CAULIFLOWER SALAD 2 DRESSING: 1 teaspoon ground cumin ½ teaspoon ground turmeric ½ cup grape seed or rice bran oil 1/3 cup apple cider vinegar 1 tablespoon runny honey sea salt and freshly ground pepper SALAD: 1 medium cauliflower 1 small red onion, finely sliced ½ cup sultanas ½ cup sliced almonds Add all the ..read more

Tomato seedlings are coming along nicely.  They’ve been outside for a while now due to lack of space inside.  But, I reckon they’re doing well enough and will be a good enough size by the time we come to plant them out at the end of the month. So this month is dominated by seed ..read more

FLORENCE FENNEL SALAD 1 medium fennel bulb ½ or 1 small red onion 2 tablespoons capers small handful mint leaves lettuce or rocket or baby spinach DRESSING: 3 tablespoons olive oil 1 tablespoon lemon juice 1 clove garlic, crushed sea salt and freshly ground pepper   Add all dressing ingredients to a small jar and ..read more

A winter blog done in absentia!  Off to Spain to celebrate my eldest son’s 30th birthday.  Nature marches on regardless, so Rob is sowing my tomato, eggplant and capsicum seeds in the First Quarter of this month for me.  Then he’s off on holiday, so I’m looking after his for him while he’s away.  Check ..read more

Garden beds are full and we’re enjoying the first of the broccoli. I’ve been focusing on tidying up. The garden paths are all renewed (with a little help from friends) and the spent crops are tidied up into a hot compost.   There were coffee grounds outside our local café today, so together with the biomass from old crops, grass clippings, egg cartons, chicken manure, Morganics and some well-rotted wood chips all layered up, we have a good heap going here. It needs to be a bit more flat on top to create the cube shape to make the science work but it flattened down when I covere ..read more

SERIOUSLY GOOD PUMPKIN SOUP 2 tablespoons coconut oil 1 onion, diced 4 cloves garlic, crushed 1 tablespoon fresh ginger, grated 1 teaspoon each ground cumin and curry powder 800-900 grams pumpkin, peeled and chopped 1 agria potato, peeled and chopped 1 carrot, peeled and chopped 1 litre vegetable stock sea salt and ground pepper ¼ cup smooth almond butter   Heat oil in a large saucepan and add the onion, garlic, ginger and spices and cook for a couple of minutes.  Add the pumpkin, potato and carrot and coat with the spicy mixture.  Add stock, season and bring to the boil.&nb ..read more

Brassicas planted in March are taking off and I continue to plant more as space appears.  We’re still enjoying lettuces, so it’s a real changeover of seasons.  I really like this lettuce which does well in the cooler weather.  There are no damaged outer leaves to dispose of and it’s lovely and crunchy.  Can’t begin to understand the name ‘Drunken Woman Fringed (some say Frizzy) Head’, but it’s an Italian heirloom lettuce. I’ve been holding off getting this next bed sown with a green manure crop because it has had amazing mizuna in it.  But the mizuna is all ..read more

Leading up to this month of April I’ve been enjoying tidying up the summer garden and starting winter planting. Our leeks planted last month are coming along nicely, and it’s now time to plant onions. Last year you may remember we planted little onion (and leek for that matter) seedlings out in the garden in clumps to grow on, then lifted them from there to go to their final destination.  This year I sowed onion seed in a regular size punnet and once they’d germinated and were a decent size I put them outside for a good few weeks.  They have come on well, so that now that it’s t ..read more

A bit late getting this month’s post out, but that’s because we’re having days of glorious rain, it’s too wet to get out in the garden, and the garden couldn’t be happier. It’s time for the big changeover.  We’ve gone from abundant green in spring… to parched brown in autumn… So it’s out with the tomato and pumpkin vines – they go on the biomass pile for the next hot compost. And in with the new autumn/winter planting. I’m a bit boring in my love of buttercup pumpkins, but thrilled with this year’s haul.  I could have left them on the vines a bit longer (the longer you leave ..read more

How is everyone coping with the heat?  I have to say I’m not a heat-lover, so I do go out in the early morning, but my favourite time in the garden is 7-9pm.  There’s a cool breeze and a stillness which is a great time to be communing with nature. I saw Jenny Lux of Lux Organics calling her tomato crop this year a glut, and while it’s an ugly word, it describes our tomato beds too.  After the plants were looking all green and glorious, and the fruit plumping up but still green, a week later the tomatoes were all red and the plants were a mess.  This is one day’s haul ..read more