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Published on January 13, 2025February 5, 2025 by Viv

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Discovering Damsons, Damson Jelly and Cheese

Published on September 12, 2024September 12, 2024 by Vivien

I must confess to having a love affair with damsons. With their blue-black skin and astringent/sweet flavour they are a firm favourite. Of all the stone fruits available to the preserver, the damson is the maestro.

Pressure Cooking Preserves

Published on June 2, 2023February 19, 2025 by Vivien

In 1948 when my Mother got married, women automatically stopped working, and her employer, Good Housekeeping Magazine, gave her a pressure cooker as a leaving present.

Kitty and AL Tait Breadsong: How Baking Changed our Lives.

Published on May 10, 2022January 31, 2025 by Vivien

Earlier this year I was invited to judge a category of the Guild of Food Writers’ Book Awards. I was reminded of the years spent as a librarian buying non fiction titles for public libraries. Would evaluating cookery books, forty five years later demand a different set of skills?

Devonshire Splits and Raspberry& Chocolate Jam Masterclass ,

Thursday 16th June at 6.30PM, planned to last up to 90 minutes.

Preserves Masterclasses 2023

Published on February 21, 2022February 15, 2023 by Vivien

I taught my last face to face preserves class in February 2020, unaware that the following two years would see the closure of Denman College, where I taught the majority of preserving courses and other venues forced to close for months at a time due to COVID restrictions.

Citrus by post

Published on November 9, 2021February 19, 2025 by Vivien

Following the craze for sourdough and banana bread during lockdown in 2020, Marmalade making became a go to activity during lockdown in the early months of this year.