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Friday, 8 November 2024

Friday 8th November - just a trifle...

 ... a trifling sort of post, of snips and snaps poached from a newspaper and a blog

This article from the Guardian newspaper appeared in my newsfeed today. I get the gardening columns. Here's the opening section;

I'd never heard of 'Persephone Days' before. I thought it's a rather charming name for this time of year.

This is the last paragraph ;


Yes, amen, and I thoroughly agree.


So this recipe from the Lavender and Lovage blog for a pear and ginger trifle chimes in nicely with this theme. Just don't tell Prue Leith or Paul Hollywood! 

This is the ingredient list. The method is more or less what you'd expect.



First drain and slice the pears. Heat them gently in the mulled wine and let them cool; leave for a few hours or even overnight. 

When you are ready to assemble the trifle, slice the cake into a beautiful cut glass serving bowl, should you possess such a vessel, or else something similar. Spoon a few tablespoons of the mulled wine over the caje to moisten it, then drain the the pears and arrange on top. Cover with custard, then blob the clotted cream on topon top.

Decorate with chopped crystallised ginger, crumbled flake and edible gold glitter...

This the picture from the blog post



I recommend the recipes on the site. They are an eclectic mixture, including many 'old-school' favourites and I have cooked a numberof them over the years.. They aren't usually 'cheat' recipes like this, but as she says, when it comes to a busy time of year, why not!

I was thinking that I could quite easily downsize this for 2, and finish the ginger cake, pears, custard and cream in other ways... the flake leftovers would already have been 'tidied away' soon after the trifling trifes were assembled...

8 comments:

  1. I've done a similar one using the pear juice instead of the wine (for an alcohol free event!) and adding chopped stem ginger.

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  2. RannedomThoughts9 November 2024 at 09:36

    Pears are good in a crumble which is good with left-over custard :)

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  3. I love Trifle! I'm sure it wouldn't be too hard to downsize it.....or just make a big one and eat the lot?

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    1. I'm now pondering some peaches in brandy lurking in the cupboard with lemon drizzle sponge for a trifle...

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  4. I’ve just read this article in Saturday’s Guardian. A treat to buy a real newspaper nowadays but we need it for fire lighting at this time of year. Persephone gardening chimed with me too. I put my veg plot to bed at the end of September by sowing a green manure (blue phaecelia, pink clover and yellow mustard) altho with no frost and temps in the teens I have continued to pick purple podded beans and red dahlias and have only this week cut back the asparagus which was a blaze of yellow. I have put the asparagus fronds in an empty blue glazed pot held up by a rusty iron plant support and they are looking colourful on the terrace. Am avoiding plants in pots around doorways nowadays as they can make the paving slippery and hazardous for my husband who has Parkinson’s. Meanwhile my perpetual spinach and bright lights chard from an April sowing is still going strong and am feeling smug that I made August sowings of these reliable crops to enjoy next spring. Can recommend direct sowing perpetual spinach and chard (the seed is corky and easy to see and handle) in April and again in August for year-round pickings. It stands well throughout the winter months. I’m in West Sussex too Kirsten betwixt Pulborough and Petworth in the village of Fittleworth and we were frost free last year and as I’m on the well-drained greensand ridge everything seems to keep going - even my orange tree (half kumquat and half mandarin) now remains outside all year in a sheltered spot and I made a jar of marmalade with 15 of its little bitter oranges this week. Sorry for long comment- I get a bit carried away when talking gardening! Sarah in Sussex .

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    1. A really interesting and useful comment! Over to the East side of West Sussex we were definitely NOT frost free.
      I shall make a diary note to sow perpetual spinach and rainbow chard in August 2025 as I do like both of those veg.

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