Tag Archives: homegrown

Garden Notes – Signs of Spring

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It is almost a month since my last proper blog post. I took some time away from writing as there did not seem to much of note that was worth writing about. Additionally, I find a certain level of inertia sets in at the end of winter. Autumn and the early part of winter have a certain excitement as we relish the change of season after a long, hot summer and we look forward to bracing walks, some cosy indoor time with our latest craft projects and the opportunity to indulge in pots of warm soups and comfort food. However, by the time late August rolls around I am itching to toss aside the multiple layers and once again be out and about in the sunshine.

We are finally beginning to see some real signs of spring.

The daffodils are in full bloom. You can’t help but feel happy when surrounded by their bright yellow blooms.

Other flowers include borage and the first blooms on the espaliered nectarine.

Lettuce are ready to begin picking for salad as the weather starts to warm up.

There was much excitement today as we had 2 rainwater tanks delivered. They are only relatively small but fit neatly between the shed and the back fence. The water collected will be a useful addition for the garden during the hot, dry summer. They will be connected and ready to go early next week.

I think a final word on the coming of spring here in Victoria needs to go to a Facebook friend who posted this. It just about sums up where we live perfectly.

Wishing you a pleasant weekend wherever you are and whatever the season may be.

This and That

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While it is only the beginning of the second week of August there is a definite hint of spring in the air. At least the bitter chill has gone, at least for the moment. Today was a glorious sunny day.

The daffodils are almost ready to burst forth.

GMan picked all of the remaining lemons from the tree. It is only quite a small tree and one of the branches that was laden with fruit really needed to be pruned.

I have juiced about half of these and will do the rest tomorrow.

One thing led to another and I sorted out the freezers which were a bit of a shambles and I was not 100% certain of what was in there. I found a single serve of soup and a zucchini quiche which GMan and I had for our lunches. I also pulled out a bag of whole ripe tomatoes from last summer. I will thaw and chop them to use in cooking.

A jar of prepared chickpeas was thawed out for a vegetable curry for dinner – it is chickpea, pumpkin and eggplant.

We also made the most of the better weather to do a bit more fence painting. I think it is going to be our version of the Sydney Harbour Bridge!

It is still cold at night so firewood is a must.

Pruning and Planting

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We have plenty of plans for developing various aspects of the garden further but in the meantime we are pleased with the parts which are established.

GMan recently participated in a one-day workshop on pruning techniques and more particularly, the benefits of summer pruning of fruit trees. He has since purchased some new equipment and yesterday he applied his newly-acquired knowledge and pruned our 3 espaliered fruit trees. There are 2 Nashi pears and a nectarine.

Meanwhile, I have planted a punnet of pea seedlings.

The summer garden continues with tomatoes and zucchinis ripening and ready to pick every day or so.

I have at least a dozen packs of grated zucchini in the freezer which I can use to make zucchini quiche throughout the year. Of course, we have had fried tomato and zucchini as a side dish with plenty of meals recently.

The tomatoes have been especially prolific. I used 6kg to make sauce and there is more than enough to eat with almost every meal. There is nothing like the flavour of homegrown tomatoes.

This is what is on a rack on the kitchen bench at the moment as I constantly use some then add more from what I harvest almost every day.

Stocking the Pantry

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Today has been a mixed bag, as usual.

Bed changed, 2 loads of washing done, some volunteer admin work and visitors this afternoon for wine, cheese and chat.

Somewhere in between all of that I made time to make another batch of tomato sauce for the pantry.

We have almost finished the last bottle from last year and this is the first time in several years that I have almost run out. I am hoping to make more batches to stock up.

I had less tomatoes than the recipe so I did some quick calculations to reduce the other ingredients proportionally. I took a fairly easy option by chopping the tomatoes and onions in the food processor before simmering them with the sugar, vinegar, salt and spices. You can find the actual recipe here.

We are expecting tradesmen tomorrow to remove and replace some doors and windows so I will hopefully have interesting before and after photos to share before too long.

Acquisitions

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I have had my head down working on an admin project for a volunteer job that I am doing so there is not too much to report on the home front just at the moment.

However, our next door neighbour kindly dropped in a box of home-grown tomatoes and a zucchini a couple of days ago. I plan to make some more sauce with the tomatoes and the zucchini will be used in a meal in the next day or two.

Meanwhile, I took a break today and we went to Castlemaine to do a couple of things and I had time to pop into one of my favourite op shops. I found these small glass serving plates for $1 each. There are 7 of them and I will use them at a function next week at the local film society. Other than that, I think they can live in my sideboard and certainly get some use. They could be perfect for those occasions when a huge serving platter is not really required or appropriate.

The other thing to note is that we are finally enjoying some more moderate weather than the heatwave conditions we have endured recently. In fact, the forecast for tomorrow is only 17C which is much better than 37C (or more). The next 7 days are looking rather pleasant though some rain would be nice for the garden.

Processing Plums

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It is that time of the year when everything seems to be ripening at once. I have a nectarine tree but no other stone fruit, however, there are plums aplenty around town and I have received some from 3 different sources in the last week so today I made jam using 3.4kg of plums.

This is the result.

These were the first batch of plums I was given. They don’t look much but have a lovely flavour and beautiful deep red flesh.

Since having an airfryer I have discovered that it is a relatively quick and easy way to sterilise the jars and lids rather than having to turn the oven on. That is definitely a consideration on a day like today when the forecast temperature was 37C (98.6F).

However, it was not all plain sailing as I had a calamity with the second batch of jars. Thankfully there were only 4 of them but they came to grief when I managed to catch the handle of airfryer with my oven mitt and send the contents flying across the kitchen floor. One jar broke but that was all. GMan kindly swept up the broken glass while I retrieved the remainder and the lids, re-washed them and started the process again.

The other job was somewhat simpler than jam-making as I had some gifted oranges to juice. It is the first time I have had fresh orange juice since we moved here which has been a bit of a shock after having what seemed like an endless supply from the 3 trees we had in our previous garden.

Finally, we were delighted to record 42mm of rain in a series of thunderstorms overnight. It has given the garden a welcome soaking during what has been several weeks of fairly hot, dry weather.

Netted Nectarines

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It is about a week since I picked the first of the nectarines from our tree. For the first few days it was a matter of picking 2 or 3 at a time.

However, the ripening process is speeding up and I picked enough this morning to fill a large bowl.

The slightly firmer ones are in the fruit bowl and we will have them to finish our meals.

I sliced up some of the others which had some slight marks or need to be eaten quickly. These will be the fruit I add to my cereal for breakfast each day.

There are still many more that are yet to ripen and be picked so we are going to end up with a bumper harvest. It will be much better than last year when the birds probably ate more than we did. The netting that we added about 2 months ago has made a substantial difference and was definitely worth doing. You can read about it here.

Beating the Birds

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I have been fully occupied for the past few days doing some writing that was not blog posts nor in any way blogworthy. It was administrative work for a local voluntary organisation that I belong to.

Today we ventured out in the garden to do a few jobs and one was to net the fruit trees to keep the birds at bay. Last year was our first summer in this house and although we harvested a bounty of fruit we did lose a portion of the crop to our local feathered friends.

We have 3 espaliered fruit trees near the side of the house – a nectarine and two nashi pears. They are now suitably enclosed for at least 3 months while the fruit mature out of harm’s way.

The raspberries are thriving in a patch near the back fence and we did cover them last year which resulted in most of the crop feeding us rather than the birds. Last year it was a pretty simple matter of throwing some netting over them. I have some slightly grander plans this time and will get onto that later this afternoon once it is a bit cooler.

Meanwhile, the building work in the pantry is complete and GMan is finishing painting the new wall and cornice. I have started rearranging some of the cupboards and shelves and I should be able to unveil it soon. Watch this space for details and plenty of pictures.

Homemade Sauce/Dressing

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Fromm time to time I stumble across interesting sounding recipes on Facebook. I generally ‘save’ them on Facebook and often forget to go back and look them again. However, a few days ago I saw one that I could not wait to try out.

This is for a vegan ‘sour cream’ made from sunflower seeds. Sounds a bit ridiculous? That was my thought, too.

VEGAN ‘SOUR CREAM’

1 cup sunflower seeds
1¼ cups water
⅓ cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
¼ onion
1 large clove garlic
1 teaspoon salt

Place all ingredients in a blender and blitz until creamy. Makes about 500ml.
Keep in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to a week or freeze portions for later use.

NOTE: I have not tried freezing it as yet.

NOTE: You could also try adding additional spices or nutritional yeast to alter the flavour a little.

I know it sounds improbable and ridiculously easy – it really is that simple.

This is the result, although some has already been used. I would say it is a bit like a cross between sour cream, yoghurt and mayonnaise.

This was my lunch today with a generous serve of my new-found dressing.

Please note that this is not GMan-approved but I am happy to have found an easy and tasty alternative.

However, he is still raving about one of my other homemade sauces, a bechamel-style sauce made using cauliflower instead of flour and butter as the base. We have successfully grown cauliflower this winter and the last 2 became another batch of the sauce. The recipe is here and it freezes really well.

Patience Pays Off

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This afternoon GMan was weeding in the garden and he removed the cover from the raised bed where I planted some cauliflower seedlings months ago. They have had no attention and amazingly we found one ready to pick.

There are about 4 or 5 others which are a bit smaller but will be ready to harvest before too long.

Meanwhile, the chard continues to produce enough to pick. Here is what I picked this afternoon and it will be used for dinner.

We arrived home yesterday after being away for a few days. We went to see our football team play in the first of the finals and it was a very disappointing outing as they were thoroughly outplayed. They do have one more chance this weekend. I am hopeful but not confident. Our other engagement was a difficult one as we gathered with many others to farewell a friend who had died much too young after a courageous battle with cancer.

Out of respect for everyone involved there are no photographs.

However, here is a sweet reminder of the joy of little things.