the big smoke

Road trip for us yesterday to London, for the Herb Society's herb festival at the Garden Museum in Lambeth.
It is a gem of a place, in a converted church with a churchyard garden crammed with herbs and wildflowers. You couldn't tell you were in the middle of London.
The herb festival was lovely and instructive too. We met Judith Hann and had garden envy at her immaculately designed garden with mature plants and 150 varieties of herbs; made tussie mussies with wonderfully potent southernwood and lavender sage (I'm hoping they will all make cuttings too); and once again spent far far too much on plants and seeds. But hey ho. I finally managed to get hold of some tree spinach, which I've heard lots about and am keen to try - and I've set my heart on getting some Rosa mundi for the garden. They are gorgeous.

After, we visited the Old Operating Museum and Herb Garrett near London Bridge. Here were the old apothocary treatments, bowls of dried herbs and flowers hanging from the ceiling. My favourite picture was this one, with all the bottles glowing in the sunshine. Fab.

this made my day

My purple sage has flowered

oh happy day

Went out this morning and found seedlings! Lots of them. Eyebright we had had already, and borage, but now we have angelica, purslane, par-cel, betony, wormwood, clary sage and lots more, including, best of all, comfrey.

Add that to lemon grass indoors, and mandrake, which has been in our bathroom for the past month - to the bemusement of the fitters putting in our new kitchen.

Tarragon has come up everywhere, cuttings of southernwood have taken well and we are well-stocked with beautiful old favourites such as lady's mantle and viper's bugloss.

Stock levels are beginning to build up, which is crucial commercially as well as gratifying personally.

It has been particularly satisfying to talk to customers from last year who have reported how well plants they bought from us survived the winter and are thriving in the early warm weather.

We are going to have our widest and most interesting range of herbs yet this year - just as well given we are doing more plant fairs and markets than ever.

We will be at plant fairs in Market Harborough throughout the summer, the University of Leicester Botanic Garden and - the furthest we have ever been - Market Deeping, as well as our usual Leicester and Kibworth farmers' markets and Leicester Food Festival on May 29.

Time to wake up

The garden is beginning to emerge from hibernation and it feels as though we are, too. Mints are starting to send up shoots, so is the tarragon and the elecampane. The sweet cicelies are starting to push up from their shady spots and we are on the lookout for the first of the ramsons.

We are sowing like mad, including quite a few new species that we are trying this year, such as horehound, mugwort, motherwort and red orache. We are also adding a new type of basil a blue, to go with the African blue that went very well last year. This new variety is supposed to have an excellent flavour. We will report back.

To give us the space we need, we have taken on a Victorian greenhouse at our friend Sandra's farm. This is a very exciting development for us - a major expansion that means we might finally get our patio back!

Sales are being finalised. We will be at Leicester Farmers' Market on the first Thursday of each month and Kibworth Farmers' Market on the third Saturday. That's a change of date and there is also a new venue - the old Grammar School in the centre of the village.

We will be at the University of Leicester Botanic Garden plant fair on July 3 and a range of fairs and events to be comnfirmed.

The trouble with craft fairs...

....is that that you always end up spending any money you make on the fab products on other people’s stalls.
This week, for instance, we have been at Oakham, Kibworth and Uppingham and look what we found:

Beautiful stained glass robin from Cathi at Shedglas Design



Spiced, herb-filled Christmas bauble (or three) from Jo at Maid in England



Lovely blue pottery candle holder



Yummy Christmas pudding fudge -you can smell the rum the minute you open the box



This dinky ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ badge from Rhubarb Designs, Leicester



And last but not least, this reindeer from a very nice man in a narrow boat near Kibworth.



We also bought Myrtle a plague rat from Dougals Den in Oakham. I would show you a picture but she gets so excited playing with it the photo goes all blurry.

Soap frenzy!

In the thick of the sales season with our soaps at the moment, with Kibworth farmers market and three big sales to go before we can put our feet up - and, more importantly, start to think about our herbs for next spring and what the frost has been doing to our polytunnel.

Soap sales have gone far better than we had anticipated, thanks to Sian's enticing recipes- so much so that we have had to frantically make more to ensure we are fully stocked for Stamford Christmas Market on Sunday, Oakham late-night shopping on Monday and Leicester Christmas farmers market on December 22.

This is what out kitchen looks like at the moment. And the living room. And the "storeroom" (i.e. third bedroom).

Have your cake and wash with it

Just a quick entry today - too busy dreaming up new soap recipes.

Latest are figgy pudding, which looks like it has whipped cream on top and does have a dusting of brown sugar, and ginger chocolate, inspired by Sian's favourite Green & Blacks variety. This one has cocoa powder and ginger scent.

Why these flavours? Nothing to do with us both going on a pre-Christmas diet. Obviously.

Both will be unveiled in a couple of weeks at Leicester Guildhall and Parklands leisure centre, in Oadby.

Pictures to follow in a day or so.

Also a recipe for iced rosemary cake supplied by a friend. So we have to make that up and as it's research the diet doesn't apply.