Look at my capsicums, would you? I have to pinch myself. I cannot believe how gorgeous they are. It never occured to me that I would ever grow such beauties. Previous attempts resulted in small, thin skinned capsicums that never turned red. Continue reading
But what am I to do? I can’t help it.
The latest example of this personality flaw happened a couple of weeks ago. It was our friend Di’s birthday and, as we are social distancing, she couldn’t celebrate it in the usual way so she asked if she, and her husband Fred, could come around for driveway drinks. Continue reading
Potatoes are a frustrating crop to grow because one day you have none and the next day you have a laundry basket full.
I was trying to be smart this summer. Firstly, as soon as they began to flower, we started digging on the side of the plants, picking enough for dinner. Then, even when I knew they could all be picked, I left them in the ground, again picking them only as we needed them. I had read that this is a good way to store potatoes. But one day, I noticed new green shoots appearing and I knew it was time to act. In an instant, that laundry basket was full. That is a lot of potatoes for two people and I knew they would go all soft and wrinkly before we were halfway through so I began to think about preserving them. Continue reading
I have never seen this before so I had to show you. They looked like they were burnt black. It was bloody amazing.
As you would all expect, it is tomato time in Western Australian vegie gardens and my Roma tomatoes are doing the right thing and producing a decent amount. Continue reading
This year, through some miracle of miracles, the birds left some plums for us. Whether it was conscious or whether they just missed them, I don’t know. Of course, as happens with every variety of fruit and vegetable in the garden, they all ripened at once. There was not a huge amount but certainly more than we would eat. I put them in the cool room (along with the 1,000 passionfruit) until I could decide what to do with them. We are not big jam eaters so jam was not an option. We do, however, eat a bit of sauce. Plum sauce it would be then. Continue reading
One day’s gatherings
Australians just love passionfruit. I don’t know what it is, but we do. I am guessing it has something to do with the ubiquitous pavlova smothered in passionfruit pulp of our childhood. Continue reading
It has been sooo long since I did an In My Kitchen post – 6 months, in fact. To prove it, I have included this photo I took last May for my June In My Kitchen post that never happened. Clearly, I decided to make tomato sauce out of the last of the tomatoes. (Here is the recipe if anyone is interested.) Before long, I will be taking photos of this year’s tomato harvest but, for now, I am buying them. It breaks my heart to do so when I know that, in a few weeks, I will have so many I won’t know what to do with them all. It is always the same. Continue reading
Everyone has their favourite pumpkin soup recipe. My favourite is one I have posted before – Pumpkin, cashew and coriander soup. It is a beauty (check it out here) but it does take a bit of effort. And there are plenty of times when effort does not figure. For those times, I have been dreaming of a recipe my mum used to make. I had it hand written in my recipe book but somehow I lost it. I did ask my sisters but to no avail. I remembered the ingredients – chicken stock, pumpkin, tomatoes and onion but I couldn’t remember the proportions.
Happy New Year, everyone!
I haven’t written an “In My Kitchen” post for a while as I haven’t had anything new but I do now!
In my kitchen:
Are cherries. As I mentioned in my previous post, we harvested cherries this year for only the second time in 20 years. Clearly, the weather was just right for them as the trees produced their crop despite total neglect. Continue reading
About 18 months ago, I decided we needed a retaining wall built behind our garage. I was reluctant to call the guy who had built another wall for us. It was not that the garden wall he had built was not good – in fact, it was bloody good. The problem was he took ages and ages to come. I remember ringing him on a regular basis until, finally, he arrived. When he did come, he came with a smile, did a good job and did things over and above what was called for.
In the end, I decided to risk it and called, let us name him, ***.
Passion Fruit Garden 