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Sorry. Been away. (Danbury again) When I went it was still summer, I come back ten days later and it is a completely different season, although it is still lighter at night here than Essex. We camp in a wood and the summer camp is playtime (the other times we are doing things for the 'good of the wood' eg coppicing). Whenever we are there we spend an inordinate (good word that) amount of time preparing food, eating food and washing up (that is normally someone else's job). When we first went we ate well but 15 years on we eat like kings. We have discovered the Dutch oven. This is a cast iron pot with short legs and a flat lid with a rim. All you have to do is stand it on a bit of lumpwood charcoal and put a bit more on the lid, and you can cook almost anything. We had blackberry crumble (to be honest we had blackberries with everything), lemon tart, roast chicken, bread everyday, victoria sponge, scones (with just-made blackberry jelly and clotted cream) and goose and venison casserole.

In between breakfast, elevenses, lunch, tea and supper I spent four days catching up on a summer's worth of sleep before being hit by a creative virus. In another life a long time ago (seven years) we made windsor chairs from green wood which stopped when we moved to nearly treeless Coll. But I got this urge to make another rustic chair, and although it got a bit rushed at the end and isn't finished yet I feel unbearably smug.



If there isn't a picture there I've done something wrong. Anyway the chair is chestnut, and the front leg split a bit, and yes, I know chestnut does that, and the seat might be a poplar plank, or I might do something with the sheep shearings, and the knobbly bits where the stretchers go through will be cut back (but will still be proud because I like them like that) but still, I feel ridiculously pleased with myself. Sorry for boring you, sometimes I wondered if all the onion chopping had affected my brain, but if it has I don't care so much now, I am really very pleased with my chair!

Next blog - Why do lobsters go red when cooked.

I hope Anne won't pull this, as it isn't meant to be an advertisement, I just want to point out there is another place to eat out at on Coll. (Well, there is my burger van as well, but that would be an advert, and it is closed for the winter now anyway) So when us poor over-worked underpaid hotel staff get our time off, especially on a Sunday, we head to the Island Cafe for Sunday lunch. We got there early-ish because we wanted to watch the footie at four. I ordered the shoulder of lamb, he had pork and we started with a bottle of Normandy cider. Cider is such a great thing to drink with a meal, it isn't as fussy as wine and you get a decent amount in your glass, but it is more special than beer.
Last time we were there the background music was Runrig, this time it was the radio; the top ten albums and singles from 1974. We were both a bit puzzled as we didn't hear the number one album, we must have been too engrossed in the food, and trying to guess who supplied all the various vegetables. Or maybe that was when we ordered more cider. We began to notice a pattern in the singles chart, every third person was dead. September 1974 wasn't a vintage year musically, but we exchanged teenage memories with several other tables. It must be funny going out to eat and not knowing the other diners. We had dessert. Island Cafe does great desserts; we had banoffee pie (which is completely different to ours in the hotel) and black forest pudding so fortunately we were too busy chewing to sing 'Billy don't be a hero' when Paperlace came on the radio, although they were actually singing something else. Four o'clock came and went and we were too engrossed in what was number one, and too full to move to go. Number two was Kung Fu Fighting. We paid. Waited for number one. Number one was The Osmonds, and not even Crazy Horses, which triggered some more memories.
So ten out of ten for food and atmosphere and company, but only nine for the music.

PS Why do lobsters go red when they are cooked? Find out next time.