What’s the Velvet Alphabet?

The Velvet Alphabet is a combination of scavenging,foraging and cooking, growing and eating. This isn’t a high-end cookery blog for those already in the know, Velvet Alphabet is about offering you the tools to feed yourself and to ENJOY it – right through from field, to pan, to plate! Cheap food has come to be equated with bad food, and it is true that you get what you pay for, but what if you didn’t pay a penny? What if you found your supper in a local hedgrerow? It’s easier than you think to fill your plate when you’ve not got enough cash and  to actually enjoy what you’re putting on your fork.

We also have become further removed from what we’re eating, losing sight of where things come from and becoming squeamish about the facts behind our food. To me it seems imperative to understand the raw materials that you’re using in your meal before you can truly use them properly and so I want to arm you all with the information that you need to enable you to eat well whilst not breaking the bank or compromising your ethics. This blog gets back to basics whilst still being tasty!

Velvet Alphabet is now also home to my mother Rachel who is a Master Gardener with Garden Organic and will be blogging here about her adventures in her own garden and offering tips and suggestions for your own growing projects. She is also available to consult on any organic gardening queries you may have so do please fire away, it’s what she’s here for!

A little about me -

I’m Anna, and I grew up in rural Norfolk. My parents still live there and depending on my situation, so do I! Consequently I know the hedgerows, ditches, heaths and hidey-holes in the area like the back of my hand which certainly helps with my foraging, although that said new forage spots in new places are super-exciting! I have always loved helping my Mum or Granny cook and have had a lifelong fascination with vegetable gardens. there’s nothing finer than warm earth between your toes and the soft bitter smell of broad beans, or the warm smell of tomatoes  whilst you fill your bowl with veg. I wanted to not only help with cooking when I was small but also to do the cooking all by myself – I remember when I was 3 demanding that I be allowed to make an apple pie (my favourite) for my elderly Polish neighbour. And my poor mother was then roped into a painstaking day carefully guiding me through every step of making my own pastry, cutting up my own apples etc. until I eventually had a rather wobbly pie to present to my beloved Marysia next door.

I think that my curiosity about plants and animals teamed with the fact that my mother never shied away from the truth about food when I was growing up (I knew exactly what animals looked like dead, being skinned, being gutted, jointed etc) meant that I have such a strong desire to fully understand where my food has come from and also led me to try all sorts of things out. I wanted to know what various plants tasted like and whether I could eat them, and why they only grew in a certain place. We rely on the earth to feed us and this direct reliance on nature fascinates me so I like to keep the chain from earth to plate as sort as possible. Food is a delicious, exciting and multifaceted adventure and I hope to share some of that fun and variety with you.

 

Questions? Complements? Complaints?

velvetalphabet@gmail.com