Our Daily Bread

Apologies for the infrequency of our blog posts - the price we pay for living in the beautiful Malvern Hills is that our Internet connection has been very temperamental of late and rather than spending hours trying to upload and write our blog, the precious times the connection is live orders and website updates take priority!
It may be due to the excessive wet weather, although that seems to have worked wonders in the garden, although we need some sun to bring out our cut flower garden in time for our next photo shoot.
We are in the throws of adding a new colour to the Ochre And Ocre range for Autumn, and as ever it involves lots of planning, analysis of order quantities, and brochure pagination and copy. I do love doing the photo shoots, as Rachel Spivey is such fun to work with, and as a self confessed lover of ceramics, it is the perfect excuse to pick up some lovely new/new preloved),  bits to use in the shoot. Our office is becoming a bit crowded at the moment!

Challah (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As a break from all the planning, I am really getting into bread making at the moment. The Aga is as close to a real bread oven you can get, and it gives you a really tasty loaf. One of my latest creations was goats cheese and sun dried tomato, and next on the list is a blackened chorizo. I was lucky enough to get along to one of the Aga demonstations recently, and picked up a few new tips, although I've yet to be brave enough to prove the bread overnight in the fridge.
I really only get chance to get kneading at the weekend, but the results never seem to last into the week.
If the wet weather lets up the vegetable patch will also need some attention, and it is looking very wild at the moment, but my new venture this year of fennel seems to be doing really well, unlike the peas, where the rabbits have been on a wild rampage.
We seem to be over run with rabbits at the moment, and whilst it is nice to sit and watch the baby bunnies frolicking on the lawn, serious vengeance is required after a visit to the garden where holes and dug up plants are everywhere. Baby Ochre particularly loves them, as his favourite soft toy is Peter Rabbit, so I'm not sure how he would feel if his Mummy started pest control patrols!

Illustration of Peter Rabbit from The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies (Photo credit: Wikipedia)