Orto di Casa Cecconi

My first allotment, and then one thing leading to another…

Tag: recipes

  • Learning, weeding and improvising

    The Herb Garden at Wisley is a lovely little area that opened back in 2003 and where my colleague experiments with planting of old and novel herbs, some of which are used in the restaurants on site (they share some of the recipes online that might be interesting). The area is divided by use of…

  • Cardoons

    Cardoons (Cynara cardunculus) is not a very common vegetable, either here in the UK or indeed in Italy, where, however, they make the occasional appearance in the shops. One of the odd and little known vegetables that are kept alive by elderly people eating them and that have seen better days, when they even had…

  • All the goodness in those lemons

    Citrus limon. I adore it. And lemons are so useful in the kitchen, in Italy we say you should always have at least one at hand. You can drink their juice, full of vitamin C (also containing vitamin A, calcium and phosphorus) and hot, sweet lemonade is an Italian traditional cure for indigestion; the same…

  • Finding the right recipe for your produce

    It is very important to find the right recipes for your produce, the ones that bring out the best of its qualities – if you want to enjoy it. I am pretty sure that everything edible can be enjoyed if prepared in the right way. Just a few minutes ago I was talking to someone…

  • Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)

    Taraxacum officinale are beautiful wild flowers, laden in pollen (I remember a spring in the mountains when everything was covered in yellow “dust” as dandelions all came into flower) and last year, after reading about someone having the largest botanic collection of them, I started noticing the different leaf shapes… I even considered devoting them…

  • Because bread just goes beautifully with most homegrown produce…

    I have been making my own sourdough bread since Carl Legge taught me in beautiful North Wales then sent me home with a little bit of his starter to set me off. Over the months, I have learnt some more, among others from Sonia and Joanna. And, with time, I have come up with my reliable recipe…

  • It’s raspberry time!

    I have not written for a while about the allotment, as Kew is taking up most of my time, energies and generally most of my thoughts… However, although it is the case that I am not doing as much as I would like to (isn’t that the case every year?!?), I am growing, picking and…