Hope springs eternal

Posted on October 4, 2010 by Jane

Spring is such a wonderful time here on the farm. As we wake in the mornings the birds are going crazy. We are enjoying hearing and sighting tui. An added excitement has been a young wood pigeon visiting. A report in the paper said that a wood pigeon sighting at Spring Creek is the first in 27 years. Part of the farm is our large pond which is surrounded by native plantings. We also have several kowhai trees. It is wonderful to see the native birds returning. The white heron has been wintering over on the pond.

It has been a sad winter in the chicken coop. My dear old Wyandotte Winnie died and a couple of months later my little red hen Hettie dropped dead too. These hens were quite elderly and, while I love River Cottage, I ain’t no Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and I have to bring in hired assassins if a hen needs killing. However, hope does spring eternal and I now have four young hens housed in the dog run until they get a little bigger and can be introduced to the older girls. They are brown shavers. My aim is to have continuous egg production throughout the year. The others all went off the lay over winter. I want egg production units! These plain but oh so charming girls are, I hope, the answer. As if in fright the others are all producing again!

: The old girls

It is also asparagus time. Alas the crop is poor. The crowns in the bed are over 20 years old and it is time for new ones. The potatoes are sprouting and the weeds are flourishing. I am so keen to get out there. I had my foot reconstructed 5 weeks ago and my gardening has been curtailed. I have my King’s seed catalogue at my side and oh so many plans.

The ground is finally drying out after a very wet winter. The Chardonnay is budding out. We gave Simon Cider Apple trees for Father’s Day with the glorious names of Sidero, Broxwood Foxwelp, and Kingston Black Semi-dwarf. Apple blossom, pear blossom, cherry blossom, quince blossom…….. Hope springs eternal.

Mother's violets in my garden

In memory of my mother Ruth Forrest who died on 26 August, the Durvillea girls’ Nana.

Mother’s Sweet and Sour Pork (a trip back to 1970′s)

1 1/2 lb lean pork cut in strips

2 tablespoons fat

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup vinegar

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup green pepper strips

1 med. can pineapple chunks

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 tablespoons cornflour

1 tablespoon soy sauce

1/2 cup thinly sliced onion

Brown pork in the hot fat, add water, cover & simmer until tender – about 1 hour. Drain pineapple, reserving syrup, combine sugar, cornflour & pineapple syrup (3/4 to 1 cup), vinegar, soy sauce and salt. Cook over low heat until thick, stirring constantly. Pour over hot cooked pork and leave to stand 10 minutes or longer, add pineapple, green pepper & onion. Cook 2 to 3 minutes. Serve with rice or noodles.

South Australia and a lovely review

Posted on August 13, 2010 by Jane

One of the obvious side effects of your parents being in the wine industry is that you always live in a wine region! We have lived in Marlborough since 1995 but all we three girls were born in different regions. Before Blenheim we lived in Gisborne where Arabella was born in 1990, Libby was born in Huntly in 1986 when Simon was working at a winery in Te Kauwhata and I was born in Adelaide in 1985. Dad did his wine making training in South Australia. So, yes, that means I am technically Australian by birth!

When we last visited South Australia as a family we spent time in both the Barossa and Clare Valley wine tasting. Unfortunately, at that time Libby, Bella and I couldn’t care less about tasting and stayed in the car listening to cds at half of the places! Adelaide is famous for its food and wine culture and although we didn’t take advantage of the wine at the time we did have some great food experiences. The most memorable was probably visiting the Jerusalem Sheshkabab House – an Adelaide icon that Mum & Dad frequented as young people! Lebanese food is very popular in our household – hummus and tabouleh were some of the very first things I learnt to make. Dad taught me his own variations on recipes that I think came originally from the Moosewood Cookbook. Just quietly, I make the best hummus ever (as long as you like heaps of lemon and garlic)!

Anyway, I would love to go back to Adelaide as an adult to really take advantage of the great wine and food. My partner’s parents were just over there last week and really enjoyed it. His mother spotted a great review for the Durvillea 2008 Sauvignon Blanc in the Gourmet Traveller Wine magazine and kindly brought the magazine back for me. The reviewer was Bob Campbell.

Thanks Bob! We are glad you enjoyed it! If you are keen to see if you agree with this review we still have a little ’08 Sav available. Just visit the Astrolabe site here: http://www.astrolabewines.co.nz/wines/durvillea.

Also, if you are interested in reading more reviews please check out our “Nice things people are saying about us” tab up at the top of the page.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Meg

Kia ora from Jane

Posted on July 29, 2010 by Jane

Kia ora

Meg is on her way to a young academics’ conference in Brisbane so it is my turn to make an entry for Maori Language Week. I decided to explore Kekerengu a beautiful part of Marlborough on the Kaikoura coast. We source fruit from 2 vineyards there and of course rimurapa flourishes along the coastline.

Rimurapa

My first I thought was “what does it mean in English.”According to The Reed Dictionary of Place Names, AW Reed, 2^nd ed. 1982, Kekerengu is a black beetle. However the name comes from a young Maori chief called Te Kekerengu who had to flee to Kekerengu because he made an enemy of Rangihaeta, who was one of Te Rauparaha’s lieutenants.

This was such an intriguing story I have had a little look further. The reference librarians at the Marlborough District Library provided me with this first information and then I had a look at http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/1966/maori-tribal-history/4 and a fantastic electronic version of History and Traditions of the Maoris of the West Coast North Island of New Zealand Prior to 1840, by S. Percy Smith , ( Polynesian Society, 1910, New Plymouth) on New Zealand Electronic Text Centre. http://www.nzetc.org/tm/scholarly/tei-SmiHist-t1-body1-d17-d9.html.

So I am going to retell this amazing story.

Te Kekerengu was the son of Whanake the principal chief of Ngati Ira of the Wellington area, and Tamairangi, his wife. She was a celebrated beauty and a great chieftainess. Following an attack by another tribe Tamairangi and Te Kekerengu were offered protection by Rangihaeata of Ngati Toa. They were taken to Kapiti Island.

Now Te Kekerengu was apparently very handsome and Percy Smith describes him as a fine, handsome fellow and somewhat of a “gay Lothario.” This means that he was a good looking ladies man. Te Kekenerengu had an affair with Rangihaeata’s wife. Once Rangihaeata discovered this, Te Kekerengu and his mother were in great danger. They took a canoe and escaped by night with all of their relations. They crossed Cooks Strait to Aro-paoa Island (which we call Arapawa Island today). This is where Tamairangi came from. However still fearful of Ngati Toa, they moved onto Kaikoura area and joined their distant relatives of the Ngai Tahu tribe.

Te Rauparaha

Once Te Rauparaha heard about this insult to Rangihaeata he sent off to the South Island to avenge him. He saw an opportunity to attack the Ngai Tahu, who would have been viewed as guilty as they were giving shelter to Te Kekerengu. Initially he landed at Wairau (Blenheim) and then went overland to Kaikoura. The Ngai Tahu had, however, heard of their coming and fled southwards. They were overtaken at Omihi, where they were attacked and defeated with great slaughter.

Te Kekerengu escaped the slaughter and fled back up the coast. He and his relatives made their way up the Kaikoura Coast towards Cape Campbell. How long they remained there seems unclear. However it would seem that the Ngai Tahu followed them. They saw Te Kekerengu as the cause of the slaughter at Omihi and avenged themselves by killing Te Kekerengu and all his relatives at the river now known as Kekerengu.

: Kekerengu Vineyard

I am a history graduate but like most pakeha people of my generation have little knowledge of the stories of our past. I think we need to tell these stories and I tell this story with respect and apologies for any errors.

Nga mihi na

Jane

Winter Harvest down on the Farm

Posted on June 18, 2010 by Jane

Nets up, after the Riesling was picked

Gosh, it is June and we are still harvesting. Today it is fantastic that the Riesling has been picked. During vintage Simon decided it would be the year we made a Noble Riesling so the nets went back on.

We last did this in 2007. So then we waited and waited. The weather was fine and the infection slowly developed and then it rained and rained. So we were pleased that the sun reappeared this week and Jeremy and Simon decided to pick today.

Nick with the mechanical harvester

However I had also booked a spot at the olive press for our first pick of olives. It has been a crazy day. Luckily Arabella was home on study leave and helped prepare morning tea and lunch for pickers of all varieties and crops.
This year we experimented with a mechanical olive harvester. It was an interesting day. Hand harvesting relies on lots of people to reach the required 300kg weight of olives to ensure to ensure a single grove batch press. It is also very pleasant gathered about the trees gently running your hands done the fruiting branches milking off the olives. However it is also a lot to ask of people. As we don’t sell the oil all we can offer is lunch, and a supply of delicious oil. So this year I borrowed a mechanical hand held machine from a friend and fellow grape/olive grower Jan Johns. The upshot was we managed to pick half the grove with 4 people. We also picked trees with a patchy crop that we would have left if we were hand picking. An interesting conundrum to consider is how I balance the argument in my head of mechanization versus hand picking. Tomorrow being Saturday we will pick traditionally by hand. The jury is out.

Winemakers helping out

Now with a number of people coming for lunch and the need for tasty winter fare I made a pot of Vegetable Soup last night. We have been going through a soup phase of late brought on by our harvesting of mushrooms. Alas the weather is too cold now for mushrooms but a good crop of pumpkins are stored in the shed in anticipation of my personal favourite Pumpkin Soup. However we did make pots and pots of Mushroom Soup, and using field mushrooms makes such a difference. Tomorrow Arabella will whip some savoury pinwheel scones to accompany the soup. Below is our Mushroom Soup recipe from the good old Edmonds cookbook.
Mushroom Soup
225g (8 ozs.) Mushrooms
½ cup Water
1 tablespoon Butter
1 Tablespoon Flour
1 cup Milk
Seasonings
Little Lemon Juice

Peel mushrooms, break into small pieces, and cook in the water until tender. Melt butter in a saucepan, add flour, and gradually stir in the milk. Cook until the mixture thickens, and cook a few minutes longer; mushrooms and liquor and seasonings. Just before serving,add lemon juice. A little cream improves the flavor.

Off to buy some shade cloth to make some new nets for the olive pick. Meg is home this afternoon and can help sew and bake treats for morning tea.

Jane leaves the farm – O Canada

Posted on May 17, 2010 by Jane

I thought I would lead with a sensational headline as today I am writing my blog, not from my dining room table, but from my train seat on the way from Toronto to Ottawa.

I have been in Vancouver from the past week with my Astrolabe hat on and this week I am multitasking between the two labels. However, do not worry, I have my Durvillea pinny in my bag.

We are off to a New Zealand Winegrowers Tasting, a trade event. Three sessions: trade, sommeliers and public. Then tomorrow we head back to Toronto for a similar event on Thursday.

I loved Vancouver. I had a day and a half off and did a fantastic walking tour through Gastown and Chinatown, biked and walked around Stanley Park, visited the Museum of Anthropology at UBC and Granville Island Markets. Jason and I meet Tim Pawsey for dinner and he took us to a terrific new generation Chinese restaurant in Chinatown called Bao Bei.

Tim is a wine writer whom we met in New Zealand for the first time last year. It is always great to meet people and discover interesting places.We also visited Salt, a cool wine bar in the fantastically named Blood Alley. We ended up at Boneta where we caught up with the House Wine ladies.

Now I am home in Marlborough and it is raining and pouring. The garden badly needs it. Simon and I have been mushrooming and eating the product of our labours. Autumn is advancing and the olives are beginning to turn coloured. I have booked dates at the olive mill for June.

I was so inspired by the public gardens of Vancouver and Toronto I have planted tulips. I have many plans for the garden over the coming months as we are having a wedding here next March. It is very exciting and a wonderful spur to planting. I want flowers, so dahlias and delphiniums are mycurrent focus. Daisies, salvias, and geraniums are also in my mind. It is such fun and I am looking forward to getting stuck in. However this week it is Perth and then home. Home sweet home.

‘What’s cookin’- Down the farm

Posted on April 15, 2010 by Jane

I said to Sophie I’m off home to write a blog. Well I’ve checked my emails, planned dinner, and fed the cats. I suppose I could get the washing in but no I have finally logged in and scrolled through all the old blogs. We have been blogging for a whole year. I can feel a Seekers song coming on “For every season turn, turn…..” Harvest is in full swing and over the weekend some of the Riesling and Chardonnay were picked. Arabella did a stirling job making morning tea for the pickers. I was away in Auckland with Meg. We went to see Carole King and James Taylor. As promised here is the recipe for Arabella’s fabulous Easter cake. It is particularly useful as it is gluten free and it comes from Cuisine, Issue 133, March 2009 Pg.100

Chocolate & Almond Cake

200g 64-70% chocolate

200g unsalteds butter

200g caster sugar

5 eggs separated

250g peeled blanched almonds, pulsed to fine meal

finely grated zest of 1 lemon

icing sugar for dusting

Preheat the oven to 180C. Butter a 23cm-diameter loose-bottomed tin and line it with baking paper. Break the chocolate into small pieces, place in a bowl over a pan of simmering water and heat until melted. Add the butter in pieces and gently stir in. Add the sugar and stir to a creamy consistency. Remove from the heat and cool slightly then add the egg yolks. Stir in the almonds. In a large bowl whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form, not too dry or the cake will have a hard crust. Add the lemon zest and gently fold in the chocolate, ensuring you don’t overmix. Pour the mixture into the tin and bake for 30-40 mins until the cake is a lovely dark brown, has a light crust and is shrinking away from the sides of the. tin.

Meg was home over the weekend and moved up a notch on the domestic goddess front by making quince jelly. The quince tree is laden with fruit and so using Granny Lois’ Constance Spry cookbook (which begins with a chapter on hosting a cocktail party. Here is the recipe:

Quince Jelly 2.5 kg crabapples 2kg quince

Pared rind and juice of 2 lemons sugar

Wash apples and quinces and remove all blemished parts. Cut up and put in a pan with cold water to come level with the fruit. Simmer until pulpy. Turn into a jelly cloth or bag and leave overnight. Measure the juice and allow .5 kg sugar per litre. Put together into a preserving pan rubbed round with a piece of cut lemon, and the lemon rinds tied together, and the strained juice of the lemons. Bring to boil slowly, stirring from time to time to dissolve the sugar. Boil rapidly, skimming occasionally, until it will set lightly when tested.

Quince Jelly in jars

Taken from “The Constance Spry Cookery Book (J.M. Dent;1956)

Lamb Shanks marinating in Durvillea Pinot Noir

Finally Arabella has been cooking a storm and here are a couple of photos of her efforts. Both were fabulous with the Pinot Noir.

So if you have been cooking up a storm too, make sure you add your recipe and wine match to our face book page (www.facebook.com/durvilleawines)

A Friday Flap-Up

Posted on March 19, 2010 by Jane

Sophie rang me this morning and asked me to bring in the Dean’s bread recipe. I was out feeding my chickens last night’s leftovers and scraps. The chickens are looking a bit scruffy as they are moulting at the moment. Not looking their best and egg production is suffering. I think the time for brown shavers has come. Having to buy eggs when you have 5 chickens (or in my case old chooks) is silly.

Then I had to check my new baby goldfish. Yesterday my lovely pilates teacher Marcia gave me 16 little goldfish for my pond. I have always disliked our funny little concrete pond which had a concrete statue of two little boys in the centre. From their little out stretched hands was meant to come a fountain of water but the pump has died. We named the boys Douglas and Michael after Doulas Wright and Michael Parminter. Unfortunately I knocked Douglas’ head off when cleaning out the pond. However the fish I hope will help the pond and the boys have been retired and I have planted watercress on their plinth instead.

So in the midst of bucolic bliss Sophie’s call sent me into a flap as I can’t find the recipe. I will look again but in the meantime here is the Kasundi recipe. This is from “The Best of Annabel Langbein: Great Food for Busy Lives.” Page 16. (Simon made this using plums and a little less sugar).

225g green ginger, peeled
100g garlic loves, peeled
50g green chillies, sliced in half lengthwise, seeds removed
2 1/2 cups malt vinegar
1 cup canola or safflower oil
2 tbsp tumeric
5 tbsp ground cumin
3 tbsp chilli powder
5 tbsp mustard seeds, ground to a powder
2kg tomatoes, washed and chopped
2 1/4 cups sugar
about 3 tbsp salt

Puree the ginger, garlic and chillies with a little of the vinegar to make a paste. Heat the oil in a very big pot or preserving pan. Add all the ground spices and fry until they exude a fragrant aroma. Add the pureed paste, tomatoes, the rest of the vinegar, sugar and half of the salt (check near the end of cooking to see if more is required). Cook over a low heat, stirring occasionally, until the oil floats to the top (about half an hour). Bottle in sterilised jars while hot with a thin film of hot oil on the top of each jar (to prevent top from drying out) and cover with screwtop seal lids. Leave 2 weeks, keeps indefinitely. Makes about 2 litres.

A final note from Jane: we used old Durvillea bottles to bottle ours.

Crafty work down on the farm.

Posted on March 9, 2010 by Jane

The approaching harvest of the grapes is beginning to dominate life. Nick has been working hard in the vineyard cutting out green fruit and putting on nets. There is a rising sense of anticipation. We are beginning to watch the weather carefully and notice the cooler nights. So far so good.

As well as the grapes, the pears and apples are now ripe. The swans wander up from the pond and eat the fallen pears and we are enjoying them straight off the tree. We also had a great plum crop and Simon made plum kasundi. In the past we have made a tomato kasundi but Simon cut out about a 1/3 of sugar to account for the higher sugar levels in plum. The recipe we use is Annabel Langbein’s and goes particularly well with courgette and feta fritters. These fritters are a great way to use up courgettes that are probably more correctly called marrows.

Simon has also ventured into jam making using up the apricots that could be saved from the birds!

Winemaker jam making

Domestic activities have been a feature of our summer. Libby, Meg and I decided to take up crocheting over the Christmas break. We bought wool, borrowed books from the library and struggled. I did know how to do this once and the plans for an afghan rug may at this point be beyond our skills. It was a lot of fun and I intend to keep trying.

So it was with some relief when Arabella decided to make cusion covers for her flat. I am much more comfortable with the sewing machine. Generally I have not fulfilled my role of good mother by teaching my daughters to sew. However my hopes have been rekindled with Meg and Arabella showing a bit of interest. It was great fun whipping up soft furnishings with Arabella. Appliquing creatures on top of the floral fabrcs was particularly successful. We even tackled recovering a lampshade of an old standard lamp she had painted. Adding fringeing pleased me greatly.

Making cushions

From this I carried on to make aprons for us to wear for the wine and food festival. I love to wear an apron. Arabella found some seaweed fabric online and we had some pockets screenprinted with the Durvillea artwork. Simon took one look and said that the seaweeds on the fabric were from the Northern Hemisphere! The girls looked fab lined up behind the counter at the Wine and Food Festival in their pinnies.

Super pinny model Sophie

This domestic activity culminated in a fantastic bread making session. A couple of weeks ago we had a visit from Toni and Dean Betts. Dean is a chef who started The Fish Market restaurants in California and then moved to Auckland and started The Anglesea Bar & Grill. In discussing food, wine and life Dean offered to show me how to make a a flatbread and baguette loaf using a no knead recipe. Wow! We mixed up the dough and the next morning Dean came back and we shaped and baked , topping the flatbread with olive oil, rosemary, and garlic from the Farm. It was so much fun, extremely satisfying and very delicious. Dean’s generosity as a chef and teacher was greatly appreciated.

Dean making the bread

Jane and Dean's bread

Over the next week I will post the recipes…………

Down on the Farm….A new year

Posted on January 12, 2010 by Jane

Happy New Year to you all. Monday morning and back at work in the office. Actually I covered the office between Christmas and New Year but everyone is back at their desks looking bright eyed or is that just the lovely strong coffees Simon made us all.

After spending most of November and December away it is great to be based at home over the next couple of months and boy does the garden need it! Weeds, wind and water. The first two in abundance the last is more of an effort. However it has been raining for the last 12 hours. Hooray. One of the things I love about the garden is how forgiving it can be. Seasons come and go and you have a chance to try again.

You will be pleased to hear that the chickens are all well and reasonably productive. They have eaten all the lettuces in the garden. This is the downside of letting them free range. The vegetable garden is I am afraid rather depleted. However I have begun the campaign and I think I am beginning to regain control. Lack of water and chicken attacks mean that the salad greens have been compromised but the courgettes are coming along. I harvested some potatoes, peas and broadbeans and made a great salad. Now broadbeans have been quite a revelation for me. I have always loathed those nasty grey offerings served up traditionally. However peeling them has changed my life! I am a born again broadbean eater. Below is the recipe I used.

Broad bean, pea, potato and green salad

1 small new potatoes, fresh broad beans podded, fresh peas podded, a few handfuls of green leaves (I used spinach), shaved parmesan cheese, sea salt, freshly ground pepper, 2tbsp red wine vinegar, olive oil.

Cook the potatoes and set aside. Nice if keep warm. Boil the broad beans about 2 mins until their skins start to pop but not too long. Refresh in cold water. Pop them out of their skins. I boiled the peas with beans. Wilt your chosen greens in a little olive oil over a high heat. Split open the potatoes and place a single layer on a serving dish. Add broad beans, peas, greens, parmesan and season with salt and pepper. dress with red wine vinegar and oil. (I adapted a recipe from”Fuel for your Family: The Waihi Cooks”. This is a lovely cookbook put together by the families of Waihi School in South Canterbury.

My attention is turning to our abundance of plums and Simon and I thought we might try using our favourite tomato kasundi recipe for plum sauce. We have enjoyed a moderate crop of apricots and we have a huge crop of pears coming on. The swans and ducks on the pond will be very pleased. The coppice is growing so well. Although we have never watered them they are thriving. Grovetown has a very high water table and they seem to be very happy. However Arabella made the observation that at the moment they are kindling size rather than firewood.

Simon and Jane inspecting the alders

We have noticed lots of hegehogs about. I love them, too much Beatrice Potter I suspect. However there have been a number of fatalities in the little pond and pool. Arabella and I have both managed to rescue a couple frantically swiimming with their wee noses poking just above the water.

A shy hedgehog

Next blog I thought I might tell you about how the Durvillea girls are getting crafty.

Jane

On the road

Posted on November 27, 2009 by Jane

Week Two: Dublin

We are on the train from Limerick on the way back to Dublin. We travelled down this morning, which took about 3 hours. Now Limerick is an ancient city formerly inhabited by Vikings and more recently by Frank McCourt of Angela’s Ashes fame.

: Some of the O’Briens staff with the family at an Astrolabe tasting

We are here to launch Durvillea with the O’Briens Wholesale team. Durvillea will be a restaurant brand in Ireland. It is a challenging market in these times but Mike Curran is doing a great job and we wish him well. The weather today in Limerick is also challenging. It has been raining for a week and there has been a lot of flooding and road closures. Tonight the Shannon river is expected to flood and conditions are expected to worsen. In spite of this it has been great to begin in this market and to get to know Mike, Lynne Coyle the Head Buyer for O’Briens, and of course Kevin O’Brien. So here we are on the train with a bag of lovely Irish cheese and crackers, a bottle of Rioja left over from the tasting and 5 paper cups. We can’t wait to come back.

: Jane and Arabella making tasting notes!

While we are off on our Durvillea journey Simon is in Dublin doing a tasting at the Blackrock O’Briens store. Last night we all attended another tasting at the Westbury Hotel for about 100 O’Briens loyal customers. It was the first time the girls heard their dear old dad talk formally about the wines to an audience. Tomorrow it is a winemaker’s lunch at the Royal Irish Yacht Club and then Simon is presenting a masterclass at the Good Food Show.

Tomorrow is our last day in Dublin. We head of in separate directions on Saturday. Meg and Henry head off to Liverpool and London. Arabella, Libby, Simon and I are off to Paris for the weekend. On Monday Simon is off to Perth to meet Jason and fly the Astrolabe flag for the first time in Western Australia. The girls and I are meeting up in London and I will spend a couple of days in the trade, visiting customers.

Dublin is such a fantastic market for us. O’Briens import us into Ireland and distribute us through their 28 stores and now Durvillea through the wholesale division. They are terrific stores and a wonderful family based company. We enjoy working with them all. Coming here is like visiting old friends and we have grown very fond of the city of Dublin.

- Jane.

Durvillea Wines

A wine label from Marlborough, New Zealand

Author Archives: Jane