‘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.

Fettuccine, prawns and prosciutto

Posted on March 10, 2010 by Durvillea

After Jane’s post yesterday I had a flick through Jason’s copy of The Fish Market, this is a fabulous recipe book, and after photocopying many of the recipes I decided on one to cook for dinner last night. Pg 148 for those of you who own the book.

Fettuccine

2 Tbsp Olive oil (Jane’s olive oil)
1 Tbsp Chopped shallots (which came from one of our Growers yesterday!)
16 Prawns (for 2 people)
150ml Cream
2-3 slices of Prosciutto (I used Streaky bacon as it was what we had at home)
A pinch of Chilli
Cracked black pepper
6 leaves fresh basil, juilienne
1 Tbsp fresh garlic puree
1 packet fresh fettuccine
2 Tbsp grated romano cheese (I used hard parmesan)

Place olive oil, shallots and prawns in a pan over medium heat and saute for 1 minute
Add cream, prosciutto, chilli, cracked pepper and half the fresh basil julienne
Saute over medium heat until cream has reduced by half the volume, I added half the cheese here too
Cook fettucine while cream is reducing
Add cooked fettuccine, toss to coat, add garlic puree and plate
Garnish with the rest of the cheese and the basil

This recipe was very easy to do, and the best thing was it did end up looking like the picture- always pleasing when cooking! Paired with our Durvillea Pinot Grigio it was a great match.

Thanks to Dean Betts and his Fish Market Cook Book, I look forward to making more recipes out of it!

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

Food and family

Posted on October 30, 2009 by Jane

Libby, Arabella and Simon survey the tent before the party

Last weekend was a big one for the Waghorn family. Simon turned 50 and we threw him a big party at Astrolabe Farm. Sadly, none of us took many pictures but hopefully some that my aunt Nicki took will surface soon. A great time was had by all – particular highlight for me was watching Dad pogo-ing around the dancefloor to the B52′s later on in the evening…

Having the whole family together (along with lots of extended family and old friends) got us thinking about the next big occasion in the family calendar – Christmas. Every family has their traditional Christmas (or other seasonal holiday) foods and recipes. We’d like to share one of ours, the Christmas Cake. It’s not that original but , as for many other families, the making of the Christmas cake carries with it a lot of meaning and memories.

Ruthie using the Christmas Cake recipe for Jane & Simon's wedding cake

Our recipe comes from our maternal grandmother (Jane’s mother) Ruth Forrest. Our lovely Nana is sadly in a home suffering from severe dementia but we think of her often, particularly in the kitchen as she was a phenomenal cook. This is Nana’s recipe and the copy we have is precious to us, as it is hand written by her. The hard copies of recipes are so evocative, this one has the smears and smudges of a well used recipe as well as the conversions and additions written by my mother, Jane (and a few extras from Dad/Simon). It’s a very visual reminder of my family tree.

This cake has been a Christmas Cake, a wedding cake and a Christening cake in our family. The lucky way to make it is to let everyone stick their hands into it and mix it up a little.

Here’s the recipe:

recipeccrop

Ruth’s Christmas Cake

625gms Butter

250gms Brown sugar

250 gms White sugar

750 gms Flour

12 eggs

Tbsp almond

1 kg Currants

1 kg Sultanas

375 gms Sunmaid raisins

125 gms cherries

60 gms almonds

250gms peel

2 tsp cinnamon

pinch nutmeg

1/2 cup brandy

Pour brandy over fruit – I leave overnight. Better to line tin the day before also (easier next day). Cream butter & sugar, add essence. Add egg yolks & mix well (little flour with eggs [I can't quite read this bit - Meg.] won’t curdle.

Next add flour & fruit [and SPICE! - Simon's note]. Lastly beaten egg whites.

Cook six hours in lined tin, light cardboard base – newspaper folded about 3 thick then grease proof. Paper above tin about 2 inches – I put piece of cardboard over cake [can't read here! - Meg] about an hour, won’t burn but smells like it will. [Some hard to read instructions about lining tin]. Bake 300 for 1 hour then 250 – cook 6 hours – place middle – tray underneath.

Use 1/2 recipe will be big enough. 1/2 cooking time – don’t panic if getting too brown – turn to 200. Don’t open oven too much.

Leave in tin until cold, then remove.

Good luck.

- Ruth (& Meg)

Meg, Libby and Bella making the Christmas Cake

Durvillea Wines

A wine label from Marlborough, New Zealand

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