Blogger back online at last!

 

Last nights dinner consisted of most things coming from the garden. The New Zealand yams (otherwise known as Old Mans Toes) are dying back so I went and bandicooted a few for dinner last night. Then I went and gathered some rocket and Asian lettuce mix, radishes, which I forgot to put in the picture, tomatoes from the grow house, mini chocolate capsicums and grated carrot which was not from the garden. In the home made meat pie, made from scratch, I included some of the mushrooms out of the bags of mushroom compost. The yams were baked in the oven and even M commented “It’s pretty good”. Tonight we’ll have marinated steak from our friends happy cow, rice and the remainder of the salad, easy!

Autumn is well and truly here and the weather is being pretty unpredictable. The nights are cold this week but we do have sunshine during the day (oh doh – we’re not going to get it at night are we?). Stupid comment Jan. I finally succumbed today and pulled out all the eggplants, sob. I only got one eggplant off about six bushes in the grow house. There were still flowers but nothing much else was happening. So it is done. Now, what shall I try in the grow house through winter? I’ve already put some silver beet in and the capsicum and tomatoes are still going strong so I might try some bush beans and peas perhaps. The sugar snap peas are still growing in there so I might take a gamble with some seeds. Plus some lettuce I think. I have some Drunken Woman lettuce seed to try, yes I bought the seed because of the name!

                           

You can see by the lack of leaves on the old oak tree that Autumn is definitely here. M spends a lot of time raking up the leaves to put on the compost pile – and then the wind blows and he starts all over again.

I’ve started the pruning of the apple and plum trees but there’s still about six to go. That’s what I should be doing now but I haven’t been able to access Blogger for a few days so I thought I’d do a quick post whilst I can.

Next Sunday in Hobart will be the Climate Action rally. It starts at 11am at Franklin Square so I might try and get to the farmers market in Hobart first, just to have a look. That’s one of the problems about living an hour’s drive away from the city, you never do just one thing when you drive up there, there’s always a list of things to do/collect/visit! Please send us dry weather for the rally, just like today would be perfect!

Well, I’d better get out there and prune whilst the sun is still shining! Have a good week everyone.

Jan

And I’m really mad that I missed the Aurora last night here in Southern Tassie, double bummer!

Oh lordy it’s cold

This past week has been very cold – and wet. The ground is soft and the leaves are falling quicker than ever. But the poor pear tree is totally confused! I saw blossom a couple of weeks ago and now there’s a tiny pear growing. I have to prune the tree in the coming weeks so no doubt it will end up in the pile of clippings.

I actually started the first paragraph one week ago and then the weather fined up! We had a glorious weekend with sunshine and warm temperatures and I was able to get outside and start the pruning of all the fruit trees. I’m still pruning. And clearing up all the cut off pieces to put on the bonfire – ready for the man. Men luuuuvvvvv bonfires! And now – well it’s bloody cold and wet again!

Other news – well the daughter who said that she wasn’t going to get married until 2013 has decided that they want to go and live on the Whitsundays so they’re going to get married now on 17th December 2011! Yes, only six months to lose this belly of mine. It’s taken me ten years to grow it (since I moved to Tasmania) and now I have to lose it in six months. So, last Monday I started the seven day soup diet to give me a kick start, so to speak. I have lost 2.5 kilos but going by the number of times I had to go pee I’d say it’s mostly fluid. I didn’t get hungry on the diet as it was a thick vegetable soup and there was fruit and vegetables on various days, but – and it’s a big but – I don’t think I can eat another bowl of soup for a while, at least not vegetable soup! So I’ll try and boost the exercising and stay away from the vino, sigh.

Tonight we had mushroom risotto for dinner with a green salad. The mushrooms were from the mushroom compost bags that we bought in bulk locally and the salad greens were from the garden. The radish, rocket and Asian lettuce are doing fine in this cold weather. I collected the tomatoes, sugar snap peas and capsicum from the grow house and there was dinner. The rice, unfortunately was from the local stupormarket. I’m sorry there’s no pictures but I’m hopeless with cameras and always forget to take any photos. I will try harder.

And for all those that can make it to Franklin Square, Hobart at 11am on Sunday 5th June, you’ll see M and me there at the rally for climate action. It will be a good day and a very important day too. Speak up now before it’s too late.

Jan

A big week

Last weekend (not the one just gone), I had one of my favourite friends come for a visit from Adelaide. She had a meeting to attend on the Monday so she came on the Friday and stayed with us in far south Tassie. She arrived on a 9.15pm flight into Hobart so M and I decided we would go a bit earlier so we could pick up a few things in town first and have a bit of a treat and maybe see a movie or eat out for a change.

Harris Scarfe (HS) had a sale on cast iron cookware and I was interested in the large oval Dutch oven, reduced from $400 to $70. We arrived in town about 4.30pm and HS was the first and most interesting shopping venue (well he wanted to go to “Nuts and Bolts” and Bunning's) for me. M parked in a 5 minutes loading zone (it was the closest park) and I ran in to HS to discover that kitchenware was on the first floor, up a large staircase as I couldn’t see the lift. Anyway, I found what I wanted almost straight away and wow, they even had the green one. I paid and refused the plastic bag after finding out where the lift was (this was one heavy Dutch oven) and staggered over there. Naturally, the lift was at the opposite end of the store where I had come in so I hurried the best I could through the shop and out into the street.  M saw me coming, but did he leap out of the car to assist me with this heavy parcel (I’m pretty much panting and red faced by now)? No, he flicked the switch for the boot of the car from inside the car, and I carefully placed my precious parcel in amongst the assorted “necessities”, i.e. tools, bits of rope, telephone directory????

“Thanks for helping” says I. But sarcasm is wasted on someone who is fixated on nuts and bolts don’t you think? Anyway, the next part of the day was pretty boring as it was his shopping and I was glad when he had finished and time to find somewhere to eat. I had previously checked movie times and nothing had fitted into our time schedule. But, we did find an absolutely fantastic Turkish restaurant in North Hobart called Anatolia and if you ever have the chance, do pay a visit. There was a guy playing the Spanish Flamenco guitar and the banquet for 2 was just divine. Dips and bread, followed by an assortment of lamb and chicken kebabs, meatballs, falafel etc. and baklava and Turkish coffee to end. We stayed there for two and a half hours, it just felt so friendly and the food was perfect. Needless to say we’ll be going again.

Off to the airport to meet my friend. Well she arrived but her suitcase didn’t! So over to the desk, details given and a promise that she would get the case the next day. (It didn’t come until lunchtime). She wasn’t that bothered about the case but the delicious cheeses, Maggie Beer pate and quince paste and South Australian wines were in it. Would the cheese and pate survive? Well, if we lived in Queensland or the Northern Territory where it is warm I may have worried, but here in Tassie – not a problem! Lunch on Saturday was very enjoyable as to complete the meal we opened a bottle of organic strawberry champagne and spent a lazy afternoon at the table talking – a lot.

The next day we decided to be a bit more adventurous and not just sit around talking (and eating) and off we went to Hobart again to visit MONA (museum of old and new art), which opened at the beginning of the year and we had yet to visit. Wow and double wow, we all loved it. We spent the whole afternoon there and will have to go back for many more, there is just so much to see and absorb and it’s all pretty much exciting. There’ll be future posts on MONA for sure.

Meanwhile, my friend was dropped off at the city hotel and home we went. One thing I have neglected to mention was that my friend didn’t recognise me straight away at the airport because I Have had my First Haircut in twenty years! Not just a trim, a hair cut. No more Janis Joplin a bit more Germaine Greer I think! (Although another friend has used the words “ becoming a bit bag-ladyish”) It was nerve racking (for the hairdresser too) and I worried needlessly because I am very happy with result. Yes, all the blonde has gone and I’m now totally grey, but it does have some interesting silver highlights. But, boy, did I choose the wrong time of the year to have it cut! My neck is freezing! Luckily, I have scarves that people have given me over the years and I have never worn because my hair always got in the way. I now wear them – all of the time.

From this:                                 

 

To this:                                                           

All in thirty-five minutes.

Apologies for photo’s – M used his telephone, not his camera. Little Miss D is still not sure even though it was her Mum who cut it!

So now I’m wearing all the ear rings that I never used to wear as they couldn’t be seen and I don’t think I look at all like a bag-lady anymore!

Jan

Time to organise – myself!

Taken out of the oven at 9am this morning before I went off to work. M was given strict instructions not to touch – again. But when I came home at 3pm, absolutely starving (missed lunch), this is what I found":-

So I cut myself some too! This one was baked in the small,  3 quart cast iron pot and M has decided that it’s just the right size for me to bake for us three times a week! That is going to take some organising until sourdough baking becomes second nature. Can you see my wonderful slicing?

 

 

It’s not as holey as the last one that I made freeform, but then every one that I have made seems to come out different. I’m kind of following a couple of recipes and the dough does seem incredibly sticky – I almost end up wearing “rye dough gloves” and I often wonder about how much I seem to waste as it’s stuck to my hands (and my watch – and my sleeves – even in my hair, don’t ask!).

So, the next task is organisational training. This could be a major obstacle as I have a first class honours degree in procrastination ……..

Jan

This and that

 

 

So, here it is, Easter Saturday and I’m home alone. In this little town where I live, we have an annual sailing regatta – at Easter. Now even though M has not taken his little sailing dinghy down to the beach he is involved with the races. Today he is in the patrol boat. His job will be to rescue anyone who has the misfortune of falling into the sea; broken mast; upturned dinghy etc. etc. He may very well be busy today as the wind is pretty strong out there. And it is very, very cool today. There is no promised sunshine to be seen. However, the sailing crowd seems to relish these conditions, apparently it makes the racing more exciting (even if your fingers fall off with the cold) and there is a good turnout from southern Tasmania.

Some of the larger boats sailed down from just outside Hobart last night as part of the weekend’s racing program and some very brave souls have set up camp on the foreshore. The committee of the sailing club here ensure that there are meals and drinks (particularly hot ones!) available and there is entertainment at the club on both Saturday and Sunday nights. M is also working the bar tonight as he enjoys the singer who will be performing (and it means he’s in for free). I may wander down later but it could be difficult leaving a warm room to brave the walk down the street in the wind and possibly rain. Hmmm we will just have to wait and see.

But on a positive note I have had a wonderful success with my sourdough trials. A big thanks must go to Kate from Vegetable Vagabond fame on this count. I visited Kate at her pretty home and wonderful, wild garden last week to collect some multigrain that she had ordered for me through her Garden Shed business. Naturally I stopped for coffee and a chat and Kate broke out her fantastic South Australian Haigh’s chocolates. I was very strong and only had one (I think). They are very yummy. Anyway, I digress. Whilst I was there I asked Kate about sourdough starters and baking, did she have any helpful hints? Well, she very kindly handed over some wonderful rye sourdough starter from her fridge, told me about cast iron camp ovens (cheaper than Le Creuset cookware) and their beneficial use. I was very excited about all of this and thought that M might have an old camp oven in the shed. So with many, many thanks to Kate I took myself off to collect a friend who needed a ride home. 

But, I didn’t get very far down the road when I espied Pickle, Kate’s jack russell terrier, who had been for a wander into town, on his own and was in big trouble. He was playing with a couple of other small dogs and a young boy obviously on his way home from school. I stopped the car and wandered over to the pavement where I called Pickle by name. He came running up and I grabbed him quickly. I asked the young boy if he knew where Pickle lived and he pointed to Kate’s house so I was pretty sure that I had the right dog. I put him in the back and gave him a talking to while I turned the car around and drove back to Kate’s. She heard me arrive and came out and the first words that I said were “This IS Pickle isn’t it?” I was so worried that I had stolen some poor child’s pet. Luckily it was and with Kate holding Pickle (firmly) in her grasp I left.

I collected my friend and drove us home and when we arrived at my place I asked B if he wanted to stop as M had just arrived home from a job. The decision was affirmative and M said that he would drive B home after they had both had a beer. It was at that point that I asked M if he had a camp oven in the shed that I could use for my bread. Answer: No, but I’ve got one that’s a bit effeminate! But no, he didn’t even have a girly one so I had to pay a visit to the hardware shop in town. They didn’t have an oven that was the right size but they did have a saucepan and the wooden handle screwed off very nicely. I haven’t used it yet as the first batch of Kate’s starter produced a large loaf and I baked it on a baking sheet instead. I gave strict instructions to M that it was NOT to be cut whilst warm but even so, by the time I came in from the garden a lot of it had disappeared and he wormed his way out of trouble by saying that it was wonderful. And it was.

On another note, we had a long discussion with Miss D, the five year old grand-daughter this week about “Where does the Easter Bunny live?” So after dismissing the idea that he might be in the magic cave with Father Christmas, we thought that it must be a gigantic magic burrow where the Easter eggs can be stored. She is soooo excited about the Easter Bunny coming tonight I’m not sure that there’ll be much sleep.

By the way, the other news is that my younger daughter sent me a text last week to tell me that she is getting married! Congratulations, I sent back, but please give me some time to lose some weight. “No rush” she said, it’ll be on Daydream Island in 2013!” That should give me a good chance, don’t you think?  She’s already living with the man involved in the story. He was the one that nearly died earlier this year in a motorbike accident. I think the wedding is the silver lining of that event! A near death experience tends to put things into perspective and realise what love really is. Good luck to them both and hopefully the magic will still be there in 2013. (And I’ll be a size 14).

Jan

Kitchen (mis)Adventures

Well, what a week in the kitchen. Naturally it’s still tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes and I now have a cupboard full of dried tomatoes, chutney, relish, pickles and a freezer full of frozen tomatoes. And they’re still coming! We have eaten tomatoes with everything and nobody is allowed to leave the house without at least one bag brimming with them.

But I also decided to try an bake some sourdough bread this week. Here I am, nearly 59 years old and never tried before. So I did a bit of research and thought to myself that it seemed pretty straight forward and gathered the flour and water and nothing else to give it a go. Well, you have to “feed” the mixture and wait for the magic. Hmm, the first bowl of “magic” ended up in the bin as it looked and smelled mouldy – not sour. But I was not going to give up and started another little batch of “magic”. This time I was excited to see the bubbles and a little bit of froth so I thought that we were in business this time! I had a very plain recipe from the web and set about to create the masterpiece. Well, maybe it’s not that warm in my kitchen but it didn’t seem to rise very much, even after leaving it overnight! Now I’m not known for my patience, in fact I think that when it was being given out I must have got bored waiting and left before I received my share! So after hours and hours I just bunged it in the oven, a very hot oven. The recipe said to leave if for thirty-five minutes but after peering through the oven door for the millionth time I decided to pull it out after only thirty minutes. It looked done to me – see below

However, upon cutting it was plain to see that this very dense loaf was not completely cooked in the centre. Bugger! M said that he was sure that it would be fine if we toasted it. So we did. But one slice was enough it was so heavy. So then I thought that I had better make some bread with yeast so at least we would have some edible bread in the house and I made these

 

The focaccia (spelling is not a good point either!) turned out very well and so luckily we didn’t starve this week.

Yesterday I decided to give the old sourdough “magic” another go and dragged the starter out, separated what I needed and gave it a feed and left it all day to bubble up. Naturally I had forgotten that I was going out to my book group last night, so after making up the dough with the starter and putting it in the bread making machine for it’s first mix, M was given strict instructions to “NOT TOUCH IT” except for turning off the plug and I would deal with it when I came home. Well, it was a good evening last night so I was a bit later home than I had originally planned. And yes, at 11.30pm there I was in the kitchen kneading this bread dough, which quite frankly, didn’t look as good and elasticy (yes I know that’s not a real word) as the first lot. But being positive I left it to rise overnight again. It’s still there, not rising. So I’ve started an ordinary rye loaf in the mixer to keep us going. Just in case. I am going to leave the sourdough all day and then bung it in the oven to see what happens. This could become a mini series……

M had also decided to have a go in the kitchen last Friday. I was going around to a friend’s place and he decided that with the surplus plums he was going to try and make an alcohol of sorts. This involved cooking the plums. So he filled my largest pot to the brim (we had a lot of plums), added water, aaahhh, put the lid on the pot, double aahhh, turned the heat to full power, Noooooo and then went out to do a little job in the shed! Need I say more? Apparently, (it was all cleaned up before I got home) when he remembered the plums they had escaped and were covering the stove top, the benches either side, dripped down through my recipe books onto the floor and through both drawers under the cook top. In fact I was cleaning a small river of plum juice from those drawers for a couple of days! The pot of plums was taken outside and left there until I peeked inside and saw the mould and insisted that it be sent to the compost heap! I also refused to wash the pot so I think it might still be in the shed!

I’m so glad that kitchen failures are something that can happen to everyone!

Happy weekend, we might even have a dry one after endless days of rain………

Jan

Recycling at it’s best!

What a creative idea! Joanne Ussary bought a used Boeing 727.  She paid $2,000.00 for the plane.  It cost $4,000.00 to move and $24,000.00 to renovate.  (She has a LOT of wood and specialty windows for $24,000!  I want her carpenter!)  But not bad for a $30,000.00 investment...  The stairs open with a garage door remote and one of the bathrooms is still intact.  There is a personal Jacuzzi in the cockpit. The Boeing home is featured as part of a collection of creative conversions.  It  has a spectacular view!  (I wonder how much the land with this view cost!!!)  

And where it is based!

 

Jan