Titanarum

Here’s one of my mother’s recipes: Creamed leeks. Take 4-5 good size leeks. Cut into thin slices. Steam for 10 minutes. Transfer to larger cooking vessel, say a pan. Heat up till remaining liquid has evaporated. Just before it dries out add 250ml of single cream, good pinch of salt and half a tea spoon full of ground cinnamon. Leave to simmer until flavours have blended. Serve with pork (chops, meatballs or roast). 

And here’s how to grow your own leeks. Plant seeds in trays in the summer. Remove the weakest seedlings and leave one in each compartment. Insert into dug and weeded soil as many plastic tubes (30 cm long with a diameter of about 4 cm) as you need. Leave about 10 cm between each. Fill up each tube with mixed sand and soil (half and half). Water through. Carefully insert 1 young leekling into each tube. Keep well watered and fed until the leeks have filled out the tubes. This may take many months. The good thing about leeks though, is that they only get better as the weather gets worse. My life’s too short for all that bother so I just get them in the supermarket but don’t let that stop you doing what’s right and proper.