Back to the Allotment Blues

For an all too brief time (like Norwich's lead over Arsenal this afternoon) we had what felt like the first day of summer today. Unless I missed it we missed out spring this year. We dashed to the allotment to plant our spuds, far later than in any of the seven previous years on the plot. Or rather the first lot of spuds, we have two more to do.

Not just spuds. A few beans went in, which like second marriages shows the triumph of hope over experience. It was a clearing up from last year day too, so a load of leeks, purple sprouting broccoli and Brussels sprouts were harvested. All of which changes my thoughts about the weekend's food, but then bounty like that is not to be wasted.

The tidying up included chopping down the last six feet of the pear tree we had lopped a few months back. I was busy with a handsaw for ten minutes, then a kind neighbour came over with his petrol-driven jobbie and had the thing down in about ten seconds. But I did saw up some of the trunk into smaller sections to dry off and bring home for the burner - and the new smoker. I collected a bag of the apple logs and logettes that had been drying in the shed over the winter with an eye to making some wood chips for the new toy.

Then it rained and ended both our plans to use the smoker - smoking food in the damp is apparently a waste of time - and the fleeting flash of summer.

With true male logic having a smoker means we need to do more fishing trips, to catch things to smoke, especially mackerel. They'll have to be local, as mackerel don't keep at all well. At the supermarket yesterday I had a look for the fish in case they had some good ones I could experiment on, but their stock had the dead eyes and skin tone of a heroin user.

What Are You Smoking?

I just bought a ready-made home smoker, wimping out of making the design I had in my head for a garden incinerator topped with a dustbin (both new of course) fitted with rods and racks. One motive is simply wanting to give it a go, another something of a V-sign to the food fascists, eating more than a single slice of bacon every six months apparently risking Death's instant scythe.

The third is my fascination, or is it obsession, with the wood for free from our garden and allotment. I have a stack of pear logs in the allotment shed, and in the front-garden wood-store a similar stash of apple wood. They were cut with the intention of burning them in our stove, but from all accounts they smell divine when alight and we would miss that if the wood-burner's door is closed as it should be.

Sadly the weather has turned damp and drizzly, not it seems the ideal for smoking food. But watch this space (if anyone is reading this at all) for reports on progress once it brightens again, and I have laid in a stock of salt and salmon.

FYI the smoker is a telescopic thing, supposedly good for cold- as well as hot-smoking, 29cm wide and when extended 92cm tall (if memory serves), complete with a rack, hooks and drip tray, not cheap at just shy of £100 but it is well-made. They provided a starter-pack of sawdust, which will be added to with our own hardwood stuff as and when, plus I intend splitting pear and apple logs down to the thinnest possible slivers and cutting those into chips, ideally not covered in blood from my fingers. A man can dream.

Government Energy Policy - Cross Our Fingers

The recent cold weather has highlighted the fragility of Britain's energy supplies. Sellafield went into controlled shutdown because of the dangers posed to the workforce by snow; for whatever reason the gas pipe into Bacton, one of the three that keeps the country going, conked out briefly the other day. And our train system that feeds fuel to the major power stations in West Yorkshire is not as robust as it could be - the wrong sort of snow and all that. Add the strains on the system from increased demand because of bad weather here and over the other side of the Channel and it's worrying.

Why we haven't legislated to make a couple of solar panels compulsory on all new build houses is beyond me. Likewise some ration of panel to roof area for offices and other commercial property. Not a solution, but a contribution to one. It was not reassuring yesterday to hear a politician from the department of energy say that there was little chance of gas running out. Little, which translated from message-speak means it is a distinct possibility. There was a frightening headline, albeit tucked away on a back page, in Saturday's Telegraph: Gas to Run out in Two Weeks.

We have an open fire and a wood-burner as back-up. With memories of sitting in the dark in the seventies in my head I added 100 tea lights to my shopping on Friday, and called in for a few packs of compressed sawdust heat-bricks to fuel the stove. Wood chopping in the winter now seems all the more worthwhile, the greenhouse holding a dozen or more bags of firewood.

It is not just heat generation of course, but retention, so this weekend I have been round the house with a sealant gun fixing the little gaps that develop around windows. Small measures but effective and cheap. As would be solar panels if their own dogma (and lobbying by carbon fuel suppliers) allowed our political masters to push them properly. Instead of which we are promised a new nuclear power station in god knows how many years, something announced with much fanfare while the closure of five other conventional units merited not so much a press release as a press escape.

So the government policy is to keep fingers crossed for a bit and hope we're ok. With the fall-back position of blaming it on the previous government, as the previous government when it becomes the next government will also do. Which surely makes us all feel warm inside. Just as well as we could end up facing freezing temperatures without power at some points in the not too distant.

Improvised Kiln-Dried Firewood

A brainwave today has I hope made some huge lumps of ash burner-ready well in advance of their natural drying time. I was burning a load of old papers, credit-card slips etc, in our garden incinerator - one of those holey dustbins with a chimney in the lid. I balanced some of the big bits of ash on the top, turning them regularly to avoid them setting alight, though they still scorched a bit. The results are quite pleasing - the six pieces feel dry enough to burn without worrying about clogging the chimney with moist deposits. 

Don't for goodness' sake try this on the burner itself btw - I did an experiment, monitored very closely, and within a minute or so the wood on top showed signs of smoldering. Round the sides, a few inches away from touching the burner, is in my experience fine, though I always feel better keeping an eye on things. 

Years ago holidaying in a gite with friends at Easter we dried a couple of substantial logs at the side of a big open fireplace. Every night the other guy and I struggled to light the fire, to much comment from our wives. When we asked if they could do a better job on the last evening they more or less set a match to the by then dessicated logs which burst into flame as if soaked in paraffin. So drying's worth the effort. 

Save the Planet, Wear a Hat

There are innumerable small things we can do to reduce our energy use (and thus costs, reliance on Russia and the Middle East, etc etc), thereby lessening our impact on the environment. It seems to me that wearing hats during cold weather is one of the easiest.

I bought a Scrooge-style nightcap for my father the other day, not in his case really for warmth, his house being generally over-heated, but for comfort - and it has helped him sleep better. As he is almost as bald as me, maybe it is something to do with keeping his head as warm as his duvet-covered body.



Our house is a tougher prospect to heat, being somewhat larger and having four rather than two storeys. The central heating here can be all on or all off, so rather than heat the entire house while my family is out, we have the radiators off in the middle of the day, and I wear a jumper. This is no sacrifice, it is cosy. If it gets colder I make sure the wood-burner is fired up to keep the chill off the place, and put on slippers and a smoking cap - quickly taken off if the postman or couriers arrive. If I venture out I wear gloves. This is not a difficult concept to master.

When did we start thinking that we should roam the home in shirtsleeves or less all the time? Pepys I recall (though I didn't know him personally) wore a waistcoat in bed until the spring weather arrived. It used to bug me travelling in the USA when I ran a company there that in summer the offices you visited were freezing, and in winter they were boiling, defying the elements and then some. When I drove with salesmen I wore a sweater to combat the aircon which was set at something Scott would have jibbed at. The attitude seemed to be deliberately wasteful of energy. Here in Preston I have noticed over the last couple of years that even in winter many men out shopping wear shorts or cargo pants, and women have jeggings and micro-shorts.



Is it too much of a sacrifice to don a hat and a woolly in winter, provided you have the means to own such? By not having the central heating on all day we must cut our energy bills significantly. Happily, unless I am imagining it, hats are becoming slightly more fashionable again. Or maybe people have cottoned on to how warm they keep us?


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On Keeping Warm and Solvent

Saturday saw me making an angry phone call from my bed - it was Saturday after all, and old habits like the lie in die hard (once you are through the getting up at five with sprog phase). Our energy supplier had notified us they were putting our direct debit up by 25% with nearly immediate notice. We were substantially in credit, and by their estimate only a rise  of 11% (11%!!) was actually needed to match the expected upturn in our energy usage over the winter. So I told them firmly the figure we were prepared to go to (after waiting 10 minutes on the phone with what amounted to aural torture every minute - if I had wanted to give them a reading wouldn't I have done so the first one or two times they asked?) and they were ok with that. Calculate £30 per month extra in their account earning interest x say 5,000,000 households and they would be earning about £500k per month from us all without doing anything much to deserve it.

That made us reassess our energy usage - all to the good - and go on a turning lights/TV/radio off campaign again. But more than that we are trying an experiment with reducing the time the heating is on (only marginally, losing about an hour a day) but using the wood-burner to boost the warmth of the house at breakfast time (and a fire is so comforting too) and for an hour or two beyond. The wood as other posts have explained is nearly free - a huge load of pine dried for the last two years cost £40 if memory serves, it will last the winter, and we have also cut and dried branches, boughs and now a major bit of next-door's ash tree that came through our shed roof when it fell. The fabric of the building is warmed by the burner, on the bottom floor of four so the chimney conveys some of the energy through the other three.

Piously it also makes me think of those who can't use such a strategy - no means, or strength etc. There are few things more miserable than being cold and damp. While we can continue with this we shall, provided it works. Money is not that tight, but I am. As the one in the house in the middle of the day it affects me most, and I'll happily work with my smoking hat on and even a cravat or scarf if needs be. Louche meets bloody silly.

Word Gets Round, Like My Stomach

Though our garden is thoroughly secluded our next door neighbours must have noticed me cutting lopped branches into wood for the burner, as they offered me the stuff left by a tree surgeon who sorted out a few of their unloved apple trees. It's a pity that the burner is sealed as applewood smells lovely on an open fire.

Cutting wood is about the only exercise I do these days, but it makes me want to do more as the lift you get afterwards - all those endorphins doubtless - is great. Sunday was spent cutting out-of-place branches from the fruit trees on our allotment, sawing worthwhile bits down into more firewood. Trouble is for all it is a great heart-pumping-muscle-straining-aerobic-workout it gives me a healthier appetite than normal. Add to that it was Mothers' Day so a special meal was called for, any calories burned replaced and then some. Eaten outside though, which in mid-March is pretty wonderful. My patent kale-and-everything bruschetta, lentil salad with the remains of Friday's daube cut into it, a ripe tomato salad, roast chicken with potatoes done beneath it plus PSB fresh-picked, green salad to mop up the juices and bought in cheesecake to finish. Plus two half bots from Adnams. Would have needed to fell a whole tree and turn it into firewood to nullify that lot.

Wood Burning

I'm not sure how environmentally friendly or otherwise our woodburner is. It's one suitable for smokeless zones, so is very efficient - hardly any ash and not much smoke. The alternative is gas or electricity that is generated by goodness knows what methods - though we do pay the tiny premium for ostensibly green power. And a tree left on the earth would rot in the long term and produce plenty of gases without warming us up.

In full money-saver mode I refuse to buy kindling. A sack of this costs about £5 from garages and shops, if I take 10 minutes and a sharp axe I can make the same amount, and generally thinner so it lights better, using only a couple of pieces of wood that cost maybe 50p between them.

This morning we had a fire in the burner to cheer Monday breakfast and warm the place up, the temperature has dropped a few degrees in the last couple of days. I must admit that as well as the practical immediate economic benefits - we have lots of trees whose trimmings are dried for burning - I had an eye to future unrest in the world when I suggested buying it. Private Eye seems to be the only publication pointing out that unless the politicians get their fingers out and rapidly the lights are going to go out in the next few years. And if push comes to shove I reckon I could cook on it - one pot stuff, quick fried or, with a heat diffuser, slower stews. What a depressing thought, but one I would guess I am not alone in having.

When the lights do go out how will the politicians cope? In the most creative and useful way they know - blaming the other side, using researchers to dig out 10 year old pronouncements to prove their fatuous cases. David Cameron will be able to burn some of his money, and as everything beyond Oxford and Westminster is outside his experience Ed Milliband will have to ask his team what fire is for. Nick Clegg will look worried and nod a lot.

Barbecue Summers and Dire Winters

It was alarming this morning to hear that several weather forecast companies (now there's a gig - I predict it will rain in Preston next week - that'll be £1000 please) are expecting a very harsh winter. Then I remembered these are probably the same people who assured us a year ago that 2010 would see a barbecue summer.

Strangely I feel rather drawn to the idea of a harsh winter, selfish though that is, as I love the cheerful cosiness of eating in a room with a wood-burner throwing light and heat about the place. We have bought some of our winter log supply, and half of Sunday was spent sawing up two fallen branches from one of the apple trees. Odd how the wood smells of apples, distinctly so. Those logs are now in the greenhouse drying out, there is precious little plant life beyond a big tarragon plant competing for the space.

Economic doom and gloom that sometimes gets to depressive depths, and food inflation running way ahead of the general level, is nudging me to lay in a load of tins and other keepable stuff, may as well invest the money in such stores as see it lose value in the bank. I am reminded of just such a suggestion on the bloody awful Nationwide in the Seventies. And if the world spirals into total economic meltdown we will be able to have tomato ragu and various bean dishes. Add indispensible olive oil to the list then.