Preparing for the future

This may well be a very short entry. I took the day off work today to clear off the old summer house from the top of the garden and to cut back the hedges etc. ready for the new summer house to go up over the weekend.

Since it looks like we are in for a busy few days I thought I would get Sunday dinner ready. To satisfy this there are two good lamb shanks sat in the sous vide, packed with olive oil and fresh thyme, cooking through at 62C for 48 hours or so. i'll let you know on Sunday what else happens.
We only have a small garden but it is big enough for a 12' x 8' log cabin and a fire pit (a steel hemisphere and stand my Mum bought me). I have adapted it so the it has three sockets on the edge that will take a Lodge tripod for the 18" Lodge dutch oven I own (want one, look here http://www.lodgemfg.com/ ) . In addition, on a visit to a garden centre earlier this year I saw a £25 barbecue (on sale) that consisted of a weak and shallow pan on three legs to burn charcoal and a great tripod with a chain pulley and grill. The charcoal part was recycled and the tripod is now a great part of my garden food cooking equipment.

After a very long day ripping down the last of the old summer house and cutting it into 8" to 12" chunks. Cutting back very mature shrubs and hedges and shredding same I was just a little peckish and more than a little tired. Enter the fire pit, a blowlamp and a little tinder. Hell, I'm Welsh so fire starting is in our blood so in very short order a good fire was devouring bits of the old summer house.

While my wife and I hauled the debris to the shredder and bagged it ready for composting the fire built up a good bed of hot ash and charcoal. As the light faded to a point where we could just about see to put the tools away we lit the torches (oil) in the garden, moved the tripod and grill over the glowing fire pit and toasted off some corn on the cob, pork burgers and chicken skewers, the chicken having been marinated in a chili and lime sauce.

With the last of our energy we ate our October barbecue, quenched out thirst on Aspall's Premier Cru cider ( http://www.aspall.co.uk/ )and wondered if we will be able to get out of bed in the morning to start phase 2. I'll let you know tomorrow.