We had a good time.

There is little to report on the knitting front. Except that, a week ago today, as I was walking along the street in Alyth on my way to the shop where they take in yarn for the charity knitters, I passed a knitted Andy Murray in a shop window. It was Wimbledon semi-final day. He was about a foot high, wearing a kilt, holding a tennis racket of course, with his initials on his shoes.

I didn’t have my camera with me. We were back in Alyth on Tuesday – I knew he wouldn’t be in the window any more, but I thought maybe they would get him out from under the counter for me to photograph. The shop was shut that day for “staff training”. I rattled the door to no avail.

Nor can Google find him. You’d think there might have been a picture in the Blairgowrie Advertiser.

Gardening

We had a week of glorious weather, followed on Wednesday and yesterday with a tremendous downpour. Things are beginning to move, after that long, cold June. The runner beans definitely twine counter-clockwise.

Erin, that was a most interesting article in the New York Times about Good King Henry. Many thanks for the link. There were two distinct oddities in the story – one, that the plant is apparently grown from seed every year. Mine is an utterly hardy perennial. I tried seed once and failed. My current stock started with one plant, bought at the Farmer's Market in Blairgowrie, which I have cautiously divided.

The other, is the statement that it fell out of general favour because it is bland. Mine has a strong bitter taste. Plants are affected by different soils and climes, but that seems an extraordinary difference. The NYTimes picture matches my plants, and so does the Latin name, chenopodium bonus henricus.

And the big news is, that cooking it like the sub-continental vegetable bathua was a great success.

Alexander and Ketki came over at the weekend. I made a lamb korma in the slow cooker, with the unauthorised addition of a tin of cocoanut milk, and served it with a bathua raita. One of those rare meals where things go right. Alexander said that the spices I was using would overwhelm any vegetable, I might as well use asparagus, but he was wrong. Good King Henry stood up and answered back.

A few days later I tried the spiced potatoes (same link). They, too, were delicious although in that case I may not have put in enough GKH due to running out. The deliciousness may have been entirely due to the spices. I will have to give some thought to increasing my stock.