....And Where Have You Been????

What started as a delay due to major technical upheaval and software updates, turned into a delay due to family things, then work stuff, then a huge case of malaise to be capped off yesterday with the crappy news that our friend John has finally lost his battle with cancer.......I'm sure that we'll be toasting his memory this weekend and he will be sorely missed....a great bloke and a great craftsman to boot.....I'm sure I speak for the whole team when I say that our thoughts are with those he has left behind.

Thanks to those who have stayed with the blog over the recent lack of postings, it's much appreciated....and Helen, it was good to hear you had some joy with the chicken.....pictures of our efforts are now over at Flickr for you to peruse and we shall be doing it again this weekend, only this time we'll actually finish the dish!

¶Capons stewed.
¶Take percelly Isope sage Rosemary And tyme breke hit betwene thy hands and stoppe thy capons ther with and color them with saferon And put them yn A erthyn pot or els in brasse for erth is better. And lay splentys underneth and all a boute the sydes so that the capons tuche not the sydes nother the bottom and cast of the same herbys in to þe pot A mong the capons And put a quart or A pynte of the best wyne that thow cansye gette and no other licour And set A lydde ther A pon that wyll ly with yn the brym. And make batur of white of eggys & floure And put betwene the brym A paper lefe or els lyncloth that the batur may stop hit sowrely þat no eyre com owte loke þat hit be thyke of bature And set thy pot on A charecole fyre to the myd syde & se þat the lydde ryse not with the hette and let hit stew esely and long and whan þow supposyth hit is enowgh take hit fro the fyre yf hit be A pot of erth set hit upon a wyspe of ftraw that hit toche not the cold grownde And when the hete is well drawn and over past take of the lydde And take owte thy capons with a stycke And ley them in A noþer vessell and make A syrryp of Wyne And mynct datys and Cannell drawn with the same wyne do ther to rasyns of corance sugur safferon And salt boyle hit A litill And cast yn powder of gynger with a litell of the same wyne do the sew to the syrryppe a bove upon the capons And serue hem furth with A rybbe of beffe ever more a capon on a dysche.

We stopped short and didn't make the sauce to pour over the bird, but to be honest we were more interested in how much the herbs had flavoured the chicken.
This weekends variation will be to cook the recipe twice....once ommitting the herbs inside the carcass just to see how much they add to the flavour.
If you're tempted to try it yourselves I can thouroughly recccomend it as it adds a very subtle herb flavour to the flesh....just like you'd expect from sage and onion stuffing but rarely get....It would be ideal for summer sandwiches or a salad.

I'm not sure how much the saffron affected the final results

but it certainly looked impressive....erzatz corn fed poutry! As did the pot when the head of steam built up enough to blow off some of the luting....

Shame I was round the corner when she popped, but Robin had repaired it all by the time I got back.
As for the rest of the pictures.....pop over to the Flickr site to have a look....the link is in the right hand column.

This weekend sees more of the same, so I should be able to fill in the gaps image wise from last time........I'll be posting the rest of the last weekends pictures next week, followed by anything we get from the next few days.

The biggest news from the Palace of late is that the Base Court re-surfacing project has now begun and by Easter 2009 the grass that we are all used to seeing in the first courtyard will have been replaced with a cobbled surface more like the original would have been in Henrys day......fingers crossed I'll be able to get some pictures of the progress for you to see.

More posting as the weekend unfolds.......scouts honour ;-)

TTFN

Ooo Look It's David Bailey!

At last I've broken the run of weekends with no pictures.....just over 300 taken today alone! Admittedly there are a lot of repeats and duffers in there, but you'll all have plenty to look at as soon as I can sort them all out.

It was an odd day today, what started off before opening as a truly lousy day turned out to be one of the best we've had for a long time.
Barry and Barry.....along with Edmund our sometime standby man...were talking about weights and measures as well as maths with a counting board....what a success. We've had surveyors and maths teachers all day treating their visit like a bus mans holiday, as well as kids learning to do addition, subtraction, multiplication and division all with the counting tables....all with glee......and on the weekend.....without any coercion needed!!

Robert spent the day recording temperatures and the like for a piece of beef that was roasted.......this time he reckons we have 7 hours of data to work with....hooray.

The middle kitchen had Marc H working on the malmenye furne recipe again, which he thinks he's cracked (more about that in another post).....whilst Robin spent the day 'teaching' Jorge to cook. They worked through tartus of ffless and capon stwed to great success.......all of which you will hopefully see and appreciate when I post the pictures early next week. Until then here's this one of Robin explaining how he wants the meat cut up to a very attentive Jorge.

Robin's now cutting out the cloth for a new set of hose now, so I'm off to watch and help.....for a price of course!

TTFN

No Sleep Til Bedtime!

Well we're back from our jolly jaunt, but I've not had time to sort out the pictures yet, so you'll get them with all the images from this weekends work.

Was it a good trip? Yes, I think so......nice to see how other sites work, both their strengths and weaknesses and how they work all these to their advantage to come up with some interesting education sessions. Thanks especially to the staff at Gainsborough Old Hall for letting us shadow their session.....something I know is not easy as it really makes you feel under pressure.

This weekend should be good to go so to speak, not a lot to say at the moment as I'm trying to sort out 4 things at once before I can leave tomorrow, so you'll just have to tune in over the next couple of days to see how things are going.

TTFN

5 Go Mad In Lincolnshire

Hmm, not quite the smooth day we were anticipating I must admit.
First off, the site we were supposed to be visiting today contacted the education officer on Friday to politely point out that they were shut on Mondays! So a swift change of plans and we were off to Burghley house, home in the sixteenth century to the Cecil family......or not as it turned out!?!

The car hire company that was supposed to be delivering a vehicle to the Palace for us turned out not to be doing that.....'before 1.00 p.m. No, you must be mistaken.'!?!?!? So a swift phone round to local rental dealers and a Volkswagen Passat was obtained....if only Robin and I could find where abouts in Kingston the company was...so after 4 or 5 trips around the one way system I threw him out at the rental company and drove back to the the office to await his return and the journey North!

Not a bad trip it turned out and a pretty successful afternoon looking around the site and working out how we would do education sessions there... All in all a really good learning experience that was fully discussed over a nice cup of tea.....then a pint and dinner in Lincoln.

Tomorrow we are off to a coupple more sites....Gainsborough Old Hall and the Collection at Lincoln museum before we travel back. Becky, the education officer has a full day of work planed for us so it's off to bed now to get ready for the full day that awaits us...