We’ll Never be Royal … Except During Artichoke Season

November 16, 2019November 19, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Just a few of the artichokes…

It’s artichoke season again, and we are officially overwhelmed. It’s no longer a question of whether we’ll have artichokes for dinner, but what we’ll have with them. I seem to have permanent spines in my fingertips from preparing them, and my fingernails are stained an unattractive grey from the purple ones.

But the spines and the stains are worth it. Having this many artichokes makes me feel like a queen—who else could indulge in such a luxury? (Never mind that a queen wouldn’t have to prepare her own artichokes.)

This weekend, if I can manage it around open homes, I’ll bottle (can) a year’s worth of artichokes. It’s nearly a full day’s work. Picking and prepping 60 to 70 artichokes in one go is daunting, but then we’ll have riches year-round, and all we’ll have to do is open a jar to get them. Not too hard to take.

First Fruits

November 14, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

The new property isn’t quite gushing berries like the old, but it’ll get there.

The family spent much of last Sunday gardening at the new property. It had been several weeks since I’d worked in the garden there, and the weeds had been busy. The list of weed species on the property continues to grow, with cleavers and field madder the newest unwelcome volunteers. I found convolvulus too, scrambling along the perimeter fence through a clutch of gorse seedlings. At least the convolvulus will have pretty flowers.

There were nice surprises, too. The artichokes we transplanted are growing well. And nearly all of the cuttings of gooseberry, red currant, black currant, and blackberry have survived and are flowering. The strawberries have done well, too. One of them even offered me a ripe berry—the first fruit of the new property. It wasn’t the best strawberry ever, but it was the flavour of possibilities, the flavour of things to come.

Garden Gifts

November 5, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Our house went on the market today. We’ve spent the past several weeks painting, tidying and weeding to make the place look its best. On Sunday evening, after a hard three days of work, I wandered around the yard. The air was sultry—oppressive heat slowly giving way to the comfort of a lazy summer evening. The freshly cut grass was soft and cool underfoot as I padded past purple baubles of blooming chives, snow-in-summer spilling onto the path in frosty profusion, multi-hued pansies nodding in the light breeze, and pale irises standing tall. I strolled the rose garden, only just beginning to flower. A lone peony sported golf-ball-sized burgundy buds. The last of the pittosporum flowers perfumed the air.

In short, the garden was at ease in its lush maturity—the result of fifteen years of hard work, on top of the botanical history of a hundred years of landscaping. I thought of all the plants the property had gifted us with—roses, dahlias, naked ladies, camellias, irises, and others. Discovered among the overgrown gardens, often nearly choked out by weeds, the plants responded well to love and care, and formed the core of what we’ve done with the yard.

Then I thought of our new property, a bare paddock, its botanical history limited to pasture grasses and clover. There will be no gifts, discovered among the weeds. No heirloom plants needing only a little love to bloom and thrive.

The thought was depressing as I strolled the mature plantings we will leave behind. Starting from nothing but rock and clay is a daunting prospect.

But this property will gift us plants yet again—hundreds of seedlings, cuttings, bulbs and divisions sit in pots, awaiting transport to their new home. One day, they will be the botanical history of the new property. One day, I will stroll among them in contemplation, just as I did among their predecessors at the old house.

Inspired Cooking

November 1, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

A few days ago, after a busy day, I couldn’t be bothered to cook. I decided to throw together a quick pasta, so I headed to the garden to pick a few vegetables.

But when I arrived in the garden, the sight of the winter spinach, growing like a weed and thinking about bolting, inspired me.

All that spinach would make an excellent spinach quiche. I even had some feta in the fridge, and there’s nothing better than spinach with feta.

Of course, a quiche is a whole lot more work than pasta …

And it really would need dill, too …

I scoured the weedy parts of the garden for volunteer dill, because my seedlings weren’t ready to pick yet. The weedy dill plants clinched it.

No longer tired, but inspired, I set about cooking. The result was worth the effort (as I knew it would be).

And that’s what I most enjoy about gardening—when the daily grind gets me down and I just want to order takeaways, it provides the inspiration to instead make a glorious meal.

Spring Bounty

October 23, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

What a difference two weeks make!

Last time I went to the grocery store, I scanned the isles looking for a few decent seasonal vegetables, because there was little in the garden.

But virtually by the time I’d brought the vegetables home, the garden exploded with good things to eat.

Artichokes and asparagus are both coming on strong. Every day a new cauliflower suddenly bursts, creamy-white among the leaves. The purple sprouting broccoli plants are covered in florets. The spinach and lettuces seem to double in size every day, providing crisp springtime salads.

It seems we’ve gone from famine to feast overnight. I shouldn’t be surprised; it happens every year. But it’s always a delight.

Chilli and Chips

October 17, 2019October 14, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Sometimes, I work long and hard to create a fancy meal. I worry about taste and presentation, and fuss with every detail. Other times, a meal just comes together, and ends up as beautiful in the dish as in the mouth, with very little work.

I made a simple chilli the other day to go with a pair of ripe avocados. There was nothing to the chilli—kidney beans, grated carrot, chopped tomatoes, onion, and a whole lot of herbs and spices. My husband made guacamole and grated some cheddar cheese. While the chilli simmered, I made up my fabulous corn chips (so tasty and so easy to make).

Suddenly, we had a glorious meal—beautiful colours, textures and flavours—and I felt like I’d hardly worked for it. Nice when it all works out that way.

If at First You Don’t Succeed …

October 14, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / 1 Comment

A few weeks ago, my dentist rang. not to tell me I was overdue for a checkup, but to ask if I wanted any hazelnuts (we have a long history of trading produce—I try not to arrive at an appointment without some gift from the garden).

Turns out his hazelnut gift was 10 kilos of nuts! So I’ve been using hazel nuts in everything lately. And, of course, my thoughts turned to homemade Nutella.

There are plenty of recipes online. I chose this one and had a go. The only change I made was to use dark chocolate instead of milk chocolate.

The result was quite good, but not nutty enough for my taste—the chocolate to nut ratio was too high, swamping the flavour of the nuts. It also set too hard—probably because I used dark chocolate instead of the milk chocolate called for in the recipe.

Of course, that means I’ll just have to make it again … you know, to get it right. I have plenty of hazelnuts.

If at first you don’t succeed …

A Day Off

October 1, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Cathedral of red beech

Sunday dawned warm and sunny, and I prepared myself for another day of hard work in the garden, in spite of my aching back. It would be a crunch to finish what I needed to stay on track—my garden to-do lists get longer each week, and I don’t dare fall behind at this time of year.

Meanwhile, my husband was fretting about the lectures he still needed to prepare for this week. But he’s much better at relaxation than I am. Before I had a chance to gather my tools, he suggested a hike instead of a day of work.

So we ignored our pesky to-do lists and enjoyed a day at Hinewai.

Hinewai Reserve is privately owned, and encompasses 1250 hectares of the outer Banks Peninsula. It includes a glorious mix of vegetation types.

The track forms an avenue within a dense kānuka stand.

Probably the most impressive are the 50 hectares of old growth forest. The red beech create a green cathedral, shading out much of the undergrowth. The effect is in stark contrast to the dense kānuka stands that blanket other parts of the reserve.

At this time of year, the gorse is in full bloom. Management at Hinewai allows this invasive weed to grow, because it provides an effective nursery for native trees. Eventually, the native plants will overtop the gorse and shade it out, but in areas recently disturbed by fire, the gorse is thick. On Sunday, the tops of the hills looked like they’d been capped with bright yellow snow, for all the gorse.

Gorse in full bloom in a recently burned area.

With 330 species of native vascular plants, and 60 species of fern (including six species of tree fern), Hinewai is probably the most diverse site on the Banks Peninsula. We never fail to see interesting things when we visit. This visit was no exception. A bright purple fungus creeping along a rotting branch was probably the most unusual find on Sunday, but we were treated to tree fuchsia in bloom, kererū swooping overhead, and pīwakawaka and tomtits flitting around among leafy lacebarks, kahikatea, tōtara, and kōwhai. I enjoyed seeing my favourite filmy ferns, with their translucent fronds. Large quantities of ongaonga (tree nettle) supported the red admiral butterflies that were enjoying the warm day along with us, flitting through the dappled light in the forest.

View down to Otanerito/Long Bay

And, of course, as with most spots on the Banks Peninsula, the views from the clearings at Hinewai were spectacular.

My weekend to-do list forgotten, I had a lovely day enjoying the outdoors. Next weekend’s list is necessarily longer now, but it was good to take a day off. I must remember to do that more often.

Too Good Not to Share

September 24, 2019 / Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

A few of the two dozen or so loaves from Saturday.

Saturday was a bread day, so while I headed to the garden in the morning, my husband began making up the dough and getting the fire lit in the oven. As I worked, the familiar scent of wood smoke wafted across the yard. The bread oven smell is different from the smell of the wood burner or a brush fire—from the first wisp of smoke, it declares itself a cooking fire. The smell always gives me a sense of well-being. It tells me that soon there will be a bounty of baked goods, and we will eat well for days on the delicious things we’ll bake.

Bread days are always busy—baking is done on top of the gardening, mowing, and cleaning on the weekend’s to-do list. By mid-day Saturday, I had planted out my peas and hauled a dozen loads of compost to the garden, and the kitchen was full of rising loaves in a variety of shapes and sizes. It was time for me to join the baking. While my husband managed the bread, I chopped vegetables for what would become dinner.

It was an especially hot oven Saturday. Pitas baked in seconds, kaiser rolls in a handful of minutes, the vegetables came out beautifully caramelised in no time, and focaccia bubbled up quickly and came out sizzling. While the larger loaves baked, I mixed up pound cake and hazelnut biscotti to slip into the oven after the bread was through.

Dinner was a feast of roast vegetables and salad greens stuffed into fresh pita breads followed by pound cake and biscotti—a celebration of good food after a day of intense work. The only problem with it was there was no one besides us to share it with.

(For those of you who missed it a few years ago, you can check out our kitchen during a bread day in this time lapse video.)