Table of contents for October 2016 - Issue 52 in The Simple Things

In the autumn of 2012 a new magazine appeared on British newsstands. Called The Simple Things, it offered a suitably simple promise; ‘to celebrate the things that matter most’. I bought each one of those early issues, which offered a monthly reminder to ‘take time to live well’. Now, four years on, I co-own The Simple Things. As our readership has grown, people began to ask for our back issues and we started to sell out. Then we had an idea; ‘what if we collected the best of the magazine in an anthology?’ Choosing what to leave out was the hard part. I wanted to show that it doesn’t matter where you live or how busy you are, there are everyday opportunities to learn something new, do something well, be…

     LOUISE GORROD Our Wishlist Editor, Louise, is also our Stuff of Life shopkeeper (shop.thesimplethings.com). Look out for this symbol for items in the shop. Louise also blogs, bakes and photographs at Buttercup Days: buttercupdays.com…

Rachael Matthews loves the way anyone can pick up a pair of needles and a ball of yarn, and in short order, make something – a holey scarf, haphazard mittens or a complicated jumper. But alongside its creative consolations, she believes it also offers a meditative opportunity – a chance to replace the mad rush of the modern world with time quietly spent reconnecting to yourself. She elegantly discusses how knitting teaches problem solving, maths, thriftiness; how it can encourage activism and companionship and why she loves Herdwick wool – “itchy but beautiful” and “alive with sparkling specks” – enriching any colour or texture you put next to it. (Leaping Hare Press)…

PROUDLY HOMEMADE PITTA BREADS Is there anything more satisfying than making your own bread? Pitta is extremely easy to make and it goes with everything because it’s light and doesn’toverpoweradish. 7g instant yeast 240ml tepid/warm water 1 tsp golden caster sugar 400g plain flour 50ml olive oil, plus extra for oiling 1 Mix the yeast and warm water together in a large bowl. Leave for a couple of minutes and then add the sugar and stir through. Add the flour and olive oil and knead together until you have a smooth doughy consistency that bounces back. This should take 5-8 minutes. Leave the dough in an oiled bowl for about one hour until it has risen. 2 Preheat the oven to 220C/ Fan 200C/425F. 3 Once risen, cut the dough…

SAGE AND CIDER TURKEY Chateau des Moriers Fleurie Beaujolais, £15 This is a fresh and flowery wine with subtle hints of spice, violet, cherries and raspberries. More structured and full-bodied than other Fleuries, it has good ageing potential. A perfect food wine, especially alongside white meats. PERSIAN PILAF PUMPKIN Bastion de Garille Viognier IGP, £11.50 Very powerful nose dominated by aromas of fresh peach, passion fruit and white flowers. The balanced palate is creamy and lively, developing citrus flavours. PUDDING PIES Reflets de Carbonnieu Sauternes, £22 Rich and complex with honeyed apricot and pineapple notes and that all-important balance between acid and sweet. Wines recommended by Borough Wines & Beers (boroughwines.co.uk), which works with small producers worldwide to offer a unique selection of wines, spirits and beers through its website…

The Little Book Of Hygge: The Danish Way To Live Well  by Meik Wiking, Penguin Life “Hygge is about atmosphere and experience, rather than things,” explains Meik Wiking. His lovely book explains how to add a sense of wellbeing to everyday life, from creating a hyggekrog – a cosy, cushioned nook to read in – to finding the most beguiling lights for your home, to savouring the small, ‘humble’ things in everyday life. How To Hygge: The Secrets of Nordic Living  by Signe Johansen, Bluebird Signe Johansen provides “a primer to live your life to the fullest, not a bible to be slavishly followed.” There are suggestions for re-connecting with nature in the city, small adventures in the wild, lessons in self-sufficiency and ideas for making your home a candlelit…

Find your niche. I was working in IT and Sally in marketing, when we talked about running our own website. We were both interested in graphics and illustrations. There were lots of great designs being released but unlike, for example, cards, there was no one place to buy them online. We came up with the name To Dry For and devoted the site entirely to tea towels. The name and the niche really helped – because it was so different – as did having nice designs. Within six months we were getting national press and talking about quitting our day jobs. That niche works so well we didn’t want to dilute it. We started Beast in Show so we could produce other products for ourselves and others while keeping To…

Morning! What’s happening? I’m normally at my kitchen table in my Victorian house in south Belfast working on my laptop. My first cuppa is nearly always a coffee – I need a kick-start. If it’s an indigo dyeing day, I’m already in the studio eager to get my hands dirty. I usually end the day with bright blue hands. Sounds fun! Tell us more about your studio. It’s housed in an old linen mill. I adore the two large mill windows with views across Belfast’s mountain. I work with natural indigo on Irish linen so I love that I’m based in a building with such strong historical links to its production. I lived in Japan for two years where I studied Japanese textile techniques, including Shibori – a folding, hand-stitching…

Map in hand, I turn the corner of a quiet residential street in north London. I’m on the lookout for a particular building. But I’m not visiting someone, I’m hunting for 1930s Modernist houses and am armed with a guide to Hampstead’s finest examples. Although I’ve lived in London for more than a decade, I’ve never walked down this street before, never would have realised what was down here. And there – just beyond the point at which I might have given up – is what I’m looking for, all straight white lines, red pillars and a curved yellow front door, an architectural world away from its neighbours. I stand in admiration for a while, and then the map is out again, as I walk on to the next secret…

Don’t be put off by the ‘ism’. Humanity’s oldest form of medicine might sound like the sort of mystic carry-on that involves a cauldron and possibly some chanting, but for many of us it is an everyday part of 21st-century life. Every time we sip peppermint tea to ease an overindulged stomach or dab tea-tree lotion onto an unwelcome blemish, we are practising herbalism – harnessing the medicinal properties of plants to heal the body and soothe the mind. We’ve been foraging for natural remedies since Paleolithic times, and the first written herbals – lists of plants and their medicinal uses – date back many thousands of years to the ancient civilisations of Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq and Kuwait), China and Egypt. Greek and Roman herbalists spread their knowledge across the…

Unfortunately, shrubs don’t have the same ‘oooh’ factor as herbaceous flowering plants or trees. Ignored and sad-looking specimens in supermarket car parks and central reservations are to blame for the lowly perception of them as something boring and municipal. DIY stores and garden centre chains don’t help either, tending to stock only the most common cultivars of stalwarts like eleagnus, abelia, cotoneaster and euonymus. However, the happy truth is, just like perennials and annuals, shrubs can bring colour, scent and interest to your garden. Some fulfil a crucial role in the winter garden, too, adding structure and form when all else has died back. The trick is to seek out interesting varieties from specialist nurseries, and to plant in groups to provide impact and a foil for the plants and…

RAPID REPAIR KIT Sew on the go with thread, needles, safety pins and more. Best for: sartorial emergencies – a loose button or wayward hem. £15, merchantandmills.com THE DEPARTURE LOUNGE SHOE SHINE KIT An all-in-one polishing, brushing and buffing kit. Best for: splendid looking shoes on any and every occasion. £12.95, dotcomgiftshop.com TIPPLESWORTH CLASSIC MARTINI MINI COCKTAIL KIT Everything for a classic martini, from gin to cocktail olive. Best for: the ability to shake (not stir?) whenever the mood strikes. £19.95, harveynichols.com…

Hazel Toothed edge leaves, with a hairy underside, much like the caterpillars that like to munch them. May look like elm leaves, but softer to the touch. Lime With this heart-shaped leaf, it’s all about what lies beneath. Flip it to discover prominent veins with small tufts of hair in the angles. Hawthorn Once seen to symbolise death, Hawthorn actually teems with life and can support more than 300 insects. Just perhaps not all on one 6cm leaf. Horse Chestnut Introduced from Turkey in the late 16th century, in autumn it’s not the leaf that’s sought after, rather the fruit. It came, it saw, it conkered. Beech Like humans, these leaves darken and lose their hair as they age. Unlike mere mortals, however, they can live for hundreds of years.…

SERVES 4 AS A SIDE 2 medium, raw beetroots, peeled and grated 150g red cabbage, finely sliced 65g Iranian or Medjool dates, pitted and roughly chopped 20g bunch parsley, finely chopped FOR THE DRESSING 3 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil 3 tbsp lemon juice ½ tsp salt ½ tsp black pepper 1Tip the beetroot into a large bowl, followed by the red cabbage, dates and parsley. 2Whisk the dressing ingredients together in a small bowl. Just before serving, drizzle over the salad and give it all a good toss Recipe from The Saffron Tales, Recipes from the Persian Kitchen by Yasmin Khan (Bloomsbury) Photography Shahrzad Darafsheh and Matt Russell…

Granny tests me on The Other Realm when she’s not talking to Mrs Doherty or soaking her corns. “You’re out walking and a whirlwind comes upon you: would you lie down?” “I wouldn’t. I’d stand tall and put my hand up, like in class.” “Good girl.” Granny narrows her eyes. “Would you leave out a saucer of milk on a Thursday?” “I would.” “And would you sleep with a shovel under your bed?” “I wouldn’t. Just in case they felt like visiting, for a bit of a chat.” Granny winks at me and lights her pipe. This town is hopping with spirits. Mrs Moran’s baby is a changeling. A ginger demon who howls night and day. The fairies took her real baby, she says.Biddy Higgins the newsagent hears banshees (like…

KATE YOUDE is a freelance journalist who has written about board games on page 94. She lives in London but, having grown up on the Isle of Man, likes to escape the city for regular breaths of sea air. When do you feel at your most mischievous? When spending time with my childhood best friend. We can be our silliest with those who know us best. MICHELLE MACKINTOSH is a book designer, author and illustrator. An extract from her latest book, Care Packages, is on page 80. She lives in Melbourne, Australia, and enjoys writing letters, origami and making compilation CDs. When do you feel at your most mischievous? When I am playing with my British Shorthair cat Bronte or on the dance floor at the indie disco. NADIA TAYLOR…

Charlotte Mendelson has only 6sqm of urban back garden, but boundless enthusiasm for scanning seed catalogues, squashing in squashes and adding another specimen to an over-crowded plot. She describes it as a “wildly uneconomical experiment in extreme allotmenteering”, and has filled her plot with vegetables and herbs, 20 kinds of lettuce and harvests “by the teaspoon, juneberries, wild strawberries, tame strawberries and every conceivable currant.” There are even a few flowers, but they’re edible, too. Divided by season, this inspirational, funny book, written by someone who hankers after a homesteader’s lifestyle, will make you look at even your window box in a new, more productive light. (Kyle Books)…

The change of seasons is often a tricky time in the wardrobe department. After all this time in the bright colours and pretty prints of summer, it’s easy to forget how even your most basic staples function. Which top went with those trousers? Does this coat really go with those shoes? And why did I buy that enormous oversized jumper? Think how much easier the transition would be if you could treat yourself to an entirely new wardrobe. Thanks to this great competition from hush, one lucky reader will be able to do just that, choosing £500 worth of clothing from its new autumn/winter 2016 collection. A marriage of the classic and contemporary with beautiful cuts, soft fabrics and hush’s trademark, laid-back sense of style, the collection takes inspiration from…

IF YOU’VE EVER doodled, then you can turn your hand to a bit of Hirameki. The word means ‘brainwave’ or ‘flash of inspiration’ in Japanese and it is the art of turning a seemingly random paint blot into a picture by adding a few dots and lines. Artists Peng and Hu realised that the tiniest blot could be easily turned into something amazing; even the most inexperienced doodlers can make something from a blot. “It is simply about drawing what you see,” says Peng: “all you need is a pen and a dash of imagination.” On the subject of pens, they recommend the following: “A Hirameki pen should be no longer than your arm and no shorter than your little finger. The ink should be coal black or midnight blue,…

*There’s no better way to get to the heart of a city than through the people who live there. Every month, we ask someone, clearly in love with their city, to take us on a personal tour and tell us what makes it so special. You may feel inspired to visit one day or to rediscover the charms of a city closer to you, but for now just sit back, relax and enjoy some armchair travel. How long have you lived in the city? I’d been to Lisbon several times but moved here permanently in 2014. I’m Italian (from Sicily) and it was love that brought me here, both for the city and for my wife, who is Portuguese. I still remember how Lisbon swept me off my feet on…

BOUNTIFUL BOTANICS As part of this family-friendly weekend event at Wakehurst, the Sussex garden managed by the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, herbalists Alice Bettany and Lucinda Warner lead foraging walks and herbal health workshops. 8-9 October. kew.org ROOTS MEDICINE The healing powers of plants such as comfrey, dandelion and valerian move down to their roots in autumn. This workshop at the charitable Dilston Physic Garden in Hexham, Northumberland will teach you how to harvest and prepare them. 5 November. £40. dilstonphysicgarden.com HERBFEST 2017 Four-day celebration of herbal medicine and related therapies at Monte Mariposa, Portugal. Talks, walks and workshops take place at an Algarve retreat surrounded by fields of wild lavender and borage. 29 April–2 May 2017. From £300, including meals and three nights’ accommodation. herbfestuk.co.uk NATURAL SKIN CARE…

Winter is one of our favourite times of year. When it’s cold and dank outside, we can revel in hunkering down indoors, away from the elements, and really enjoy our home comforts and the interiors we’ve so lovingly created. To help you get the most out of the season, we’ve teamed up with innovative gift and homeware brand Sass & Belle to offer four lucky readers the chance to each win a £250 online gift voucher – a great opportunity to find those perfect finishing touches for your home. Perhaps you’ll choose from the Modern Artisan collection, new for autumn/winter 2016, which includes stylish terrariums, planters and coasters that combine gold brass with marble to create a simple, hand-crafted aesthetic with a modern twist. Or maybe you’ve been hunting for…

Once pumpkins arrive you know autumn is really in full swing. Throw a pumpkin party: ask people to bring a small pumpkin as well as the one they’ll be carving. Carve off the pumpkin tops and fill them with tea lights, votive candles or dried flowers and seedheads from the garden. Send everyone home with their pumpkin vase. Tell stories as you carve of fancy dress disasters, maybe a ghost story you once heard or simply what the word ‘pumpkin’ brings to mind. Eat pumpkin, too – a pie is the obvious choice. But pumpkin and sage lasagne or pumpkin soup make for filling savoury dishes, especially accompanied by a mug of hot cider or two. How to carve YOU WILL NEED Carving tools (a variety of spoons, knives and…

WHAT IS IT? A rather trendy leafy houseplant that, until fairly recently, caused a bit of a brew-ha-ha in the horticultural world because none of the experts knew what it was called. For years it had regularly appeared at Royal Botanic Gardens Kew’s help desk to be identified by mystified members of the public. It wasn’t until the late 1970s that it got a name, when Kew botanist Wessel Marais suggested that it was a Chinese species of Pilea. It now has several common names, including the Chinese money plant, the missionary plant and the pancake plant. WHY WOULD YOU? It has a rather appealing story attached to it: the plant was introduced to Europe in 1946 by a Norwegian missionary who had been travelling in the Chinese province of…

This brightly-coloured, no-cook Persian salad makes a fun and flavoursome accompaniment to a roast chicken. Crunchy raw cabbage is an everyday feature of salads in Iran and here red cabbage is combined with raw beetroot and dates for a sweet and healthy take on a winter ’slaw. Quicker, lighter and less fuss than your usual roast dinner veggies, a salad means less time in the kitchen and more time for autumnal walks. For the recipe, turn to page 128.…

There have been many glitches in mapping the world – “accidental phantoms caused by imperfect navigation, optical illusions and poor recording by mariners and cartographers”. Tallack takes us on a tour of all kinds of intriguing islands, from the mythic, to the discoveries of the early explorers, to the “supernatural regions, where the lines between life and death were blurred” – perfect locations for tales of the afterlife. There’s Atlantis, the mysterious Hy Brasil, hidden by thick fog and only seen once every seven years, and the entirely imaginary Javasu, invented by ‘Caraboo’, who wore feathers in her hair, could make a bow and arrow and was a dab hand at fencing, but was really Mary Wilcock from Witheridge in Devon. (Polygon)…

Half term handicrafts Try wand whittling, leafy crafts, pumpkin carving and den building at National Trust properties around the country. nationaltrust.org.uk Creative retreats Spend a tranquil weekend in Devon learning or honing a new skill from knitting to Scandinavian wall hangings with a range of creative retreats from Made on Holiday. madeonholiday.com Seasonal skills Get ready for a creative Christmas with a range of inspiring courses at West Dean College in Sussex. There's everything from calligraphy to weaving and gilding decorations. westdean.org.uk Outdoor learning Wild Goose in West Yorkshire runs outdoor nature-based workshops from seasonal art days to campfire cooking with an emphasis on relaxing, de-stressing and having fun outside. wildgoosecic.co.uk…

Thanksgiving has never really taken off here the way it has across the pond*, where family is summoned from far and wide for a feast to rival Christmas. But it is a great excuse to gather a group of good friends to whoever’s house has the biggest dining table. Ask everyone to contribute a dish so you can go to town on a seasonal spread that has none of the stresses of a big family party but all of the fun. There’s even a turkey and a pumpkin pie (stars and stripes, optional). And if you’re looking for a reason to celebrate, being thankful for what you have is not a bad place to start. So gather everyone together, cook up a storm, and take a moment to remember how…

Meik Wiking is a happy chap. On a scale of nought to 10, he claims to be a solid nine. That’s quite a tall order for anyone at the tail-end of a whistle-stop business trip to London, but he’s the director of the Copenhagen-based Happiness Research Institute, so he probably knows what he’s talking about. Plus, he’s Danish, and the Danes have once again topped the charts as the world’s happiest people. “You could say we’re the happiest country in the world,” says Meik, with a broad smile. Lean, lightly tanned, with a European long-short haircut… as if this former Danish think-tank director needed any more credentials as poster boy for living Danishly, his surname is also pronounced ‘Viking’. So what keeps Denmark at the top of the world’s happiness…

THE SYMBOL OF a season on the turn, a tool to ward off evil spirits and the fodder of fairytales – pumpkins are probably the most famous of all the winter squash, but are they the most delicious? Related to cucumbers, courgettes and melons – and techinically a fruit – these hardy squash come in a spectrum of shapes, sizes and colours, from dusky blues and creamy yellows to egg-yolk orange and moss green. Pumpkins, which are native to America, are best known for their part in the Thanksgiving tradition (puréed with warming winter spices, as the filling for a sweet pie*) or disembowelled and carved for Halloween. They can be brewed into beer, grated into cakes, or simply mashed with buter – even the leaves and seeds can be…

BANANA AND MEDJOOL DATE CAKE Serves 8 – 10 300g salted butter, softened 300g golden caster sugar 3 eggs 3 bananas, plus 1 sliced for decoration 9–12 Medjool dates, pitted and chopped 100g milk or dark chocolate*, broken into smallish pieces 350g self-raising flour 1 tsp baking powder 1 Preheat the oven to 180C/Fan 160C/ 350F and line a 27cm round baking tin with baking parchment. 2 Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and light. Add the eggs and beat again until well combined. 3 Peel and mash the bananas in a bowl until just smooth with a few chunks. Add to the cake mix with the dates and chocolate and fold in gently. Carefully fold in the flour and baking powder. 4 Spoon the batter into the…

FAVOURITE SHOPS Miss Can Visit the São Jorge Castle and, when on your way back, stop by Miss Can to grab a couple of cans of fish, or sit down and enjoy its fish-based tapas and a drink.miss-can.com/en Underdogs Art Store/ Montana Lisboa A jointly managed coffee shop, which is also an art shop – you can buy artwork from urban- inspired local artist and sit with a coffee and a cake, riverside. under-dogs.net/news/underdogs-public-artstore-montana-lisboa/ Ler Devagar A former printing house turned bookstore, Ler Devagar (Read Slowly) boasts an exceptional collection of books, including second-hand books, and is a true bookworm’s heaven. lerdevagar.com/ FAVOURITE GALLERY MAAT Contemporary art lives side by side with industrial archaeology at the ancient Tejo Power Station, now Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology. Good for families…

We’ve curated Best of The Simple Things, a 256-page anthology that gathers together our favourite features from the magazine’s first three years. It’s full of delicious, down-to-earth recipes, novel household projects and creative ideas for ways to share your home-grown bounty with friends and family. Swap your ‘to do’ list for a ‘could-do’ list and order a copy for you or a friend. Take time to live well. £19.95 + free UK p&p* ORDER AT ICEBERGPRESS.CO.UK/SHOP  OR FIND US AT ALL GOOD BOOK SHOPS *Check online for overseas postage prices…

You may not have described it as such, but you’ve almost certainly taken part in the giving or receiving of care parcels – thoughtfully put-together packages to offer comfort, celebration or just a reminder that someone is thinking of you. Although the term ‘care package’ may seem to be a very obvious case of ‘what it says on the tin’, the term ‘care parcel’ actually comes from the humanitarian organisation Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere (CARE for short), which began distributing parcels of food and supplies in Europe following World War II (check out the meat-heavy contents of a typical 1940s parcel on page 83). The tradition of sending care parcels to soldiers has continued but now they are also made and sent by charities, individuals, families and friends…

Shirley Conran famously said, “Life’s too short to stuff a mushroom” so imagine what she’d have thought about cutting unidentifiable foodstuffs into squares and arranging on a cocktail stick. Perhaps more horrifying than the unappetising delicacy on the cover is that this was published as recently as 1984. The recipes inside range from creamed chipped beef on toast to fruited chicken mould. The real hostess magic here would be getting your guests to try anything. Found at awfullibrarybooks.net…

Luxurious Body Butter Make your own aromatic, cooling skin smoother MAKES:250ml KEEPS:6 months INGREDIENTS 2 tbsp cocoa butter 4 tbsp shea butter 2 tbsp coconut oil 4 tbsp evening primrose oil 10 drops jasmine 10 drops sandalwood 5 drops rose 1.Gently heat the cocoa and shea butters with the coconut oil in a bain-marie until they have melted. 2.Remove from the heat and cool until hand-hot. Add all the oils and whisk well. 3.Put the bowl in the fridge, removing every 30 minutes or so to whisk. 4.When nearly set, whisk well and pour into jars. 5.Replace in the fridge until set. Found in The Domestic Alchemist: 501 Herbal Recipes for Home, Health and Happiness by Pip Waller (Leaping Hare Press).…

THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO Just as we know that the Dancing Queen is only 17, we can trust in Abba that at Waterloo, Napoleon did surrender. But probably best to refer to that history book on the shelf to get a little more detail. In 1815, French troops, led by Napoleon, entered Belgium, hoping to capture Brussels. He faced opposition from the Prussian Army, under General Blucher, and an Anglo-led Allied army led by the Duke of Wellington. The actual battle, which took place on 18 June 1815, was a bloody and close-run thing, with victory for the Allies only thanks to the arrival of the Prussian troops. The significance of the outcome was huge: it stopped Napoleon’s drive towards European domination. He abdicated four days later. Wellington secured a…