Your Farm, Fairlee VT stand

After the long, white winter in New Hampshire and Vermont we have three months of fabulous summer weather… hopefully! After a very wet summer in 2010, we are having a wonderfully warm and summery 2011, let’s I hope don’t jinx it by having noticed…

Wonderful Colours of Potatoes

The summer weekends bring yard sales and farmers’ markets, both new to me since leaving England. We’d call yard sales “jumble sales” and reserve them for church bazaars and other fund-raisers, none of this “dump it on your front lawn and stick out a for sale sign”! I’m not sure why we don’t have farmers’ markets… a lack of farmers and sunshine?

...delicious...

This weekend I went to the Norwich Farmers’ market and enjoyed the brightly coloured produce – how do they grow potatoes in so many glorious pinks and reds? And how are there still peonies for sale?? (refrigeration in Hartland apparently!)

Norwich Farmers’ market, located on Route 5 just South of Norwich on the way to Wilder, has so many fabulous things to tempt you – local fresh produce, plants for your yard, delicious snacks, fresh squeezed lemonade, beautiful cut flowers, home spun yarns… next time you have a free Saturday morning come check it out!!

from Ward's Berry Farm, Strafford, VT

Summer seems short and fleeting here in Northern New England, so it is essential to make the most of every glorious day.  This weekend has been two perfect summer days – warm, sunny, slightly breezy and long!  Today I decided was the day to head out and find pick-your-own berries… after a short poll of my friends Dawn and I decided to head to Ward’s Berry Farm.

The berry farm is located on Miller Pond Road in Strafford, VT, about twenty minutes drive from Hanover, NH, so an easy destination if you only have an hour or so and want hand-picked berries for dinner!

The berry farm was all that it should be – long rows of fruit bushes weighted down by heavy, ripe berries!  I was slightly confused when the owner, Karen Ward, told me that the berries should not be crushed or you’d have jam by the time you got them home.  I was imagining having to pick them as single layers, and not quite being able to imagine how I would keep them all flat and uncrushed… thankfully she explained that they could cope with a punnet’s worth of weight, just not a bucket!

Dawn and I picked for an hour or so, and each gathered 3 pounds of delicious red raspberries.  We ate our fare share as we picked, making sure to keep fully energised for the task!  I hate to think how many tiny worms we ingested… there were one of two waving about from the ripe berries… I quickly threw those ones to the birds!

Now is the challenge of what to do with the berries…

Decorated… ready to roll!

I went to a Church of England school and between Spring and Summer terms we had a two week break for Easter.  Spring term followed Autumn term, and it never occurred to me that there was no Winter term until moving here… having lived in New England for eight years I realise that it was because we really did have NO winter!!  (I’m making up for that now!)

This year I decided to recreate my childhood Easter day by borrowing four children from my friends.  We decorated eggs, hunted eggs, rolled eggs down a hill and ate fresh-baked hot cross buns – my childhood memories in technicolor!  I am not sure whether to share this post with my brothers and sister, they might pop my bubble with different memories…

Rolling the eggs...

Once we had decorated the eggs we found the highest hill in the neighborhood and started rolling.  The aim is to roll them down the hill as far and fast as you can make them go, without the shells cracking.  What we discovered was that eggs roll far further on icy snow, and with far less cracking!  It took us MANY rolls before they disintegrated, to be left as porcupine snacks.

After egg rolling and searching for hundreds of mini chocolate eggs in the “garden” we went inside to eat hot cross buns straight out of the oven – delicious!

What a fun day of egg rolling and chocolate eating!!

We were very excited to put together a float for Row The Prouty – celebrating the first year that rowing is to be part of The Prouty!

We decorated a boat trailer – adding a four, plenty of red, white and blue bunting, an erg, Hanover High oars, UVRF oars, and then drove with the parade through the town of Hanover, throwing candy and waving.

The parade was a great success, with a few people coming to find us afterwards to learn more about Rowing The Prouty!! So far we have 120 people signed up to row next weekend, registration is now closed, but there is always room for more!!

The Friends of Hanover High Crew Team have been amongst the largest teams at The Prouty, and we had a great group of kids come to help us at the Fouth of July Parade. They kept the erg going for the whole drive, and manged not to row it off the blocks!!

A fabulous day, thank you to everyone who came out to celebrate!!

The J List, Norwich, VT

I LOVE shopping, not internet shopping, real shopping where you get to visit stores and touch before you buy!

Before moving to the Upper Valley I lived in Southern California, where there were three giant shopping malls within a fifteen minute drive of my apartment, a shoppers paradise! 

Before that I lived in Earls Court, London, where a short walk would find me at one of many great shopping destinations depending upon my mood - Harrods, Kensington High Street, the Kings Road… it makes me nostalgic to think about relaxing afternoons spent browsing through the stores, walking for hours through the winding streets, before realising that I was completely lost and finding the nearest tube to take me home!

The J List, Norwich, VT

Upon moving to Hanover, NH, I realised that internet shopping had been developed with New Hampshire and Vermont in mind!  Over an hour drive to the nearest shopping mall or Target – help!!  Shopping here would be more of a challenge, but one I took with relish!

After eight years in the Upper Valley I have my “go to” stores, I’m always on the look out for more, but these are my favorites!

Artisans New London

My two favorite gift stores are within a short drive of Hanover, NH - The J List in Norwich, VT and Artisan’s in New London, NH.  Both are owned by amazing, talented, wonderful women, who are skilled at filling the stores with beautiful clothing and perfect gifts, no matter who you are looking for!  Each store has a very different feel, and very different merchandise, so definitely worth taking a trip to both, you just never know what you will find!!

Main Street Kitchens, Hanover, NH

When looking for anything kitchen or cooking Main Street Kitchens in Hanover, NH is the place to go! A great selection of cook books, cookie cutters, pot holders, spices, candles… it’s easy to make a gift basket from the large and varied selection to be found there.

Brambles, Hanover, NH

For greeting cards my go to store is Brambles in Hanover, NH.  Located in the basement of 15 South Main Street, you feel like you are walking down into a cross between someone’s dorm room and a gift store. Brambles has a great selection of greeting cards, as well as baby gifts, jewelry, bubble bath and of course the essentials for creating the perfect dorm room!

Between these fabulous stores and others just a short drive away in Woodstock, Vermont, I find I can do my gift shopping without clicking a button – it’s great to keep it local!!

Never fear – we might not have a corner shop at each four way stop, but there are fabulous general stores in each community that will have all that you need and more.  You might have to get into your car, but it will be worth the short drive, and you’ll find the heart of the community with your newspaper and pint of milk!  Every community has a store, these are a few of my favorites.

Dan and Whits

The most well stocked general store of any that I have ever visited is Dan and Whits, in Norwich, VT.  Their tag line is “if we don’t have it you don’t need it”, and I think that they might just be right!  The first time I went into the store was in 1996, to me it seems just as fabulous now as it did then.  From garden tools, to groceries, to local cheeses, locally baked bread and cakes, wine and beer, paint, clothing… whatever you could possibly need can be found here.  I have to admit that it took me a few visits to brave walking past the meat counter into the hardware section!  The other great thing about Dan and Whits is that you cannot go in there without bumping into at least one person that you know, it just isn’t possible!

As with all general stores there is a giant notice board where you can find your lost dog, belly dancing lessons, mulch deliveries, snow shovelers, as I said, if they don’t have it you don’t need it!! 

Etna General Store

Mason Jars of Maple Syrup

Fun in the Upper Valley can come in any form – today it was an afternoon spent with friends watching sap boil!

Ann and Harry started making their own maple syrup three years ago by boiling maple sap in a roasting pan over a brick barbeque in their back yard in Wilder, Vermont.  Now they have a very professional set up, with a giant boiling pan that sits above a customised oil barrel – amazing! 

Maple syrup is produced in Northern USA and Canada, when you google it Vermont maple syrup comes up first every time – I wonder what makes Vermont maple syrup best and why is it better than New Hampshire maple syrup just a few feet away??

This weekend Ann invited me to come and join them sugaring – my contribution to the adventure was drinking hot sap tea and taking photos!

Ann's Backyard

The first step is to locate the correct sap producing trees and collect the sap.  I asked Ann how she knew which trees to tap.  She said that the trick is to look at the leaves in the fall and mark the trees.  By the time they are ready to be tapped they are deep in snow and unrecognisable! 

Sap Buckets

The sap starts flowing when the weather “warms up” (ie the sun shines and it varies between freezing and very freezing!) usually in early March. 

Sap

Ann and Harry drilled small holes in the trees, inserted the taps and then hung buckets from the taps.  During the warm days the sap will pour like water from the taps, today the sap was dripping slowly from the tap into the almost frozen sap in the bucket.

Ann with the sap barrel

Every couple of days they pour the sap from the silver buckets into two big barrels, where they store it until they are ready to boil it down.  I was amazed at how much sap was produced in such a short time, they had filled both big barrels and the sap was still running!

The Professional Equipment

The second step is to boil the sap down in the big boiling pan (I am sure there is a technical term for this, but I have no idea what it is!) – guess where they bought this… Dan and Whits!  Dan and Whits is a fabulous general store in Norwich, VT.  It really is true – if they don’t have it, you don’t need it!! 

Boiling Sap

Ann and Harry boil the syrup down at the weekend when they have time tend the fire and keep the syrup boiling – I think it would be a great excuse for a few days off work… “I can’t come in to work today, I need to stoke the fire and make delicious maple syrup…”

Boiling Sap

As Ann said, it kind of looks like dirty (but delicious) soapy water!  Harry made me a cup of tea using this watery syrup.  It tasted great and was perfect to hold my hands around the hot cup as we watched the boiling sap, it’s cold in the Upper Valley in March!

Final Boiling

They boiled the sap down most of the way in the giant pan and then finished it off in the smaller pan on a camping stove. 

The small shed that they are completing the final boiling in smelled like a delicious sugar factory.  The boiled sap tasted AMAZING!

Delicious Syrup

The mason jars contain syrup from their four boilings, the syrup gets darker each week.  There is a ranking system for syrup, but it all tastes pretty darned good to me!  

The darkest bottle was a little over boiled and has a smokey flavor.  Ann has a great pulled pork recipe that I can imagine would be perfect made with smokey maple syrup… doesn’t that sound delicious?!!

Sugaring Saturday

Thanks Ann and Harry for a great afternoon, and a reminder of the fun you can find in your own back yard, even in mud season!!  I’m now wondering if I should find a tree or two in Hanover, NH to tap and do a taste test between Vermont and New Hampshire syrups…

Flooded Cookies

What could be more enticing than a plate of delicious and colorful cookies?!

My best friend mailed me the amazing new Biscuiteers cookbook from England – it includes both recipes and decorating ideas for delicious flood iced cookies.  They are super easy to make, great fun to ice and just a little bit messy!

Here are the step by step instructions… make sure to taste test along the way!

Shortbread Cookies

Make a batch of your favorite shortbread or sugar cookies and cut them in to various different shapes and sizes.  I used the shortbread recipe from The Silver Palate cookbook – delicious buttery shortbread.  I tried a recipe from Williams Sonoma that included an egg, but the resulting cookie was a little brick like, so I went back to using the Silver Palate recipe.

Icing Sugar

Make up different colors of icing sugar in two different consistencies.  The middle two bowls are the thicker edging icing, the other bowls are the much runnier flooding icing.

Edging Icing

Pipe a thin line of the thick icing around the edge of the cookie.  If you want to add different colors within the cookie you can pipe an interior line also.  You must make sure that the line is complete, with no gap, or the flooding icing will pour out.

Add the flooding icing

Using the runny flooding icing carefully pipe it into the area created by the edging icing.  Make sure that the cookies are on a level surface or the icing will pour out!  You can see some of my icing making a bid for freedom…

Add a second color and patterns

Add different colors of flooding icing, and then carefully drip a contrasting color icing onto the still wet icing.  The second color will pool into the first color, creating a smooth surface.

After you have finished icing the cookies put them back into the oven for half an hour at a low temperature to dry them out.  If you don’t do this they will take a couple of days for the icing to fully dry.  My first batch I took out of the oven too soon and the icing never quite dried, you could tell who had eaten a cookie by the blue and pink dyed lips!

They taste VERY sweet, and slightly like food coloring, so most popular with young children!  I’m going to see if I can find some more natural organic food coloring in the hopes that it will taste a little better!!

Winter Fun on the Frozen Ompompanoosuc River

This past winter has been long and hard! After almost ten years in America, 2010-2011 has been the first year that I wondered WHAT I was doing!!

The winter has been amazingly snowy, with more shoveling of snow than you can imagine…

Thankfully signs of Spring are in the air with temperatures reaching a heady 40*f – if ONLY it were 40*c!