Yesterday I made Jamie Oliver's 'Cheeky Chilli Pepper Chutney' from his 'Jamie at Home' book. It's nice - quite hot and spicy. It's a fairly simple list of ingredients: red peppers, chillis, red onions, rosemary, cinnamon and bay leaves, balsamic vinegar and brown sugar. But it's a bit of a palaver grilling all the peppers and chillis until charred, blackened and blistered all over, then putting in a bowl covered with clingfilm until cool, then peeling off all the skin and removing the pips and pith. Luckily I had my parents visiting, and they helped with this part. And after all that, only 3 and a bit jars! I didn't have any of my own peppers either, which slightly defeated the object, mine aren't ripe yet. However I might try doing it with tomatoes instead of peppers, or maybe a combination, once my peppers start to ripen.
Here are my boxes of tomatoes, in various stages of ripeness:
I should really go and pick some more, before they all get blighted.
Today I went to have a peek at the allotment show. I haven't been to anything like this since I was a child and I used to enter the children's miniature garden category. I can't remember if I ever won anything. Anyway, today's show was quite an education. The same few names appeared again and again, and some vegetables weren't even represented at all, eg courgettes and squashes, french beans, cucumbers, brassicas other than cabbages, and fruit - nothing except apples and one plum entry. If there's only one entry in a category, you automatically get first prize don't you? I don't know if there just weren't other categories, or whether there were but nobody had entered them. There was only one pot of jam - if I'd entered one I could have at least won second prize??? Maybe next year...
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