It's June, so that must mean it's Litha soon

We moved a while back to pastures new. A good place, with a garden for Littleun, with the hills just a few yards away. One of the things we are enjoying is finding out how the locals do things.

It is very different from where we have come, there yes they celebrated many things but it was a bit of a split community. Here everyone knows everyone. Before we had even finished unpacking I could tell you the names of all our neighbours. I didn't know the names of my old neighbours, even though they had been there for the 13 years I'd lived there!

So we turned the calender over yesterday and started the countdown to Litha/Summer Solstice and had a look around in the area to see what they do for it. And boy are we spoilt for choice. After looking through it all we have decided to go and join our friends the Pentacle Drummers at their celebration a few miles over in the next town.

Here be a few things from their site about it all:

This Summer Solstice come and Join Eastbournes most popular drumming group, The Pentacle Drummers, Lords of Earthen Drums at their spectacular Summer Solstice event in their home town.

A fun filled day for all the family, with Ceremony, Drumming, Morris Dancing, Bouncy castles and slides, Sand pits, Fancy dress, Stoneage games, Belly dancers and much more, followed by an evening of Great music and dancing under the stars.

FREE PARKING & FREE CHILDRENS ACTIVITIES

This event will be held on secure private enclosed grounds, so the whole family can play in a safe private environment.

The Line up so far.
Evening Entertainment:Emma Harrop
DC Fontana
Roxircle
Inkubus Sukkubus

Daytime entertainment will be from:Devilstick Peat
Pentacle Drummers
Emma HarropThe Sea Gypsies
More to be announced.

For the Kids there will be a free Bouncy Castle and Bouncy Slide, plus FREE professional Face Painting (not just for the kids though)

Other traditional summer fayre entertainment will include:
Have a Go Archery run by the Herstmonceux Archers, Hook A Duck, Splat The Rat, Kids Coconut Shy, Pick a Straw, Penny Roller, Tin Can Ally, Teddy Tombola, Bottle Tombola, Water Splat Stocks (filled with your favourite Pentacle Drummer!), Toy Stall, Bric'a'Brac, Books.

There will also be stalls selling magnificent items and crafts.

This event will also be supporting WRAS, a local wild life ambulance service.

 

Please do click on the photo above for a link jump to their Facebook event page.

So mixed up with our personal celebrations and family gathering, we are looking forward to it all.

So its the Solstice

And although sunrise was technically 4.42am it has yet to appear here. One of the wettest and grayest solstices I have ever known. Even the wood for the fire is so damp I doubt it will light first go!

However dancing and music abound as Littleun has a new rhythm he wants to play for his drums and we have food on the go already.

I also have a new beginning today as I go for the first of my BSL course. I have started to accept that my hearing isn't getting better and at the rate the NHS works will be a very long time before they do anything to help so decided to take matters literally into my own hands and start a course to help refresh my sign language abilities.

Hope you all have a lovely day and that the Sun finally makes an appearance!

Litha Feasting: Lemon preserving and Lamb Recipes

If you are like us any Sabbat requires celebrating the good fortune of food around us. For this Sabbat we are lucky to have some lamb from the nearby salt marshes and I thought as we are celebrating the longest day of sunshine we would go for a Moroccan dish as this has some lovely ingredients such as apricots and lemons, reminiscent of the sun in shape and colour. In searching for recipes I found that the one I wanted to use needed preserved lemons. Now I know you can buy these, but half the fun of this path is learning together with Littleun so we decided to make ours (plus it’s a lot cheaper!).

For the lemons we have the following recipe and all I’d say is if you have any cuts do put on some food gloves first!

Ingredients
8-10 Meyer lemons*, scrubbed very clean
1/2 cup salt, more if needed
Extra fresh squeezed lemon juice, if needed
Sterilized quart canning jar

* You don't need to use Meyer lemons, regular lemons will do, it's just that the milder Meyer lemons work very well for preserving in this way.

1 Place 2 Tbsp of salt in the bottom of a sterilized jar.
2 One by one, prepare the lemons in the following way. Cut off any protruding stems from the lemons, and cut 1/4 inch off the tip of each lemon. Cut the lemons as if you were going to cut them in half lengthwise, starting from the tip, but do not cut all the way. Keep the lemon attached at the base. Make another cut in a similar manner, so now the lemon is quartered, but again, attached at the base.
3 Pry the lemons open and generously sprinkle salt all over the insides and outsides of the lemons.
4 Pack the lemons in the jar, squishing them down so that juice is extracted and the lemon juice rises to the top of the jar. Fill up the jar with lemons; make sure the top is covered with lemon juice. Add more fresh squeezed lemon juice if necessary. Top with a couple tablespoons of salt.
5 Seal the jar and let sit at room temperature for a couple days. Turn the jar upside down occasionally. Put in refrigerator and let sit, again turning upside down occasionally, for at least 3 weeks, until lemon rinds soften.
6 To use, remove a lemon from the jar and rinse thoroughly in water to remove salt. Discard seeds before using. Discard the pulp before using, if desired.
7 Store in refrigerator for up to 6 months.

Now that we have done this we can use them on Litha to add to our Tagine recipe:

Moroccan Lamb Tagine

Ingredients
1.5kg shoulder of lamb
1tsp coriander seeds
1tsp cumin seeds
olive oil
2 or 3 preserved lemons, chopped
2 onions
1 good handful dried apricots, chopped
1 good handful sultanas
Black olives
Fresh mint, roughly chopped to serve

Instructions

In a non-stick fry pan gently toast the coriander and cumin seeds until they become fragrant but don't allow to burn.
Tip the seeds into a pestle and mortar and crush with a pinch of salt.
Add the ground seeds to the lamb with a good drizzle of olive oil, black pepper, and the preserved lemons. Work all the flavours into the meat and leave to marinate.
Roughly chop the onions and put in the base of your tagine.
Then add the apricots and the sultanas followed by the lamb.
Next add some black olives, mix well to distribute the flavours and put the lid on.
Cook for about 3-4 hours at 160°C.
When cooked, sprinkle with the chopped mint and serve.

Oh I can’t wait!

Litha soon, some some crafts we are doing

Wanting to rearrange our altar with some new items this year we went on the search of things that Littleun and I could make and do together. One of our must haves is the smell of orange. Those big round juicy fruits which look so much like the burning Sun and smell of freshness and summer hope are important to us. We came across the stones below which we liked. It gives Littleun something he can make and he can craft with messages on the base, allowing him both his own special offerings and a chance to practice his runes or oghams. It’s an American recipe so uses cups but we just used English cups and added a little here and there to get the dough the right consistency.

Orange Fragrance Stones

1-1/2 cups flour

1/4 cup salt

1/4 tsp cornstarch

2/3 cup boiling water

1 tbls. Fragrance (orange in this case) oil

Colorant of your choice

Mix all dry ingredients. Heat water in a Pyrex cup in the microwave or on the stove. Add the f/o and the colour to the water. Stir water mixture into flour mixture. Mix as best you can and then knead the dough with your hands. At this point you just want it to look like pie or cookie dough. Roll it out about a quarter of an inch thick. Cut into shapes or use cookie cutters. Another option is to stamp the flat shapes. Let the dough stones dry. They get hard as rocks and will last for months.

We are looking forward to Litha, last year we spent it in France but this year it will be here in England on the beach with our friends.

Alban Heruin/Litha: Sun cake recipe

I’m always one looking for an excuse to eat cake and Lemon cake is a favourite too so thought why not make some with Littleun but instead of my usual loaf tin shape go for a round, that way when the icing is drizzled on it will look like a sunshine burst of colour. It will be a nice addition to our Litha/Midsummer picnic feast. Of course just to make sure it works we have to have a trial run so if you need to “test the waters” with me here is a scrummy recipe for you to try:

• 115g unsalted butter, softened

• 115g caster sugar

• 4 large eggs

• 180g ground almonds

• 30g poppy seeds

• zest and juice of 2 lemons

• 125g self-raising flour, sifted for the lemon syrup

• 100g caster sugar

• 90g lemon juicefor the lemon icing

• 225g icing sugar

• zest and juice of 1 lemon

Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF/gas 4. Grease and line the bottom and sides of a 20cm springform cake tin with greaseproof paper.

Using an electric whisk, beat the butter with the caster sugar until light and creamy. Add the eggs one by one, beating each in well. Fold in your ground almonds, poppy seeds, the lemon zest and juice and the sifted flour. Spoon the mix into the prepared cake tin and bake in the preheated oven for 40 minutes or until lightly golden.You can check to see if the cake is cooked by poking a cocktail stick right into the sponge.

Remove it after 5 seconds and if it comes out clean the cake is cooked; if slightly sticky it needs a little longer, so put it back in the oven. Allow the cake to cool on a rack.

Make your lemon syrup by heating the sugar and lemon juice in a pan until the sugar has dissolved. While your cake is still warm, make lots of little holes in the top with a cocktail stick and pour your syrup over.

To make your icing, sift the icing sugar into a bowl and add the lemon zest and juice, stirring until smooth. When your cake is almost cool, put it on a serving plate and pour the icing carefully over the top. If you pour it on to the middle of the cake, then let gravity disperse the icing down the sides, you get the ‘drizzle’ effect.

Alban Heruin/Litha handprints and dials

With the longest day coming soon I have been thinking of things that Littleun could do. One of the simplest was a handprint sun for Littleun to have in the window. We basically have yellow and orange paint, cover our hands and make a sun; it’s very simple but looks quite funky. Unfortunately this meant that not only the paper got covered as we turned it in to a fun game to try and print each other with it!

"human" sundial!

The other thing we are going to do now we have our patch is go for a walk along the beach, choose a few largish stones and then go up to the allotment, placing the stones out in a semi-circle we can make our own sundial so that we will always know the time without the need for a modern intrusive clock or alarm, plus it will be a gentle reminder of the turning year.