Almost a year ago now, on a blustery morning last autumn, my neighbour George stopped by to deliver 30 litres of fresh apple juice. He'd just crushed it himself, made from a ute load of golden delicious apples picked from a mate's old tree.
Showing posts with label tasmania. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tasmania. Show all posts
Almost a year ago now, on a blustery morning last autumn, my neighbour George stopped by to deliver 30 litres of fresh apple juice. He'd just crushed it himself, made from a ute load of golden delicious apples picked from a mate's old tree.
The cherries are finished, must be four of the saddest words in the English language. The end of the all too brief cherry season always leaves me feeling a little downhearted that there will be no more scoffing bags of roadside stall purchases and spitting the pips out the car window.
Which is why we stuff ourselves silly on the juicy purple fruit for the few weeks in summer we get to enjoy them. We make them into jam, dehydrate them, pickle them and plonk them into jars of brandy, to quietly do their thing for a few months before opening on a chilly midwinter night.
It's that crazy thinking that means I usually forget something critical...like the camp oven, or the children's flip flops, sunblock or rain coats. And we always need rain coats, because if we're going camping, in Tasmania it's highly likely that it will rain. It's how we roll.
"Would you like anything Alice?"
These are the words I uttered to one of my all time food heroes.
Yep, that's what I said to Alice Waters.
I shiver just writing that.
She smiled and replied no thank you, as she admired the roses and strawberries on display, her voice hardly audible over the din of 140 or so excited travellers and entourage also in the room.
We exchanged a few more pleasantries before Alice disappeared into the crowd.
The third and final day of our Behind The Scenery tour of southern Tasmania with Katie Quinn Davis saw us travelling around my own home neighbourhood, the glorious Huon Valley. A food lovers paradise, it's difficult to pack in the best of the Huon in just one day...but we gave it our best shot.
Kicking off with a coffee at the Cat's Tongue Chocolatiers in downtown Huonville, (in a part of town now known by some of the locals as SoHu). Andy's little jewel of a chocolate shop is only open Friday to Sunday with a delicious menu including pumpkin pie, fancy lemon tarts, killer waffles and ever changing specials for lunch like fried baccala or matzo soup. Andy makes everything from scratch including amazing ice-cream and great coffee too. We ducked in next door to visit Bron at her stylish shop Twigs and Daisy Chains, a modern gift shop with lovely cushions, soaps and candles and contemporary locally made pretties.
As much as I love waking to the sound of rain on the tin roof, on this particular day it wasn't such a good thing. I had lots of outdoor plans for our visit to Bruny Island that day. Oh Tassie spring weather, you wild and crazy thing, you. I had to rejuggle a few planned outdoor and water activities for my second day showing Katie Quinn Davies my favourite Tasmanian spots, but we we would still manage to see, and most importantly, eat a lot.
It's no secret that I'm madly in love with this tiny island I call my home. The food, the landscape, the history, the pure clean air and the way the sunlight casts a soft, pretty light makes Tasmania easy to love. I think I've made that clear by now.
That love was rewarded recently when I received a call asking if I'd like to participate in a Tourism Tasmania campaign, and show Katie Quinn Davies, Sydney photographer and blogger from What Katie Ate, some of my favourite local places.
I didn't have to think twice, I was more than a little excited.
Spring and autumn are the best times to pick nettles, but we haven't picked many this spring, mostly due to bad weather. But yesterday when the weather played nice we packed our safety gear and baskets and hit the road in search of this springtime treat.
Ignoring the threatening trespassers will be prosecuted sign, we drove along the muddy track to get to this hidden valley. I knew there would be nettles here, but I didn't expect so many. The lush young leaves growing under the pine trees were the best. The nettles growing along the track in the sunshine had started to seed and they're not so nice to eat. If they start to rattle they're no good, a local youngster recently told me, referring to the sound the seeds make as you brush past the plants.
Armed with rubber gloves and scissors we picked a load then headed home. Nettle pesto or nettle risotto? I'm not sure yet. But if you blanch and freeze the leaves, you'll have enough nettles to see you through until you make your mind up. Whatever you chose it will be delicious.
An after school activity of the very best kind, trespassing, picking weeds that sting and helping with dinner. I am such a good mum. I think we'll back in March to pick the autumn flush.
PS. We did actually have the owner's permission to pick his weeds, I would never advise ignoring those signs around these parts.
I can think of no better way to kick off winter than a day spent with good friends, good food and an old gramophone high in the hills. There may have been bread, cheese and apple paste along with a little blueberry port too. And laughter of course, lots and lots of laughter.
I was so very excited when Luisa Brimble asked me to write a story for her new project Alphabet Family Journal. And I jumped at the chance to write about three very inspiring families who live in the Huon Valley.
On the weekend super ace photographer Jonathan Wherrett shot the first family, a gorgeous young couple who moved to Tasmania seeking Land, Adventure and Opportunity. I think they've found all three. You'll have to wait until Issue A arrives to find out more. In the meantime, here are my shots of those clever peeps at work.
The temperature has been steadily dropping over these last days of autumn, and today the mercury didn't reach double figures, languishing around the eight degree mark. With winter on the doorstep, it's perfect weather for curling up in front of the fire. But the lure of one last fruit picking adventure was too hard to resist. Especially one as clandestine as scrumping, that is fruit looting, or ahem, stealing apples off the trees without permission from the owner.
Up into the hills and along an old dirt road stands an overgrown abandoned apple orchard. There were hundreds of kilos of apples rotting on the ground, with plenty more still stubbornly clinging to the gnarly, moss covered trees. Despite the steep hills, thick grass and lots of brambles we had to battle to get in there, the prize of biting into those cold apples in that fresh mountain air was utterly delightful.
We picked at least 20 kilos of granny smith's and tiny golden delicious, and would have picked more if we could reach the higher apples. We hauled our heavy baskets back down the road, whilst we stuffed our faces with crunchy sweet apples.
Tomorrow I'll make apple sauce, apple jelly and apple butter with the loot.
Apple scrumping, stealing perhaps, but a late autumn activity of the very best kind.
