LEAVES FROM A NATURE NOTEBOOK: RAINBIRDS AND HAY BALES
'The green woodpecker was the proof of the coming of the rain...'
John Lewis-Stempel
Short reads on Nature and History.
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FRENCH PEASANT COOKERY: The original Niçoise salad (and why it was improved.)
What purists find difficult are the additions of cooked potatoes and green beans...
FRENCH PEASANT COOKERY: PICKLED WALNUTS
On the way back down the track to home I pull down a globular green walnut from the tree near the barn, and stamp it under my foot; there is no shell, the contents are white and milky.
LEAVES FROM A NATURE NOTEBOOK: WHY THE SHIT OF DOMESTIC HERBIVORES CAN SAVE THE PLANET
No ifs, and lots of butts...It's the insects, stupid
FRENCH PEASANT COOKERY: Berlinguettes d’Avignon
Ah’, she said, ‘Le héros malgré lui dans la cuisine.' Meaning eggs, in other, English, words.
LEAVES FROM A NATURE NOTEBOOK: AFTER DARK
Notes on nightwalking
FRENCH PEASANT COOKERY: ÉCLADE DE MOULES
'Éclade de moules is primal cookery...and it is art, and it is spectacle.'
An Ode to the Beech, Queen of Trees
Beech trees, they haunt the mind...
LEAVES FROM A NATURE NOTEBOOK: MAKING TREE HAY
Or, how to get VERY close to the buglife of trees
FRENCH PEASANT COOKERY: HACHIS PARMENTIER
Monsieur Parmentier spent his life promoting the potato... So starry did Parmentier make the spud that his crop of the veg near Paris required a guard by the Army.