Author: Lesley

It might have taken us a few years but we are at last making active, and importantly commercial, use of the croft through sales of our mixed salad leaves and herbs, and our Croft baking.

Albeit on a very small scale. But that doesn’t matter. The land is sustaining us, and we are getting to know it better each year.

It’s sort of taken off all at once and as is always the way, I’m still a bit behind the curve in terms of preparation.

The micro-perforated salad bags haven’t arrived yet, so our initial sales to local cafes have meant we’ve had to commandeer other food safe bags to hold the produce.

However, the first four 250g bags of salad leaves, peashoots, and bags of herbs have now been delivered, and negotiations are underway to supply the local community store and our local very posh restaurant with more of our growings.

It’s become very clear that the problem is going to be growing enough to meet demand. Most of the restaurant/cafe outlets use several kilos of salad leaves and herbs each week, and we simply can’t manage that quantity. Especially with still growing out of sheep lick tubs rather than proper beds yet!

But, it’s a start and I’ve been delighted to see how readily local businesses have embraced buying from local suppliers.

Life is good.

The recent rain has really brought on the outdoor plants, who despite being watered regularly have loved the deep drenching that a few hours of steady rainfall provides.

These recent mornings have meant early starts for me. I may be a bit bleary-eyed at five thirty but the sun is up and the croft is still and peaceful.

It’s just me, the cats and the birds, all singing their hearts out. Well, the cats don’t sing, obviously – they just yawn and demand first breakfast.

Husband manages to go back to sleep until a more civilised hour.

Blackbird, willow warbler, blue tit, chaffinch, wren, cuckoo, dove, siskin, robin, meadow pipit, raven, all serenading the morning. The Merlin bird app has been so useful, identifying birds from their song when you can’t see them in the froth of spring foliage of the trees.

I bake with the patio doors thrown open to allow the cool morning air in whilst the oven is on.

And our first strawberries of the summer! So sweet and fresh.

This is a good time of the year on the Croft. A golden few weeks of sun and rain, long, light mornings and rosy evenings late into the night before the midges start…

You know that we’ve switched into summer mode when the cake changes from Spring cake to Summer cake!

Summer cake is a pineapple sponge, made with crushed pineapple, sandwiched together with pineapple, passionfruit curd and fresh cream, and frosted with cream and edible flowers from the croft.

Carefully brushed clean from any moving visitors that might constitute unwanted extra protein ☺️.

It had to be done.

I may experiment with mini loaf cake versions of this too.

The flowers are blackcurrant sage, calendula and nasturtium with lemon verbena leaves.

The purpose of any croft is for its tenants to make productive use of the land. That can be achieved traditionally through the raising of livestock, or less traditionally by growing and selling produce from the land.

Up until now any real crofting endeavours have been on a rather limited basis for us whilst we’ve been building the house. We’ve deer fenced part of the croft, planted hedging and a small orchard, but still have much to do on the tree front that we’d planned.

From this year onwards we will be growing herbs and salad leaves to sell, as well as baking cakes using croft produce for local outlets.

We’re starting small. And probably staying small, to be honest! I’m enjoying the stress-free living of not having a schedule that dictates my life.

I’m supplying three local businesses (the Selkie Collective, the Stables restaurant at Armadale Castle and Armadale Stores, our local community shop) with freshly baked buns and cakes. That takes up most of my early mornings, leaving the rest of the day for croft growing and other normal life stuff.

We’ll be offering salad leaves and herbs grown here on our croft to local restaurants and the local community stores. We love the idea of supplying the local community with what we grow.

Packaging for the stores needs some sort of recognisable branding and for those of you that are Gaelic speakers or who have been around long enough, you’ll remember that we named the house after our pair of resident ravens, Taigh an Fhithich.

In line with this we’ve called the Croft business Raven Croft.

I’m researching suitable bags for salad leaves and am starting to get the branding up and running. We won’t have a website as all of our business will be truly local.

It feels as if we’ve reached another milestone in our lives here, and that feels good.

I’m still working out how many croft beds need to be dug to work off one of those chocolate hazelnut cakes, but the less said about that, the better. Balance in all things!

It’s been a lovely weekend of weather here on the Croft as we see out the last few days of April. Sunny days and blue skies, although with a chill north easterly wind to remind us not to get ahead of ourselves.

Husband has been on a drystone walling course over at Tarskavaig on the other side of the Sleat Peninsula, so I’ve had a quiet few days working with my seedlings and wandering the croft.

The heathers on the bank are blooming, as are the saxifrage and the primroses. It’s especially noticeable as we haven’t planted many flowering plants, so the little pops of colour on the banks are particularly welcome.

The polycrub is bursting at the seams with seedlings and there are more to be moved in shortly.

This weekend saw the moving in of the tomatoes, of which I of course have grown far too many. I have no idea where they’re all going to go!

The herbs are coming along nicely. We now have a few unusual ones, like hyssop, which I’m growing for the first time this year.

Baking continues at pace, and I’m keeping the Sleat peninsula in cakeage and buns a few times each week now.

These are elderflower lemon cakes filled with lemon curd and fresh cream and topped with edible Croft flowers.

It means early morning starts, especially as the cinnamon buns take a good three hours to prove and bake and I need to get them to the Stables before the populace arrives. But that’s ok with these light mornings.

The sun usually wakes me up around 5.15 am right now and I don’t mind the gentle repetitiveness of baking whilst the sun comes up.

The pictures say it all.

At least ten female red deer grazing in broad daylight yesterday evening right next to the front of the house, completely unfazed by our presence.

I think they’re beautiful, but you can see the problem for tree planting. They’d eat the lot without fencing to protect them.

We still have to decide how to manage this. There are options, but none are easy or cheap, so we’ll think further on it.

It feels like we’ve had the longest, wettest Spring ever, but days like today make me forgive the weather everything.

The sky is the bluest of blues. It’s warm, with a gentle breeze, and the birds and insects are busy out there. Thankfully, no midges yet!

I’ve just come in from a few hours in the polycrub potting up seedlings. We’re at that time of year where we go through sacks of compost like it was going out of fashion.

Big Bertha, our orange wheelbarrow, has been working her passage carrying barrow-loads of compost over to the raised beds and the polycrub.

It’s filling up already. Lettuces, beetroot, potatoes, kale, rocket, Brussels sprouts, leeks, spinach, pak choi and herbs.

Some edible flowers too – calendula, borage, nasturtiums and marigolds. Some hollyhocks too, as I found an old packet of seed that needed using up.

The outdoor beds are progressing slowly. It’s been so cold and wet on the Croft that picking days that we’re able to work has been challenging.

The onions, beetroot and carrots are in. There’s just one more bed to weed, dig and replenish with compost, then I’ll be able to plant up the kale, leeks and Brussels sprouts.

The indoor plantings are growing well too.

The tomatoes, cucumbers, courgettes, chillies and peppers are all keen to be out there, so warmer days need to get here soon!

We may have had snow on the tops only last week but I can feel summer coming on today’s breath of spring air.

The pace of days here on the croft, on the island, is so different from London and our previous lives.

It’s slower, more relaxed, more reflective. More weather-driven, as much of what we do is outdoors now. I can go a week without leaving the house and croft, and I’m absolutely happy with that.

So when a day with girlfriends comes up as a possibility, it’s a real change of pace and a much anticipated treat.

In order to make it work I had an early start to bake a tray of Scandi cinnamon buns for The Stables, and now also for The Selkie Collective, our local community eco shop who have asked me to supply them too.

We dropped the buns off at Selkie and treated ourselves to a browse of their supplies and gift section. It’s such a lovely space.

Then a dash back to the car in the rain and off island onto the mainland to visit Duncraig Garden Centre, a lovely place nestled into the old kitchen gardens of Duncraig Castle.

Their plants are always in such good health and they’re such nice, knowledgeable people. Real plant enthusiasts, with cool cats wandering around the place waiting for head rubs too. What’s not to love.

The rain pounded down incessantly which maybe cut our visit short a little, but not significantly. We’ve all got good waterproofs.

They’d put by a rosemary plant for me and before we knew it we’d filled the boot of the car with vegetable plants and herbs. Don’t ask. I have no idea where they’re all going to go..

Next stop was a warm-through and mug of Cullen skink and a toastie at the Croft Cafe. The soup was so exceptionally good that I felt compelled to stop off at Fisherman’s Kitchen on our way back through Kyle of Localsh to pick up some of their fresh, undyed locally caught smoked haddock. That will go into a smoked haddock and creamy potato dauphinoise tonight for supper.

Back home to a fire, hugs and a couple of sleepy cats who have been curled up avoiding the rain all day.

A lovely day with fun and chat and the company of two good friends.

After tasting my first batch of mini loaf cakes it occurred to me that we could go one better. They were nice, but I figured that we could cram in even more deliciousness.

So I split each mini vanilla loaf cake and added a layer of blueberry conserve and cream into the middle. Then I sandwiched it back together and added cream and fresh blueberries to the top.

I did the same with raspberry jam and fresh raspberries, and strawberry jam and fresh strawberries.

The final variation was lemon curd with cream, lemon zest and fresh primroses.

Better.

Chocolate cake with ganache, cream and maybe chocolate flakes or buttons on the top next.

This is going to be fun.

I’ve been experimenting with different cake types as it seems that people in cafes prefer their own cake to a slice of a large one. Who knew, but there it is!

I bought a nifty mini loaf tin. It’s heavy duty carbon steel with loose bottoms in each of the sections for easy cake extraction. I’ve just tried it out, and it works.

Experiment number one was a simple vanilla sponge mix with fresh cream and fruit – single cake portion size and as cute as a button.

Just the right size to go with a cuppa.

Then with my baking apron on, and having just had a delivery of fresh croft eggs from friends, I thought why not try to make pastel del natas.

So I did.

These little Portuguese egg tarts are so addictive. It’s almost impossible to stop at one.

These are a batch half with a blueberry and half with a raspberry popped into the custard before it bakes, giving an intense explosion of fruity sharpness alongside the richness of the egg custard.

Is Skye ready for pastel del natas?