Around the house

This is the delicious cauliflower soup I made this week.
Cauliflower, potatoes and onion (and I added two turnips) chopped up and put in the pot.
Add a tablespoon of oil and 1/4 cup of water, heat until bubbling then cover and cook on medium for ten minutes. Veges should be steamed and softened, but should not be dry.

Add tblsp grated ginger, crushed clove of garlic, 3tsp turmeric, tsp ground coriander, tsp cumin seeds s+p and cook stirring on med-high for two minutes (this is the point at which the photo was taken. The veges all got more yellow still. Then add 1Litre vege stock and simmer 20mins. Puree before eating.

This got praise from all my siblings, my brothers girlfriend and friends. (and I thought it was pretty good too.

The other night I made Risotto and there was some left over so I made some risotto balls. Just got some mozzarella and put a small piece in the middle of a chunk of risotto and molded it much like a meatball, then rolled them in breadcrumbs.

I think traditionally they would be deepfried but instead I sprayed them in light oil and baked them while a cake was in the oven. Delicious fresh and reheated. Great way to use leftovers.

In the growing challenge I have some sprouts emerging from my seed trays. Broad beens lettuce, and peas of some kind (I can't remember if they are snow or ordinary.) I also planted some more and mostly things I haven't grown before: pidgeon peas, chicory, thyme, dill, warigal greens. Can't wait for them to come up. I do need to get some silverbeet in too, as it's so good in winter.

I'll also explain my potting cups. These are the cups you get coffee in, and I get all my coworkers to rinse their cups out and keep them for me, I then rip the bottoms out and fill with potting mix and seedraising mix. They do need to be in a sealed container such as an ice cream container or plastic tray to keep the soil in but by the time they are planted out the roots generally are holding all the soil together.

Because they are waxed they do not wick the moisture away from the plants like the newspaper pots can sometimes do, and when they are planted out they provide a small barrier to protect tender young seedlings from the slug attacks that used to decimate my plants. they then gradually breakdown and add to the organic matter in the garden.

Now I have to wait for the ground to dry out a little, (it's been raining since the weekend) so I can prepare some more garden beds to plant out all these plants.

Also on the weekend I went out to our local tip which has a buy back centre and found a perfactly good electric mulcher. I have been thinking about getting one of these for a long time, but the cost was prohibitive. This was only $15 and was thrown out a branch was jammed. The tip manager just dislodged the branch and hey presto as new mulcher.

I promptly went home, got a cord to fit and mulched some weedy trees. I believe they are a native legume so I will use thema s mulch and in the compost. I also picked up some cheap concrete reinforcing wire. One of the sheets I have set over the broad beans and will support them as they grow. I simply folded it into an a frame shape and the wire was cut off with spikes that I pushed into the ground.

You can see the broad beans have grown a lot since the last post You can also see my sexy gumboot (there are two) that I got in new zealand. There is another sheet of wire I will use to grow the snow peas on and then I'll have to go back for more.