Tuesday, August 20, 2013

My First Ever Blog Post

Well here goes, my first ever blog entry. I'm a bit excited about this new project and look forward to sharing what is going on in my garden and kitchen throughout the year. It may take me a little while to work out  the technical side of things  so please bear with me while I learn.

It may not yet be September but Spring has definitely sprung here. Yesterday I picked the first  asparagus shoots of the season....there was only three so I will pop them in a jar of water and store in the fridge until there's enough for a feed. I also planted bean and zucchini seeds into pockets of lovely rich worm castings that I separated from the worms the other day. I've found a good way to do this is to put the worm farm in the sun and then just keep scraping off the top layer of castings as the worms dig deeper and deeper to escape the light. By the end of this process there is a squirming mass of worms left in the bottom and you can just add them to some fresh bedding.
My worm farm is made from two foam broccoli boxes stacked together. The top one has holes punched through the base with a screwdriver and the bottom one collects all the lovely worm 'wee'....actually I now have two of them because there were so many worms I decided to divide them. Apart from the obvious advantage that the foam boxes are free and easy to obtain, I think they are better than plastic in our very hot climate as they provide some level of insulation. I keep them in the shade house, sitting under potted plants and that way they get watered whenever I water the plants. Today I have given the worms a special treat...pig poo! I've never tried this before but I've read that it is one of their favourite foods so will report back later as to what they think of it.
 Last night I wanted to do something special with the beautiful potatoes I dug up yesterday
so I made a potato galette and served it with herb crusted salmon, creamed kale and roasted cherry tomatoes, all from the garden (apart from the salmon of course!)
For the herb crust I mixed panko breadcrumbs with some melted butter and added chopped fresh herbs, in this case parsley, chives, thyme and mint, and salt and pepper. I then pressed it on to the flesh side of the salmon and placed skin side down on a lined baking tray and popped into a 220 deg C oven for about 10 minutes. 

Yesterday evening when I raced up to the garden to pick the herbs for dinner I was stopped in my tracks by the site of the full moon and pastel colours of the sky framing the vege garden and had to run back and get my phone. The iPhone photo doesn't really do it justice so you'll just have to believe me that it was truly stunning and another reminder of why I love living here.

2 comments:

  1. Fabulous dinner! Are they Desiree potatoes? And the photo below of the broccoli and prosciutto looks delicious.

    Looking forward to a photo of the pigs, love pigs.

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  2. Hi Anonymous,

    Thank you for your comments. They are Ruby Lou potatoes and the broccoli salad is my adaptation of one from Ottolenghi's book. The broccoli is chargrilled and it just takes it to another level.

    A photo of the pigs will definitely be coming!

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