theWI Adderbury & Districr WI – NFWI Menu of the Week for Valentine’s Supper – Monday, 15th February 2016
15Print Menu of the week Welcome to the WI’s meal ideas for using fresh seasonal British produce. Recipes on our site include new contemporary dishes as well as family favorites making use of the WI’s huge wealth of food talents gained over nearly 100 years. Some recipes are quickly made whereas others will take a bit more time and skill. There is something here for everybody. This week’s recipes provide a fabulous Valentine’s Meal commencing with a light fig and goat’s cheese bruschetta followed by venison and ending with a sumptuous chocolate torte St Valentines Feast is not only notable for lovers. Until recently in some parts of the country secret gifts could be left on the doorstep and the bell rung. In this way anybody could benefit from the day not just lovers FSA is trying to reduce the number of people who suffer from the food poisoning bacteria campylobacter See #Chicken Challenge For more help on how to prepare chicken safely click on the link The recipes also use cows milk and butter and with Dairy farmers once again under pressure and the numbers British dairy farmers reaching record lows, we can all do our bit to help by buying British Dairy, such as milk, cream, yoghurt, butter and cheese. On these pages our recipes also highlight the important role bees play in the food chain with many of our recipes including “Bee Friendly dishes” – using foods such as herbs and edible flowers from bee friendly plants to increase the number of pollinators available for bees. For more ideas follow the Home Economics Adviser on twitterhttps://twitter.com/NFWI_HomeEc Some of our recipes use left over vegetables and other foods in your fridge and cupboard, but we also have other great ideas in our recipe pages, just click on the links on the left hand menu. For even more ideas on how to make meals from left overs, see www.lovefoodhatewaste.com Starter Fig & Goat’s Cheese Bruschetta Main Venison Steak Dessert Chocolate Torte Drink Rossini For other ideas, including other vegetarian recipes, follow the link or click on the link on the left hand menu: RECIPES: Fig %26 Goat’s Cheese Bruschetta A quick and decadent starter just perfect for Valentine’s Day Serves 2 4 slices of Granary Bread 1 Clove Garlic 100g Goats Cheese 4 Figs, ripe, brown Turkish Garnish with Mint leaves Serve with a dressing of Balsamic Vinegar and Olive Oil 1. Toast the bread and rub a cut clove of garlic over 2. Allow the bread to become cool 3. Spread the goat’s cheese equally on each slice 4. Cut each fig into quarters and arrange neatly on the bread 5. Serve immediately with a dressing Tip As an alternative to goats cheese a creamy/ crumbly Lancashire or Caerphilly may be used Venison Steak Have you tried venison yet? Venison has such a wonderful flavour and is not particularly “gamey”. Venison can be purchased from most large supermarkets during the season and is lower in fat than other red meats Serves 2 300g Venison Fillet, cut into 2 steaks a little Olive Oil, ground Black Pepper and Salt Method Brush the venison steaks with oil and season according to taste. Heat the grill/ frying pan and cook the steaks for 3 mins each side for a rare steak or a little longer according to preference. Serve with vegetables, mashed potato or chips. – See more at: https://www.thewi.org.uk/what-we-do/recipes/meat/venison-steak#sthash.i7LPBdJu.dpuf Chocolate Torte This dessert uses a chocolate torte recipe. It is easy to make, gives a great result and tastes gorgeous 75g Butter 40g Cocoa Powder 225g Sugar 2 large Eggs 50g Plain Flour Chocolate Ganache: 150ml Double...
Read MoretheWI Adderbury & District – Afternoon Visit to Ardley Energy Facility – Monday, 15th February 2016
Dear Ladies, We had a really excellent visit to Ardley this afternoon, all yellow jacketed, goggled, hard-hatted, thickly gloved and wearing ear-defended, we were shown around the working site of Viridor’s energy recovery facility by a most well-informed member of Viridor’s visitor centre, whose name I most unfortunately did not get down. We began our tour with our guide telling us all about the facilities we were about to discover, then on to walk through their excellent centre before we were required to don health and safety items before descending to the working floor. Here are a few photos to whet your appetite for your own visit and perhaps on our next scheduled WI visit in April…. My photos show a circular tour of the visitor centre and the entrance and I’m afraid some of them are a little unclear. No photography is allowed on the working floor but what you get is lots of steep stairways up and down, steep slopeways, huge containers, one blue, and there’s the green ceiling way up above us. Pipes travel in all directions. Green lines delineate the pedestrian pathways which must be adhered to. It’s noisy, fascinating and very futuristic and the brains behind the brains who owned the secret to the engineering intelligence belonged to a French submarine concern. The engineering of Ardley is the most exciting, amazing, wonderful heart of the enterprise which needs to be experienced, just for the thrill of it all. As soon as I encountered the pipeworks, my thoughts went straight to the building in Paris, a Museum if memory does not fail, where all the building’s innards are on the outside, which enabled me to appreciate the beauty of the structured lines. Well, that’s what I experienced! The outside area is like a lunar landscape. The old landfill site is still be accessed for the methane gas and one day, when the technology has been created, they may be able to get at the material buried there, but the ground will have to be firm and compacted. For now, it is still unstable and they have no idea what may be mixed in with the hidden rubbish. The maps have not yet been drawn. They have 6 open days a year when groups of two’s and three’s, families and singletons may visit and see for themselves the wonder of the works, see how the place ticks. I can’t wait to go again. All info is on Viridor website and they have a Face Book page too. It’s a great experience… Margaret Halstead xxx PS.. Dear Ladies, Zandra Ryan has very kindly sent me the following four photos from her camera call for our visit to Ardley yesterday. It was such a brilliaant visit… ...
Read MoretheWI Adderbury & District WI – Recycling by Andrew Jenkins – WI Meeting February 4th 2016
Reflections on recycling – WI meeting Thursday 4th February 2016 Dear Ladies, Andrew Jenkins, the recycling officer for both Cherwell and South Northants District Councils provided an excellent presentation on Oxfordshire’s waste recycling operations giving us a general break-down of details to contemplate before our member’s follow-up visit on Monday, 15th February. Visiting groups may only be a maximum of 15 and names and next-of-kin telephone numbers are required for all visitors. Here are a few of Andrew’s fact and figures to juggle with: Collections from Cherwell: 5 daily collections of blue bins 80,000 tonnes per week 240, 000 tonnes per month 3,360, 000 tonnes per year Food and Garden waste: In-vessel composting to cope with meat and dairy. Agrivert operation means all waste stays in Oxfordshire for sorting, shredding and into bunkers at temperatures of bet ween 60o – 80o C. to kill off all material. Speedy maturation to a high quality fertilizer allows contents to be provided for farmers within 8-10 weeks. Blue bin recycling: 70% paper, card and all mixed paper – this provides us with an excellent money return for our endeavours. 12.5% low weight plastic bottles and containers 5% ferrous metals 2.5% Aluminium 10% glass and other residue – glass is not wanted – other materials are – clothes, shoes, textiles, household waste, food. Glass: this degrades quality of other items. Bottle banks good for better quality of glass for recycling which gives more financial gain for our operations. Every clear glass item in particular will be made into new glass. It’s a win-win situation with better organization for recycling exactitude resulting in higher profit margins for the operative. Our recycling facility is in Cheshire – UPM – a large company and Cherwell. Waste is carried to Cheshire and worth of recycling is higher than cost of petrol. Waste sorted in 40 minutes by visual inspection, followed by ferrous separation via magnetic conveyor belt, with sale of items as blocks of steel. Paper and cardboard roller sorted with smaller things falling through. All previously done by hand, roller operation much more efficient. Plastics sorted by high technical sorter. Spectometer scanner. Separation chamber. Not for big items or flimsy plastics. Difficult to recycle. Crushed milk bottles straight back to dairy. Paper and card to pulping machine via Cheshire and immediately back into re-use. Much better to recycle than to use landfill sites. The Facts: 300,000 tonnes of waste per annum 95% diverted from landfill 338, 000 homes supplied with electricity – reduces carbon emissions by 58 tonnes Value for money – landfills cost us more money Recycling firms make money by efficient handling of waste. Shut-downs cost them money as does any non-efficient workings. A follow-on question and answer response allowed members the opportunity for individual queries and Caroline gave our vote of thanks for a most interesting explanation of how our accumulated waste is collected and recycled. Margaret...
Read MorethjeWI Adderbury & District WI – NFWI “Share the Love” Campaign – Sunday 14th February 2016
“Share the Love” for Climate Control – We can protect the Places, People and Things we love from Climate Change” Dear Ladies, Here is my presentation for NFWI “Share the Love” Campaign for Valentine’s Day – We can protect the places, people and things we love from climate change” And here’s my photo presentation for Pancake Day….. Happy Valentine’s Day… Margaret Halstead...
Read MoretheWI Adderbury & District – Blenheim & Bladon Walk – Tuesday, 9th February 2016 – Our First Walk of 2016
Dear Members, On a somewhat dull morning, a group of our members gathered at The Institute for a 9.30 car share start to our walk at Blenheim. Lunch at the Oxfordshire Pantry or coffee in the village were both suggested as delightful endings to our walk, setting us off in high spirits. We began with a lake-side group photo… as we set out to walk the outer ring of the grounds, up and down a few nice slopes and over several wet and muddy paths, by-passing lakes tranquil in the morning sunshine… Pheasants were cackling everywhere and Estate foresters were busy with their chain saws. A pheasant hatchery busy with the morning sounds of its young chicks made this early part of our walk surprisingly noisy. Mary very kindly offered us a “Finger of Fudge” to munch on as we travelled onwards. We stopped on a bridge for the views, managing to persuade a passing visitor to take a photo of all thirteen of our group, and then I took just a couple more for good measure. We passed by the rear aspect of Blenheim Palace then onwards to connect with the children’s railway track on whose train, my grandson Freddie, rode on for his 1st birthday picnic outing to Blenheim. And then our path returned us to Blenheim’s front door and those lady members staying for lunch made their farewells and strode off in pursuit of lunch while three members walked away to find a cup of hot coffee and Enid’s car for the journey home. A popular and excellent walk with many dog walkers out who, like our group, were revelling in the bright warm mid-morning sunshine which eventually blessed our footsteps through Blenheim’s green and pleasant sheep-strewn pastures and past peaceful lakes on gently sloping pathways. Our thanks to Mary for a very pleasant morning’s walk around Blenheim Park…. Margaret Halstead...
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