The Local Fall Fair

 The very hot and dry weather this summer has made for a difficult growing season for my garden, since I'm using both deep raised beds and large planter pots.   It was difficult to keep them properly watered.  Sometimes they needed watering twice a day, but watering in the evenings usually causes mildew and other difficult to control diseases.   The only plants which seemed to thrive in these conditions were the basil, leaf celery and the peppers!   I was at a club meeting and asked for suggestions to use up some of these peppers as I wasn't thrilled with the pickled pepper recipe I used last year.   The gal on the fair committee said to enter them in the fair as they were a bit low on entries this year.   

So I entered the peppers, and a few other things.  The banana peppers which were rapidly turning red rather than yellow, took 1st place and the mystery hot peppers which weren't supposed to be hot, came second.  I was really pleasantly surprised at getting a ribbon for my meagre gardening results this year.

I also dug through the items I'd made over the past year or so and entered a few things in the hand craft division.  I certainly wasn't expecting to see this 1st place ribbon and a rosette for most points when I peeked in to the exhibit hall when I arrived to demo weaving on the first day of the fair.    

I may have entered more things than I realised.   Not everything won a ribbon.   A few things got the nice little thanks for entering sticker.   I entered 2 shawls from historic patterns, in 2 different sections.  The one section judge wrote lovely comments on the back of the entry tag saying it was  warm and congrats on finding and using an old pattern which was still a good pattern. The little stuffed bear also got a comment on how it was creative and child safe since I used safety eyes on it.

Most of these items are things that I just knit up in the evenings because I hate when the tv goes on and I have nothing productive to do with my hands!

a few items are missing due to lack of space

I was doing a demo on the Saturday with the Weavers and Spinners.   The fair was super busy and the two gals who were demonstrating table looms, spent the entire 5 hours teaching kids and adults alike, how to throw a shuttle, change sheds and use the beater bar.   It was totally awesome.  I usually bring my spinning wheel, but didn't this time, because sometimes people spend so much time talking to me about spinning and telling me their memories of relative spinning that they don't check out the weavers quite so much.   Next year, if we're invited back, I'll bring the wheel out to play.  I kind of missed that this year, but I'm happy I simply had a my little inkle loom because the other two demonstrators got so much attention.  It was great.  On Sunday I took my display of Dorset Buttons.  It was much quieter that day, so I had time to catch up with another demonstrator which I don't see very often.

The local fair is interesting because they've done away with a mid-way.  They've geared it to younger kids, with pony rides, games, bouncy things but kept it relatable for most others in the community by keeping the horse shows, the sheep show, the 4-H classes, the handcraft division, crops competition and live music the whole weekend.  I did demos both days and it was a great, albeit tiring weekend!

Eliza Acton's Lemon Tartlets

More trees are changing colour.  The fields of beans are drying out, as are the fields of corn.  Today I saw squash and pie pumpkins in the shops.  We went from crazy hot weather, to its fall for sure.  Last night it dropped to 5°C.  Poor Dion slept draped over whoever he could find to give him some warmth.  It's definitely autumn!  With the cooler weather upon us it gives me ample opportunity to bake!

I made the following recipe for Common Lemon Tartlets  as found in Eliza Acton's Modern Cookery for Private Families, 1859.

It was a very pretty tart.  Because my chooks have been free ranging all summer, their egg yolks are very dark yellow which helped with the colour.  

A patty pan tin is a small, individual pie tin about 3-4 inches diameter.  They are often in fancy shapes, fluted, hearts, shells, etc.  

Fluted small pie tins with removable bottoms worked really nicely for this.   I'd recommend pre-baking the pastry for a few minutes because the pie crust didn't quite fully bake before the filling was done.  Prick the pastry a lot with a fork for steam to escape and to help the pastry stay flat.  Pie weights, beans or rice might work too.   I made some in tart shells, in a muffin pans.  They weren't as pretty but worked just fine.

350°F is a moderate oven temperature.

This was easy to make.   It's very pretty.     With the eggs and butter, making a rich base, with the sugar and lemon juice, you get sort of lemon flavoured omelette.   The butter softens the lemon flavour.  I wasn't a huge fan of lemon flavoured eggs, although it was pleasant enough.   I'd used the little patty pans for other pies though as it's a fairly impressive presentation.  

Sunshine Cake - 1896

 This cake was definitely sunny.  It's a sponge cake and was only a little fussy to make.  It was well worth the effort and the eggs though.  It was pretty and tasty! It's definitely a party cake or when you need something to impress!   It was from the 1896 edition of the Boston Cooking School Cook Book, by Fannie Farmer.  

I followed the recipe pretty closely.   The only thing I deviated with was that I added the sugar  slowly, in several additions once the egg whites were half beaten, since I was using an electric stand mixer.    I sifted the flour with my sieve first, and spoon the flour into my measuring cup.  Then I resifted the 1 cup of flour with the cream of tarter to evenly distribute it.  

Things to know -

This was much easier to make than it seems.   Just remember to be gentle with folding in the flour and check the bottom of the bowl so that all the flour gets folded in evenly.    I would have sifted the flour in, but managed to stick the sieve in the sink, so it was wet.  

An angel food cake pan has a tube in the centre so heat circulates and bakes cake from both the outside and the inside at the same time.  If you don't have one, then I think that maybe a not too complicated bundt pan would work.   Just remember to not grease the pan so that the batter can cling to the sides while rising during baking.   

Remember to cool the cake upside down.   My pan has little legs on it for this but before I had it, I just set it on something to keep it off the ground.   This keeps the cake light and fluffy as it cool settle and get a little heavy otherwise.

Moderate oven is 350 °F.   The suggested time was pretty accurate.   The cake should be nicely risen,  puffy and bounce back when gently touched.   

I will make this again but I'll drizzle it with a simple glaze of icing sugar, a few drops of water and either lemon juice or vanilla.  I think it would just add that little bit extra fanciness.