RAIN! IT RAINED LAST NIGHT!.

It is like a bird feast in our backyard this morning, the red flowering gum is in bloom and the rainbow lorikeets and other birds have arrived. (this is a pink flowering gum, photo from flicker)
The ground is wet from overnight rain, the veggies are thriving with this lovely warm weather.
We have basil and spinach, tarragon and chervil, we have turnips and chillies, we have curry leaves and tomatoes, we have edible chrysanthenums and baby capsicums, we have passionfruit and mint, we have the best garlic I have ever tasted, we have parsley and shiso, we have lemons and chives, we have lemon verbena and lemon myrtle leaves, we have lemon grass and tulsi, we have nettles and comfry, we have horseradish and purple congo potatoes, we have miners lettuce and wild rocket and lots more in the garden.
The weather forecast for the next week is just lovely sunny days about 26 F, no heat waves yet.
Well they call Australia the lucky country and for us gardeners we certainly have lovely weather this week.

HAPPY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE

The Mad Gnomes has Polar Baby Tomatoes ready to eat! Check out their blog.
HAPPY CHRISTMAS everyone, how are your gardens growing?
Are your tomatoes ripe?

EMBRACING INNOVATION

I have been watching a video called Cradle to Cradle. It's not just any video. This is an in depth analysis of where we are and where we can go instead of where we are going. 

They have created 10 acres of pasture on top of a Ford factory complex and nature is returning to the site with the arrival of some birds who have made nests there.

At about 16:40 minutes it gets really interesting and Bill begins to talk about 12 green cities he is designing for China. The gist of it is that they shift the farm land up onto the tops of the buildings! They do so many creative things it is an inspiration, that's for sure.

Bill says so much in his dead-pan voice and it is hard to take it all in but it is worth the effort to feel that such people are out there doing their best to save us all from a grey world.

Thanks to son Alex for suggesting I watch this video.... and I hope lots more people watch it and learn what can be done if we reach way outside the square and get rid of conventions that don't work for us anymore. 

Embrace innovation like there's no tomorrow.....or there won't be.

Cucumbers called Bari

Chook asked me about the varieties of cucumbers we are growing after I commented that we had more bees in the garden last year when we had an Anise Hyssop growing in near the cucumbers. Last year we grew Richmond Green  from Diana & Beit Alpha from seed. This year we have grown Richmond Green, Armenia & Bari (seeds from Kate - named after the village in Italy where they come from) cucumbers. The Bari cucumber is a hairy oval shaped cucumber with a nice flavour & crisp texture. Bari cucumbers tend to wander along the ground more than wanting to climb. Kate wrote about this cucumber here. A  gentleman  she met wanted us to grow and save the seed from his homeland because it is such a prolific, wonderful cucumber. So the cycle continues with people & seeds & good food & fun & seed saving. Please read Kate’s article about Bari cucumbers.

Maybe you have grown a similar cucumber in your part of the world

 

WHAT'S HAPPENEING IN THE LAND OF THE BIG GREEN ZUCCINI?

You know it is summer when people start trying to give away zuccinis! No, not me, because mine are just beginning to flower, but Sally from gardening has given me about a kilogram's worth. So while I was at the market on Friday I bought some mushrooms and a packet of lasagne sheets and decided to make one of our favourite summer dishes, Zuccini and Mushroom Lasagne.

It is so much tastier than it sounds..... somehow the flavours are just right and blend to form a dish that it greater than the sum of its parts. It is a bit fiddly, especially if you use the non-instant lasagne like I do, and you brown all the zuccini slices but it works OK with instant lasagne and with raw zuccini. In fact if you were going to use raw zuccini I would use instant lasagne because it would soak up the juices really well. But if, like me, you enjoy an excuse to put on some music and spend an hour in the kitchen, this is a recipe for you.

I usually now grow either the yellow zuccini or the yellow fluted squash....which are just all the same flavour, but with different jackets on and in different shapes. My favourite colour is yellow and if there is a yellow version of anything I can never resist it!

Today is quite hot and after many weeks of cool weather it is making me think of summer food and BBQ's etc. I think my favourite foods would have to be Middle Eastern and I have on my lap one of my favourite books, that Maggie wrote about once, called "Taking Tea in the Medina". The photo on the cover of the book almost oozes with the juice of the pomegranates..... and the recipes and the writng entice me to go outside and pick mint and coriander and parsley and start cooking chick peas and eggplant and adding my own garlic and lemons. I have a lovely, quick recipe for puris which, although Indian, would be fine to scoop up hummus and babaganoush and slow-cooked feral goat marinated in yoghurt..... I smell dinner.....I have some feral goat in the freezer.

Oh dear..... none of this will be ready for lunch today and I am starving now! We will have to finish off the lasagne and pick a salad......and thaw that goat. 

ps I did thaw the goat and marinade it in yoghurt and lemon peel and juice and tomato paste and other stuff I have forgotten..... then baked it for nearly 3 hours very slowly and covered for most of the time because feral goat is VERY lean.... and we had it for dinner with vegetables from the garden. It was divine.... one of those recipes that is so simple but so good and only requires cooking time, not preparation time. And that to me is the perfect meal.

ANISE HYSSOP - AGASTACHE FOENICULUM

One of the best things about growing different vegetables and herbs for the first time are the surprises that await you as these tiny seeds or seedlings are placed in soil and tended occasionally and just left to grow and become what they are.

Our greatest surprise last summer was a herb we bought at the herb society last year.

The label said Agastache foeniculum, Tea Herb and Bee and bird attracting.
This one glorious plant attracted lots of bees to our garden and obviously the bees did there work in pollinating lots of other herbs and veggies in the garden.
We had an amazing amount of cucumbers.

I cut the plant back harshly and it died(or maybe it was my neighbours use of poisons on the fence line and his drive way).
This year we have not as many bees and less cucumbers.
This was a really majestic plant and I would recommend gardeners have a couple in their summer gardens.
These photos I took look a bit washed out compared to the real thing.
I have learnt another valuable lesson in loosing this plant, slow down in the garden take care of what you are growing and companion planting and bee attracting plants work.


The common name is Anise hyssop, a hardy perennial, grows to 2-3 ft (6ocm-1m), long spikes of purple- blue flowers. Grows in rich moist soil in a sunny position flowers in summer. Propagate in spring by seed or divide creeping root. Use dried leaves as a seasoning or infuse as a tea.

There is good information about herbal teas at this site The Herbal Tea Garden

If you want an adventure check out all you can do with garden herbs at Alchemy Works

THE LAST WEDNESDAY GARDENING FOR 2008

This was the last Wednesday morning for our garden group this year. It was at Sally's which is looking so fabulous just now that I thought I'd take some photos. Sally has been a reluctant vegetable gardener, preferring roses and other beautiful flowering things, as you can see in these photos. She and Lou and I have been part of this group for 12 years, spending hundreds of Wednesday mornings gardening at one of the 5 or so gardens. All that time I have been trying to encourage Sally to grow vegetables...to no avail..... until this last year or so and now she must be the world's most successful new vegetable gardener!

Sally already has too many enormous zuccinis .....

Her rhubarb is mammoth.... with dozens of long, thick, red stems.

Here they are, the best friends a person could have.....

 

 

 

Sally uses tinsel in the garden (right) to keep the parrots off the roses and she swears it works a treat.

The job today was to extend the width of this garden bed.....again!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We always give each other something home made or grown or local for Christmas and this year I made this panforte..... a delicious Italian Christmas cake made from nuts, dried fruit and chocolate. You can get the chocolate, fruit and nut ingredients, all measured out in a pack, with the recipe, from Charlesworth's in the market....you just have to add brandy, flour, cocoa and a few other things. It is perfect sliced thinly and served with coffee.