Plums and tomatoes in winter

A few years ago a friend served me plum sorbet she'd made in her icecream maker. The plums were from her backyard tree, and I was so impressed by the winter flavour burst of summer plums that I promptly bought my own icecream maker. Sadly it has mainly sat in the cupboard, and you might see it on Trade Me soon.

My version

Now I have come up with my own way of having my hit of plums all year round. Our Hawera plum tree is dropping more fruit every day than we can eat, and many of them are over-ripe. Roughly chopped and frozen, though, and added to a smoothie, they are incredible. Better than frozen berries, I reckon, and I know that's saying a lot.

My smoothie has a banana, frozen plums, kefir (or unsweetened yoghurt) and a teaspoon of coconut oil. I whiz it up with a stick blender. It's delicious, cheap, healthy and filling.

Harvest tomato sauce

We manage to eat enough tomatoes around here that we don't have a lot left to cook with - or maybe the problem is that we don't grow enough. Anyway, I buy big, cheap bags of cooking tomatoes from the Farmer's Market. Then I make Annabel Langbein's Harvest Tomato Sauce (see the recipe here). It is the BEST, and incredibly easy - in spite of what the recipe says, you don't even need to chop the tomatoes - just throw them whole into the roasting dish with the other ingredients, stir and put in the oven. It gets pureed after cooking and cooling.

I also modify the recipe by leaving out the capsicum (purely because we scoff all those raw), chilli and sugar.

Then I freeze a lot of it in old honey containers. We use it on pizza bases, on fried eggplant for eggplant parmesan, and with pasta and meatballs. My children love to eat it by itself with spaghetti noodles, too.

Enjoy!

Abundance and lakes

It's the height of summer here: close to 30oC most days. The garden is loving it, with free food all over our front and back yard. Cucumbers, zucchinis, salad greens, herbs, tomatoes, berries, plums, and flowers for the bees. The grapes are hanging voluptuously, but are still hard and green. It's a good feeling when our preparatory garden work bears fruit, literally. (Not sure what happened to the beans this year - I'm trying hard not to think about their disappointing crop.)

Hawera plums

Luisa plums
(note the insect-damaged leaves, but the fruit are wonderful despite it).

The oregano flowers are usually covered with huge bumblebees.

Poppies and alyssum for the bees, with a young tamarillo tree
behind.

Luscious blackberries ripening on our driveway fence.

The vegetables would be pretty sad if we weren't watering them, although the fruit manages fine. It's the kind of weather that makes us do outside jobs and exercise either first thing in the morning or after dinner, and fall into the (neighbour's) pool at about 5 pm.

The heat and humidity drains me. So last weekend I packed up the car and took the children, plus a friend, camping at the Rotorua Lakes. Just an hour or so of driving later we were at the gorgeous blue lake, surrounded by verdant bush and cool blue water. The air was several degrees cooler, as well. So we swum, and swum, and swum.

Evening swim at the Blue Lake.

Lake Tarawera - I love that volcano looming in the background.

While we were there, we took part in some Falconry at Wingspan - fascinating!

A female New Zealand falcon

A summer visit to the Tree Church

If you live in Hamilton, or find yourself visiting here, I highly recommend a trip to the Tree Church. How beautiful it is!

Just a 10 or so minute drive from town out towards Ohaupo we turned into a property on a rural road - the type that you find plum stalls on - and indeed they were good plums.

The entrance gate to the church.

Up the driveway we came to the Tree Church. It was created by a man who loves to relocate mature trees, and who has traveled the world and taken note of the architecture of a lot of churches. He combined his passions by planting trees that are growing up and over a metal frame that one day won't need to be there, because the trees themselves will form the framework.

It is creative, immaculate, peaceful and enchanting, and we loved it.

It would be a magical place to have a wedding (although not cheap at $2-3,000). The bride would walk through this grove of trees. I think they are silver birches, but they are surreal ones. Does the owner polish the trunks, do you think? I've never seen such clean, tidy bark!

At the alter would stand the groom awaiting his bride. But it's not just any alter, it is a looming, impressive alter that seems ancient.

The guests, while deliciously shaded by the leafy roof, might notice the roses entwined in the trees around them. (If it rained they would need umbrellas.) 

The reception, or the first phase of it at least, would take place under this magnificent canopy.

The guests could also stroll in the surrounding gardens, which are also gorgeous.

Best of all, there are chickens there. I took no photographs of them though - I know, what was I thinking?

There are huge spreading trees with picnic tables under them, and visitors such as you and me (not wedding guests, I suppose) are encouraged to bring a picnic to eat in their shade. Visiting times are from October to May, Sundays and Tuesdays from 10-4 pm. Admission is $10 per person, although I think I overheard the girl at the till saying that it is $5 for children under 14. 

For up to date information, check their website: http://treechurch.co.nz/

Enjoy this fairytale place!

Beautiful, biodegradable gifts

Recently I read that David Suzuki - scientist, intellectual and environmental warrior - believes that disposable should be a dirty word. That man is a legend.

In this gift-buying season, I love finding things that are biodegradable and/or help people avoid using disposable nasties. Here are a few I've come across. 

Beautiful chickens and op-shop shirts.

Reusable bags that fold up small to fit into your handbag so you never forget them when you go to the supermarket...

... and open up to be gorgeous, spacious and strong, so that they are always better than a "disposable" plastic bag. This one is by Envirosax. There are many stylish designs to choose from. They even have man bags.

Reusable produce bags (although I really want some Onya weigh bags, as they are lighter so you don't pay for their weight at the checkout).

A bunch of homegrown flowers is a wonderful gift - these are sweet peas, of which I have grown far too many this year!

I'm hoping Anna's teacher likes this stunning kokedama succulent, because it's her thank you gift for being such a wonderful teacher this year. Kokedama is a plant with its roots surrounded by mud, then moss, then twine. Beautifully biodegradable.

An orchid in a pot (I find quite a few attractive pots at op shops).

A Christmas cake is also a fantastic gift - for an easy one, my mother-in-law's fruitcake recipe lives on! Find it here. 

Here are a couple of items I spotted in Trade Aid - an adorable dog cushion (you'd need to use a feather inner for it to be biodegradable, and an ageing feather pillow could work) and a solidly made twine reusable bag. I bought Jack a cushion like this a couple of years ago, and it was his favourite Christmas present!

There's also the option of a magazine subscription. In New Zealand I struggle to find something that's from-the-heart green and lacking commercial focus. Australia has Earthgarden, and I find myself very tempted by Taproot from the US. 

Happy shopping. Remember Trade Me, bookshops, markets and Trade Aid for shopping - maybe I'll see you there!

Colour-coded bees in your garden

It's now been 43 years that I've been plodding this earth, and I've only just made a discovery that had been right in front of my eyes all that time - if only I'd looked properly at bees.

I was almost embarrassed to share my delight, in case everyone else had always known this fact. But everyone I've told has been similarly surprised (although never quite as delighted as I am by it). Just maybe, I thought, you might also be thrilled to read about it, even if you already knew.

It is this: bees that have been collecting pollen end up with vividly coloured pollen baskets, the colour revealing which flowers they have been visiting.

See the full, purple pollen basket on the bee's right hind leg. The left one is also visible.

I'd been aware of bees' dull yellow pollen baskets for years, so I wondered what those vivid purple lumps were on either side of the bumblebees patronising our phacelia patch. Could it be the pollen of those purple flowers, I wondered? Then along came a honeybee with bright yellow baskets, possibly from another person's yellow flower patch.

Then, out the front of our house on our uproariously flowering flaxes, were many bees with flamboyant orange pollen baskets - and indeed the flax flowers were tipped with the same hue.

Dwarf flax flowers. It looks to me as though some of the flowers have bright orange pollen, and some a very pale, almost white pollen. I don't know how that's possible on the same plant, but the camera is showing that it is! The bees I spotted on the flowers certainly had orange pollen baskets. 

Did you know that flying around your garden are bees with colourful jewels that reveal which flowers they've been frequenting?

Beating boils with manuka oil

I've learnt a few things about treating boils as a mother, and one of the best discoveries I've made is how to use manuka oil to eradicate them.

The boil that took Anna to hospital. The pen
lines show where the infection spread down
her leg (that's called cellulitis).

A few years ago my daughter Anna began to get the most terrible boils, for no obvious reason. They'd begin as red welts like mosquito bites, then relentlessly swell into painful mounds up to 4 cm across. There would only be a few days between one boil healing and the next one starting. With one on her knee she ended up in hospital on intravenous antibiotics for three days. These were very nasty boils and we were at a loss at what to do about it.

Lab tests showed that it was Staph aureus, that ubiquitous bacteria, that was infecting her skin. Why it managed to breed so successfully on her skin, nobody knew. She was a sturdy, healthy girl in every other way.

Avoid antibiotics

Since then I've learnt even more about how bad antibiotics are for the body's healthy microbes, and as antibiotics are the treatment your doctor will prescribe for boils, you need a preventative measure instead!

(However, if you or your child has a large, painful boil with pus showing, I'd go for the antibiotics. Infection from a boil that spreads to healthy tissue is very dangerous.)

Catch them early

The best tip came from the wound care nurse who came to change the dressing on Anna's knee for a week or two after she was discharged from hospital."When you see one starting, put some antiseptic ointment on it straight away, and cover it with a plaster. Keep doing that until it fades away."

With that advice, Anna never had antibiotics again. We used either crystaderm or betadene ointment, with a little 'dot' plaster on top. The ointment is a great bacteria killer.

The key is to be vigilant so you can start early. For months I examined her skin all over every night for signs of boils beginning, and there were plenty of them. (Just to be clear though: if they aren't caught early and grow large with obvious pus showing, it's a case for antibiotics).

Not just for boils

Garden cuts and scratches can get infected with bacteria fairly easily (usually Staph aureus), so to avoid pain and antibiotic treatment it is really worth putting a bit of ointment and a plaster on such things for a couple of days.

Manuka oil is better

The trouble with the ointment is that it needs a plaster to keep it on the skin, and Anna has sensitive skin that develops welts where the sticky stuff goes. Even the sensitive plasters would leave painful red marks. Plus the plasters kept falling off, we needed a lot of them and at $10 a packet they were getting expensive.

Manuka flowers

I'd tried manuka honey (the special woundcare version), because having written about that for New Scientist magazine years ago I know it blitzes Staph aureus. However, the honey hadn't worked.

Then I found manuka oil. It seems that the same compound that the bees collect from the manuka flowers which makes the honey so antibacterial is also in this oil, in a very concentrated form.

Of course, with the oil, the plasters wouldn't stick. So I just smeared a bit of oil on the baby boils each night and left the skin uncovered. The boils disappeared, usually in a three or so days (although the bigger the boil, the longer it took).

The best kind of manuka oil

It turns out that some manuka oils and honeys are more antimicrobial than others, largely depending on where the manuka is growing. The best one comes from New Zealand's East Cape (that's the big chunk of land that juts out to the right of the North Island). Fortunately that's the oil I stumbled upon first (it can be bought here).

At around NZ$25 for a tiny bottle, it seems expensive. But you only use a drop at a time, and there are no plasters to pay for... or doctor's visits, or antibiotics... so it's well worth it. Plus it comes in a glass bottle so your rubbish bin stays clear of tubes (and plasters).

Manuka flowers come in pink, too.
These are from our neighbour's garden.

The outcome

When Anna's boils were at their height, two paediatricians told me that such boil outbreaks just happen to some children for no known reason, and that they will probably keep coming for two or three years.

It's three years this month since Anna was in hospital, and the boils have almost stopped. However, just last week we were swiping manuka oil on another one, also near her knee, that looked like a mosquito bite. Constant vigilance!  I don't have to examine her anymore, because she is now old enough and sufficiently aware to tell me when she feels one starting. She says they feel a bit sore and a bit itchy.

I think they must have nearly finished, though. Anna has a few scars, but at least our family has all learnt how to deal with skin infections. Hopefully this post will help others, too.

Other people's children

As the spring sun shone for us over the school holidays we visited with several old friends and their children.

It made me realise that one of the things I'm enjoying hugely about our children growing up is watching my friends' children grow. Children who I've come to know as newborns, or babies, or toddlers, now reaching towards their teenage years.

How they do grow, so big, strong, capable and beautiful!

Can you spot the baby seal down in the shady rock crevice?

Spring things

Daylight savings just started, arriving simultaneously with lots of sunny days. Therefore, there are important things happening around here: growing vegetables, flowers and chickens. 

Vegetables

I'm growing a few flowers (more than ever, the older I get !), but mostly we focus on vegetables - our garden is actually an extension of our pantry/fridge. We think about what we want to eat, then grow it. Cucumbers, radishes, tomatoes, spinach, peas, lettuce, spring onions, garlic, beans, shallots, kale and potatoes come to mind. Oooh, and strawberries.

A sunflower emerges

We're  later than last year planting our vegetable seeds, but it's as exciting as ever watching them come up. One experiment from last year that we've enthusiastically taken up is the tomaccio plants from Egmont seeds. The tomatoes were intensely sweet and delicious, and the plants were hardy, producing a LOT of fruit well into autumn. $5 for just two seeds sounds scary, but it's worth it. Only when I was sowing them at the end of August did I remember vowing to grow nothing but tomaccio this year, but by then we already had other types of tomatoes sprouted. Oh well, next year.

Flowers

I've sown Icelandic poppies, but I have ladybird poppies (red with black spots) to sow, and wildflower seeds. I've also just planted three Asiatic lily bulbs - enormous, fragrant and rather over-the-top lilies that I love having in a vase. From now on they'll be free from the garden.

Our tulips by the front door are blowing us away, rather. It is SO worth planting some bulbs each autumn!

Chickens

I've also been loving my new chickens - the others were 'spent', as they say. I brought in four fresh ones: three brown shavers and the other a half-Orpington, half-bantam something-or-other. She's a character, our Hattie - and isn't she gorgeous?

When she lays us an egg, sometimes she leaves us a token feather, in case we don't know that her distinctive creamy egg is hers. Aren't feathers beautiful?