Santa Paws came but Rudolf was left in the stable

Well that's it for another year, Christmas has been and gone. I hope that you managed to make the most of it amid all the restrictions. To be honest for us it wasn't really any different to previous years as there is usually only the two of us and my sister. As my sister is in our bubble and in today's restrictions classed as being a member of our household it was the same year. Of course it wasn't always like that, at one time our house would have been full and Christmas meant more to us.

We made a flying visit to the allotment on Thursday to gather a few vegetables.

Sabrosa Savoy cabbage, Crispus sprouts and Red Lodero, red cabbage

We made the first picking of sprouts. Like our cabbages the outer leaves were spoiled but once removed there was plenty of sprout left for Christmas dinner. These was accompanied by half of one of those huge parsnips that we dug the week before. It would have been appropriate for us to have had Rudolf potatoes for Christmas dinner but that didn't occur to us until later so, Rudolf stayed in his stable aka the garage.

As well as picking our first sprouts of the season, we also cut our first red cabbage. As a change from the green cabbage that I normally use, I'm going to use some of this in coleslaw but we also like to braise red cabbage with apples and onion. The braised cabbage freezes and reheats well.

Our 'Christmas pudding' was a blueberry cake made by my sister. Martyn classes it as his favourite cake at the moment and I don't actually like the traditional Christmas pudding so this was a delicious alternative.

Ruby  jhad turkey for her Christmas dinner too. After her Christmas walks and lots of playing time she had a little snooze.

As she had mostly been a good little girl Santa Paws didn't forget her.

Our acrylic print made it to its place on the dining room wall

Unlike the print we had bought some years ago, this one didn't come with fittings so we had to order some before being able to hang it. We still have another blank wall in the dinning room - I wonder whether it will take as long to find another worthy photograph to hang ther. I'd really like an autumnal print so I may have to wait until next autumn.

Christmas dinner wasn;t the only meal last week to feature our homegrown vegetables.

One such meal was a vegetable risotto. I used parsnip, carrots and peas in this. If you are wondering why my rice is yellow, I add turmeric to many of my meals.. I don't add enough to change the flavour but turmeric is reputed to have health benefits. The amount that I use may not be sufficient to have much effect om health but every little helps.

Another of our vegetable based meals was a sweet potato curry served with rice and peas - another misnomer as the peas are actually beans. I used cannellini beans as I didn't have any of the black eyed beans that the recipe called for. Some of our onions and cabbage went into this recipe but I had to buy the sweet potatoes and peppers. We've tried to grow sweet potatoes with no success. I’m still experimenting with spice mixes to make my own curry powder.

To finish - with the actual day behind us, I'm wondering whether it is allowed to wish for a belated Christmas gift. Sunday's news suggested that the Oxford vaccine developed here in the UK may be approved as early as next week. As this vaccine doesn't require the same incredibly low storage temperatures it may speed up the process of getting us all vaccinated. Now wouldn't that be a good, if not a belated Christmas gift, a really positive start to 2021.

Here's hoping the slackening of restrictions on Christmas Day hasn't given the virus more opportunity to spread.  Whatever the outcome keep safe and well.

Copyright: Original post from Our Plot at Green Lane Allotments http://glallotments.blogspot.co.uk/ author S Garrett