Finally – A Fence

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Posted on April 21, 2014

We have been living here for over 8 years now and when we moved in there were no vegetable gardens and only 3 fruit trees – avocado, orange and lemon in rather odd spots in the yard. We built some vegetable gardens which have evolved over time and the chicken run has been moved and is now next to the vegetable gardens. Since free-ranging chickens and vegetable gardens do not go terribly well together we decided to fence the entire area containing the garden beds. This has been a very long-winded process but we can finally see the end in sight.

Today we actually did one run on fencing and here is the result.

We hope to finish the fencing which will enclose the vegetable garden area next weekend. It should mean an end to the various bits of wire contraptions that I create to keep the chickens away from the seedlings.

These are peas and pak choy seedlings that we bought at the Yandina markets on Saturday. We also bought lettuce, broccoli, cabbage, kale and cauliflower which are in the other beds.

Here are the purple beans and radishes which have come up from seed I planted a couple of weeks ago.

What are you growing in your garden at the moment?

Birthday Business

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Posted on April 20, 2014

Today is my birthday. No particular milestone but time to reflect on the year that has passed and look forward to the year ahead. I have been blessed with lots of lovely messages from family and friends.

Our wedding anniversary was a couple of weeks ago and we did not have a particular celebration for either event. However, in the past fortnight we have had a picnic with family, been to the movies twice and eaten out at our local Italian restaurant.

Today we spent the time together working in the garden – re-arranging, planting and naturally planning the next project. My brain works faster than my hands!

I did stop and make lunch which was as good as any cafe offering and the view from the deck is pretty special, too.

I hope you are having a relaxing Easter break.

Foodie Friday – Kids in the Kitchen

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Posted on April 12, 2014

I didn’t get back to post this last night. Miss O and Izz have been staying for a couple of days so the food focus has clearly been about them. They enjoyed shopping at Simply Good yesterday and discussing many of the different fruits, nuts and grains that we bought. Miss O was keen to practise her recently acquired spelling skills to read the names of the ingredients on the storage buckets and fill them up when we arrived home.

They picked pumpkins and tomatoes as well as collecting eggs. It is great to see them understanding where their food comes from. 4 year old Izz wanted an anatomy lesson on how the eggs get out of the chickens!!

Tomorrow we are going to a picnic with extended family so I made some choc fruit nut balls and Miss O helped by rolling the balls in the coconut.

Apologies for the brevity of this post but I have been working on our Ireland itinerary and looking at ferry timetables and rental car details.

Ashes to Ashes, Branches to Mulch

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Posted on April 6, 2014

We collect all of the fallen branches on our land for firewood, so today The Duke spent some time cutting up some more logs that were stacked and waiting to be cut.

Here are some of them cut and waiting to be stacked in the woodshed.

The mulcher which you can also see in the photograph also got a workout as we mulched several piles of smaller branches as well as some palm fronds and rotting branches. As always, nothing is wasted so some of the mulch was added to one of the raised garden beds that we are filling and the rest will be spread under the native shrubs which are planted along part of the front boundary. The mulch keeps the weeds mostly under control.

Next, we headed over to the area near the vegetable gardens. There was more debris to mulch, including the remnants of the corn stalks.

While the Duke and Psycho Dog were hard at work, I turned my attention to the new garden bed I built yesterday. I needed a bit more mulch and soil to fill it up and then I planted some Purple King climbing beans and radishes.

It is along the outside of the chicken run so the fence will provide an excellent trellis for the beans. I grew these beans a few months ago and had an absolutely fantastic crop so decided to grow them again. I added a couple of star pickets and some wire to enclose the bed so that the chickens cannot dig it up when they are free-ranging. I was just putting the finishing touches to the wire surround as the first drops of rain fell late this afternoon. We had a tremendous thunderstorm with some huge bolts of lightening very close by but were lucky not to lose power.

Finally, just to prove that our garden is decorative as well as functional, here is a photo of the roses flowering in the front garden.

Tonight I am going to make some decisions about my 33 items for the round of Project 333 which began on April 1st. I have kept track of what I have worn so far this month and will include them in the tally. I hope to share the details of my choices with you tomorrow.

Foodie Friday – Fit for the County Fair?

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Posted on April 4, 2014

Just a reminder that real food comes from real dirt. We never actually set out to grow pumpkins – they come up self-sown in the compost and some are more successful than others. This is by far the largest I have ever grown. I picked it today and it weighs 8.7 kg or 19.2 pounds.

I placed a 2 litre ice-cream container beside it in the photo for comparison. This will make a lot of pumpkin soup!

Foodie Friday – No Recipe Needed

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Posted on March 21, 2014

What do you understand by the term ‘salsa’? Is it the spicy tomato mush in a jar or finely diced fresh ingredients?

Here is the definition from the font of all knowledge, Wikipedia.

“Salsa is the Spanish term for sauce, and in English-speaking countries usually refers to the often tomato-based, hot sauces typical of Mexican cuisine, particularly those used as dips.”

When I had an abundance of fresh mangoes a few weeks ago, I found a recipe on the internet for mango salsa. It included diced mango, red onion, coriander and lime juice. As usual, I improvised and used mango, brown onion, parsley and lemon juice! It was delicious served with grilled salmon and vegetables.

Many of our home-grown fruit and vegetables lend themselves to a salsa-style preparation. I have made several combinations using tomatoes, avocadoes, corn and mango as the bases. Salsa is a great accompaniment to fish, chicken or barbecued meats.

Last night I made a corn and tomato salsa which helped to turn a couple of humble grilled sausages into a special meal.

The ingredients were frozen corn kernels, cherry tomatoes, parsley, onion, lemon juice, black pepper and chilli powder. The quantities are whatever you have but only a small amount of finely diced onion and a pinch of chilli powder are required.

What do you think?

Foodie Friday – Keeping it Local

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Posted on March 15, 2014

I am sure it is still Friday somewhere – my apologies for the lateness of this post – it is Saturday morning here.

How do we feed ourselves? Food prices keep increasing, labelling laws are ambiguous, processed foods contain unfamiliar additives and food allergies appear to be on the rise. Add to this, a desire to eat organically-grown food which I believe is better for my health and the health of the planet and it starts to feel a bit overwhelming. While we are at it, the wasteful packaging needs to be minimised as well as transport costs, both monetary and environmental. Don’t forget ‘food security’ – the latest catch-cry. This is the ability for us, as a nation, to feed ourselves in the event of natural disasters or major changes to the world order.

Have you thrown up your hands in despair? Fear not. You can begin to solve all of these issues with a single action – grow some of your own food.

The Duke and I have a somewhat neglected but productive garden which sometimes surprises us with its bounty. We both work full-time and have minimal time to spend on tending a garden. We try to grow some annual vegetables but the real secret is in growing trees and perennials. We have an avocado, peach, fig and several citrus trees. There are blueberry bushes as well as self sown cherry tomatoes and pumpkins. The clump of parsley has been in one spot for so long that it has a stalk that looks like the trunk of a tree.

It may seem obvious but it is also important to eat (or preserve) what you grow. Do not let the harvest go to waste.

Keep your eyes open for food producing plants in your neighbourhood that are not being harvested. Don’t be afraid to ask if you may have some. There are many reasons that people do not harvest – lack of time, knowledge or health are but a few.

The last few weeks we have had access to the following (either fresh or frozen) from our own property or nearby – corn, blueberries, avocadoes, mangoes, figs, lemons, beans, pumpkins, and pineapples. At times I have felt overwhelmed by the excess on the kitchen bench but I have endeavoured to make sure it was used or stored for later use.

Last weekend I kept track of what we ate.

SATURDAY

Breakfast – buckwheat blueberry pancakes

Lunch – platter of cheese, cherry tomatoes, avocado, dried figs and mango chutney

Dinner – Salmon with mango salsa and vegetables – everything came from the garden except the salmon and onion which I used in the salsa.

SUNDAY

Breakfast – mango and pineapple smoothie

Lunch – Pumpkin soup

Dinner – grilled chicken with cherry tomatoes and mango/avocado salad

We certainly will never be completely self-sufficient but being able to produce at least some of the food that we eat goes a long way to addressing the myriad of issues that I identified in the first paragraph. Eating local food also gives you an appreciation for what is in season in your area. I really look forward to the new crop of things such as figs which have a short season. We eat them constantly while in season then it is but a distant memory until next year.

You do not need a huge amount of space and even though you could not grow some of the thing that we do in your climate, the reverse is also true. What do you grow?

Must Watch

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Posted on March 5, 2014

There is a relatively small amount of information and resources for Australians and it gives me great pleasure to share a link to a video which is made by Australians, about the Australian situation, using Australian statistics and information. The video is titled ‘Waste Deep’ and was produced by the group at Sustainable Table. The headline is “Waste Deep, a documentary that will change the way we cook and eat”.

This is not an over-the-top production designed for its shock value. It simply and eloquently states the case for all of us to dramatically reduce our acceptance of plastic packaged, perfect food and the culture of convenience.

Please watch the video, preferably more than once. Listen to the message and commit to acting to make a difference. We all can make a difference.

Some of the themes are menu planning, growing your own food, reducing the amount you buy at supermarkets, supporting bulk/loose food stores, taking you own containers to be refilled, buying direct from the farmer or Farmers’ Markets and reducing before recycling.

Although this is an Australian video, the message and actions are applicable wherever you live.

What are you already doing? What are you going to do? Please share your thoughts and ideas so that we can build an online network to follow these principles and make a difference.

Flown the Coop

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Posted on February 25, 2014

We have a small flock of chickens. It ranges in number from 2 to 7 depending on circumstances. We had 5 until last week when one of them died. We usually let them out for a couple of hours late in the afternoon when we are home so since I was working from home today I went downstairs to let them out about 4pm. The 2 brown chickens came running but there was no sign of the 2 black ones. I searched everywhere for them but to no avail.

Then I noticed that the shadecloth that we have over part of the run was split. The join had obviously deteriorated in the sun. One of the reasons I put the shadecloth up was to stop the chickens getting on the roof of the henhouse and then using that as a launching-pad to fly out of the enclosure. The black chickens were the main culprits and The Duke had christened them ‘Harriet Houdini’ 1 & 2. It looked like they had lived up to their names and I was not sure whether I would see them again.

I decided to fix the split so I used these fencing wire clips.

Here is the finished result.

About an hour later the 2 escape artists returned and carried on scavenging in and around the garden beds as though nothing untoward had happened. I am hoping that I have solved the problem and they will stay in the run.

Planning is the Key

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Posted on February 24, 2014

As I sat down at my desk on Saturday morning to write a menu plan for the week, I started to think about how much planning goes into keeping our lives running smoothly.

I have always menu-planned to some degree but I have now developed a routine which works for us. Every Saturday morning I write a plan for the next 7 – 10 days. I keep in mind what food I have in the refrigerator as well as what is available in the garden. From that I then write a shopping list. This generally a few basic groceries such as milk and cheese as well as fruit and vegetables. I buy meat every couple of months and pantry staples about every 3 months.

We have big plans, such as our overseas trip but also small, day-to-day plans that ensure things run smoothly and we work towards achieving our goals. If this sounds like our lives are totally structured and regimented, think again as nothing could be further from the truth.

Over breakfast on a Saturday morning, either The Duke or I are often heard to say, “So, what are your plans for today?” Then follows a discussion about what we have individually considered that we need to get done. It usually centres around shopping, washing, lawn mowing and the like. The next step is to plan.

On Saturday morning we had to take the dog to the vet at 8.30am so we decided to leave the shopping until Sunday morning and do some outdoor work. We needed to finish by 4.30pm so we could be cleaned up and head off to dinner and the movies by 6pm. We planned our outdoor work and achieved a real sense of satisfaction when the jobs were done. All of the piles of mulch were collected from various spots around the yard, we weeded and mulched the garden bed beside the front steps. The Duke lightly pruned the roses and we planted 5 more pineapple tops. The remainder of the mulch was spread under the native shrubs on the front verge.

Since it was drizzling with rain most of the day we then adjourned under the house to start on one of the other jobs on the master list – covering the area which is bare dirt under the verandah with pebbles. The original plan was to build 3 more low retaining walls to create stepped levels to hold the pebbles in place, however, we have decided to retain the sections using some timber sleepers. We will also place some along the outside edge to separate the pebbled area from the garden bed outside. We have calculated how many sleepers, how much weed mat and the volume of pebbles that we will need to complete the job. The ground has been dug out and is almost at the levels we need so I hope we can get this finished over the next few weeks.

Sunday was a different story. I did the ironing early, before we went to do the shopping in a couple of different locations and came home with the intention of more outdoor work. One simple message on the answering machine changed that. A friend had left a message to ask us to come for drinks at 4pm, so I amended the menu plan as I knew we would have plenty of late afternoon/evening nibbles. I then spent the rest of the day in the kitchen. I made pizza bases, wraps for our lunches and a chocolate cake (all gluten-free). I made 1 pizza and took that and the chocolate cake with us that afternoon. The remainder of the pizza bases are partly pre-cooked and in the freezer.

So, to round off a fairly long-winded story, I think it is important to have a plan, otherwise things can turn into a disorganised jumble and you end up wasting a lot of time. The organisation that results from these plans allows you the flexibility to change those plans to accommodate things that arise out of the blue. What do you think?