A Little Bit of Black Tie Fun

Well, why not?   

Great British Beer Festival 2011

In his tribute to the life and works of William Shakespeare, Washington Irving quotes the proverb 'they who drink beer will think beer'. This is certainly true. Little less than an hour into GBBF 2011, I wondered if I should purchase a silly hat and beer said yes.

If you do end up buying a silly hat you shall not be alone. There is also a great deal of fancy dress. The bars are named after medical heroes and if you head over to B3 JENNER, I guarantee you will be impressed.

I was told it was all this man's fault.

Going to the beer fest has become something of a birthday tradition for me. I consider it a real treat. Beer doesn't come better than this. All 700 of them are classified as real ales.

CAMRA coined the phrase 'real ale' in 1972 to distinguish a top-fermented beer that is put to cask following fermentation. In the cask is added yeast and residual fermentable sugars, which means the beer is 'live'. It is important that the beer is not pasteurised, nor filtered and that carbonation occurs naturally during secondary fermentation. If the beer ticks all these boxes, and made with TLC, then and only then does it make the grade.

Tutorial over, on to the tasting. There's no sipping here. You cannot taste beer by the sip. It has to be by the mouthful. I insist!

£3 hires you a pint glass which can be filled by the 1/3, 1/2 or pint full. And with measures like that, you can afford to be generous - there was no ending our mirth in shouting rounds for 5 and pocketing plenty of change from a tenner.

Here are the beers that did it for me:
Bar W4 BLACK, Hobsons 'Mild', 3.2% from Shropshire, described as having a roasted, toffee nose, and creamy roasted finish
Bar P7 ROSS, Highland 'Dark Munro', 4.0%, described as 'a dark beer with intense roast aroma followed by summer fruit flavours returning to strong roast malt'
Bar W7 FLEMMING, Goose Eye 'Over and Stout', 5.2%, a full bodied stout, roast, caramel, dark fruit and liquorice palate, bitter finish
Bar W5 HASTINGS, Beowulf 'Dark Raven', 4.5%, a dark brown mild, with a chocolate, coffee nose, and a sweet fruit and nut chocolate taste

'Dark Raven' was by far my favourite.

I would also definitely queue again, no matter how long, for a half of the Gold Medal Winner Mighty Oak 'Oscar Wilde'. They won't serve you any more than that. They want to spread the love. The tasting notes describe it thus: 'Roasty dark mild with suggestions of forest fruits and dark chocolate, the sweet taste yields to a more bitter finish'.

As it was only running off one pump the queue was long. They impressively refused to serve pushers in and there were quite a few. There was one chap whose job it was to watch the queue, and he watched it like a hawk. Well done him. Oscar Wilde was unanimously declared the best beer in Britain by all the judges.

It's a hoot. The pumps are manned by volunteers and brewery-folk and they know the beers best. There are some great beer names such as 'Hedgemonkey', 'Silent Slasher' and 'Joblings Swinging Gibbet'. And you invariably end up meeting lots of very lovely people too, as we did in the Oscar Wilde queue, befriending a Venetian brewer called Filippo who was previously in the caviar industry. Husband also spotted Andrew Ridgeley by P4, looking tanned and in great form.

By the by, Washington Irving shares a lovely anecdote in his essay entitled 'Stratford-on-Aven' [sic]. Apparently Shakespeare was 'as true to his ale as Falstaff to his sack'. Irving tells us that in his youthful days the bard oft went to the 'thirsty little market-town' of Bedford, famous for its ale, for contests of drinking. Staggering the seven miles back home, his legs would fail him by a crab-tree which Shakespeare spent many a night under with his drinking companions, the proof of this being that the crab-tree, still standing, is known locally as 'Shakespeare's tree'.

Sadly there isn't a crab-tree to sleep under by Earls Court. By the time the final bell tolled, I could have done with one. But I urge you still to make your way there. You've got until the 6th. And the bard would approve.

Potato and Egg

I love Potato and Egg. Proper nouns for the two stones salvaged from the wreckage that is my garden. Husband and I have adopted them, thus saving them from the blue rubble sac.

Something Happened

I woke up this morning a whole year older. Fancy that? Apparently I did it all by myself.

It turns out a few people knew this would happen and have conspired to help me survive the day. I am currently opening cards of condolence, most of which are dog themed. So far, this has been my favourite:

It's all very inconvenient. A beer fest has been organised in Earl's Court which I shall have to attend. And before that a lunch at The Bull & Last that needs be eaten. And there was me thinking I had the day to nurse Willow (who has been a bit in the wars) and regret the last drink of yesternight whilst thinking of suitable apologies for not blogging sooner.

So here's the rub. You commit yourself to blogging, get expectations up and then disappoint them. Birthdays and blogging therefore have something in common. They both have the potential for public humiliation.

Dear reader, don't be alarmed. This is all in jest. A great big glorious fib. It's a beautiful day. It is going to be boiling. Willow is on the mend, and I've had a long holiday in Pays Basques, Rioja and Ribera del Duero, which goes someway to explaining the silence. I shall most certainly be blogging about said trip as soon as I've sifted through the 3,000 odd photos I took.

By the way, when the 3rd of August comes around again next year, as it is bound to do, the government are going to ask all Londoners to travel differently.

Beds and Tarts

The blonde pointed out yesterday that I have neglected my blog. This is true. I’ve been playing with tester pots, watching the puppy grow and grabbing any other excuse not to work in the garden, hence negating the need.

Why the sudden apathy? (You ask)

Not apathy! (I reply).  The lull in blogging is down to what I’ve come to consider a period of adjustment, which has required much sipping of chilled wine whilst contemplating the work I’ve done. It has taken some time adjusting to a garden bereft of trees.

But I’m over that. Willow is now twice the size he was when first brought home. He sits when you ask him, will recall if I have sausage and enjoys socialising Parliament Hill Fields way because the walk culminates in a pig's ear for him and a chilled Picpoul for me, carafe of, at The Bull and Last. So without wanting to sound too content, it has all been rather pastoral. It's now raining and Willow is asleep in his new grey bolster bed from Mungo & Maud, which I highly recommend, not least because of the giant hessian sack you get to take it away in. 

When the garden is finished I shall turn the sack into an outdoor pad for Willow, who enjoys sitting on it.

They are almost the same colour.


Also, a few post-Chelsea ideas simply won’t go away.  So it's been back to the drawing board as Bunny Guinness and The Bulldog Forge Garden have inspired the dedication of border 3 to a raised vegetable bed. The blonde’s newly raised beds have also flourished in recent rains and I like that they are neat and that I shall never, in my imagined garden of the future, have to bend over to tend the curly kale. I’ve an eye on the superior range at Harrods Horticultural and am awaiting a quote. Their timber beds featured at Chelsea, where Harrod scooped up a Certificate of Merit.

I also fancy slate walls much like The Magistrates Garden instead of fencing in places. And some fretwork panels here and there. And an outdoor day bed to divide border 2. And on a shoestring budget.

And by September.

With all this hard work to do, I intend to commit myself fully to the task mid July. Until then, walks with Willow are the order of the day. And investing in tester pots, which always proves prudent. I picked up all 3 blacks F&B have to offer. 

Railings

Off Black

Pitch Black

Both Railings and Off-Black lean towards dark slate, particularly in the sunlight, so I've gone for a small pot of Pitch Black in eggshell to test as soon as the weather picks up. F&B’s exterior wood paint comes in either eggshell or gloss; the former has a 20% sheen that I shall gladly live with as Cuprinol's budget matt black in the Garden Shades range has a sheen reminiscent of council jobs. To my eye anyway.

Completely off the point, I thought to share this apple tart recipe with you. I am making it for guests tonight.

I don’t often do desserts. Being terrible at all things pastry, it comes as a relief to find a tart I can muddle through without the stress that comes with the territory. Also, people really enjoy the results – which is what you want.

The recipe is from Smitten Kitchen. It has some pedigree, having come from Alice Waters, who took it from Jacques Pepin who created it some 20 years ago. In keeping with evolution, I haven’t followed the rules. I use the ingredients to produce 2 very thin-based tarts, rather than Smitten’s 1.  It is imperative that you use tart tins that allow you to push the base out. Especially if you are me.

Here are the ingredients:

1 mug unbleached all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

3/4 of a block of unsalted butter, slightly soft and cut in 1/2-inch cubes

31/2 tablespoons chilled water

Filling:

2 pounds tart but firm apples (I use Golden Delicious), peeled, cored (save peels and cores), and sliced

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

5 tablespoons sugar

Glaze:

1/2 cup sugar

What I do is this:

• 1.      Preheat oven to 180
• 2.      I mix the dough ingredients in a blender
• 3.      Kneed the mix into a rough ball adding flour if need be. I often don’t bother chilling it either, as I once forgot and it didn’t seem to matter
• 4.      Divide the ball in two and roll each out on greaseproof paper into a circle roughly the size of the tart tin. The point here is to get the pastry really thin and flip it into the tart dish. Then peel the greaseproof paper off. The greatest joy is that if, like me, you do end up with tears in the pastry, it doesn’t matter one jot. A bit of patchwork, or squidging of edges together, and then the seams remain hidden under the rows of apple slices, which get a lovely glaze from the butter and sugar which binds it all together at the end
• 5.      Peel and core the apples and then cut into thin crescent slices, keeping the peels and cores for later, and then layer them in a fan shape, following the curve of the tart tin
• 6.      Before popping in the oven, brush all over with 2 tablespoons of melted butter, and sprinkle liberally with the sugar, then bake for about an hour, or until golden. It is worth checking it and rotating the tin half way through, to get even colour
• 7.     While it’s in the oven, heat the peels and cores with the ½ cup of sugar in a pan until it becomes syrupy. Brush this over the tart

Chelsea Flower Show 2011

Thursday last the 2011 Chelsea Flower Show went like this: wet, dry, wet, dry, wet, wet, wet. 

The weather didn’t spoil it for us though. It just added to the fun, particularly when intermittent rainstorms would send slurries of punters into the pavilion for an impromptu Pimm’s and brollies mash-up. It has to be the perfect place for inspiration, and if I had a pound for every time I heard the words ‘the rain will be good for the garden’, the Pimm’s would have been on me.

The show comprises of 17 large gardens, 8 smaller urban gardens and the new category of 7 artisan gardens. By the time we got to the artisan gardens, I was beginning to doubt flip-flops as my choice of footwear, but at an average price of £180,000 each, we started in better weather with the large show gardens adjacent to the Pavilion, catching the urban gardens scattered in between.

white peonies and purple fennel

Regardless of the garden, wondering around the 89^th show, it wasn’t individual plants that stood out but combinations that caught my eye. Each and every one boasted borders well put together, be it through the use of strong structural planting, or something seemingly wilder. 

Tilia Cordata

Purple fennel and sage were used as fillers in a number of gardens, often in combination with white flowers such as blousy peonies, and Tilia Cordata (Pleached lime) was absolutely fabulous in the M&G Garden. But don’t despair… if you haven’t 12 years to train the branches in baroque style, Bunny Guinness sourced her trees from a nursery in Elveden.

crushed shell paths

Tourism Malaysia Garden

The Urban category always offers plenty of ideas for city gardens that have lack of space and shade. I finally succumbed to water-feature envy, not with the Tourism Malaysia Garden but with Adam Frost’s The Land’s End Across the Pond Garden, which had water cascading over a large panel of dark polished concrete. Probably more achievable than The Monaco Garden plank and pool combo...

Designer Olivia Kirk had used dark slate for the walls of The Power of Nature Garden, as had Kate Gould of The Magistrates’ Garden. the slate was pretty thin, so got me thinking about how tiled walls could be an option when I set about defining spaces. Slate should not be used to pave a sunny spot as it can get mighty hot and melt the soul of your boots. Not that this was going to be a problem on Thursday. With the heavy rain setting in we headed to the Pavilion.

Carex Obnupta (sedge)

Brizia Media 'Golden Bee'

With borders in mind, my criteria of judgement was anything that would look good against a matt black fence and work well with white climbing roses and herbs. Pavilion highlights for me included Carex Obnupta (a species of sedge) and native quaking-grass Briza Media ‘Golden Bee’, both at the Knoll Gardens stand.

Actea Simplex Atropurpurea 'Brunnette'

Orlaya gradiflora

Then there was Actea Simplex Atropurpurea ‘Brunette’ at the Harveys’ stand. I kept on confusing this with Cimicifuga racemosa ‘Brunette’ which is not a bad thing, as they are both attractive specimens although I have an inkling one might flower yellow later, which would be a no-no for me (I have banned yellow from the garden, or am at least trying to). The two were often planted with white flowers such as Convallaria majalis - lily of the valley, Alium ‘Mount Everest’, Disporopsis pernyl (an evergreen with graceful white flowers followed by black berries), Orlaya gradiflora (photographed above), Astrantia major ‘Buckland’ and Anemone leveillei.

There were some celebrities in the Pavilion, although by name only. ‘Ian Hislop’ was a single dalia, which the bees will like, whilst the carnivorous and rather rubbery Nepenthes ‘Helen’, named after Helen Mirren, made mother and I chuckle. No rose for her then.

Acer 'Seiryu' planted with Libertia Formosa

Hosta 'Pearl Lake'

There were an abundance of large acers on various stands. The limey Acer dissectum ‘Seiryu’ was surrounded on one side with Libertia Formosa. It put me in mind of my acer in border 3 that I shall now be keeping. Nearby Hosta ‘Pearl Lake’ was a beautiful green grey and Tulbaghia ‘Pallida’, although not photographed, another plant to note.

Ligularia 'Britt-Marie Crawford'

Eriophorum Angustifolium (bog-cotton)

Ligularia ‘Britt –Marie Crawford’ is a dead-cert, deep as it is with the colour of liquorish. Eriophorum Angustifolium (common bog-cotton) was entirely covetable, although as it requires a waterside spot, it shall not be coming to Muswell Hill, with me anyway.

Anthriscus sylvestris 'Ravenswing'

'Black Tuscany' kale 

Anthriscus sylvestris ‘Ravenswing’ is however guaranteed a place in my beds thanks to the wonderful Bulldog Forge stand, with its glorious rows of ‘Black Tuscany’ kale and ‘Kalibos’ cabbage. I now know that the soft lamb-tongued plants that have popped up in the planters at home are in fact Stachys byzantine. They have since been potted up and shall be definitely used in the borders to come. Joy to spot the white pom-poms of Viburnum opulus ‘Roseum’ having bought one a month back that has sadly finished flowering.

The South Africa stand translated well through the camera lens, although, like the Thai stand in the pavilion, neither had anything for my garden.

Papaver 'Peony Black'

Paeonia 'Koshino Yuki'

Aquilegia vulgaris 'White Barlow'

Chamaemelum 'Treneague' (Lawn Chamomile)

Santolina chamaecyparissus (Cotton Lavender)

Good for ground cover were Chamaemelum ‘Treneague’ (Lawn Chamomile) and Santolina chamaecyparissus (Cotton Lavender), both at the incredibly impressive Hooksgreen Herb stand.

'Tall Story' Modern Shrub 1984

And finally, there were only a few white roses that I took note of, such as ‘Pauls Himalayan Musk’ and 'Tall Story'. The majority were in soft pastel shades so on goes search for white climbers and ramblers. Hoping I might find ‘Glamis’ on the David Austen stand, I was informed that whilst they do supply it, it isn’t a very good one. How strange that they would stock something that they then advise you not to plant.


In any case, if you missed the show then don't miss the coverage on the BBC iplayer, even if it is only to catch Andy Surgeon enthusing about Alchemilla mollis ‘Ladies Mantle’ and the holy grails of the horticultural world, such as the one achieved this year: Petunia ‘Black Velvet’ is 'just released' and ‘set to ‘revolutionise the bedding plant market’. I was up till the early hours of the morning. I think I fell asleep watching Simon Lycett arrange a bouquet of sweat pea interspersed with mint, whilst telling us that Kate’s bouquet comprised of lily of the valley, sweet William, hyacinths and that we should all move towards buying British.