Busy, busy, busy. Courses at Sissinghurst making this lovely wreath under the tutelage of eco-florists Blooming Green, and to Leith's in Hammersmith to learn how to photograph food with master William Reavell - have a look at his website - you'll recognize his work. Often send in pics of my dishes to the Telegraph, and some are used, but would really like to know what I'm doing. So it's a new camera, close-up lens and hopefully better results.
The pop-up shop went really well. Thank you to those who made long journeys just to visit. Glad to hear many had an enjoyable weekend in Whitstable, which must have made it all a bit more worthwhile. All cleared away and now hosting book club party this weekend and enjoying Ludo's pre-Christmas excitement. We walk the High Street examining every tree and each shop's decorations in detail. I am a source of disappointment: as "Big tree Granny's house?" has still not been realized, and I don't think my artistic rendition with twigs of burdock and teasels will cut the mustard.
Hope you all have a good Christmas and to see many of you in the coming year.
15th November 2013
8th October 2013
These last few days of glorious weather, before they threaten winter, with a bumper crop of fruit, seeds and nuts, has got me weeding the area round my new fruit trees. I’m buying some new mulch mats to keep the grass from their roots – lots of fruit, but very tiny. And planting meadow bulbs, camassia, alliums, fritillaries and narcissus ‘Actea’ – an early ‘Pheasant’s Eye’ look alike. Am also planning a new woodland garden in the old bramble patch and have been popping in English bluebells, scilla, cyclamen, aconites and snowdrops, that’ll be happy under the oak tree. The ‘meadow’ has been cut and the hens have enjoyed foraging the newly mown grass. A lovely memory that will have to last me through winter.
A visit to Great Dixter Plant Fair last weekend, (put it in your diary for next year), well worth a trip, plus several visitors from Suffolk, down to the seaside before season’s end, have kept me from writing my book – though it’s coming along, and I’m enjoying looking back over the last three years.
Planning another, bigger pop-up shop for December 1st with friends, extending to another house up Joy Lane. More details to come.
2nd September 2013
I love September. The slightly fresher weather, the low light that brightens colours and the harvest of fruits and berries that liven up the garden and hedgerows. I’ve been eating my damsons – and so have the hens, as they sit waiting under the trees – cheering themselves as they moult all their feathers. The apples and pears are still to come, with blackberries, quinces and medlars yet to ripen.
Country Living have been photographing the house and garden, so I suppose the house at least could be called complete. Still the odd thing to finish, a few cushions to make and still the bathroom doors to put on – too late for this summer’s batch of visitors’ modesty, I’m afraid. I have lots of writing to get on with, no more procrastinating, no more excuses.
A recent visit to Alnwick in Northumberland has broadened my horizons a little, so I have no excuses not to travel a bit. Except for poor Lulu who has been diagnosed with hyperthyroidism and needs a pill everyday. Any advice on how to give a lovely old cat a pill every day?
30th July 2013
During this really hot weather, it has been really wonderful to be beside the seaside. And of course, I’m not alone in my delight – Whitstable town centre heaves in summer, but the worst bits are easy enough to avoid. Just a short walk further along the prom and you come to the nearly deserted West Beach. It’s here we rent a beach hut occasionally, and I wander past them on my morning circuit to stop myself seizing up during a day at the computer. I nearly bought a hut when I first came here, flush with cash. Two years later and they are out of my price range.
Often though, when it is really hot, it’s just as good to sit in the cool shade of the garden, and I rig up a tent effect with a counterpane and the old swinging seat that has made it’s way here from Suffolk. Ludo and I spend many hours inside this shady den, pretending it’s a bus, train or plane, or alternatively in the cool garage driving in Max’s nearly completed bright blue beach buggy. Now in its third incarnation, some will remember it as the groom’s transport to Jacques wedding, Max’s love affair with this vehicle hasn’t dimmed, and has certainly been passed on in spades to his nephew.
Still, there are worse ways of spending a baking hot afternoon…….
17th June 2013
Where is the summer? I sometimes work at my desk with a hot water bottle on my lap – in June! Better to wrap up and work outside. The front of the house is painted and planted, and the back is tidied up. The decking responded well to a pressure wash, and briefly all is neat – though at this time of the year, it doesn’t take much to get out of hand in the garden and overwhelm us all. Am looking forward to a bit of disorder, as it all looks a little neat and suburban.
The hens have come out of broody purdah – I didn’t set any eggs, the thought of a flock of youngsters digging up my newly-planted borders, put me off. Am turning into a poultry whimp – and after a few days of seeming not to recognize the garden, are back on form. Come to think of it, the garden probably has changed over the past few weeks.
Chelsea was a bit of a disappointment. It would be interesting to see how the designers would fare, if, like all of us, there was a strict budget. Also, with disease restrictions, I feel all plants should be UK grown. There were a few designers responding to real life, but mostly it was pie in the sky. Come on RHS! (Wrote a couple of pieces for the Telegraph, see Articles).
3rd May 2013
April has just slipped by in a miasma of paint – everything is covered in sticky coats and nothing is in its proper place. Have just started a final push with son Max, and life is settling back in a more settled, if different, colour-scape.
Planting is underway in the garden with the arrival of some spring-like weather. The bulbs have come and gone, and even those tulips I found in crates in the shed, just a month ago, are beginning to flower. Can’t believe that it’s Ludo’s second birthday soon – he seems to have been part of our lives forever.
Work for the Telegraph carries on with a visit to Kensington Roof Gardens (have a look under the Articles page on this website); I’ve just completed a piece for Gardens Illustrated – coming out next month, and have written a couple for Country Living on friends’ houses. My new book is slowly taking place with a last photo session with Vic Spoff in July. Despite being a quarter as busy as I was in Troston, there is still not enough time, perhaps that’s the human condition.
20th March 2013
Feeling a lot better – thank you for your kind emails. And the builders have gone, revealing in their wake a wonderful new dormer window with good views and lots of extra light and space inside. Slowly getting back to normal, decorating and planting the garden. Still another million loads of compost to barrow, but it’s brilliant stuff, and the plants should thrive.
Skip-free, am thinking about my front garden. Waves of verbena bonariensis, iris sibirica fronted by hummocks of lavender in gravel, I think. But first, I must get rid of the weeds and couch. Have lots of builders plastic leftover,
will use it as a mulch for a while. Have rescued the few bluebells, iris and hellebore foetida, and will move the vivid technicoloured roses, much loved by the previous owner. They’ll have to take their chances in the hedge.
Hens on top form, laying well and enjoying the activity in the garden. Am hoping to hatch a couple of pullets when they go broody. Will get some eggs from breeder, Patricia Middleton, who will be joining me at the Kentish version of the Hen Party, run by Sheila Hume in her garden in Benenden on May 18th – for details emailcharles.hume@btinternet.com. Come along – it would be lovely to see you.
18th February 2013
Afraid the hole in the roof, builders’ dust and lots of cuddles with grandson Ludo (toddlers get so many viruses) have finally got the better of me, resulting in a chest and a throat infection, so have been laid very low. But at last, with a little sun, departure of source of dust, lots of freshly laid eggs and slow return to normal life, things are looking up and I’m not coughing all the time.
In an effort to escape the chaos and cacophony of the wind in the scaffolding poles, I moved downstairs into the sitting room, so it has been a bedsit life since mid November – a limiting existence – so am looking forward to moving back upstairs to three bedrooms and two bathrooms, which has been the point of the exercise. Hope to be persuaded that it has all been worthwhile.
Am working slowly in the garden, moving a lorry load of compost – deposited four years ago – all round the garden. It was a surprise to find this cache of wonderful soil behind the bramble heap, but more so to find that a fox had made the same discovery and constructed a des res with several bedrooms and a couple of metres of corridor. Luckily no-one was in residence, but all the more reason to dissemble this pile and distribute it speedily around the garden to improve the rock hard clay, but also to gradually get my stamina back.
So it’s out in the garden in the sunshine, with the girls, cat, Ludo and his tractor on Wednesdays and hopefully back to normal.
7th January 2013
I’ve wished my hens a Happy New Year with a good clean up in their run. All this rain has resulted in a quagmire, so have been pondering the best carpet. Dried leaves are good, but can be slippery, gravel is rather expensive, straw is messy, so have bought 5 bags of chipped bark and laid it good and thick. I’m assured it is just bark, with no additives. It has a slightly antiseptic smell, but that’s just the pine resin.
The hens quite like it and have been scratching around. Hopefully it will rot down over the summer and will either improve the drainage in the run or I can rake it out, and with the additional droppings, it will make a good mulch on to my flowerbeds. I’ve popped down a few strategically paving slabs to make my journey to the feed bins a little less perilous.
I’ve hoovered the house, removing the spiderwebs in the roof, dusted with anti-mite and laid a good thick wodge of broadsheet – the Sunday Telegraph is best. The nest boxes are lined with dried moss in the hope of eggs in the near future – Valentines Day is not that far away. So with drinkers and feed bins scoured, the dustbath topped up with wood ash, and everything neat and tidy, let’s hope we have a productive 2013.
All this activity in the run and garden is just to escape the chaos in the house, with a hole in the roof, and a thick layer of dust – I could be better off in with the hens. Here’s to better times ahead.
17th December 2012
Well, here I am, covered in dust again. With breath-taking timing, James my builder finally arrived just before our pop-up shop opened. Hopefully, customers didn’t notice the fine veneer of dust over everything, and we had a wonderful day with lots of customers, enjoying a festive atmosphere. Thank you, everyone who made the effort to come, and relieved me of my stock.
Work is going apace, if the banging upstairs is anything to go by, and we’ll end up with an extra bedroom and bathroom, plus a beautiful dormer on the side of the roof. I’m sleeping in the sitting room, and the cat is very put out. This may be a camping Christmas, but I’m still looking forward to it all. Am collecting my goose and some salt marsh lamb from a local farm at Monkshill that supplies the best restaurant round here – the Sportsman at Seasalter, visiting Macknades for fruit, veg and cheese and maybe some Chapel Down Sparkling to wash it all down.
Thank you all for persevering with me over the last year. Next year will bring a new book. May I wish you a Happy Christmas and a good time over the holiday.
27th November 2012
Somewhere between the continuing (non) arrival of the builders and work in general, we are hosting our Pop-up Shop. I couldn’t let Christmas pass without a little foray into retail therapy. This year, more friends are joining Pascale and her wooden decorations, Sue and her pots and Martin Pammant and his driftwood furniture for our sale here on December 9th.
Marilyn Phipps from the Battery makes amazing embroidered and beaded jewellery and this is a rare chance to buy. Marilyn’s sense of style and colour sense are legendary. Embroiderer Hiroko Aono-Billson will be selling a wide range of embroidered toys, bags and showing antique Japanese fabrics. Some of you will have seen the gorgeous yellow bag that I commissioned last summer.
I’ve been out scouring the bootsales for vintage bits and bobs, and have some leather French posties’ bags - great for blokes who carry laptops, embroidered curtains, vintage glass and kitchenware, plus the usual Christmas decorations, plus garden and henkeeping paraphernalia.
Quite a few friends from Suffolk are making the trip down to Whitstable. There are lots of great places to eat (if you book early) and the chance of a bracing walk along the beach. Do please get in touch if you’d like more information on 01227 264 707.
28th October 2012
Still no builder, so have been excavating the bramble plot at the bottom of the garden. Have uncovered several etiolated evergreen shrubs, now cut back, a massive climbing rose with stems 6 inches thick, another 10 foot of garden, and there in the middle of it all – a fox den! Now obviously derelict, I suppose it dates from a few years back when this garden was an extra 200 foot long, and probably mostly left wild. Let’s hope no previous inhabitants come back looking for somewhere to live.
The hens are jollier, now that they have a few more feathers, and enjoying the excavation and land clearing work. Cutting back brambles plays havoc with your hands, and I’m covered with scratches, but it’s good to spend a few hours each day working outside. Ludo comes out with me on Wednesdays and we have borrowed Harry-next-doors toy tractor and trailer, so there is much laborious earth moving, apple transporting and pebble collecting.
Made a delicious poached plum pudding topped with sliced brioche drizzled with local roast cobnut oil, dusted with sugar then grilled. Seem to have been cooking a lot, with visitors, Max here still working on the third incarnation of his beach buggy, and an increasing social life, with lots of local produce to be trying out.
Still collecting goodies for our Pop-up Christmas Shop on Sunday December 9th at local carboots and antique fairs, so hope to have the usual eclectic mix, with several creative chums joining in. Please email me on francine@kitchen-garden-hens.co.uk if you’d like details and fancy a brisk winter’s day by the seaside.
30th September 2012
How the weather has changed! And my poor girls are out with barely a feather between them. Topping up their breakfast with a sprinkling of Poultry Spice to speed their return to snug feathery finery, and offering protein-rich snacks of old cheese, nuts and sunflower seeds. Much needed rain in bucketfulls complete the change to autumnal chill, with the odd gorgeous day in between.
I’m still expecting the return of my builder – or what my friends call my imaginary builder to complete work to the upstairs of this house. Have lived too long in a half world of someone else’s taste, though admittedly mostly in the dark, asleep. Am waiting for the work to be finished before completing the front garden and cheering up my rather dreary frontage.
Have started buying bits and bobs for our Christmas Pop-up Shop, penciled in for December 9th. Had forgotten how much I enjoy shopkeeping!
29th August 2012
After a couple of weeks of computer hell, am now sitting in front of a toweringly menacing iMac. I’m sure, like most owners, I will get to love it, but at the moment, the changeover from ancient PC is fraught. In the hiatus between the two, I lost all my history and addresses, so please contact me onfrancine@kitchen-garden-hens.co.uk if are wondering what has happened to anything.
The hens are sitting out another spate of broodiness, which bodes well for future hatchings, but is a bore from the present non egg-laying situation. Because they both copy each other in everything, it makes it harder to break the habit, and there’s no ‘flock’ to get back to.
Meanwhile, lots of sitting in beach huts and on the beach. It has been a lovely summer and my grandson Ludo loves playing house by the sea, though at times we have been more like the characters inside a Swiss weather house, as we pop in and out to escape the showers.
25th July 2012
Ate my first wild blackberry today. It was sharp, hardly surprising considering the lack of sun up till now. Better to concentrate on English cherries, just nearing the end of their season. I’ve eaten lots this year, thanks to discovering Terry’s Cherries just off the Faversham road. I go for the fruit, but also for the beauty of a traditional cherry orchard, pure 1950’s HE Bates, and a cathedral of 50 foot trees with tapering ladders. Read more from my Telegraph article and try a few of the recipes – some cherry brandy or jam perhaps?
The hens are back out in the garden and laying well, (photographed here by Kate Gadsby who visited last week). They and I are looking forward to the damsons ripening, and the bees are enjoying the bramble bushes – mine are still in flower. With over 200 types of wild blackberries, it’s not surprising they all fruit at different times during the season.
The Oyster Festival is in full swing, with the weekends so crowded in town, that it’s almost worth avoiding, though some of the attractions are worth a visit. Bliss to have some decent weather, at last and a few dips in the sea.
26th June 2012
What a wonderfully heady time of the year. My daily walk along West Beach is full of delicious smells: honeysuckle, sweet peas, lilies, broom and roses of course. I try to sniff a different rose each day, from front gardens and parks, but not yet from my own garden.
Roses are fairly hideous plants for most of the year. With twisted thorny stems, that can often grab a hold of you and catch your clothes, their foliage is often discoloured and diseased, but for this one month of the yea,r they are worth the other eleven. I thought I could forgo that month-long charm, but have succumbed and bought some ‘Souvenir de Docteur Jermain’ – deep magenta bloom with delicious aroma to clothe one wall of the chicken run next to our rickety old swing seat.
Not all June’s bounty smells so sweetly. How can elderflower blossom with a bouquet of cat pee make such a delicately flavoured cordial? This is the definitive recipe: light, lemony and Muscat flavoured: pick 10 flowery heads on a sunny day and soak them in 850ml of boiled cooled water in a large pan or bucket. Add 650g sugar and 3 or 4 sliced lemons with their juice and zest. Leave to macerate for a day or two, then strain through a muslin-lined sieve.
Any surplus can be saved and frozen in small plastic bottles, but if you use this cordial in sorbets, jellies and drizzled on cakes; or mixed with gin, lemon and ice in a cocktail or with cheap fizzy wine, there won’t be a drop left.
7th June 2012
Over the past few years, June seems to have exhibited the widest array of weather conditions: one day baking hot for sunbathing, the next - fires on and sheeting rain. At least the latter is filling my nice new galvanized metal rainwater tanks – all three from ebay – collecting rain from house, garage and shed roofs. Although the national reservoirs must now be full to the brim, there is talk of charging gardeners for their water in the future, whether there is a drought order or not. So some kind of water saving for garden use makes sense.
In early spring I wrote and article for the Telegraph (read here) about rain water collecting devices, and there are plenty on the market. Not all are attractive, but not all need to be on display. Some fit flush to the wall and can be hidden along a back wall – have a look at www.premierwaterbutts.co.uk, while www.watermate.co.uk have a good selection of watering solutions including diverters and drip lines.
My two hens are sitting under the henhouse, watching the rain. I saw a lovely pair of call ducks for sale recently, I was v. tempted – but have promised my family never to venture that way again. Those who remember the paddling, dabbling, flying hoards at Troston will understand why!
8th May 2012
Picked up a good tip from my visit to Bob Flowerdew’s: to use moss raked from the lawn to line nestboxes for the hens. No sooner installed, both girls have enjoyed the new nest materials to such an extent that they’ve both gone broody. I haven’t installed any fertile eggs, they are a little young for maternal duties, and I don’t need to extend my flock till next year. I tried for a while to distract them to no avail, so I’ve dusted them for bugs and left them to get on with it.
Grumpily fluffed up and grumbling, they’ve stayed put now for nearly three weeks, allowing me to lift them out every day for a quick meal, a squawk, a flap, a long drink and a horrid mess before stalking back to the nest. Next hurdle will be to get them back to normal. Ploys include lots of excitement at the bottom of the garden, digging a new bed and more practically, the closing of the nesting area. I have missed their eggs and their company, and singing the Cheeky girls song with Ludo.
17th April 2012
I had always promised myself that my new hens would not have access to all of my new garden. They would have the orchard and wild section (an area 100ft x 50ft) but the area close to the house, where we sit and where grandson Ludo can play – when the weather improves – would be chicken poo free. Of course that never quite happened. I’m always so charmed by my flock’s desire to spend time near me that it’s access all areas. So far……
With the planting up of the veg beds and the new spring border and Ludo’s desire to up and going, I’m going to have to bite the bullet and close the gate. Of course there’s plenty of grass in the orchard and beyond, but in order to provide a constant supply of greens – spinach, beet and salads – I’m planting up a succession of blue plastic grocers’ boxes, lined with newspaper, filled with compost and sown with seed. If rescued before being pecked to the ground, these crops should recover and then can be offered again when the contents have re-sprouted.
I’m now going to try and re-write this in 140 characters for my tweet! Follow me on twitter@FrancineHens.