Category Archives: Living in UK

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Friends With Benefits

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If you are American you are probably are familiar the expression, friends with benefits that I’ve used as a title for today. John thought it meant having friends who receive state benefits when I asked him what he thought so after explaining the American meaning of the phrase to him, I decided to add a link for those reading who might need more information. I’ll be using those three little words a bit differently today to illustrate a few of the benefits I have discovered after making new friends here in Cornwall.

My husband John and I have a great life together which I would say is only missing two things, one of which I barely notice now, but most of my American readers would think impossible to live without. I know I did at first and still struggle a bit with it on some of the cold and wet days that seem to stay with us for long stretches in the winter.

Georgia winters are cold and wet too so that was nothing new, but making it through the damp days without a tumble dryer as Brits call the other half of the washer/dryer combo was a whole other beast. John thinks they are a waste of energy and has never owned one. Two years into a dryer-less life, I find that I have adjusted to hanging them on a clothesline in all sorts of weather and I am no longer ” bovvered “ as Lauren Cooper might say.

The other thing I miss is having my own dog. We travel so frequently that it really is impossible to consider getting one. It would be too hard on the dog to board at a kennel and too costly as well. So for now we remain dog-less at least in our home anyway.

You see everywhere I go in this village there seem to be dogs and some people don’t stop with one, they have two or three. So there are always plenty around to play with like Cherry and Nigel’s new puppies that I had an opportunity to photograph in the churchyard on Saturday.

Remember what I said earlier about friends with benefits … well, having a chance to play with sweet puppies like Alfie and Dougie are two of the benefits that go with having Cherry and Nigel as friends. Not that those too aren’t great on their own, but letting me cuddle up to their new boys makes it just about perfect.

Remember what I said about having not one, but two …

I almost can’t stand the cuteness whenever I am around these two.

Dougie chasing Alfie through the primroses.

Looking for something to nibble.

Striking a pose.

Alfie discovering someone else on the scene.

Mark and Nigel trying to get Dougie to pose while Alfie pretends he is a patch of white primroses on the ground in between them.

Dougie doing his best to look aloof.

One of me in the pub with Alfie … pubs with dogs … heavenly!

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Finding The Roots In Our Stories

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Seventeen years ago, my husband’s mother died. She had not been in the best of health, but still her death was unexpected when it occurred. It happened fast. She had put a bunch of cut branches from a twisted willow tree in her garden into a vase of water to use in a floral arrangement not long before she went into the hospital. The cuttings were still in the vase with almost no water left around the new roots when my husband John noticed them a few weeks after her funeral while stopping by to check on his dad. He picked up a handful on his way out and took them home to plant around his house. Over the last seventeen years, he’s moved five different times and always taken a few cuttings grown from the original twisted willow while leaving the the larger plants behind in the ground for the new homeowners.

I loved the twisted willow that John planted in the garden here, at first because it was so pretty, and even more after he told me the story of how bits of it had moved with him over the years. My grandmother was always picking up cuttings or passing them on and the story he told reminded me of her and how she would pinch off a piece of something I’d admired and send me off with directions on how to make it grow.

Last summer I met Sarah online when she left a comment on this blog post. Later on when she and her sister Suzanne came to Cornwall on holiday, we had a chance to meet in person. Earlier this week Sarah sent me the picture below after reading my blog post here. It is a piece of twisted willow that I gave her when they were here last summer.

She planted it in a pot and now it has new roots and another story to go with it should she pass a cutting on to someone else. Sarah can tell them about her American friend that she met online because of cows and caution and how she brought home a bigger memory than just a walk through the buttercup field with her sister Suzanne and their new friend Elizabeth who kept them late that day because she had one last story to share about John, and his mother, and the twisted willow.

Suzanne, Sarah, & Elizabeth 2009

 

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Hanging On When It Looks Hopeless

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Last year for my birthday, my husband John planned a lovely get away to St Ives. Along with an overnight stay at the sweet little B&B below, he surprised me with a stop along the way to buy a Dogwood tree for my birthday because he remembered that I had talked about missing the Dogwoods that bloomed in my Atlanta neighborhood every spring.

This is what my Dogwood looked like when we got it last September. It seems to have made it through the winter snows we had here and has even begin to put out tiny new leaves as you can see below.

We would be seeing an explosion of color by now if we were in Georgia, but the Dogwoods here will not reach their flowering peak until much later. It was early June last year when I realized that Dogwood trees grew in England. They were in full bloom then which is long after you would see their flowery bits in Atlanta.

When we brought it home last September, there as a small piece about 4 inches long that broke off in the car. John slipped it into a small vase of water and put it in the kitchen window where it sat looking like a dead stick for the last five months. I almost tossed it a couple of times, but since John has the green thumb, I deferred to him and left it there.

A few weeks ago I considered dumping it again. It looked so dead that I wondered why he was keeping it. So I took it out of its watery grave and sniped off the end. I gave it a fresh bit of water like John had been doing for months and stuck in back on the window ledge. After all this time, I did not expect much. In fact, I thought we would be tossing it into the compost bucket soon, but today I gave it a passing glance like I have all winter and guess what I saw.

The top looks the same as it has all winter, but hello, what is that I see inside the glass.

It’s new life … welcome back my little Dogwood.

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All Aboard

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My sister Margaret saw pictures of my completed new studio space this morning and said something while we were iChatting that made perfect sense when I took a second look. She said my new space made her think of the Orient-Express. It was a combination of the wall lights, the interior windows facing the corridor leading into the larger space, and the vibrant colors. Additionally, she thought that the curve of the coving (crown moulding) gave it a bit of a train cabin interior especially around the bookshelves and daybed. I did a little internet search and although my studio is not quite as swish as a cabin found in an Agatha Christie novel, I can see what she means now. What do you think?

This photograph will give you a clear picture of how the door looks.

The orange curtains make everything glow a lovely warm shade in the morning before I open them for the day.

I love this shot of the entry taken from the other side of the glass door.

The picture that welcomes me when I come into my space is one of my daughter Miranda. It was taken when she was about 18 months old while sitting in my grandmother’s old wicker chair.

I know I am being a terrible tease here, but I will be back tomorrow with more of the big reveal.

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I Thought Those Sheets Were Clean

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If you have slept in our guest bed anytime in the last year, the cleanliness of your sheets may be questionable. When I first moved to Cornwall, I used John’s choice in laundry detergent for a short while, but given the lack of a tumble dryer combined with John’s desire to buy the cheapest best value soap powder, I found my line dried clothes felt a bit like cardboard. So I launched a campaign for something that would satisfy my requirements and went in search of a laundry soap that would not have an overbearing fragrance or be too hard on my clothing.

After several trips to Morrisons, I found what I thought was just about perfect. I read a lot of packaging information while trying to decide which one would work best. You would think it would not be too difficult, but being an American living in Britain can sometimes make product recognition a little confusing. Even if it has a name I recognize it is often packaged in a completely unfamiliar way or smells differently than the American version. For the record, I have yet to find an unscented laundry soap over here, but I thought using the product below that was made for babies was a good compromise. It had an acceptable smell and it left my clothes soft.

I think it was an easy mistake to make, I mean it looks like liquid laundry soap … right? It clearly reads 42 WASHES at the top. I see wash and I think detergent which seemed reasonable until I tried to buy some more yesterday in a different store. Something in the display made me think hmmm … followed by, uh oh!

Do you see what I see in the box midway down? That’s right, the words, ” Comfort clothes conditioner.”  In America this would be referred to as fabric softener, a product designed to make your clothing soft to the touch, not to wash away dirt.

Okay, so now I’m better equipped with the bottle of Surf detergent above, but you should have seen the look on the faces of the two women who were stocking shelves at Trago Mills when I said, ” You mean Comfort concentrate is not laundry soap.”

I can’t say for sure, but I think I saw a smirk and a head shake pass between them. I was too busy thinking about how long it had been since my clothes had seen a bit of soap. On the positive side, it’s nice to know that my itchy skin is more likely due to excess fabric softener instead of early menopause.

If you happen to be some of our friends or family that have been planning a visit this year … rest assured, I have it sorted now and you will definitely have clean sheets.

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Waiting

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I took the fuzzy picture above from a fair distance through our kitchen window. It’s a view I see at various times of the day as Fudge, the cat in the picture sits waiting for his owner to come home. John says he is only waiting for his next meal, but he is out there at the end of the drive twice a day, just as he always was before his owner died a week before Christmas.

Several neighbors have taken turns feeding him, but when I try to coax him over for a little snack, he runs away. The man’s daughter lives several hours from here and does not know what to do with Fudge. He won’t go with her and he won’t stay put. As far as we can see, he likes to roam. He keeps his distance from people … sometimes even those like me with hand out for comfort and a bit of food to nourish. I keep reaching out, but Fudge cannot bring himself to be comforted or even fed by someone he doesn’t recognize.

I on the other hand, wanted to say how much I appreciate the kindness of  all of those who stopped by … even the new names that I do not recognize yet. Your messages of support and encouragement after reading this post were a great comfort to me as I am sure they will be to Ray when I am able to share them with him. Thank you so much for taking the time to share your thoughts.

As for Fudge, if you live in Cornwall or close by and would like to take in an independent outdoorsy cat, I can put you in touch with the right person.

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We Won!

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Wednesday night you will generally find us down at the pub having a bite of dinner and enjoying a little friendly competition with the folks who turn up for Quiz Night. I have written about this before on my old blog here and mentioned it in a few other places as well.

John and I tend to be somewhere in the middle of the teams and don’t often move too far up or down in the rankings from week to week. There are some brainy groups who always seem to win or at least finish in the top three, but it’s rarely been us. Well, once we did finish first, but we were part of a team of six instead of our usual two so while it was fun, it didn’t feel as sweet as it did last night.

I have to say here that I always feel a bit of pressure when there is what people in the pub would refer to as an ” American” question. Last night, we played with Jean and Robert who were also at the pasty making competition. They always do well and frequently win or come in second so we had a much better chance right from the beginning than we normally do.

It was a killer quiz and seemed much more difficult than usual and I struggled as I often do to come up with the answers to questions I think of as ” British” questions. One example of this might be a rugby question about a famous player from 1970. Now there is no way I am going to get a question like that one right, but the pressure is always on when it’s about something related to American trivia.

Last night’s combination of Jean, Robert, and John left little for me to do much of the time as they were usually whispering the answers to each other while I was still digesting the question. In fact, there were only two questions I answered that my teammates needed help on and while I knew a few others, they were the type most of us would know.

I am often teased here in a good-naturedly way about my competitiveness which I prefer to laughingly call enthusiasm. One example of my “Enthusiastic nature ” might be the difference in how I react when the answers are read at the end of the quiz. In a room full of people who at most give off a soft murmuring sound when they’ve found they have answered a tough question correctly, my loud ” YES! ” coming out of the corner tends to draw a bit of attention.

Last night, there were two questions like this for us, questions that I answered that no one on our team could answer. I can’t remember them both, but the one that stands out was, ” What was Nancy Reagan’s maiden name ?”  It seems easy until everyone looks at you for the answer since it’s an American question and for a few minutes I was blank only remembering it when I thought of her daughter Patti Davis who used her mother’s maiden name after disagreeing with her father’s politics.

After we placed first, I was excited, but felt like it was more their victory than mine as I had only known two answers that they couldn’t get on their own. This morning though I can see it a bit differently. While writing the details of last nights win, I just realized that the points difference last night between first and second place was … two questions.

This is the regular team of folks that Jean and Robert usually play with on quiz night. Robert and Jean are in the darker purple shirts at one end of the table with Helen and Jeff at the other. Karen is sitting in between Jean and Jeff and has moved back to Canada recently freeing up a spot on their team. Jeff and Helen couldn’t be there last night so we joined Jean and Robert to create the Anglo-American Alliance.

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And The Winner Of The 2010 Best Pasty Is

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I wanted this so bad I could taste it, but the winner of the 2010 Pasty Contest was…

… not me! The winning pasty was made by Rebecca, the woman you see above. I have to admit her Scotch egg pasty was spicy and delicious and as you can see below, beautifully made.

Competition was fierce among 21 contestants and while I scored a respectable 120 points, the winning numbers were 139, 134, and 129. Second place was captured by Pauline who rushed in late and whipped up a Pigeon pasty that earned her a spot in the winners circle.

Robert and Ian, who made their pasties on the same table tied for third. Robert, who you see closest to you is rolling out the pastry for what will be his stuffed to the max haggis and potato pasty while Ian is almost ready to begin putting his rabbit pasty together with onions and a bit of mustard sauce. With key ingredients such as rabbit, pigeon, haggis, and scotch egg making up the winning pasties, you might wonder what of some of the others 17 varieties of pasties contained.

There were several versions of spicy indian mixtures along with lamb, beef, and chicken. A Christmas pudding pasty with cheese and chillies along with several fish pasties added options for snacking and included Helen’s smoked halibut, cod, and asparagus combination which looked really yummy. Several contained breakfast ingredients that included baked beans and black pudding. I must admit that I gave those a miss. I can’t yet get my taste buds around black pudding no matter how good people say it is.

That’s Len’s pasty ready for the fold over, but first …

…  he decided he needed a quick break below …

… for some liquid refreshment leaving his wife Mary hard at work on her own above.

We made pasties in shifts at the tables while others strolled around offering praise or advice while checking out the competition.

Robert gives his wife Jean’s ( that’s Jean, who sometimes comments on my blog) pasty technique a good look after putting his entry in the oven.

Next to Jean is Helen, who came up with the pasty-making party idea and did all the work to make it successful right down to making the great looking award you saw Rebecca holding in the photograph above.

That’s me in the apron working next to Kate. She made three pasties while I was still finishing up my first one, but she did say she used to make them in a shop so she’d had a bit of practice. My pasty took a bit longer too because I made something no longer seen in the area, a two course pasty with a sweet on one end.  It was the only two course pasty in the competition and Gary, one of the judges said later that he really liked the sweet part of mine in particular.

A two course pasty requires a little pastry to separate the sweet from the savory. Can you tell what’s inside mine yet?

After the making …

came the baking …

… and then the waiting …

… until it was time for the tasting.

The three judges went first. I need to add here that Gary, David and Griz each ate seven pasties over the course of the evening and the variety of ingredients made some less appealing to me than others so a big well done to all three judges.

As they came out of the oven, the judges took one pasty from each plate and split it three ways leaving two to be taste tested and judged by the other pasty makers who each had a chance to leave a number and a vote behind.

We’ll call it the people’s vote. It was only a small percentage of the total score, but seeing what your plate looked like after the table was rushed by the hungry hoards, did a bit to ease the disappointment of not winning later.

Number three on the end is my pasty sitting next to the scotch egg pasty that won first prize.

Here is a look at my plate ( number three ) after the other contestants had a taste. So while it’s not a trophy, I think the empty plate reflects public opinion fairly well. Some of us laughed about the competitiveness of Americans, but I think there were a few other people who coveted that trophy as well.

Now down to the nitty gritty, packed inside my Cornish pasty was a decidedly Un-Cornish set of ingredients. It contained a mix perfect for a tailgate party or a 4th of July celebration. With slow cooked pulled pork barbecue, a bit of coleslaw and smattering of cheddar cheese filling the main section, there was also a tiny bit of dessert tucked on the end made from a sweet potato pie mixture that included brown sugar and pecans. It really was pretty yummy or scrummy as one might say here.

Now I need to say that I am really just teasing about being so disappointed in not winning … I had a great time and I learned a lot about making a local dish. In addition to a fun evening there was a fund raising element involved as there so often is at these kind of events. After the small expense of the village hall rental, and a few other things, we had 45 pounds left to donate to Shelter Box, an international disaster relief charity that has it’s headquarters here in Cornwall.

Thanks again to Helen and her partner Ron who did so much work to make the event run smoothly and to the judges Gary, Griz and David.

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Cornish Pasty Competition – Bringing It To The Table

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Today is a big day for me. I am going to be participating in pasty making competition here in the village in a couple of hours and I am so excited. When I told my step-mom Cullene about the contest the other day, she said, ” I never thought I would hear that you had entered a cooking competition.”  I worked so much when I lived in America that I barely had time or energy to think about proper meal planning and saved any cooking beyond the basics for special meals. So until a few years ago, I would have laughed at the idea too. Living in Cornwall has brought out some skills I didn’t know I had and the luxury of time to explore new areas is a gift I don’t take for granted.

Although today’s pasty competition is mostly an excuse for a party with some friendly competitiveness thrown in, I have to admit that I am taking it pretty seriously. The winning part doesn’t really matter as I have had such a good time preparing a taste of the American south to go inside my Cornish pasty, but you know … it might be kind of cool to win too.

I just finished a trial run to see if I could get the twisty fold-over thing down that you do along the edge. It’s a bit tricky, but I think I managed a respectable job. We have to make three identical pasties and we will be judged on taste, presentation, and innovation in the filling. It ought to be a fun evening and I will be taking lots of photographs to share with you later.

I’ll leave you with a little quote from a famous chef that is beginning to make more sense to me now …

“I was 32 when I started cooking; up until then, I just ate.”

~Julia Child

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All This And Each Other Too

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Yesterday, after a working on my studio space which is almost ready for its big unveiling, John and I took a little walk. We went out the door with a clear mission seeking the first signs of spring. We were hoping to find Snowdrops, the flowers you see below.

Pushing through the earth on an old grave in the churchyard, we caught our first glimpse of the green and white flowers.

Moving farther down the hill, we went to a secret place we know of that will look like a carpet of green and white in a few weeks as the snowdrops raise their heads and begin to open. Most of them are still budlike and new, but if you go in close for a better look, scattered among the green stalks with their bowed heads of tightly closed petals, you can see a few opening with centers that look almost etched with color in vibrant shades of green.

We follow a familiar path as we walk through the buttercup field and cross over this water. As I take this photograph,  I comment to John that this is the shade of green I wanted to duplicate in my studio space when I bought the fabric to recover an old chair.  I promise you these are real colors saturated by nature, not Photoshop that light up like this even in the late afternoon light of a shadowy wood.

More shades of green with a leaf tucked in the space were it fell last fall.

The bluish purple of this water always calls me to this spot and I have tried to duplicate it in my studio color scheme. It is one of the many colors in the fabric I used to recover my daybed.

It was about here that John took my hand and said, ” We are so lucky to have all this and each other too. ” I often think the same thing and have said it myself. It’s lovely to know that we share an appreciation of our space and each other in such a similar way.

This celtic cross marks the way into our village and behind it you see a stile I cross over sometimes on my way through a farmer’s field. It’s from this field, I was able to photograph a snowy view of our village a few weeks ago with the church tower in the background.

These horses always come to greet me when I pass by. ( I must remember to bring the sugar cubes I bought for them )

After our walk, we stopped by the pub for a cider for John and diet lemonade for me before heading for home. I gave a few dogs in the pub a good cuddle and we chatted with some friends before stepping outside into the evening light. I couldn’t help but snap a few pictures trying to capture this peaceful scene as we walked up the hill towards home.