Selfsufficientish.com

We regularly still take cheques at work (post office), and I'm even paid by cheque, which I still find weird after all the talk of getting rid of them a few years back.

Lunar eclipse set for tonight, and sure enough it starts pouring down over us.

We've had a couple of days rain the past few weeks, but nothing much to write home about, not holding my breath for the supposed thunderstorm we're due either.

Not sure that raisins would give it "a bit more", though folk often toss in a handful of raisins because they feel that if grapes are good then oxidized wizened grapes are better Yeah, didn't really mean more as a good thing, I think the idea I was looking for was padding, hence the "...

I think I'd be tempted to throw in some raisins or something, just to give it something a bit more, but seems like a plan to me (then again, wine always does )

Definitely not bald, although I was after my last haircut. Possibly a bit young to fall in with the hippies, but yeah, the hair is long enough.

Our loganberry seems to be doing quite similar to other years. The chillis seem to be a bit behind where I'd like them to be, and haven't flowered as much as expected.

I can definitely think of better things to do with my time rather than pluck my eyebrows. Then again, the last time I had my hair cut was a few years back.

I loved my fennel for the seeds, but then I love the taste of anise. Hmm, maybe one to put back in the garden next year

I've been growing it for 6 years now, harvested it once. It grows very happily in my herb garden, perhaps a little too happily, I've had to pull up shoots of it a few times. I don't give it any special treatment, just leave it to it and cut back any dead growth. Looking forward to harvesting it agai...

The apple sherry and the damson chianti are from a book called "brewing wines like those you buy". Most the recipes are a bit intense for home brewing, as they often want large amounts of fruit that have different seasons. The sherry isn't fortified, it's fermented up to something like 18%...

My uncle co-owns a bit of land which has a bunch of stuff growing on it. Went down yesterday and collected 27 kilos of apples, 6 kilos of rhubarb and 1.5 kilos of damsons. After spending most of yesterday and all of today chopping, pressing and otherwise messing, I am at capacity in my fvs and wonde...

As long as you sterilize the other two jars and don't leave the damson gin out for too long there shouldn't be any problem. Or split your apple mix between two kilners. (Although part of me wonders if you can have too many kilners)

Yeah, the aim was to brew a gruit, hence the particular choice of herbs, I just thought "hopless" was as good a descriptive title anyway (plus the happy accident with hopeless). The low figures for the herbs comes from the lowest used in the various recipes using any of the ingredients. I ...

How many gallons is this to brew? 2kg sugar along with the sultanas and grape juice seems a lot of sugar. Water should work fine GA, especially with the sultanas in there. I'd be tempted to add some pectolase and some over brewed tea (tannin). The pectolase and a bit longer aging should stop the nee...