Thursday 11 July 2013

Strawberries

I love the perfume of fresh strawberries... don't you?  Today I found some really gorgeous, flavourful ones and bought many punnets.  I'd had this idea, after making elderflower cordial, that a strawberry syrup would be lovely.  I looked it up.  Found a recipe.


Doesn't that look irresistible?


So here it is,
my first batch of
Strawberry Syrup




It did feel a bit tragic to use up all those beautiful strawberries in a syrup but I have loads left over to eat fresh as well.  I think a bit of that drizzled over ice cream would be heavenly, with some fresh ones too of course.  What about with pancakes?

Don't have much to show for in the tatting department though...  here is a very small sample I worked on yesterday, sorry it's a bit wonky!  But... it's given me ideas...


... to be continued.

Best wishes,
Frivole

14 comments:

  1. Your strawberry syrup looks fantastic!! :) I use Smuckers strawberry syrup on pancakes, but I bet your homemade would be a whole lot better!! :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Brilliant! At first I thought you were back to clunies, but these half/ringy things look amazing!

    ReplyDelete
  3. The color of that strawberry syrup is wonderful! :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. It's years since I saw strawberries like that; they all seem to be white and crunchy now. We used to live on a rambling acre of ground many years ago, and, from nowhere, there appeared a patch of wild berries; I haven't tasted a proper strawberry since those days.
    Your syrup looks magnificent, but don't spill any on that beautiful snow-white doily!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We get those too Maureen, crunchy and tasteless, particularly when out of season. But these are truly delicious and flavourful. I think I'll have to get some more tomorrow! These will get devoured in no time in our house.

      Delete
  5. Oh yum! That syrup looks amazing!

    ReplyDelete
  6. That looks amazing...I love syrups, made an apple cinnamon one last fall, thinking about blackberry while on the island in a couple of week.

    Are those partially closed Josephine knots? I have seen that element used in some of the older tatting...very pretty and effective, I wondered as to why it isn't used now days...will be interesting to see your ideas!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Oh yes, blackberry would be delicious Julie. And I really like your idea of an apple cinnamon one too - do you have a recipe to share?

    Yes also about the knots. I've tried them before and they appear in Edwige Renaudin's book quite a bit. I just saw them again in a vintage book and it inspired me to give them another go and has given me more ideas I'm trying out at the moment.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I used this recipe: http://www.food.com/recipe/apple-cinnamon-syrup-canning-138473 I make my own apple juice to use from the peelings and cores that I would have thrown out a few years ago...one can get such nice juice from them for the making of jelly and syrup that I now throw them all in a gallon bag in the freezer until it is full and then cook them down with six of cups of water and run the juice through cheese cloth to strain it. I like the flavor I can get from the combinations of apples doing it this way too. I have also added things like sage, mint, rosemary, etc to get different flavored jellies (I add those either when I cook the cores and peelings or when I reheat the juice, but remove them prior to adding the sugars).

    ReplyDelete
  9. Your strawberry syrup looks like the essence of summer! Like Fox, I thought those were clunies. I look forward to learning more about that technique.

    ReplyDelete
  10. You made me feel hungry with those beautiful strawberries.
    Interesting pattern, looks something new but I too thought it was ClunIes
    Enjoy your strawberries/and syrup
    Margaret

    ReplyDelete
  11. Dear Frivole , indeed strawberry's are magic because of their smell, color and shape. A friend of mine, a great American tatting artist has a fantastic design with strawberries, and she sells it!

    Have a look at: Carollyn's tatting blog. You will have a nice surprise;

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Chantal,

      Very pretty strawberry bag. It's the same technique as is used in Marie's Beaded Shuttle Bags (pattern in tab above). In fact I had the same idea a while back and I started making a shuttle bag using red thread and gold seed with a similar idea in mind but it's still on the shuttles, unfinished.

      Delete
  12. Thank you for looking, Frivole. It is a true fact that many people have the same ideas at the same time. In science many things were invented or discovered simultaneously (Like Oxygen and the Hiv virus). I bought the pattern that you wrote for the little beaded bag, but I have not tried it yet.The first tatting that I ever made, was a flower with an embroidered centre in French knots, just like you show in this blog.
    Please, followers of Frivole, all have a look at: http://tennbrown.blogspot.be/
    Carollyn started this blog years ago, then had to stop it for personal reasons, and she started it again recently. It will please her a lot if you visit her.

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for taking the time to write a comment, it's always appreciated!