On December 2^nd we had a visit from this group of people from

Karrantza or whose roots are in Karrantza.

The weather was extremely mixed in December, with swings from

frosty mornings with temperatures of 1,8ºC

to mornings with dawn temperatures over 9ºC. Midday temperatures

ranged from 8.2 to 19.9ºC. We had snow on the hills some days

and sunny, warm weather other days and collected a total of only 50

litres in the rain gauge. Once again we had some unusual dawns.

We gave the cows mainly dried forrage, grass silage and a little

feedstuff. The heifer and dry cows did graze the fields.

Recipe of the month:  Pumpkin cake

2 cups plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1.5 tsp ground cinnamon

2 tsp mixed spice

1 cup olive oil (or sunflower)

4 eggs

1 cup natural yoghurt

1 cup Brown sugar

½ cup white sugar

2 cups pumpkin puree

1.5 tsp vanilla essence

Preheat oven to 170ºC

Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and mixed spice.

In a separate bowl whisk eggs, and then whisk with oil, brown sugar,

white sugar, pumpkin puree, yoghurt and vanilla essence.

Combine all ingredients and pour into oven proof cake tin. Bake for

30-35 minutes.

Apart from going to the weekly farmers’ market in Bilbao we

also went to a fair held in Leioa (11^th),

a mini-fair held in Karrantza (10^th) and to the important

yearly Santo Tomas fair in Bilbao (21^st). All farmers are

now in the middle of the fair, satisfying an historic demand.

On December 15th we once again donated pasteurized milk to the local

food bank as part of their Christmas solidarity drive.

Flower of the month. Tall flat sedge grass (Cyperus eragrostis)

This species is actually native to other parts of the world but has

become naturalised in Europe. It has no fodder value and on the

farm actually only grows in one or two stoney buy generally damp

waste areas