The little things in life......

This week we have been blessed with a very special visitor from Indonesia.  She has come to stay with us through our childrens school for only a week (which just didn't seem long enough!!).  She is just gorgeous.  When she arrived she brought gifts with her for all of us - some lovely traditional clothes.  We in turn gave her a travel journal (which I made) and a little koala who says "Gidday Mate" when you push his tummy.  Here he is tucked up in her bed while she is at school!

It has been wonderful experiencing all her "firsts" with her while she is here in Australia.  She rode a horse for the first time, fed a kangaroo, fed a seagull chips (below) and saw her first koala!!  It has been just as exciting for us as it is for her!!

It is so exciting to see things through others eyes and to appreciate all the beautiful things here in Australia that we take for granted on a daily basis!!  We finished our week off with icecream at Halls Gap, then a beautiful roast lamb for tea.....we will be very sad to see her go, it has been an absolute joy!!!

Yellow Tomatoes????

This is something special I grew this year.....yellow tomatoes!!!!  I wanted to give a few different varieties of tomatoes a go this year and this one is so cool!!!  My goal next year is to plant enough to make yellow tomato sauce - sounds wrong, but anything's worth a go!!!

What's your favourite variety??  Sam

A lovely drive in the country....

A lovely drive down the road from our place takes us to the lovely Byaduk General Store.  A lovely lady took this over a few months ago and has done a fantastic job!!!  She has a lovely mix of Antiques and new pieces.......check out the gorgeous photos....

Definately worth the drive to Byaduk!!!  Sam

A day in the garden.....

As you have probably guessed, I love to recycle!!  As well as being great for the enviroment, it is also much more affordable than buying new building materials.  One thing we have discovered since moving to the country and buying a few acres is everything is on a much "grander" scale than in a suburban backyard. 

One of the reasons we came back to the country was to have the space to grow our own produce.  Unfortunately we bought a house with very little established in the garden in terms of vegetables etc.  So, we have planted plenty of tomatoes which you have seen did really well (really well!!!! we are still picking 10-15kg per week).  However, our strawberries didn't fruit as well as we would have liked. 

Another thing which is great in the country is clearing/garage sales.  So a couple of weeks ago we saw 2 big water tanks which had the bottom rusted out, we knew we could do somthing with them (they were only $10).  We cut them in half and this is what we came up with - an instant strawberry patch right near the back door.  The other is a kitchen herb garden full of our favourite herbs.  One of the things I just had to get was a "Pink" strawberry plant (the flowers are pink instead of white), they are just gorgeous......



Just beautiful for Valentines Day!!!  Anyway, hope you're having fun in your garden!!!!

Sam

Dirt Cake.....sounds horrible, tastes fantastic!!



This is a yummy treat I discovered while living in Newcastle from a friend.  This is called "Dirt Cake" and both of my kids decided to have this for their birthdays before Christmas.  It is super easy and a few friends have asked for the recipe so I thought I'd share:

Dirt Cake

250g cream cheese

3 1/2 cups milk

1 cup icing sugar

1 1/2 cups whipped cream

2 packets instant chocolate or vanilla pudding mix

1 packet of Choc Ripple or Oreo biscuits crushed

• Beat cream cheese and icing sugar together
• In another bowl mix milk, pudding mix & whipped cream
• Combine the two mixtures carefully but thoroughly
• Put 1/3 of the biscuits in the bottom of a foil lined clay or plastic flower pot (I have used a tin bucket)
• Top with 1/2 the pudding mixture followed by 1/3 of the cookies, other 1/2 of the pudding mix and top with cookies (which looks like dirt!).  Refridgerate until ready to serve.

Top with flower lollypops, sour worms, chocolate ladybirds, whatever takes your fancy and you can serve with a little spade/trowel.

Note:  Light cream cheese and milk also work well (just not light cream as it won't whip).  The pot should be at least 18cm high.  Mine came from the Reject Shop.

Happy Cooking....Sam 

Scrambled Eggs with Smoked Salmon....

This is one of my favourite "special" breatkfasts and well known to anyone who has been a house guest.  I first had this for breakfast at a fabulous little restaurant on Brighton beach in Melbourne over 10 years ago.  It is so easy to make and a fabulous way to start the day!!

for 2 people:

small piece of butter

3-4 spring onions sliced

50 grams smoked salmon diced

4 eggs whisked with a dash of milk

toast to serve (I had some fabulous grainy sour dough)

Melt butter, fry spring onion.  When done add amoked salmon, cook for a minute or two then pour in egg mixture.  Keep it moving continuously so you don't overcook it, then when you're happy with your eggs serve on your favourite toast.....it's that easy and never fails to impress guests!!

Let me know what you think!! 

Sam

Summer Harvest!!!

This is the first of our summer vegie crop!!  So exciting, it was lovely to have fresh tomatos for breakfast and the spring onions were just fab in my scambled eggs with smoked salmon.  It so lovely to get out of bed, go for a stroll in the garden and return with something lovely and fresh to eat for brekky.  Stay tuned for my recipe....

Sam

Preserving - Summer Fruit!!!

I just love the start of summer and the beautiful fruit that comes with it.  We had a small orchard when we bought the house with a few fruit trees - most need a bit of TLC.  However, the apricot tree had about 5kg of fruit on it so after eating a few straight off the tree, we rescued the rest from the birds.  Family also brought a box up from our favourite old veggie store in Bacchus Marsh, so in total we preserved and jammed 15kg of fruit Christmas Eve (mind you, finished the pav at midnight, but it was really yummy!!).

I have made jam for quite a few years and was lucky enough to be given a Fowlers Preserving kit by a very dear old friend with boxes of jars.  I hadn't really used them before until last year (because you start preserving when you're moving house???? NOT!!) as we had a peach tree we had planted in our garden in Melbourne and of course the first year it fruited was our last year in the house so I bottled it all up and brought it with us!!!  So of course now I have been scouring all the garage sales and collecting the Fowlers jars. 

It is really rewarding to know that a couple of days work will provide yummy fruit (for fabulous Apricot Chicken in the slow cooker) and jam for the rest of the year!!!  I know preserving is something 'Nanna' used to do, but give it a go.....it's fantastic!!

Happy Cooking, Sam