Grape jelly
From the rain soaked derelict vineyard at the bottom of the garden, the wet scent of ripe grapes and rich blackberries called me.
Turns out that Jure Bilobrk is a lovely chap.
So as soon as my man's back was turned, off I went, bucket and scissors in hand, in search of purple fruits. Our own berries under the fig tree were a bit disappointing, but I covered the base of my bucket with some legal fruits.
Beyond the ancient grey stone wall, the pickings were much better. Over I scrambled, avoiding the concrete and metal pilings in the corner. A path opened out and the blackberries and small bunches of semi feral grapes fell into my container. Spiders hung on to the fruit, with earwigs hiding in the leaves.
As the rain fell down, I wandered back to the house and washed the many kilos of grapes, berries and figs. Then I wondered what the heck I was going to do with all this fruit. Later that evening the kitchen was scented with the smell of anise, blackberry and fig compote. Perfect with honey and greek yogurt.
I asked my Croatian friend what people would normally do with 4kios of grapes. Wine, of course. I like immediate results, and I didn't have time to go get all the equipment. I gently heated them, pressed the juice, and made three huge jars of grape jelly.
So as soon as my man's back was turned, off I went, bucket and scissors in hand, in search of purple fruits. Our own berries under the fig tree were a bit disappointing, but I covered the base of my bucket with some legal fruits.
Beyond the ancient grey stone wall, the pickings were much better. Over I scrambled, avoiding the concrete and metal pilings in the corner. A path opened out and the blackberries and small bunches of semi feral grapes fell into my container. Spiders hung on to the fruit, with earwigs hiding in the leaves.
As the rain fell down, I wandered back to the house and washed the many kilos of grapes, berries and figs. Then I wondered what the heck I was going to do with all this fruit. Later that evening the kitchen was scented with the smell of anise, blackberry and fig compote. Perfect with honey and greek yogurt.
I asked my Croatian friend what people would normally do with 4kios of grapes. Wine, of course. I like immediate results, and I didn't have time to go get all the equipment. I gently heated them, pressed the juice, and made three huge jars of grape jelly.
Wibbly, wobbly, stolen purple heaven from the neighbours neglected field.
__________
Does everybody know that just down from the artificially coloured Mall of Split, there is a wonderful nursery with masses of baby plants?
Because Boško was friends with this lady’s husband, so she immediately shook his hand, hugged him and pulled him into the muddy field to ask what he needed. He asked her for five each of cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, and sprouts. A perfectly reasonable amount for my relatively small kitchen garden.
We departed from there with two large, wet carrier bags of at least 20 of each variety, and added to the large pot of raštika that his mum gave us, I was at a boggled loss. Now I had a lot of plants to soil up!
“I am going to have to dig more soil over!”
“Or you could give some small plants away!”
“To whom? Everyone we know has already got their plants in the ground!”
It’s true, despite it being only the end of August, the cabbage comp had literally hit the ground running. Most of the village gardens were chock-a-block with tiny green leaves.
I was excited by my bouquet of green freshness, and when we arrived at the village house, I popped them in the shade nearby. I made the usual cup of tea and coffee to drink convivially with the man. It's a quiet pre-work ritual of love, gentleness, and caffeine. We just sit quietly on the garden steps and listen to the birds.
Inevitably, I started to overthink. I wondered if the cabbages minded been planted next to sprouts. Did broccoli and raštika get along? Then something occurred to me.
__________
Caterpillars
The butterflies are at it again. When the tomatoes and peppers were mourning the end of summer, it was time to wonder if I was brave enough to enter the (unofficial) Croatian season of kupus growing.
I thanked the tomatoes for their hard work and then removed the sad looking plants from the ground. I set about digging over the small patch of garden that sits directly under the kitchen window, which included mixing in all the bunny's pooped that I had added over the summer.
I kept digging and extended the patch for another couple of metres. I had a lot of soil to plant up. Part of this unacknowledged cabbage competition depends on where you get your baby plants from - everyone has a guy who they swear has the best plants. His mum sent us off to a lady near Split's Roman Aqueduct.
Does everybody know that just down from the artificially coloured Mall of Split, there is a wonderful nursery with masses of baby plants?
Because Boško was friends with this lady’s husband, so she immediately shook his hand, hugged him and pulled him into the muddy field to ask what he needed. He asked her for five each of cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, and sprouts. A perfectly reasonable amount for my relatively small kitchen garden.
We departed from there with two large, wet carrier bags of at least 20 of each variety, and added to the large pot of raštika that his mum gave us, I was at a boggled loss. Now I had a lot of plants to soil up!
“I am going to have to dig more soil over!”
“Or you could give some small plants away!”
“To whom? Everyone we know has already got their plants in the ground!”
It’s true, despite it being only the end of August, the cabbage comp had literally hit the ground running. Most of the village gardens were chock-a-block with tiny green leaves.
I was excited by my bouquet of green freshness, and when we arrived at the village house, I popped them in the shade nearby. I made the usual cup of tea and coffee to drink convivially with the man. It's a quiet pre-work ritual of love, gentleness, and caffeine. We just sit quietly on the garden steps and listen to the birds.
Inevitably, I started to overthink. I wondered if the cabbages minded been planted next to sprouts. Did broccoli and raštika get along? Then something occurred to me.
“I wonder which plants are which? I don’t suppose she labelled them.”
I’m not being rude, but all those little green plants look the same.
“You’re the plant expert, don't you know which is which?”
As the sun shone overhead, threatening to melt all the tiny delicate leaves, I took the mašlin and got to work. By the end of the afternoon, all of the mystery plants were tucked into their soil beds, and were enjoying a thorough watering. Only time would tell me which brassica was which, and I couldn’t wait.
As I was packing up the tools and heading into the house, I noticed that the butterflies had magically learned that our garden was once again full of earthy green delights that they could visit and populate with caterpillars.
And so the cycle of garden life continues.
__________
Dubious Trucks
The truck we were in was a disaster. The colour was indeterminate, the seats were coming undone, the passenger side door wouldn’t open, the broken key wouldn’t unlock the unlockable door, and there was a gaping hole where the radio should be. There was also an unearthly whine coming from the engine.
We both jumped in. He slammed the door vigorously and some plastic panelling jumped off in response.
“Put the radio on, it will drown out the noise”, my comedian man yelled as we were going up the old road to Klis.
“You could try singing!”
“Hahaha you think you’re so funny”
The hysteria was palpable as my quietly panicking man was praying that the borrowed truck would hold together. He had borrowed it from his stirapol guy. In the back of the truck was a load of glue and cladding for the house. We were hoping that all the packages wouldn't fly off as we lurched through the hinterland.
We decided that a stop for provisions was a good idea, so we ground to a halt. Then he realised the handbrake didn't work. What followed was pure ballet: I held my foot on the footbrake, he ran around the truck to open my door, and then gracefully came back to relieve me of my foot duty. Fully provisioned up, we set off on our merry way, to the sound of groans, whinges and squeaks of this marvellous truck.
He hasn’t dared to borrow this truck again. My unshakeable man found his limit.
No comments:
Post a Comment