Antiques Roadshow and a walk round the Botanic Gardens - photo heavy

We spent a few hours queuing in the rain at the Antiques Roadshow at the National Botanic Gardens of Wales yesterday.  We know howto have fun!  Our geese were deemed geese and not swans, which is what we anticipated, but at least I got to have a leisurely wander around the gardens afterwards.  Enjoy!

The beautiful mass of blue flowers are Phlox.  Must get some of these for the garden.

Love this tumbling herb garden.

Isn't this gorgeous - more herbs.

I wish my veg garden was this tidy . . .

On the way out - Purple Loosestrife growing at the pond's edge, it's natural habitat.  Mine here doesn't have wet feet but blooms beautifully all the same.

An anti-inflammatory diet

GINGER CARROT SOUP WITH INDIAN SPICES

3 tblspns coconut oil (or Rapeseed oil)
1/2 tsp. yellow mustard seeds
1/2 tsp coriander seeds
1/2 tsp curry powder (I like a bit of a kick so used a dessertspoon of hot curry powder)
1 tblspn minced ginger (I used a one inch nub of peeled fresh ginger and grated it)
3 cups thinly-sliced carrots - this is about 12 oz/340 g - 4 largish ones
1 1/2 tspn grated lime peel (scrubbed first to remove any pesticide residue) 
2 red onions, chopped
Four cups vegetable broth (I made my own veg stock using up the cabbagey bits and some craggy carrots etc sifted from a stir fry pack, and added veg trimmings from the pack I have in the freezer and add to when I prep veg.)
2 tsp. lemon juice
1 tblspn low fat yoghurt

Grind the mustard and coriander seeds.  Heat some coconut oil in the pan on medium high.  Add the ground mustard seed and coriander powder and stir for 30 secs.  Throw in ginger and stir for 30 secs.  

Add onions, carrot and lime peel.

Stir for 2 mins and add 3 cups veg broth.  Bring to boil and them simmer for around 30 mins or so until carrots are tender and cool.  Puree.  Pour back into pan and add around 1 cup veg. broth.

Bring to boil and cook on simmer for 5 mins.  Stir in lemon juice and seasoning.  Garnish with yoghurt.

I'll put up a photo of it in a bowl when I have some at lunchtime.  Recipe from a book of Anti-inflammatory recipes I have on my Kindle.  There seem to be dozens of this sort of book available now.  Inflammation is at the bottom of so many diseases and gut-health is now seeming to be of extreme importance to health.

Since the worsening of my asthma seems to be partly gut-related as it is immediately obvious that I have eaten something I shouldn't, I am on a low-histamine diet, and including as many anti-inflammatory recipes as possible. This is a whole new way of eating - I am normally a bung-it cook, just making the same recipes I have always eaten - tasty meat-based dishes with tomatoes/onions/beans/veg. Think Spag. Bol, curries, casseroles, chillis etc. Now the larder is full of tins of various beans and glass storage jars filled with Quinoa, Bulgar wheat, Cous-cous, Millet, Brown Rice, Red Rice, Barley and all sorts of other whole grains, plus a gigantic earthenware jar full of rolled oats . . .  My comfort zone is definitely being pinched!

So, we shall see how much this helps - I do know if I eat Dairy at the moment I get a "hit" with my breathing, so am having to avoid that but hope to start introducing a probiotic yoghurt - and Kefir - again soon (desperately needed to recolonize my gut as my recent gut microbiome test revealed the total absence of several very necessary "good guys" in my microbiome.  That's the result of being on antibiotics for 3 years because the GP couldn't be bothered to have a sputum test done to see what was causing the repeat infections . . .)

Anyway, I see my Asthma clinic nurse next month and am hoping she will get me into the system to go and see someone in the Immunology department at Cardiff Hospital to try and turn this round.

Sorry, I'm wittering.  Been up since 4.15 a.m. and have time to kill as I can't do housework whilst Keith's still asleep.

Then we went to Kington

Photos rather than words today as I've been awake and doing since 5 a.m. this morning.  This is a view of the middle of Kington which follower Marlane should remember very well.  It was such a peaceful little town, but I am guessing it is busy on market day each Friday.  There's a Saturday market monthly too - crafts and what have you.  There were 3 charity shops, banks all shut (as they are everywhere - nearest one is probably Hereford, or perhaps Leominster), and a good selection of individual traders, plus a Londis and places where you could suit most of your day-to-day needs.  Everyone was SO friendly and if we do move to that area, I have already been offered a place helping at the local Riding for the Disabled group, which would please me no end.

Anyway, back tomorrow, with photos from our outing to the Antiques Roadshow valuations which were held at the National Botanic Gardens today.  We stood queuing in the rain for quite a while, to discover - of course! - that our geese were just geese and not gilded swans!!

What a place to put a telegraph pole - totally spoils that lovely view!!

A day out in Hay and Kington - Part I (Hay)

Keith and I had a day out in Hay today, which was very enjoyable - and we chose Market Day especially.  We stopped for fuel in Sennybridge, and I couldn't resist taking a photo of this practical solution to taking your car with you on a delivery (or perhaps they had sold it).  I presume it was put up there by the same fork-lift-truck that put the straw bales up there . . .  You can't say country folk aren't practical!

We caught up with friends and had some real belly-laughs, then we had a wander round the Market.   This is always a very tempting stall for me, but I was good and only bought some Rosemary, some Ground Mace and more Pumpkin Seeds.

The fruit and veg stalls always remind me of the roadside ones the Market Gardeners around Southampton had on the side of the roads.  Mind you, these are a bit more upmarket with an interesting array of vegetables (in my childhood, such things were more basic staples and lots of Strawberries).

A bevy of modern Welsh blankets to choose from.

More tempting vegetables.  As I am largely vegetarian - nay, Vegan at the moment as I can't have any Dairy produce, I was looking at this spread and planning what I could make.

Gorgeous rugs and baskets (I have 3 of the latter, one for shopping and two which have craft stuff in them, wool etc.)

The flower stall . . . I may just have been tempted here.  I blew £5 on a gorgeous deep violet purple Salvia nachtvlinder - never seen one before and hope it survives the winter here.  I'll add a photo tomorrow (when I've taken one).

Just one view taken near Kington, to tempt you to check out tomorrow's post:

When I can't sleep . . .

Although I'm stepping down off the steroids now (6 today), I still found myself wide awake at 1.45 this morning and came down to "do things".  I put tv on and watched Alaska's Last Frontier - about a Swiss family who came to Alaska after WWII I think, and began homesteading.  Now their extended family live off the land and their resources, and I love the way nothing is wasted and everything gets repurposed.  Although they all self-sufficient and hunt and fish as well as growing vegetables, beekeeping, raising beef etc, they have stockpiles of "dead" vehicles and mechanical things, huge piles of firewood, trees for building as of course they have built their homes from scratch too.  OK, some of the cheesy set-up scenarios demanded by the Director make you grate you teefs but on the whole I really enjoy it.  

Whilst I was watching the Christmas episode - and of course all gifts are home-made too - I was also polishing up a pair of lovely old brass hinges which have been in one of Keith's piles of useful stuff in the barn.  They were black with dirt but have polished up beautifully and are a lovely design too.  They are destined to hold a new-old door to change what was once a solid oak wardrobe (£1 from an auction over 30 years ago) converted to a bookcase ever since, into a storage cupboard (or bookcase with door).  The door in question cost £10 from Ledbury car boot sale last year and has been sat waiting for a purpose . . .  The handle for it has also just come from Keith's stash . . .  One slight problem has arisen - the whole carcase of the bookcase has twisted from the weight of the books and being on an uneven floor - so problems for Keith's reconfiguring.

This will be a harder bookcase to cull as really I want to keep most of these . . .

A work in progress . . .   Sorry, the flash didn't work on the bigger photo.  It's an antique hand-sewn wholecloth Welsh quilt, stuffed with wool, and being rebound by me and mended with the trimmings from the most badly-damaged edge where it has been clutched and held for a century of nights and worn quite through in parts.  As my stitches echo that of the woman who made it, I feel such an affinity.

The times they are a changing

We had a busy weekend, as ever.  Our son was here on Saturday to help out with some outside jobs, so I had a baking session (which I always enjoy: baking is "me".)  I made the top recipe using Blueberries and then some Raspberries from the freezer (home grown ones from last year).  I didn't have a Passionfruit, so omitted that. This was scrummy, but sadly I got a "hit" (as in they affected my breathing) from the Raspberries, as on an Elimination Diet at the moment and hadn't had any for a year anyway.  Danny went home with half of this and half of the Blueberry & Lemon Clafoutis (below), which was also very tasty and made using some lovely Duck eggs from our friend and neighbour Nikki.  The colour of the yolk was almost orange from them being pasture-fed and it made the batter a beautiful Primrose colour.

For our lunch I made a pizza - just white pizza dough, sprinkled with 1/3 pack of Spicy Chicken pieces, and then sprinkled with Cheddar.  Oh My - it was GOOD.  I'll make that again.   Sorry - no photos of that - we ate it too quickly!

No snazzy dishes for me - I just use my favourite battered old 50p (car boot sale) enamel dishes.

LOOK - this has NEVER been seen before.  An empty bookcase.  It used to hold my books on Edward Thomas and my poetry books.  I had a cull of my Literary bookcase in the blue bedroom yesterday and emptied two shelves - enough to take all the books from this bookcase which I was keeping, but this was culled too and we took four big boxes of books to the Red Cross Book Shop in Llandeilo, to be rehomed (and to make them lots of money I hope).  I even began a cull of my cookery books, and ruthlessly got 15 or so out and took most to the Charity table in Tesco to find new homes.  Some are more valuable and I will list those on eBay.

I just hope that the Universe has cottoned on to my Downsizing Intentions and will send us a buyer SOON, especially as Danny persuaded me that yes,  we could radically downsize to the cottage I liked the best (which Keith considered hopelessly small because we have too much furniture).  Danny said we needed very little furniture and that 9/10 of it SHOULD be sold.  They didn't want to inherit that problem when we shuffle off this mortal coil . . .  That was SO liberating to hear.  That said, some of our furniture is very beloved and it will be hard to choose which bits to keep for storage/use.  If it's a piece that Keith has restored, he feels a deeper affinity than I do.

I had to go to the Doctor's yesterday - well, I saw the nurse-practitioner (new one on me), who was very helpful.  We discussed my problems and the way my asthma is affected far more by what I am eating now, although the pollen on top at this time of year makes it so very much worse of course, and is the reason I've had to take a longer course of steroids - coming off them now, thank heavens, a week later than I wanted to be.  I am booked in to see my very good respiratory nurse in 3 weeks' time, and I need to be referred onwards to see an Immunologist at Cardiff to try and sort out the gut problems regarding histamine intolerence/DAO levels etc, but meanwhile I am having to radically change what I am eating, and all dairy has to be sidelined for the moment as I had such a bad reaction last Sunday.  So basically I am eating lots of vegan meals only with meat on the side, so to speak!  Low-histamine fruit and veg only, and anti-inflammatory foods as well.

Breakfast this morning was an oaty pancake with blueberries.  It was very . . . solid!  You grind down your oats to make the flour, mix with - in my case - coconut milk.  I omitted the two small bananas as they affect DAO in the gut, and then I fried up in a little coconut oil.  The recipe said to pour the mixture into the pan - well it lumped in and the photo of little pancake looking things bore no resemblance to my lumpen effort with blueberries on the top.  It felt like I had eaten a lead balloon afterwards and I think if I make it again it will be half the oats and more coconut milk!

Right, now I'm off down to make some Spicy Carrot Soup for lunches this week, with lots of anti-inflammatory ingredients.