It has been ‘Leftovers Fortnight’ in the Cottage with the Movie Night dough being reused for the pizza and the tomato sauce also being used for spinach and ricotta cannelloni as well as the pizza. Some of the children have been learning to make homemade ricotta from scratch too, patiently waiting a whole hour for the temperature to gradually reach 95C and the curds separate from the whey. And what do we do with the whey? Well apparently as it is a fermented product it’s great to splash on your skin (on your face OR your feet!) or to drink when you’ve an upset tummy. Or to use as the water part when making bread or pizza dough. And most of all it’s great for citrus trees. So that’s where ours has been going!
Last week we also harvested a massive watermelon from the desert-like bed that runs between the Cottage and D Block. The watermelon was orange when we opened it up! Pale but juicy, perfumed and ripe – and I lifted a fab recipe from Ottolenghi’s Plenty for it: Watermelon and feta salad with red onion and rocket. Try it and see what a great combination it is!
And a massive hit again with the kids has been the Sean’s Panaroma sweetcorn chowder: a tricky recipe with a few twists and turns. But that’s how we roll baby.
Some lucky students got to flex their knife-wielding muscles this week too and reprised the Cornersmith’s bouillon recipe to replenish our bare shelves. Chopping onions, celery, carrots and their green tops, parsley, coriander, fennel and loads of garlic (and other secret herbs and spices, natch) and then blending it all up into a paste with lots of salt to make into our version of stock cubes, and then squishing into sterilised jars to waterbath and preserve. The bouillon keeps for at least 6 months, unopened in a dark and cool cupboard, and at least 3 or 4 months in the fridge once opened.
The Bondi Cook 