We are tentless but the fire bowl is blazing. The dry wood we gathered earlier from the lower paddock is burning well, taking away the slight chill. At the end of a hot day in May and early June, I find it suddenly feels cool at sunset. The waxing gibbous moon and a few stars have already appeared so the magic is all around. Our youngest is quietly nibbling on some Shepherds Purse seed pods, which I’ve allowed. She loves their heart shape, but only eats a couple at a time. They grow in the children’s playground along with some Forget-Me-Nots, Herb Robert, Field Speedwell and just lately some Scarlet Pimpernel. All truly wonderful names and sweet little flowers! We have some rather fun ideas for supper this evening. Earlier, my partner and I decided it would be nice to have a cold glass of something and opened a tin of stuffed vine leaves. They disappeared so quickly, we were left wanting more. I tried to think of a way to make some with leftover rice we still had from the night before. It already had onions cooked into it and just needed some dried herbs of some kind and a splash of vinegar. What to wrap them in wasn’t as difficult as you might imagine! Some of the hop leaves are now about the size of side plates and they are in fact very edible when blanched. I wasn’t completely sure if the prickliness would make them unpalatable if used as wraps, but the experiment could turn out to be a wonderful discovery. I waded through the wilds behind the vegetable garden in shorts and tall wellies to collect a few leaves. One zap from a hidden nettle was all I suffered so it wasn’t too bad. In the kitchen, my partner suggested that we fry the rice for several minutes while the hop leaves blanch in boiled water. He’s made the real thing before. I decided to go with Japanese rice vinegar and no herbs. Dill or dried mint would have been fun but I didn’t have any. I then placed the hop leaves end-to-end, overlapped them and used olive oil to stick them together for rolling. You only need slightly more than a tablespoon of the rice mixture to get a decent bite. The leaves had softened and were easily rolled. With a drizzle of olive oil, they were good to go! They looked exactly like they should but I wondered if they’d benefit from soaking in the oil for a while like the tinned version. No my friends, they were delicious, didn’t have prickles and maintained structural integrity. The taste was fresh and clean and I will definitely make them again. We also fried a plate full of homemade Asian inspired shrimp cakes on the fire that had chilli, coriander and garlic in them so it was quite a “Lockdown” treat. We do keep frozen cold water shrimp around, but are seriously considering not supporting that industry any longer despite their MSC certified rating. There are more sustainable fish to choose from if you have a look at the “Good Fish Guide” that is updated annually. We enjoyed the lovely shrimp cakes, stuffed hop leaves and chips. There was also a jar of pickled radishes floating around between us. The children have been loving harvesting the radishes they sowed and so I needed a way to keep eating them that wasn’t always the same. A lovely friend inspired me to pickle more things recently so I made a tiny batch. I sterilised a jar and added 6 sliced radishes, a clove of sliced garlic and a few slices of red chilli. I poured some boiling apple cider vinegar over the mixture and boiled the jar for 10 minutes in a pan. The result was sensational! So simple but yummy and tasty pink liquid to pour on things as a bonus. Almost like spicy pickled Daikon my partner said he had in Japan. I say, “Isn’t it like we’re camping tonight but without all the fuss”. We sat around the home campfire for a long time after eating and talked about what it would be like to sleep on the sun loungers under the Copper Beech. The children aren’t really old enough for that yet but I’m sure they’ll want to camp out some day. I think they’re afraid of the owls and foxes they can hear outside most nights. That’s fine with me, my brother and I once heard a bear outside our tent in California and that’s had a lasting effect on me. When the fire had almost burned out, we said Goodnight to the night noises and went in.