Preserving months........

I can't believe it has been so long since my last writing - where has the start of the year gone?  Well in my case it has been 'preserved'.  I've spent the last 2 months working on a great project with the lovely Thane Prince, testing recipes for her latest book 'Perfect Preserves', which comes out in July to coincide with her judging of 'The Great Allotment Challenge'.
I've never really been into preserving, it always seemed like such a lot of work for not much of a result - certainly tales from friends who spent hours slicing citrus fruit skins or watching a rolling boil, didn't inspire me to join in.  But then I started making the most wonderful curds, marmalades and fruit butters, and I was hooked - the beautiful colours, creamy textures, jewel-like jellies - and the smell every time I re-entered the house, was bliss.  That is, until I started on the pickles, chutneys and relishes, and then the smell was of vinegar - lots of scented candles were required for those few weeks!
But one of the best things about making preserves is giving them to friends - the delight on their faces of being given something that you have slaved over and they know will taste so much better than anything they can buy - it was worth all the smells!
So after that I was relieved to escape to Bordeaux for a week of rowing training, on a stunning lake on the outskirts of Libourne.  With a perfectly flat lake for the whole week, we managed to get our scheduled 36km done every day.  A lot of mileage, but good for getting fit if only we had been given food that could sustain us for that amount of exercise.  You'd think wouldn't you, that being in France would be a certainty of at least getting great food.  But no, we were being catered for by a training school whose idea of a balance meal was for everything to be the same colour (mostly beige), and not a fresh green vegetable was spotted all week!
The only time we escaped training we headed off to the pretty nearby town of St Emilion, a place known not only for its' great wine, but also it's light but chewy, delicious macaroons!  Clearly this did not improve our diet much either!
So now I've returned home I am in desperate need for some micro-nutrients!  

The juicer is out of the cupboard and I have bought every green vegetable that is on offer!  I can feel my body soaking up the vitamins as I write!  If you need inspiration to get into juicing then you need to watch 'Fat, sick and nearly dead' - hopefully it will kick-start you into a new healthy regime too.