From Puglia beaches, back to pots and pans. Last week, lunchtime squid.  This week, lunchtime sinks!
But, on the positive side, when I returned to work on Tuesday, everybody was really pleased to see me. Tuesday turned out to be a really happy day in the kitchen.

In fact, when Mr Cooper rang me as usual  at 5.30, to see how my day was going, I replied that I was having an unusually lovely day, and I said that "everyone is pleased to have me back."  

"Have you back?" he questioned, sounding surprised.  "Why, where have you been?" 

Luckily, when prompted, he remembered the lovely week's holiday we had just returned from!

This week, I submitted three pieces of work for the Stride Open Art competition.  http://oxmarket.com/stride-open-competition/  For the past 5 years I have entered at least one piece for it, which have always been accepted, until last year.  My first Oxmarket rejection.
The downside about being a 'creative type' is the fact that you have to get used to picking yourself up, and dusting yourself down.

I always do a lot of thinking and planning at The Greyhound, and last year, whilst washing away,  I imagined how lovely it would be if Mr Cooper, on his free day, would appear at the window with a bunch of red roses.  

 I created a watercolour study based on this idea, and titled the image 'Totally Unexpected'.

And once, to surprise me, Mr Cooper did just that! He appeared with red roses, and we spent my break together.  I think the chefs were also surprised later, as we had spent the break over the road in 'The Three  Cups'  But nothing got broken…...

So last year I created a more finished watercolour based on this.  The stacks of plates have not been exaggerated, but I might have knocked a decade or two from my age!
But hey, I am the one holding the paintbrush.

And this is the image that 'The Stride' rejected.
Next week I will be able to tell you if any of the three I entered this year were accepted or whether I am picking myself up, etc etc.

When I was in Puglia, I was so excited by the different plants that were there, in particular the different varieties of cactus, a secret love of mine.

This was a huge cactus, as tall as an adult, which we watched every night whilst enjoying 

our  'Couples Come Dine With Me' experience.  We were watching, not because there were very long breaks between courses (well only once, really) but because the beautiful flowers on the cactus opened fully only at night time.

I took a holiday sketchbook with me, and used it to write down shopping lists for us all. But also to create some studies of this beautiful plant, thinking I might paint it on my return.

Here is one of the studies…….

………….and here a photo of another cactus.  Luckily, this blog contains only 2 holiday snaps!
Perhaps these will become the idea for next year's entry.  Anyway, tune in next week for the results.

Friday saw me and Mr Cooper back in training for next year, when we hope to walk the South Downs Way in 9 consecutive days.  We have only just realised that we will have to walk twice weekly throughout the winter, but in the meantime let's enjoy walking in the sunshine.

We set off from Chalton, climbing to the top of Chalton Down to enjoy extensive views on the Isle of Wight, the Spinnaker Tower etc.

This is the view of St Hubert's Chapel, Idsworth, built in 1053, which the walk took us past.
Inside the chapel are some amazing frescoes.  One lot dates from about 1300, and another created to mark the millennium by fresco artist Fleur Kelly.  Well worth a visit.

 A little known fact about Fleur is that she has a recipe for lovely bread which she calls a 'Roman Loaf.'  Very easy, an overnight rise then straight into the oven.  In fact, I will share the recipe with you, if so desired, at the end of this blog.*

So after 5 miles of stunning scenery, gorgeous weather, and only one serious uphill, we return to Carlton, and to the Red Lion.  It is very picturesque outside.  Inside there are a couple of lovely old bars at the front of the pub, and then an extensive modern dining area.  My advice, a great place for a drink in the old bars, or a snack in the garden, enjoying the view, which is truly beautiful.
 I would not eat there again, as I dislike food that is overcooked or served cold, and I was given both.
It must take a certain amount of skill to get something wrong at both ends of the spectrum!
Peanuts for me, next time (but I will definitely check the expiry date)

On a more cheerful note, here is a cake that was not overcooked. I baked it for my Mum's 83rd birthday, using a recipe from her Mum's cookery notebook. 'Orange Drizzle with Melted Chocolate Topping.  Rather like a Terry's chocolate orange cake. (And yes, I am still in the process of writing the 'Green Donkey Cookery Book'.  Or at the moment, still in the process of baking the contents of it….. )

It was lovely to spend the weekend with Mum, and lovely as always to see Mark, Ella and Jem.
 And Snowy was pleased to spend some time with his various furry cousins.

As well as baking, I continue to sew.  On this picture of the boys, autumn images and train tracks now surround them.  Only one more textile photo to complete now.  Then hopefully the 'Memory Cushion' project will begin to gain momentum, after the summer break.

I need to gain some momentum now, as in an hours time I am taking part in a 'Creative Writing for Gourmets' event.  Mr Cooper and I decided to try different experiences, so next week I will tell you just what this experience involved, as I have no idea what is to happen!

In the meantime, enjoy your week ahead, and make the most of the sunshine.  I will catch up with you next week, with news of acceptance, rejection, and news of just what gourmets write about, creatively!

And here is the bread recipe.  I have often made it, and now usually make 2 loaves from it, not one huge one.  Try it, and see which you prefer.

*Recipe taken from "New Pauper's Cookbook' by Jocasta Innes and Kate Harris, 1992.

Fleur Kelly's Roman Loaf.

Makes 1 large loaf.

I bag strong white flour.                                1 tablespoon salt
1 sachet fast action dried yeast.                     1 tablespoon sugar

Mix together all the ingredients in a vary large (9 litre/2 gallon bowl)
Add enough warm water to make a loose, sticky mixture.  Stir the mixture rapidly with your hand, just enough to combine the ingredients.  Cover the bowl with a clean, damp cloth and leave to rise overnight, or even the following lunchtime, in the warm near the Aga.
The next morning, give the mixture a quick scoop round with your hand, then turn it into a baking sheet sprinkled with flour.  Put it in the bottom of the Aga's top oven for 45-60 minutes, or until the crust is firm and the loaf feels springy.  Stand the loaf up sideways after taking it from the oven, or the base is liable to become soggy.

The last two weeks have seen me and Mr Cooper embark on a journey from Portsmouth to Puglia, and mainly on public transport.  Be warned, this blog is longer than usual, and contains some holiday snaps!

On the Wednesday before our week in Puglia, Mr Cooper and I got on the train, and descended upon the Historic Dockyards again. This time, we had refined our visit to an hour or so on HMS Warrior, followed by a harbour cruise.

I love The Warrior, especially the fact that you can wander around her at will.  And the weather was beautiful, what better way to spend a Wednesday morning?

Whilst we were on deck, we heard the sound of a brass band playing, and getting nearer.
The brass band was on the deck of HMS Argus, a big Naval hospital ship as she returned to Portsmouth from Africa.
 Nobody was waving from this vessel, they were all standing to attention on the decks.
 It is sometimes easy to overlook the importance of Portsmouth as a Naval base, but not when you are standing on HMS Warrior, witnessing this spectacle.

After that it was time to join the harbour tour, but not before taking an artistic  shot of me in my holiday dungarees, and my amazing holiday crocs.  After years of being dissuaded to buy a pair by my loving sons (they kept pointing out the type of women who were wearing crocs) I decided to break out, and join the ranks of middle-aged croc wearers.  Retro turquoise, what a treat!

There are two things that are really good about a harbour tour.  One is, that it is very informative about all the ships that are in dock.  The other is that it then goes over to Gunwharf Quay, where you can alight for a spot of lunch, and a little light purchasing (today, a lightweight green waterproof jacket, to match my holiday shorts.  The last item needed for my Puglia wardrobe)

Friday saw us back on another train, this time heading for London Victoria, and from there to London City Airport, to stay overnight in the Travelodge nearby.
The view from our window was of the runway.  It was fascinating to watch an assortment of jets and passenger planes land and take off, one side of the runway being a stretch of water, the other a busy road.  Quite a surreal setting.
And on Saturday morning, we discovered what a great airport nestles in this surreal setting.  Minimum queueing and fuss, a good choice of breakfast, and a small but perfectly formed range of shops.

And, when you take off, the ascent is so steep, and the view of London, so spectacular.

Onwards to Rome, then aboard another Air Italia plane to Brindisi, then into the hired cars to the very bottom of Puglia, to a village called Torre Vado.  We were too late to stock up at the supermarket on the way down, and I must admit, as Mr Cooper and I sat in the back of car number one, admirably driven by Rachael, we were both envisaging an evening where there was either black tea, tap water or gin on offer, full stop.
After an hour and a half driving through the darkness, we arrived in Torre Vado at 9 pm, to find two shops still open, full of amazing fruits, cheeses, wines, bread etc.  Gone were the thoughts of a slightly miserable evening as we bought provisions for that evening and the next morning.

The villa was amazing, and the most beautiful accommodation I have stayed in.  We didn't fully appreciate this though till the morning.  The villa was on three layers, with many little stairs connecting various terraces.  The only time we were actually in the villa was to cook and to sleep.  The rest was spent on the large terrace overlooking the olive groves leading down to the sea, or sitting in the outside dining area, doing the same as darkness fell.

Plus add to that the infinity pool, and we were all getting very excited about the week ahead.
The four youngest members of the party were mainly pool-based during the day, with the odd beach excursion added to this.

Of the four older members left, two opted for a combination of sight-seeing, pool and beach, and the other couple opted for beach and local bar. Can you guess which couple we were?

Below is a picture of Mr Cooper engaged in one of our favourite holiday pastimes.  Lunch, with beach either side of it. (For me, always squid, salad and grilled vegetable, and for both of us, always beer)

And here is the local beach, expertly taken by me standing waist deep in the Mediterranean, what a hardship!  It was a very small beach, but as it was not in the school holiday period, there were really us and a few locals there.  So, here began 6 days of a combination of sunbathing, swimming, reading and lunch, with quite a bit of dozing included.

The beach art was fascinating.  Mr Cooper and I thought it seemed to say that visiting Torre Vado will ensure your have a really big erection…….

And if you have to go to the loo on the sand, somebody will be there to clear it up for you.

We thought we were really funny, but apparently we were not, we were very silly and childish.
Well, another thing we have in common then.

What with swimming and dozing, I did manage to slow down my reading.  Always a good point, as I had only four books with me.  Of the two I completed, this was my favourite.

On this holiday, there were 4 people all aged between 30-34, 3 more, parents of 3 of them all being 62.  And me. And, at the tender age of 53, I was a bit surprised to be lumped in a group called 'the oldies'.  Hang on, my shorts are bright green, my crocs turquoise, my toe nails bright blue……….this was not an accurate description of me, surely?

But the above book which follows several generations of the same family, so tenderly describes aspects of growing old, and also the perception the young have of the old.  At the bottom of this blog I am including an optional to read passage from the book that I found so moving.*

And as well as reading, I spent a little time each day sewing ready for the 'memory cushions' project.

Here I am with John and Sam again, but now fixed onto fabric, with blue beads
and embroidery stitches suggesting the sea.

And in the evenings we had our own 'Couples Come Dine With Me', after a jolly good gin.
Bruschetta, risotto, tonne e fagioli, melon with prosciutto, and they were only some of the starters!
As the only thing we hadn't eaten by Friday evening was a pizza, we went out to a pizza restaurant in the southernmost town of Leuca.

'Would you bring us a selection of starters?' Werner asked, as we were deciding which pizza to have.
Well, after carpaccio di tonne, octopus and potato stew, tuna tartare, seafood salad, mixed fried fish, fresh anchovies, mussels with a broad bean puree and deep fried cheese and olive balls, we were not quite so ready for the brilliant pizzas they gave us.  But we munched manfully and womanfully on, till we were completely fully.
Then we drove back to the villa for the last night, too full, and so sad to be leaving.

Here is the final photograph I took on Saturday morning, before we left for Brindisi airport.

And yes, the sea really was that blue.  But what the photo does not show is that it is also 35 degrees C!

As well as being surrounded by olive trees on the hill where we stayed, when we drove to Brindisi, this time in the daylight, we found that almost the whole countryside was planted with olive trees.

So I will end with a lovely painting which was hanging in our bedroom.
 We had a lovely week in Puglia, full of lovely things; our fellow holiday-makers, amazing food, long lunches, beautiful beaches and swimming in the Mediterranean sea.  And always, the backdrop to all these happenings were the olive trees with their twisted trunks and leaves both dark and silvery.

Well, back to work tomorrow, and back to rain today!
 At least we can look forward to planning our next holiday, whilst now eating mainly fruit and salads.

I hope you all have a good week ahead filled with sunshine as well as rain, and I will see you all again soon.  Till then, have fun with waterproofs and umbrellas!

* 'Abby had a little trick that she used any time Red acted like a cranky old codger.  She reminded herself of the day she had fallen in love with him.  "It was a beautiful, breezy, yellow-and-green afternoon," she would begin, and it would all come back to her - the newness of it, the whole new world magically opening before her at the moment when she first realized that this person that she'd barely noticed all these years was, in fact, a treasure.  He was perfect, was how she'd put it to herself.  And then that clear-eyed, calm-faced boy would shine forth from Red's sags and wrinkles, from his crumpled eyelids and hollowed cheeks and the two deep crevices bracketing his mouth and just his general obtuseness, his stubbornness, his infuriating belief that simple cold logic could solve all of life's problems, and she would feel unspeakably lucky to have ended up with him.'

After a three weeks absence I returned to Butser Ancient Farm, to see the Saxon longhouse. 

Wow! Lots had happened in three weeks.  But the mood there wasn't very upbeat.  Darren had had a not terribly enjoyable holiday in France, John didn't seem to be enjoying weaving the wattle walls, and Vivienne the volunteer told me that the whole site was having a bad day, as the onager had not worked.  I tried to look suitably stricken as I wondered what on earth an onager was, to have caused such consternation.  Luckily John revealed all as we hid in the lane, to get away from a hoard of small school children.  Of course, a giant war catapult!

So I did all I could by dispensing just-baked flapjack, inviting Darren over for an evening of red wine and French food, and helping to connect the electricity cables.

  I paused on the way out to admire the pigs.  Even that wasn't very cheery.  I knew the youngsters were almost ready to become different cuts of pork, but a helper told me that the pigs were all going to go, including the two Gloucester Oldspots who have been there a long while.
 I know Mr Cooper is sometimes not terribly observant, but I think it will be pushing it to hide two large elderly pigs in our garden.

 The good news is that  the Anaconda has gained some markings, and I think soon colours will begin to appear.

Then off to buy felt and beads and embroidery threads, ready for my 'memory cushion' project.
I have attached three images to felt, thanks to transfer paper and bondaweb, and my aim is to add hand sewn elements when I am relaxing in Puglia.

It was really hard to choose only three images, but I decided to focus on ones where both John and Sam are together.  I wouldn't want them to know which one is my favourite, now would I?

This one demonstrates quite clearly John's lifelong love of steam, and Sam's lifelong apathy towards it.  Sam is probably striding out in the direction of the picnic, a love which they both share.

This one was taken when we had a lovely week on the Gower peninsula.  The weather was brilliant, amazing for a week in Wales.  

One of the highlights of this holiday for the boys was when a tractor came onto the beach, to remove a sheep that was very deeply asleep!

And a rare picture here of John and Sam together and smiling, and also John smiling whilst at school.

Prepare to be amazed by the work you will see soon.  Hopefully amazed in the right way, as sewing in the evenings whilst on holiday could lead to amazing results that weren't predicted!

Perhaps sew before drinking Primitivo, not during.

Then onto a weekend of pleasure, starting with a party in Bristol, for Jen's 40th and Daniel's 10th birthdays.  The centrepiece to the buffet table, an awesome cake created, cooked and assembled by Val and daughter Katie.

John was born and bred in Bristol, as is evident by his accent, and he has a large, loving extended family there.

It is always lovely to stay, but never quite as lovely the following morning.

But, we had a hangover cure for Sunday, free tickets to watch 'The Rovers' play Oxford 

at the Memorial Stadium.

It was a really good game, and honestly spoilt only by the referee's decisions.  And I for one wholeheartedly agreed with the songs that were sung about him!

The only downside being that, although it was such a sunny day, we had to sit in the coldest, shadiest and windiest stand.  I had a cup of tea in the interval to try to thaw out my hands.  My tip here is, never wear shorts and sandals to a football match, however sunny.

Back to work, but with lovely things approaching on the horizon.  Number one, a week in Puglia.  

And as I haven't done any of the travel arrangements (big thanks Rachael and Jenny here) all I know is we are on the coast at the bottom of the heel, an hours' journey away from Brindisi airport.

And after Puglia, there is a lovely shiny and sparkly star on the horizon.

A firm tick of acceptance to Juliette and Colin's wedding.

We have ticked our menu choices, and I know what colour nail varnish I will be wearing. Sorted, then. And, I am so much looking forward to making their wedding present.  

I just need to do a little research first!

I hope there are lovely things on the horizon for you this week. 

I will be in touch upon my return.  I will be the one with the tan!  Until then, have fun.