snow brought lots of branches down across the Forest of Dean, and the wild boar had been feasting on something they loved as the verges were dug up as if by the wheels of a gigantic tractor!  The wild boar are very common there now.  There were long skeins of Old Man's Beard threaded through the roadside trees and bushes, their progress helped by the upsurge of wind from passing cars and lorries.  Winter wheat was coming through in a vivid green in sloping fields alongside the road as we dropped down into Monmouth, where the River Monnow was high and muddy-looking as we crossed the bridge over it.    Weeping Willows were a beautiful tawny tan colour, looking tousle-headed in the wind.  There is colour, and interest in the winter landscape, if you look for it.  I noticed the undulating flight of a Woodpecker as it flew from one stand of trees to another the far side of the road, and a Heron stood one-legged in a water-logged field margin.

Now to things more practical - that recipe I promised you.  It is SO GOOD . . .

The recipe from Emma Mitchell's wonder "Making Winter" book.  I hope the text is clear enough for you to read.  Can I suggest that the chopped preserved ginger ISN'T optional, as it makes it, to my mind.