UK Disability Resource of Disabled Needs

pam · Posted: Thu May 01, 2008 11:14 am Post subject:

what about you speeds any memories from yester year you would like to share?
Re- the wine - I don't get the time either.

Pam

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Pam.

Annie · Full Member Joined: 15 Mar 2008 Posts: 202 Location: kent

yes, I remember the maggots in apples and the blackberries, I wonder how many we actually ate, don't think it bothered us that much. Yes we had pies made out of windfalls and blackberries. Another foul thing was the fish my brother used to catch in the river, he came home once with a huge pike, he wanted us to eat it, lots of local ways of soaking freshwater fish before cooking, Mum used salt water but it still tasted exactly like the Medway when it was cooked. We always soaked garden peas in water before cooking so the maggotty ones rose and the maggots wriggled out.

Mum and my Uncle Jack used to make wine, that's what the rosehips were for. Not too sure they were that good as it was usually like sour thick sweet alchohol, only shop bought stuff we had then was port and sherry at Christmas and always a bottle of Stones green ginger, I only found out what real wine tasted like once I grew up. Like you I prefer to buy. Mum gave it up but Uncle Jack carried on and used to offer a glass when we visited, too polite to refuse. Like you I buy mine these days.

My mother used to do 'eyewatering pickled onions' as well. I was talking to an elderly lady in the village who said when he was about sixteen my brother and his mate fancied her daughter so one time when they came round she was peeling onions for pickling and had both of the boys sitting at her kitchen table peeling, things you do for love eh.

Did you have a ginger beer plant, the whole country did at one point, you kept it fermenting and once a week topped up the sugar and yeast and water, drained of half before doing that and gave it away, (probably explains why the whole country had one. In the end you couldnt give it away. It had to be kept 'live' probably ceased when they all died.

Losing my brother was hard, the first time I experienced the death of somebody that close, one thing I have from that which I have learn't to be very true, my late Mum said you don't get over losing a child but you do learn to live with it.
Annie

Speeds · Posted: Thu May 01, 2008 1:20 pm Post subject:

I do have some - but my memories are so young and almost seem inconsequential

I will have to wrack my brains
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Annie · Full Member Joined: 15 Mar 2008 Posts: 202 Location: kent

Speeds,
do rack your brains, as a family historian I believe that memories are important, I have a fabulous book which is based on lots of memories of the beginning of the last century recorded in late eighties, it is fascinating,
Annie.

pixie · Site Admin Joined: 16 Jun 2007 Posts: 1812

Can you still get ginger beer plants because I want one.

I loved making ginger beer and I still have a glass a day now. It's good for the digestion.
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pam · Posted: Thu May 01, 2008 3:48 pm Post subject:

Speeds any of your memories would be interesting to read I bet you have loads once you start thinking back.
Ann I remember the ginger plants and the ginger beer well - hated the stuff. Mum always had one or two on the go still don't like ginger - except for ginger biscuits for some reason.
I remember mum putting (Ithink it was a rabbit) insalt water, it was in a large basin in the dining room. Whilst we were all out the dog somehow got in there and drank all the water out of the bowl.

ugh

Speeds I haven't seen any ginger plants for a long time but I am sure they must still be around. Pam
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Pam.

Annie · Full Member Joined: 15 Mar 2008 Posts: 202 Location: kent

Pixie,
I Googled yesterday to see if there was a recipe for ginger beer the way we made it back in the 60's, no luck but there are lots of recipes available, most look a bit more alcholic than that one.
I dont like rabbit much any way Pam so the dog would be a good excuse for not eating it, puts me in mind of a friend when I first married, she had a cat and dog who had lived together for years, one day she put her leg of lamb to rest on the kitchen unit, the cat jumped up and knocked it down, the dog grabbed it and shot of up stairs with it followed by the cat, when she got to the top landing they were both tucking in. Completely ruined her Sunday roast,
Annie

pixie · Site Admin Joined: 16 Jun 2007 Posts: 1812

Thanks Annie, that was very good of you. We don't really drink alchohol so maybe I will give it a miss and carry on buying it for now.

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pam · Posted: Fri May 02, 2008 7:05 pm Post subject:

As a very young girl my daughter had a rabbit and a dog for pets. when we went out we would leave the dog in the garden and the rabbit out, as well - they were such good friends the rabbit was kept safe from any cats as the dog hated them and would chase them away. As a pup the dog spent lots of time in the hutch with the rabbit. On one occassion I was putting some fresh water in the rabbit hutch and thought I heard the rabbit bark - nahhhhh I thought as the dog was milling around. Later in the week I again went to the hutch - guess what?? It was the rabbit that barked!!!

Pam
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Pam.

Annie · Full Member Joined: 15 Mar 2008 Posts: 202 Location: kent

I have heard of animals doing similar things, obviously the rabbit thought he was a dog.
When I was young we had a cat that would attack any thing, she used to bring home gifts, there was a ledge outside the back door where she would leave various dead animals, even a hedgehog once, she even used to catch fish in the stream outside the cottage, she did really well one year when floods washed the carp out of the farm managers pond and they swam down the stream,
Annie