Paw Paw Sauce - 100 mile diet friendly, Japanese Gardens

Making the inedible, edible! You guessed it - I am not a big fan of Paw Paw, though I am assurred of its health value, its one of the few foods I dont get enthused about.

John always tells me he doesnt like tomatos, but loves tomato sauce, wont eat grapes, but loves his red wine, wont eat Strawberries but loves strawberry jam... see a pattern emerging????

So, when confronted by this in my Food Connect box, I recalled a great recipe for a refreshing sauce served chilled on icecream. Its the ginger that sells it for me!

Heres the recipe:

3 Cups of Chopped Paw Paw (Food Connect)

1/2 cup Water

1/2 cup Sugar (Bundaberg)

1/4 cup Lemon Juice (from the tree)

1 Teaspoon Grated Ginger (Food Connect, but growing my own)

Combine sugar and water in a pan and dissolve, add Paw Paw and simmer for 10 minutes until tender, remove from heat and add lemon juice and ginger. Once cool, process until smooth and chill. Easy recipe.

Take it from me, its yummo! Particularly with home made icecream made with real eggs and fresh organic milk.

So, what if you had Jerry Coleby-Williams from Gardening Australia as your neighbour? Our current guests do! Though they dont ask him lots of questions about their garden problems, I'm sure they would if they werent so respectful. I think I would be the neighbour from hell - always over the fence, but I would offer some nice home grown something in exchange! ;)

...and the Photos???? I digress I'm afraid. No Paw Paws here, this is a beautiful Japanese Garden in of all places, the middle of Ipswich. Called Nerima Gardens, it is part of a sister city project. A traditional shingle roof teahouse has just been installed, and we happened to be there whilst a Japanese contingent was there and got a peek inside. Glorious place. So hard to take a bad photo there - everything is so well designed.

On the way back from South East Queensland Country Conference (we stayed in Ipswich overnight) we stopped off at Harrisville and enjoyed a leisurely Wine Tasting at Normanby Wines. Great spot. Great Wine (Try the Durif - if you like a rich red this is for you!). Great Hospitality... highly recommend a drive and a visit - part of the Scenic Rim Wine Trail!

Great Spring Rain in the Scenic Rim

What a fantastic downfall over the last few days, we received over 140mm over 4 days, with 81 mm alone on Sunday night. The brown of the last four very dry months is now lush and green - how quickly it recovers.

The vege patch is now in full production thanks to "Farmer John" but I am still keeping my hand in and have planted the first batch of heirloom and unusual vegetable seeds from Eden Seeds. In their catalogue it says their aim is: "to distribute Old Traditional Open pollinated varieties of vegetable seed, preferably old Australian varieties and organically or biodynamically grown where possible".

I am just loving discovering people with such dedication to such worthy ideals.

They are based at Beechmont and have a website: http://www.edenseeds.com.au/

Wendy helped me with this selection, as she works for Eden Seeds and knows what grows into what and where successfully, so her help was much appreciated.

In the trays, almost ready for planting out are more interesting varieties from Eden Seeds: Artichoke - 2 types, Gourd (for fun), heirloom carrots, pumpkin and beetroot we will progress with experimenting with our new "old world" produce further as Autumn and Winter begin.

So, check out the pics our bug and animal proof vege patch is a picture of health. This lush result is with John's TLC using seeds and the odd shop bought punnet (over the 100 mile limit I'm sure) - Pak Choy, Silverbeet, Carrots, French Beans, Coriander, Asparagus, Italian Parsley, Beetroot, Fennel, Dill, Onions - Spring, White, and Red, Lettuce, Asian Greens, Rocket etc etc

No artificial fertilisers, regular doses of seaweed solution, regular bug "patrols" due to a minor infestation of mole crickets, and regular watering during the hot days.

Next step...expansion of the shadehouse and moving onto the Chookhouse project!

Kitchen (or Spice) Garden "After"

Its been a while since my last blog, but a lot has happened with 100 miles at Wallaby Ridge. I have met and had a great mentor session with Wendi T from Beechmont who is a great foodie and has given me some fabulous input for our direction with food for Wallaby Ridge.

I have some Heirloom seeds on order with Eden Seeds and cant wait to get sowing!

But the photo you see is the "After" photo for the kitchen garden. It is a spice and herb garden which looks a bit bare at the moment, but will fill out and take on a tropical look with the Cardamon, Tumeric, Ginger, Galangal, Arrowroot and I cant wait for the huge leafy comfrey to bush up! There is Celon Spinach under the trellis and a few more ground covering things such as sweet potato and pumpkin to go in, this will soon fill the space!

I had a bit of help moving those huge native spider lillies which have a striking new place in the garden next to the car park. Pictured are Martin and Christian who spent a couple of weeks helping to weed and mulch the vineyard and move the lillies for me.

100 Miles: Banana and Passionfruit Brioche Pizzas

Tonight, I had some Passionfruit to "use up". John and I like to use things up, we both hate wasting food, so invariably I look up the index on my favourite cookbooks and I found a perfect 100 mile recipe that we both decided was a great Pizza Dessert for our wood fired pizza nights.

"Decadence Desserts by Philip Johnson" is the inspiration:

Now, be warned, I have a breadmaker, so, if you dont - be prepared for a bit of elbow grease!

Banana and Passionfruit Brioche Pizzas (100 Mile Friendly)

Brioche
1 teaspoon dried yeast
200gm Kialla Organic Unbleached Flour
2 Eggs "from the girls next door"
2 tbs of Bundaberg Sugar
60gm Barambah Organic Butter cubed

8 Bananas from Food Connect
Caster sugar for sprinkling
12 Passionfruit from Food Connect
Thick Cream from Providence Farm
Icing sugar for dusting (I didnt use it, sweet enough for me)

To make the brioche, put the yeast, flour, eggs, sugar, 2 tbs waterand a pinch of salt in a breadmaker :) on dough setting or a large bowl :{ and mix well to combine. Knead, either by hand, or in an electric mixer using a dough hook, for 8-10 minutes or until the dough is smooth and elastic.

Add the butter and continue to knead until all the butter is incorporated. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and leave in a warm place for 1 hour, or until doubled in size.

Preheat oven to 230 degrees celcius. Lightly grease six baking trays or six pizza trays.

Place the dough on a floured surface and knock back. Divide into six even pieces. Roll each piece to a thin 20-22 cm circle and place on the prepared trays. Set aside for a further 20 minutes.

Slice the bananas diagonally and arrange over the pizza bases. Sprinkle with caster sugar and bake two trays at a time for 6-8 minutes, or until the brioche is golden and cooked.

Carefully transfer the hot pizzas to serving plates. Spoon the pulp from the passionfruit over the bananas, dot with small spoonfuls of cream and dust optionally with icing sugar.

Thumbs up from the boss. It was light and delectable! This will replace our existing dessert pizza that contains dried figs from turkey.

Food Connect and Quinoa Porrige

This singularly has to be the best way to help our local farmers and get consumers to understand what real fresh organic food is!

I joined Food connect 2 weeks ago, its a prepaid box system that offers a selection of regional seasonal produce. The first box received was like Christmas- opening it up and pulling out all the treasures of organic lady finger bananas, deep green leafy Kael, and beautiful fresh green beans. Immediately we had the Kael and Turnip (very sweet, havent had turnip in years) with our roast dinner that night.

Last night John picked up our 2nd box, this time a Gourmet box. I couldnt help but chomp on the reddest freshest strawberry I had ever seen - yummo - it was devine! French toast (organic home made bread) with Strawbs and maple syrup coming up.

This is very convenient for us - John just makes a small diversion on his normal trip home via Jo our "City Cousin" or mini distributor in Nerang. The produce is harvested and delivered, not stored for days or weeks losing its valuable nutrients. As much as I would love to get produce from the regional markets, Wallaby Ridge oftens prevents this with our weekend guests and check outs.

Though Food connect has been a step in solving this problem of obtaining fresh local produce, I will look for other fresh produce sources locally as well. See their site and learn more about the farmers in their newsletters: www.foodconnect.com.au

Follow up for Quinoa: We tried the quinoa porridge using the flaked quinoa and it has a nutty flavour with the aftertaste of unblanced almond. John said the texture reminded him of Tapioca pudding, but I suspect it requires less cooking than we thought. Lets see if we can grow some!

More research, and goodies to sample and cook with

Readers all (or any?) I have to tell you, I am quite enjoying my research and learning for 100 miles diet at Wallaby Ridge Retreat.

I have been finding it impossible to believe that it is so difficult to source rolled oats locally...at the moment I am purchasing Oats from Foodworks in Canungra (so at least I am supporting the local grocery store). Lowan brand is the only one with the most "honest" packaging saying Product of Australia and "manufactured" in NSW. So at least I'm not buying the overseas product from big stores: you-know-who (with the new logo) and you-know-who (their major opposition). Each week my custom to them is reducing bit by bit.

I have been thinking a bit more laterally since the sourcing problem and heard that Quinoa (pronounced Keen-wah) can be used as a substitute.

I read that apart from being a very ancient cereal crop from South America, with originally over 200 heirloom varieties, it has a greater level of protein (around 16%, compared to wheat, 14%), NO Gluten - (what a bonus for my gluten intolerant guests), it is very easily digestible and more alkaline than acidic, ... AND it can be grown locally... this is a growing market.... anyone willing to have a go??? I thought I might try and grow some for an experiment.

Today, I visited my new found friends at Relish Organics, and found Organic Quinoa both in flake form and the wholegrain (from Bolivia, goodness, whats the food miles there???) - which I understand is best to soak for two to six hours (depending on whose information you read) before cooking. It can replace Cous Cous, Brown rice and Oats. And you can cook it in a Rice Cooker - now theres a great idea!

Tommorrow we'll be trying it as a oatmeal/porrige substitute, hope John doesnt go hungry.

Love to hear of anyone elses experience with Quinoa...

100 Mile Organic Bread, Crops and Turkeys

I have experimented with my Kialla flour from Relish Organics, and though I suspect it doesnt have the protein levels as the South Australian premix I purchase, its perfectly fine for breadmaking. The S.A. brand of course has all the "additives" to make it soft, with crusty outside etc. The Kialla Bread premix has soy flour in it, and I'm not sure of the source, so I tried the unbleached organic and the stoneground organic flour and just used my breadmakers recipe for breadmaking from scratch rather than a premix and both produced great results. The bonus is of course I know whats in it and where it comes from.

I have some more reading to do from Jeff Buckleys book "Growing Healthy" - its an interesting read for all those budding horticulturalists. Gardening Australia also had a great piece from Jerry Coleby-Williams on growing starch crops (other than the usual potatoes). So the kitchen garden plan is coming together without it going to look like a "kitchen garden".

A Bush Turkey has suddenly decided we are a great place to forage the last few days, he even decided the pool looked inviting ( silly, cold, wet, Turkey!). So we may need to think of some barrier strategies as well before we plant!