August

Being outside grounds me: a quick walk with the dog while the sun is coming up, checking on the horses and the chooks. The first rays of sun, so pretty with a bit of cloud cover or the smokey haze over the valley. Giving a tiny hint of warmth on these freezing mornings. A friendly nicker from the horses while they wait on their hay, now the grass is all gone. The kookaburra, always a happy sound in the morning, frolicking away in the distance. The magpies, sitting on the branches above me, doing another sing along. And of course the chooks, always hungry, spotting the chook bucket and calling me over. All of this while the dog is happily doing bouncing laps around me and the kids finish their breakfast and climb on their bikes. 

Good morning, breathe in the beauty and possibilities.

The day might be busy, but its all going to be ok. We’re doing all of this again at the end of the day...

The soccer carnival came and went. It was a major job, taking up many hours. But it was a huge success. 600 juniors played, accompanied by parents and siblings. 

Behind the scenes.

It’s been quite the eye opener seeing the other side, the organisational part of a carnival. 

The strong community spirit, the many, many awesome people volunteering their time and energy.

You don’t know how strong you are until you pushed a little at your comfort zone. 

Even if that includes doing presentations...

Still Winter, but we can see nature gearing up for spring. 

The feedback from the mulberry patrol: “Loaded!”

“Wings and Wheels” at the local airstrip.

David would like this one for his birthday...

While Alex and Sophie wouldn’t mind going up in the glider...

The dam is getting lower. 

With all of NSW drought declared, we’re aware that a bit of rain in June has done wonders to get us through this Winter. We still have water in our rainwater tank. Even though most of the grass has disappeared with the first good frost, the coldest winter since a rather long time, we know that many other are not so lucky. It’s been heart-warming to see how many people are involved in fundraisers to pull our farmers through this. With long road trains of hay going all over the state. We have to look after our farmers, where would we be without them...

Going Nuts Macadamia Oil.

I keep bringing out new products, knowing it probably not the most efficient way having a menu so wide. But it’s keeping it fun, the experimenting, trials and promoting. It also enables me to bring out the best products of the season. That means sometimes saying goodbye (temporary) to best sellers, like the maple pecans. Sometimes the stress of keeping up stock is not worth it. I’ll bring it back for next Winter, with a better supply line...

My gorgeous boys, always keen for adventure.

The end of the Young Guns program,  soccer has finished for David. 

Soccer season is going towards its end, only a couple more training and games for the older ones and the season is all wrapped up for the year. Organisation for the presentation (end of year celebration) and the club's 50th birthday dinner are in full swing.

With my Autumn granola coming to an end. I’m introducing a new seasonal granola: Berrylicious.

Raspberry soaked oats, with lime, coconut and vanilla. Finished off with almond flakes and dried blueberries. 

My house now smells like raspberry macaroons... This trial batch got all thumbs up. Today will be making new labels, getting ready for the orders that are already starting to roll in!

And another couple of weeks gone, the year is flying by.

This would be the year that I would challenge myself a bit more, stretching the comfort zone. Trying new things and making sure there wouldn’t be any regrets. While keeping a balance...

Well, the balance is often the biggest challenge. But I’ve grown so much this year, in skills, as a baker, business woman and as a person. I’ll let you know at the end of the year what the verdict is...

Festive

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!

After unwrapping the gifts, we spend most of the day building the trampoline (more about that one later). We spend this gorgeous sunny day, being outside, working together and enjoying some nice meals.
A Dutch Christmas Stollen for breakfast, some Romertopf sourdough with a Picnic Ham from a local organic farm and a fancy mango salad. The kids got to choose the dinner: Pizza. Maybe a bit unconventional, but I can’t blame them I do make a very nice pizza... Sourdough base, homegrown veggies (capsicum, eggplant, zucchini), oregano, some picnic ham and local cheese.

For dessert, I made my first pavlova ever, it was a real treat and perfect for a hot day. For those not familiar with this very Australian dessert, It’s a mountain of whipped up egg whites with a little sugar. Then baked in the oven on low, giving a crunchy outside, a marshmallowy inside, decorated with fresh summer fruits. It got devoured before I managed to take a photo, maybe next year...

I used half of the whipped egg whites for the pavlova, making it the perfect size for the six of us. The other half got baked in the oven in two thin rectangles. For a stacked Hazelnut & Mocca butter Merengue on Boxing Day.

Boxing Day is also national leftovers day. With all the storms brewing around us, we gave the beach with picnic basket filled with leftovers a miss. Just spend the day at home, lazing around. But that whole leftover thing has gotten me thinking. What leftovers, I only see ingredients!

Let me explain.
We had a roasted (small, free range) chicken for dinner somewhere this week, made in a croc-pot filled with the chicken, potatoes, garlic, thyme and a little butter. A fabulous and fancy meal, served with a large salad.

That same night the carcass had been boiled down in the pressure cooker, resulting in two litres of stock. Two containers for the freezer, a large jar in the fridge, just like the leftover potato.
The stock with leftover slivers of chicken meat made a very tasty risotto the next day.
The leftover risotto got turned into those fancy risotto balls, held together with a little parmesan cheese.
Or how about a heavenly custard (going easy on the cream and sugar) for dessert. A real treat with fresh fruit. Pavlova or Merengue needs egg whites, custard only yolks. Those yolks stay perfectly fine covered in the fridge for a day or two.

The leftover potato disappeared into the crusty flatbread, one for the freezer

The other bread to be served alongside the pea&ham soup. The Christmas ham was not only used for Christmas day, the pizza, toasted sandwiched (to use up the old bread) and containers in the freezer for fried rice.
When I couldn’t cut any more of, it got boiled down into soup. Once boiled down the last pieces of meat could be scraped of right back into the soup, together with lots of veggies. A perfect meal for the cold rainy days this weekend. Dinner, lunch and freezer taken care off.

After making the Christmas Stollen, I had some leftover marzipan filling, resulting in Gevulde Speculaas for two afternoon teas.
This is only for the last week, but can you start to see my point? All those leftovers are making our meals only better, while saving heaps of time and money...

You might not be able to reuse everything, with four kids, besides the peels & bones, there is food that gets thrown out: crusts, half-eaten plates, meals heated for a second time. That’s where our chooks come in, they’ll eat or compost it, fertilising the veggie garden and providing eggs as a bonus.

But wouldn’t be something, if at the bottom of a recipe, there would be a link with recipe ideas for the leftovers?

Earth Hour 2013

Okay, I know I posted this one last year, but it's so much fun!

Saturday 23th of March @ 20:30

Turn your lights of for WWF Earth Hour, a worldwide event.

I'm organising a pizza night by moonlight with some friends. 

Are you planning on doing anything special?

(Under)mining

There has been a lot of local media coverage on CSG mining in our area, a lot of protests against the test drilling that have recently started. In my opinion, rightly so. Nobody likes mining in the place that they love, but when it starts to threaten fresh drink water of several cities. Ground water of World Heritage listed National Parks, drilling right in the middle of perfect farming ground, something is very wrong.

Many people have spoken up about it, yesterday a new law was announced that would project the ground water table in this area. And for those that doubt the effect of threat new law, read what just came in:

http://www.dailyexaminer.com.au/news/metgasco-gives-up-for-now/1789976/

Very good news.

Religion

I’m about to do something scary and very unusual for me: writing about religion.

I’m not a religious person, don’t believe in organised religion. Too many wars are being fought in the name of religion, too many churches are filled with riches while there are still people going hungry and then there is the abuse of power. Having said that, I do believe there is more out there.

As a kid I read books from the Dutch writer Thea Beckman, she wrote a trilogy called Children of Mother Earth, I couldn’t have been much older then 10 at that time. But even twenty years later I still remember the peaceful balance with nature they found. Many other books made a big impression after that, the Swedish Marianne Fredriksson has made me think a lot about religion, of the beauty, the misuse and beginnings of it.

Our lives have changed a lot in the last 6 years, we have left the rat race of the Dutch cities behind and are in turn living a much more quiet life. Bit by bit we have surrounded ourselves with nature and are falling in tune with the seasons. Seeing the changes in the moon every evening, the stars scattered through the sky, the long and dark nights of winter, the warming sun in the day. It makes us content, but I feel there is something missing. Even in a slower life, time seems to rush by, I’ve written about this before (here) and it resulted in us starting to have a special dinner on Full Moons. We’ve also begun to stand still and look at the change in the seasons. Just looking around which plants and trees flower, which trees are loosing their leaves, which vegetable or fruit to be harvested, how the weather behaves. An innocent “I spy” game with the kids, looking for nude trees.

The longest night of the year, also called Winter Solstice is coming up (21th of December or July depending on which side of the world you live). While searching the internet for ideas to make this a celebration I got hit with loads of information, this is something that has been celebrated for ten thousands of years as the Yule Festival. In order to convert pagans into christianity it has been absorbed into Christmas. The candles, evergreen trees, decorations, it all stems back to the time before Christ.
Or look at Easter, celebrated with eggs and bunnies in Spring, symbolised by the return of fertility
(click here to read more)

Where in Europe public holidays like Easter and Christmas would mark the changing of the seasons. They are a bit silly celebrating them in the Southern Hemisphere. Don’t get me wrong, the Aussie Christmas is lots of fun in the pool and on the beach, but really christmas trees, snow decoration, reindeers. It looks very alien it the harsh sun. And chocolate eggs, what’s not to like, but there is not that much fertility to celebrate in Autumn... We’ll keep celebrating these days, just as a nice time off with family to go camping (like many Aussies do anyway).
What I crave, in a time where most celebrations are severely influenced by commerce, is to go back to the simple origins. I’ll be looking to implement those special days of the year into something to celebrate with our family.

I won’t go all “I’ve found the light!” on you, but I’ll tell you that some puzzle pieces found their home.
When you think of it, it makes so much sense that there is/was a tradition to looks at the very basics, all over the world, older then any religion. About living with the land, the support of communities, being in tune with nature, the joy of life, spiritual growth, having respect for the land and life that surrounds us and giving thanks for what it gives you. Paganism.

Uhm, isn’t that what they burned the witches for?

Opinions

I do no longer watch the news, haven’t for the last 6 years. And other then glance the local rag with harmless “town gossip” I’ve stopped reading the newspaper. I turn down the radio when the news comes on: another shooting, political squabble or overdosed celebrity, I find it depressing. Lots of negative energy that you absorb time and again, which leaves you feeling useless to change it. News is so dramatised in order to sell it, when was the last time you saw any positive news? And I find it misleading, you are offered the opinion of a network as the truth and only see what they find important. Other then feeling gloomy how much do you really remember of the next day? There is an interesting article about news junkies: Avoid News

I do read, heaps of it, feel like a sponge. Books, blogs, magazines about many subjects I feel passionate about and go beyond entertainment. It makes me think, leaves me informed and maybe even a little content, positive energy goes a long way.

Not wanting to become completely alienated from my surrounding I’ve started reading posts on this website: The Global Mail. Interesting articles with thorough research which brings the story beyond the screaming headlines.

Making up my own opinions. What are yours?

Market Day, cooking to keep

 Quinces, inedible when raw, but glorious when cooked, stewed, baked.

As a blogger I wouldn’t be worth my salt if I wouldn’t at least write one blog about quince paste. So here we go... For a recipe, try this one: (link) or for a step-by-step: (link). Of course I botched it up thinking I could use less sugar. They did set, but not the nice thick jelly I had hoped for. An hour in a fan forced oven (on low!) did dehydrate them enough to save the lot. I’ve put my collection of ramekins to good use and have perfect size portions waiting to complement a cheese platter.
Oh, and don’t cut and core before cooking, quinces are so tough you might cut up yourself while you’re at it... stitches... And no, that ruby red came solely from the cooking process.

A farmer on the market gave me a 5kg bag of Packham Pears, he reckoned they looked too sad to sell, but remembered the kids loved them, they went berserk when they saw the bag and dove right in. What to do with 5 kilo’s of ripe fruit, without ending up with a tummy ache: 1. Fruity icy poles, pureed fruit with a tiny little bit of vanilla sugar, ready to go in the freezer for an afternoon snack.

2. Preserved Pears. The best two kilo’s ended up in a spiced sugar syrup (recipe), the spices are divine.

3. Pear Butter (recipe), no butter involved, just perfect on a buttered slice of toast. By the time I got to this one I admit I started to get a little over pears...

Anyone has come across this variety of corn? I reckon it is the best and sweetest ever tasted. Keep them juicy instead of starchy and cook them as soon as you arrive home. 8 minutes in cooking water, then cooled quickly in cold water and transferred straight into the fridge. They make a perfect lunchbox snack for the kids, great in quick corn fritters or chilli con carne.

The same goes for beetroot, cooked straight after buying, once done they go with their cooking liquid into a container in the fridge. You can easily use them for a salad, mashed in with the potatoes, dips or Aussie Burgers. In the fridge they stay good for about two weeks.

One of the things I like about the markets is that food doesn’t come on a foam tray. But fruit and veggies are still kept together in plastic bags to get them to check-out:
10 apples, one plastic bag,
15 tomatoes another plastic bag,
5 kiwi fruit, another plastic bag.
Then unless you bring your own bag all will be placed in a plastic carry bag.  If you like to change that, you might like the green sacks (link). I’ve had mine for 3 years and they are very well used, but still look like new. Virtually weightless and machine washable.

Earth Hour

Earth Hour started in 2007 as a Sydney event, turning of all non essential lights for just one hour. 

Ever since many countries all over the world have followed, it is becoming one massive event, whole cities become pitch black. To leave many people all dancing together in the streets by candle light.

Saturday night, of March 31th from 8:30 to 9:30pm

What does it say about me that I get tears in my eyes every time I watch this video?

It’s only an hour, but it’s a sign of hope that people still care, that we can do huge things if we do them together.

And one from the Aussies. You are better not the only one to leave the light on: beware of moths...

Will you be joining us this year?