Home Alone

Today I have been home alone!

It is such a treat to every now and then get a day to do this:


Clean, potter and cozy up the house.



Plant White Cyclamen at the front door.

Make Roast Garlic and Tomato Sauce to use during the week.

Roast a Pumpkin and Butternut Squash.

I added a red onion, a bulb of garlic, squeezed over half a lemon and added the rest of the lemon to roast with the squash and I added dried coriander (fresh would be better but i didn't have any)

I served some with the Sunday Roast and the rest will make a curry tomorrow.

Then.......

I made Raspberry Vodka - to be ready for Christmas.

This is how....

You need a sterilized wide neck bottle or spring top jar.

Pour in a 1 litre bottle of vodka.

(keep the bottle so you can pour the raspberry vodka back in it, you can soak the label off and put your own pretty label on the bottle)

Add 450 -500g of raspberries.

Add 200g of caster sugar.

Seal the jar and shake from side to side (not too quickly!) until the sugar dissolves, be patient it will happen.
Put the jar in a cool dark place, shake it every day for a couple of weeks then once a week after that. It will be ready in 7-8 weeks.

For Christmas vodka shots strain the vodka of the fruit into the original sterilized bottle, you should have a bit more than you started with so treat yourself to little glass while you use the fruit to make a dessert or it is lovely spooned on to a good vanilla ice cream (grown ups only please!)

The Raspberry Vodka will keep for a least 6 -9 months if you keep it in a cool dark place.

It feels really good to have something brewing in the cupboard for Christmas!

Happy cooking this week.

Shelly.