Gingerjo’s Blog

I’ve been experimenting with liqueur making for a while. A few months ago I added a big load of frozen summer fruits to lots of cheap vodka and a few hundred grams of caster sugar. Recently I seperated the alcohol off, added a bit more sugar and stuck the bottle back in the cupboard to mature for a bit. We’re drinking it now - it’s not the best liqueur I’ve ever tasted, but since I made it to use up the 5kg bag of fruit that Mark had bought it’s not bad. I’ve bought worse.

I’ve also made Rhurbarb Liqueur which is very nice - again lots of rhubarb, lots of vodka and lots of caster sugar. Stick it in the cupboard for a couple of months, then separate off the alcohol, adjust the sweetness, allow it to mature for a month or two and yum, rhubarb liqueur. It’s best if you don’t peel the rhubarb.

We also tried dried apricots in vodka - they needed something extra so we added a cinnamon stick half way through. Not bad and the apricots were pretty yummy too.

I’ve also had a go at making Blueberry Liqueur - I half filled a passata jar with blueberries, added some sugar and topped it up with vodka. This one seems to need quite a while to mature. A couple of weeks ago I seperated off the fruit and added more sugar but I think it will be Christmas before it’s ready. I expect it will be worth the wait though - the samples are very promising.

I’m currently making Plum Brandy - I decided to try something other than vodka for a change. I took 2 punnets of very ripe English plums (probably a 800g - 1kg worth), cut them in half and removed the stone. I put them in a 2.5l ex-gherkin jar. You need a bottle with a wide neck if you want to get the fruit back out again later. I added a couple of hundred grams of sugar - I’m not sure how much really. Then I added 750ml brandy and topped the jar nearly up to the top with vodka. As I recall I added more sugar after I’d given it a good shake to dissolve the first lot. That’s been stewing in the cupboard for a few weeks now, but is shaping up to be pretty damn good. I think with this one the longer you leave it the better it will get.

At the same time I bought a large punnet of blackberries (they were reduced and needed using). They also found themselves at the bottom of a 2.5l ex-gherkin jar. There wasn’t quite enough fruit so I added three apples as well. You seem to need to fill the bottle between 1/3 and 1/2 full of fruit for it to work well. That’s also currently stewing away. The colour has already drained out of the blackberries and into the alcohol which is now a rich red colour. I’m not convinced that the apples are adding much to the mix though.

And there are sooo many more fruits to experiment with…..

Now that I’ve completed T189 I don’t see why I can’t share the images I submitted for my ECA with the rest of the world - so here they are - View Photos.

I’ve also put together a page of the photos that were near misses - I didn’t use them but it was a really tough choice in some cases - View Near Misses.

I’m not claiming to be a good photographer - that takes a creative flair that this little scientist will never possess. But I enjoy it and that’s all that’s important really.

We’ve had the Wii a while now so maybe it’s time that I shared my thoughts.

(more…)

I’ve just submitted my end of course assessment for T189 and it’s a wonderful feeling. I’ve done my best in the time available and I’m proud of myself. I’d forgotten how much of a buzz I get out of finishing a course - I haven’t felt like this in years.  I’ve just been on the OU website looking to see what I can do next.  Well, they did tell me it was addictive.

It’s a shame I didn’t have more time to devote to studying the course generally.  It would have been nice to do all the exercises and share my results with the other students and here on my blog. I won’t have learned as much on the course as I could have because I haven’t really had time to practice and experiment with the ideas and techniques, but I have still learned a lot, especially in doing the final assignment.  I’ve really enjoyed it actually, even if I did get a bit stressed earlier in the week.

Most of all I’ve discovered that images are considerably more complex than they first appear.

In the spirit of throwing things in a saucepan and hoping for the best I attempted to create a red thai curry soup last night.  It worked out rather well so I thought I’d share it.

1 tablespoon oil
4 leeks, sliced
2 carrots, chopped
1 large sweet potato, cubed
1 can reduced fat coconut milk
1 pint vegetable stock
2 teaspoons red thai curry paste

Fry the leeks, carrot and sweet potato in a large saucepan for 10 minutes.  Add the coconut milk, vegetable stock and curry paste, bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes.  Stick it all in the blender and zjuush until smooth.

Scran with some nice bread. Simple. 

Of course the ‘Additions’ post explains why I haven’t posted for 6 weeks.  I’ve been working my little socks off and I haven’t had the energy. 

In fairness though, I am also doing an OU course in Photography which is taking up a lot of my spare time.  I’ve been at the computer for hours and hours every day, and haven’t had much inclination to compose and post blogs as well, even though I’ve had stuff I wanted to say. I’ll tell you about that another time though.

Just because I’m not busy or overstretched enough already I’ve recently chosen to enrol on a digital photography course at the OU.  I’ve attempted the first assignment tonight - spending an hour exploring the images on www.flickr.com looking for images that I find interesting for some reason. 

What an extraordinary website! I’m amazed by the beauty of many of the images - there are some truly extraordinary photographers in this world capturing the essence of their subjects.  It’s not hard to see why people from some cultures believe that photography captures a little of their soul - a good photograph certainly appears to. 

I’m now meant to think about why I’m attracted by the images I’ve bookmarked in flickr and consider the ways each image might be improved.  To be honest I’m not sure I’m learning a great deal about photography in this exercise, but I’m certainly discovering what types of photography I’m interested in.  I seem to have a strong preference for natural images - landscapes, seascapes, animals and plants, very close up (macro) images of flowers and insects and the like.  I also seem to like industrial landscapes - powerstations and windfarms, as well as entertainment landscapes - fairgrounds, cinemas, etc.  What I don’t seem to like are photos of people - except close-ups of wizened, wrinkled, interesting faces.  Faces with character and honesty I suppose.  Most of the photos of people on flickr seem to be contrived in some way.  I might recognise them as technically excellent images, but they don’t interest me at all.

Moreover, the gardening analogy can be extended - part of the pleasure of gardening is not just enjoying the fruits of your own labour, but appreciating the efforts of other gardeners too.  Bloggers are really supposed to go read other folk’s blogs and comment, leave trackbacks and generally interact.  I’m afraid I don’t do this at all - I just haven’t had chance to spend any time searching the blogosphere for bloggers with mutual interests.  Part of the problem is that I’m not 100% sure what my interests are. There’s also the problem that when you search for blogs (using technorati or google blogsearch) a lot of what you get seems to be rss feeds from news sites.  I want to read about people not corporations! 

Continuing with the gardening analogy -

I’ve also found that if you go away for a few weeks the whole garden gets out of hand leaving you demoralised and not sure where to start with the weeding/mowing/pruning/etc. I haven’t posted a blog for over two weeks now and I’ve definitely lost the momentum.  I’m finding it quite hard to know where to start, how much depth to go in to about what I’ve been up to and feeling somewhat pressured by the blog-monster who’s now DEMANDING text to munch on.

Initially I thought I’d give blogging a go because it’s being used by an increasing number of companies as a marketing tool and I thought it would only be a matter of time before the university I work for decided it wanted one/some.  Since there was a high probability that I would be asked to help the chosen blogger/s to get it going I figured I should probably know what the hell all the fuss was about and how the blogosphere worked.

(more…)