Today we enjoyed a harvest trip to fabulous Florencecourt with our schoolmates from P4. On arrival we were greeted by the House Cook and Gardener. After some refreshments our class were first into the kitchen, Rossi the Cook brought us through the old court yard entrance, down long chilly corridors to the most amazing kitchen. The roof looked like a giant iron umbrella. She explained that it was built this way so that the fossils the family had collected from all over the world were protected if the kitchen was ever to catch fire. There was a massive cooker and two ovens, one for roasting and one for baking - the junior staff had to get up at 5.30am to clean it out and light it in preparation for the days cooking. We were split into groups. The first group scrubbed potatoes and they had to pass the inspection or there would be no dinner. The second group sorted out all the different harvest vegetables that had been brought from the walled garden. The third group had to wrap all the cooking apples up in newspaper to save them and the last group prepared and rolled pastry for baking. Rossi explained how all the harvest vegetables were stored and cooked up so that they would last the family throughout the winter and the coming year.
Then we were off to the walled garden with Joan. She brought us on a wonderful walk through the forest, over the bridge, into and around the walled garden. We stopped, looked and guessed all the different vegetables. In the green house we could see lemon trees...but the lemons weren’t quite ripe enough just yet. We filled our baskets with lots of different harvest fayre and headed back up the house.
Our final session was making harvest crowns, which the staff would wear to a harvest dinner. We cut out lots of harvest shapes and made lovely crowns to wear whilst we enjoyed our lunch.
