Chapter 32: Sublime Lemon Marshmallows

The Arctic breezes have been making themselves felt over the past few weeks. It seems as though every seedling hasn't grown for weeks, and so we have had to busy ourselves with other wintery chores such as pruning, fertilizing and various forms of therapy for gardening angst. Its funny how winter affects the avid veggie gardener. We become fidgety and on edge. Any tree that has looked the slightest bit unruly has copped it this week. The Japanese maple, grape vine, macadamia, grapefruit, mulberry, wisteria and even the chili bush, have all succumbed to the secateurs. Pruning has its therapeutic benefits for the depressed winter gardener. Rather than lamenting over slow growing carrots, take out your frustrations on some dormant fruit tree. But sometimes, winter calls for more potent methods to overcome the gardening blues.



Winter Basket Case
For the severe cases, there are other therapeutic pruning possibilities that my basket case husband discovered while hacking back the wisteria...that's right, the old school art of basket weaving. Wisteria runners make for excellent weaving. they are extremely strong and flexible. So if you have wisteria and are feeling close to winter gardening madness, give it a try... Joe has made three so far, which is better than rocking back and forth somewhere out in the vegetable patch, in eye shot of the neighbours. We thought they would make lovely hanging baskets to grow strawberries in for the summer months, or just as regular baskets to collect the morning eggs or veg from the patch.

Lemon Marshmallows Recipe
As any good domestic goddess knows, Winter is best spent indoors (although I believe less gifted people know this too) doing something thrilling like mending socks, or better still whipping up some lemon flavoured marshmallows for depressed gardening husbands and hyperactive cabin feverish children. Sugar solves everything.

If you have ever had a glut of lemons, we have a recipe that will bring them back into a high demand. These are absolutely delicious.


Ingredients: 1 1/2 cups caster sugar, 2 sachets gelatin, 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract, 1 1/2 cups desiccated coconut (we used the longer length coconut), food colouring, one lemon

Choose a pan/dish/plate and line it with baking paper.Combine sugar and 2/3 cup of hot water in a saucepan over medium heat. cook and stir for a few minutes until sugar dissolves and syrup is clear. Mix 2/3 cup of cold water and gelatin in a jug and add to your sugar syrup. Cook and stir for a few minutes or until gelatin has dissolved and mixture is clear. Set aside and cool til room temperature. Then use electric beaters or we just used our bar mix to wizz mixture until thickened. Add vanilla, a little lemon rind and a teaspoon or two of lemon  juice. Wizz.




 Scoop the mixture into separate bowls (one bowl for each colour). Add two drops of food colouring to each and wizz til colour is mixed in. Spread into prepared dishes. Smooth the top over, although don't worry too much if it is still a little lumpy, you can serve it upside down.

Set aside, at room temperature until set, (about an hour and a half). Lift out your marshmallows and cut them into bite size pieces using a wet knife. Place some coconut in a ziplock bag, add marshmallow pieces and give it a gentle shake. Display on a beautiful plate, choosing one deserving of magical childhood memories and sweet delights.




Being winter and all, we decided to roast our homemade marshmallows by the fire. The stuff perfect memories are made of we thought...that is of course until G burnt her finger on the fire place door and wailed down the house, and N's marshmallow melted right off the stick. Tears all round. Sigh, the perfect hazy marshmallow memory I'm sure the kids will cherish forever...oh well, at least try the recipe..roasting is optional.

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Around the patch

While things may be slow in the patch, we have also busied ourselves with some frivolous planting ventures. Recently we planted two kiwi fruit vines (male and female), a choko vine, some lazy old carrots and sneaky shallots, and about 150 more broad beans. Our red paw paw, residing in the green house for the winter, is still looking happy, and dare I say, may be ready to bear fruit before the end of next summer.

Our citrus trees have been busy making fruit galore. The mandarin and orange trees are bursting with deliciously sweet fruit and our lemon tree has produced a much better crop than last year. The lemonade tree however seems to have carked it, the lime tree remains beautiful but barren, while our grapefruit, which had a bumper last season has taken this season off. So it got the hack, and a generous mulching. 

Chook Tractor Triumphs

With the six chooks, letting them free range sadly became something that we could not afford to continue, unless we wanted to live in a barren dusty chook poo waste land, or so we thought. Since the end of summer, the chookens have been kept within the confines of their chook yard, where not a single scerick of greenery remains. Despite our garden once again flourishing, it didn't seem right, and the ladies were stroppy. A compromise needed to be made, so we set about constructing a prototype chook tractor from some poly pipe and chicken wire.

 It was time to get the girls back onto some greenery and give those thighs a good work out before summer. The results have been surprising! with a diet of worms and leafy greens, the egg count is back up to 3 or 4 eggs a day (in winter don't forget). We have been placing the tractor where ever we intend to prepare for planting, and within a day or two, the chooks have the ground weeded, dug and fertilized. Each morning, 3 lucky cluckies are grabbed and bagged, then carried to the chook tractor, where they are released to spend the day scratching up worms and eating grass seeds to their hearts content. At sundown N and G help herd the hens back to their pen. then by night fall the cage doubles as a possum force field for some of our winter crops. Hi five chook tractor!

Next blog, its time to get serious for the big sow. Winter will be over before we know it, and spring will have us springing into seedling action. we have been storing our toilet roles, and soon, our planting shall begin!

this years challenge is set to be all together different!

Speak soon.

Chapter 31: Community Orchard Takes Root

The Community Orchard Begins

If you've ever watched "The Castle", (" Dale dug a hole. Tell 'em Dale". "I dug a hole".) you too can appreciate the simple satisfaction that can be gained from digging a hole. But there is an even greater satisfaction in digging a hole with a neighbour, and then planting a fruit tree in it.

It was like looking through a glass of cold apple cider, a crisp, sparkling, sunny Autumn morning. The sun shone through the morning haze and lazy plumes of chimney smoke from neighbours chimney's. It was the perfect morning to start pegging the perimeters of our community orchard in the lane way beside our house.  

The previous weekend we did a letterbox drop with the kids, calling all neighbours to bring a shovel, a bag of manure or a fruit tree.

Whilst Joe and the kids measured distances and staked out the orchard, the first of our neighbours, Sharon, Grant and Jackie rolled up the avenue with compost, shovels, pitchforks, a citrus tree and a barrow full of enthusiasm. The digging began.

Super helpers to the rescue

neighbours, everybody needs good neighbours...

Neil from next door soon arrived with hessian coffee bags (to use as weed mats) and tools, followed by Graham and Margaret with her garden trolley that would have shamed Edward Scissorhands. By 10 am, Barry, Gaye, Kate, Mim, Ben and their kids made light work of planting the 9 fruit trees and taming the burly bramble of Buddleia that had otherwise taken over our nature strip.

After the digging was done, we had planted two blueberry bushes, a orange, lime, lemonade, kaffir lime, and avocado tree. A few days later, we were pleasantly surprised to find that another of our neighbours had stealthily planted a small apple tree also! The community orchard had become just that, and the idea was taking root.

We estimate she will be 5 before eating from this tree

 We plan to have a second planting session in a few months, hoping to add a pomegranate, mandarin and lemon as well as some apple and stone fruit trees, as well as a little wrought iron seat with a plaque to commemorate the 'alderton lane community orchard', will be placed nearby the fruit trees where anyone can stop, pick an orange and ponder the world.

Our Avocado

If you've ever considered doing something similar, go for it; It is actually very easy. The council were quite supportive of the idea and in fact you are well within your rights to plant anything on your own nature strip without council approval. There are some basic restrictions which may vary between different municipalities for example we had to allow 1.5 metres for pedestrian access and as a distance from the road. We had to plant 9 metres away from the corner and 3 metres from the powerpole. We also contacted Dial Before you Dig, a service that contacts water, electrical and phone companies on your behalf requesting info on the location. They then emailed us with reports of anything lurking under the surface, fortunately we had the all clear.

On A Roll

Speaking of things lurking under the surface, its time to take a look in your loo... for toilet rolls, that is. We have been collecting ours now for some months, chopping them in half, and stock piling them. Why? because they make fantastic containers for seedlings!

Rolls of honour

Growing your vegetables as seedlings has its benefits. It makes it easier to space your crop properly, choose the healthiest plants, and give them a head start before the grubs, slugs or snails can get their grubby slimy hands on them. Seedling trays are ok, I guess, but they can be flimsy and difficult to remove the seedlings one by one. We have been using our toilet roles instead. they are free, biodegradable and therefore can be put straight into the ground without disturbing the seedlings. You would be amazed how many toilet rolls you can accumulate without even trying.

Simply cut the rolls in half, and pack with a good seedling mix soil. Pop in your seeds and water them. We place ours on trays and keep them in the green house for a kick start.



ready for planting



 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  With Autumn coming to a close, there is still plenty to plant in  the patch. Onions, Garlic, Silverbeet, cabbage, shallots, lettuce, broad beans, turnips, pak and bok choy, and carrots can all go in, and plenty more.
 
Rain clouds through the looking glass 
  For any parent, the rumble of storm clouds and the pitter patter of rain can raise anxiety levels dramatically. What to do with the kids? Fear not. take one digital camera, one magnifying glass and one or more children. Combine and enjoy a lot of laughs. I suspect the possibilities of this combination are far reaching, and deserve further investigation.

 

Next time, lemons glorious lemons.