Happy Birthday me!

So I've been so busy that I didn't realise I had passed a significant milestone here at the Hut Chronicles, my 1st blogging birthday. The last year has gone by in a flash, a cliché I know!

So what have we been up to?

Hut wise, it’s been a little dull, just waiting for the slab to cure, but it has been fun to walk around on it. Imagining the space. Lying down where our bed or the window seat will be. The wallabies are quite taken with it too and have taken to decorating it with their clay covered paws and tails. The builder took the formwork off the other day, so Nigella had to pose for the obligatory photo.

Gardening at the block is another story. Things have been happening. Last year we started the garden at the block. I don’t think we realised what we were in for. We thought we’d just turn the soil over. But then we developed our plan into having two terraced gardens, my (flower) picking garden (15 x 16m) and Rob’s vegetable patch (21 x 16m). We had some time off last year so attacked it with gusto, by hand. Certainly makes you feel you’ve achieved something! But then we wanted to create some ag drains so that our gardens didn’t turn into a boggy mess in winter. We purchased some of the ag pipe and gravel, but only got half way finished before we had to start saving seriously for the hut. So it kind of went on the back burner.

Having a half finished job was irritating for Rob. So a couple of weekends ago we bought the remaining pipe and gravel, and shifted another 5.5 cubic metres of gravel into all of Rob’s carefully hand dug drains. It does seem a little crazy that we spent quite a bit of money on something we will never see again (well hopefully). But we both know it has been a worthwhile investment! Now we just need to fill in the paths that will be over the top of the drains with extra soil and the excavations will be complete.

I could pretend that the Veuve was to celebrate my 1st blogging birthday, but it was really for Rob’s father’s birthday, which we headed up north to Launceston for. We took up 2 dozen oysters to have with the Champagne (which disappeared quickly between four of us) and ocean trout to poach with leeks and carrots, and served it with steamed pink eye potatoes and salad. Graham was terribly indulgent and provided a Burgundy with dinner and then Sauternes for dessert. The Sauternes was amazing, although sweet at the front of your mouth; the acidity cleansed your palate, so it didn’t feel cloying at all. The wine was 3 years older than me! A real treat.

Finally I’ve been a little busy shopping on the internet and managed to get to exciting parcels on the same day. One contained a replacement handle for our Canadian ice-cream maker, the Donvier. I can’t wait to start trying some new sorbet and ice-cream recipes, as well as our old favourites, so bring on summer! I had also found a cake recipe in Maggie Beer’s book “Maggie’s Harvest” that called for dried cumquats. There is a special birthday coming up next year for someone and I think this cake would be perfect for him. I contacted Noelle Tolley at the Kumquatery and placed an order. They arrived too, they are so beautiful, like tiny perfect sweets, I can’t even begin to imagine just how many cumquats it took to produce 500g of dried cumquats!

Another little project has been keeping us occupied, but hopefully we'll have more news about that next week.

Our weekend was:

A quick beach walk with Nigella, where taken up in the moment I decided to leap over the creek. Convinced of my athletic prowess I ran and jumped. Sadly I didn’t quite make it, landed in the water and somehow ended up rolling over and landing on my back? Apparently graceless, according to Rob. It was funny though. I then dared him to do better, his leap was just as unsuccessful and he ended up with water and sand splattered up his legs. Nigella disowned us, how embarrassing!

A drive north, punctuated by a stop at Oatlands for bread (Apple, walnut and fruit loaf and rye) and coffee, a little wander along to look at the antique shops. The Fruit bread torn into chunks and devoured as we drove along in the car.

A belated birthday dinner for Rob’s mother of perfect winter oysters with sparkling, sticky maple pork ribs with rice and sautéed cavolo nero from our garden. Dessert was a date and dark chocolate meringue cake with cream. Sticky and delicious, but light at the same time.

I picked a bucket of slightly frozen cumquats from the tree in the early morning sun to take back home to make cumquat marmalade.

The drive back home through Evandale and Nile is much prettier than the highway. We pretended to ourselves that we would not stop again for Companion bakery bread on the way home. I did smirk slightly and was secretly relieved as Rob slowed down and ducked into Oatlands again. Oatlands is looking pretty smart at the moment, new shops, renovations, new mill. For once a Tasmanian township that hasn’t been bastardised with modern buildings (well at least on their main road anyway!) In the warmth of the bakery we decided to eat steak pies and drink more coffee. We got a country batard loaf and I was quite firm with Rob that it could stay in the back where it wouldn’t disappear!

On the way back we decided to bypass the whole Brighton bypass debacle and went through Colebrook and Campania. It was nice to have the time to chat about our garden. Rob and I talked about our most favourite fruits, the ones that are hard to buy, or are prohibitively expensive. Now the orchard at the block already has 33 trees that include apples, pears, plums, apricots, almonds, mulberries, pomegranates (optimistic I know), cherries, a peach, a nectarine and a fig. Plants are our thing really, so we’d like to be a bit more serious about producing four of our favourites. We decided upon in no particular order: cumquats, quinces, raspberries and rhubarb (not technically a fruit but close enough!) Maybe we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves, but it’s nice to dream.