seasons

Winter Hiking

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

I love hiking at any time of the year, but there’s something particularly enjoyable about winter hikes. 

Part of that enjoyment for me is that it’s the only chance here in Aotearoa New Zealand to walk in snow, because it rarely snows at lower elevations. To get to snow, you’ve got to hike to it. (Yes, you can hike to snow even in summer, but it’s easier to do so in winter, and there’s more of it.)

Last weekend, my husband, daughter and I headed to Red Hill, which sits between Lake Lyndon and Lake Coleridge. At 1640 metres, Red Hill is higher than nearby Porters Skifield, but lacks the snow making machines. So the snow was patchy, even at the top. 

Still, winter hiking was in its full glory. On the way up, we hiked across crunchy frozen mud, pushed up by countless ice needles. We teetered on icy tussock mounds as we crossed a wetland. As we gained altitude, the wind increased and the temperature fell. We passed pockets of spectacular frost, with ice crystals so long, it looked like leaves. Snow in the shady hollows was wind sculpted and hard, more ice than snow.

By the time we hit the open tussock and scree-covered tops, the freezing wind was burning my cheeks, and I was thankful for my snood, which I pulled over my face to block the worst of the wind.

The view from the top was definitely worth the windburn. Winter mountains—covered in snow—stretched across the skyline. Down below us, the water of Lake Coleridge glistened blue in the sun.

The only bad part about winter hiking is that it’s often not pleasant to sit on the top for lunch, and last weekend was absolutely not a weekend to hang out on top of any mountain. After a quick look around and some photos, we hightailed it back down.

But one of the cool things about winter hiking is that, on a sunny day, you can start the hike in winter conditions, and end in spring or summer-like conditions.

Having donned all our warm layers at the top of Red Hill, we began shucking them as we descended. We went from thermals, jacket, hat and gloves to just t-shirts by the time we were back to the car. It was a balmy 17℃. Warm enough for a swim … according to our daughter. (We decided not to swim that day, but she did take a swim the following day after a hike with a friend.)

As someone with mediocre circulation, I struggle with overheating when I hike. I can be sweating, but still have numb fingers and toes, because my body doesn’t push the heat to my extremities. It turns summer hiking into a sweat-fest. But hiking during winter is much more pleasant. I can shuck my jacket to cool my core, but keep hat and gloves on to warm my extremities. It makes for a much more pleasant experience.

We’ve enjoyed some memorable winter hikes: Cragieburn under a freshly fallen 15 centimetres of fluff, a trek to Woolshed Creek Hut in fresh calf-deep snow, followed by barefoot wading in the stream at the top, a winter wonderland of wind-sculpted ice atop Mount Isobel … Winter landscapes are spectacular.

Hopefully, we’ll get out for a few more hikes before the end of winter. Gotta enjoy the snow while it’s there!

Excitement Builds

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Lately, it has still been light outside on our drive to and from work. The daffodils are up, and a few blooms are even open. When I weeded the asparagus bed last week, the Californian thistles were sprouting new buds 15 centimetres underground. 

And most importantly, my seed order has arrived!

Yep. Spring is on its way. Never mind that the frost behind the house hasn’t melted in a week, and the bird bath is skimmed-over with ice at 3 pm. Never mind that much of the country hit yearly lows yesterday. Never mind that our worst winter weather tends to arrive after spring has already officially started. 

This weekend, I’ll write my weekly spring to-do list, covering August to December. I’ll tidy the garden shed of winter detritus, and pull out the peppers in the greenhouse which have finally died. And I’ll finish the last of the winter pruning and deadheading. I’ll probably also fret over how little of those winter activities I accomplished—the sewing, spinning and other crafts I enjoy. 

And with the windows open (for the few hours it’s warm enough … just), and the house smelling of fresh air and the promise of growing things, I’ll impatiently await spring.

Blackcurrant Twists

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Things are slow in the garden during these rainy, dark, cold weeks of winter, and there’s no better excuse to bake.

Over the past three weeks,I’ve baked spice cake, blackcurrant pie, raspberry studded pound cake, molasses crinkle cookies, and lemon chocolate chip cupcakes. 

And two weeks ago, I went overboard on Sunday breakfast. Saturday evening, I made up some blackcurrant twists, which rose in the fridge overnight, to be baked Sunday morning. Half of the twists went into the freezer, to be baked last Sunday morning before I went off to the Tamariki Book Festival. (Because I couldn’t miss my Sunday morning baking just because I was working all weekend, now could I?)

The twists were excellent, and the dough froze well. But they were very messy.

The recipe I was loosely following said something vague like “Twist each strip into a knot.” Um … sure. A twist and a curl, and I called them good enough. All the while, blackcurrant jam was spewing out of them, and I was wondering whether there’d be any jam left inside by the time they baked. 

I wisely baked them on parchment, rather than directly on a tray, because the jam did continue to ooze out. But there was plenty left inside, and those gooey baked jam blobs that escaped were delicious!

I thought they looked a bit rough, coming out of the oven, but my husband loved their rustic look. (he didn’t see the beautiful buns pictured in the online recipes…) Regardless, they really were yummy.

Here’s my variation, based on a couple of online recipes:

Dough:
1 1/4 cup milk
60 g butter
scant Tbs yeast
1 large egg
1/4 cup sugar
2 cups regular flour
2 cups wholemeal flour

Blackcurrant jam:
2 cups frozen or fresh blackcurrants
juice of 1 lemon
1/4 cup sugar
1 Tbsp cornstarch
1 Tbsp water

Filling:
25 g melted butter
1/4 sugar
1/4 brown sugar
1 Tbsp cinnamon

Make the dough: Bring the milk nearly to a boil in a small saucepan. Remove from the heat and add the butter, stirring until melted. Allow to cool to lukewarm. Add the yeast and allow to sit until it begins to foam. Then beat in the sugar and egg.

In a bowl, combine the flours. Add the milk mixture and stir until it comes together in a ball. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead for 10 minutes until smooth and elastic. Place the ball of dough in a greased bowl and cover. Allow to rise about 2 hours, until doubled in bulk.

While the dough rises, make the blackcurrant jam: Combine fruit, lemon juice and sugar in a saucepan. Cook on medium heat until it just begins to thicken. In a small bowl, combine the cornstarch and water, and then add to the blackcurrants. Cook, stirring, for a few more minutes, until it thickens. Remove from the heat and allow to cool.

Once the dough is risen, roll it out on a floured surface into a large square (about 45 cm on a side). It will be quite thin.

Melt the butter for the filling, and spread the dough with it. Combine the sugars and cinnamon, and sprinkle over the butter. Then spread the whole thing with blackcurrant jam (I used ALL the jam, but if you want less messy buns, you could use less).

Fold the dough into thirds, like a letter. Then cut the folded dough into 12 strips with a sharp knife (Yes, jam will spill everywhere. You can lick it up later, I won’t tell anyone). Give each strip a twist, and then coil it into a knot and set it on a baking sheet lined with baking paper.

Cover with plastic wrap and allow the buns to rise 15-20 minutes (or put them into the fridge to rise overnight). Bake at 190℃ (375℉) for 16 minutes. Allow to cool for a few minutes before eating. If you’ve refrigerated or frozen your buns before baking, allow them to warm up on the kitchen bench for about 30 minutes before baking. Frozen buns require a few extra minutes in the oven.

Garden Tally

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Years ago, struggling with the feeling that I wasn’t pulling my weight in my family because I wasn’t earning much money with my business, I did a few back of the envelope calculations of what my gardening and milking/cheesemaking activities ‘earned’. At the time, I worked out that I was producing about $50,000 worth of food every year. The domestic accounting blew me away and put my mind at ease.

Plenty of food in the winter garden.

I’m no longer concerned about the monetary value of the gardening I do, but I’m still curious, and I love data and numbers. So I’ve decided to do some garden accounting this year.

Beginning at the winter solstice, I started keeping a log of all the food that comes out of the garden. Although the garden year never really ends here, I figured the solstice was as good a place as any to start. I’ve dedicated a notebook to the task and I’m recording as much information as I can about what I harvest—weight, number, variety, etc. I’ll periodically enter the data into a spreadsheet, so I can play around with the numbers.

Okay, yes, I’m a total nerd. But I love playing with data. And we always come to late summer (as we heave yet another laden basket onto the kitchen bench) wondering just how many kilos of courgettes we’ve harvested. But by then it’s too late to go back and weigh them. 

Peppers hanging on in the greenhouse.

Besides, there’s always the fascinating harvests, like the 500 grams of hot peppers I harvested yesterday. (in July?! For those in the northern hemisphere, July is the seasonal equivalent of January.) In addition, the exercise might tell me a bit about which varieties are more or less worth growing. Not that it would stop me from growing a crop I love, even if it doesn’t produce a lot, but it never hurts to have the data.

My intent is not to place a dollar value on what we harvest (Who can put a value on a warm, heirloom tomato fresh from the garden?), but to use the exercise to capture the quantity and diversity of food we enjoy. 

Pumpkin Cinnamon Buns

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Winter has definitely arrived this weekend, with squally rain, and chilly winds. The mountain passes have been closed by snow, and no doubt we’ll see some stunning snowy peaks when the clouds finally lift.

In response, I’ve been craving dense, high calorie food (never mind the fact I’ve been indoors most of the weekend and don’t need high calorie food in any way). 

Yesterday, I was contemplating today’s breakfast, and imagined pumpkin spice sticky buns. Was there such a thing? And if not, could I invent it?

The answer was, yes! I found several variations online. In my usual fashion, I mixed and matched, picking aspects I liked from a number of recipes to come up with my own take on the dish. 

The outcome was quite tasty. Here’s my recipe.

Dough:
3/4 cup milk, warmed to about 43℃ (110℉)
1/4 cup granulated sugar
2 1/4 tsp yeast
1 cup pureed pumpkin
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 egg
2 cups high grade (bread) flour
2 cups wholemeal (whole wheat) flour
1 Tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp cloves
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp allspice
3/4 tsp salt

Filling:
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 Tbs cinnamon
1/4 cup butter, softened
2/3 cup chopped walnuts

Glaze:
1/2 cup icing (confectioner’s) sugar
2-3 tsp fresh lemon juice

To make the dough, combine milk, granulated sugar and yeast in a small bowl and let sit until foamy. Combine pumpkin, melted butter and egg in a medium bowl. Combine flours, spices and salt in a large bowl.

Combine the yeast mixture with the pumpkin mixture and beat until smooth. Pour this mix into the flour, and stir until a dough forms. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for about 10 minutes, until smooth and elastic. Allow to rise in a greased, covered bowl for 1-2 hours, until doubled in bulk.

Roll the dough into a large rectangle, about 35 x 40 cm (14 x 16 in). Spread the dough with the softened butter, leaving a narrow strip of dough on one of the shorter sides free of butter. Combine the brown sugar and cinnamon, and sprinkle over the butter. Sprinkle walnuts on top.

Starting at the buttery short edge, roll the dough into a log, pressing the unbuttered edge firmly to seal. With a sharp knife, slice the log into 12 rounds.
Place the rounds in a well-greased baking tin 23 x 33 cm (9 x 13 in)*, cover with a damp towel, and let rise about 30 minutes.**

Bake at 180℃ (350℉) for 25 minutes, until nicely browned.

Make the glaze by mixing lemon juice, a little at a time, into the icing sugar until the mixture is thick and pourable. Drizzle over the still-warm buns.

*Knowing this recipe makes enough for 2 breakfasts for my husband and me, I divided my rolls, arranging them into two 25 cm (11 in) round pans. I slipped one pan into the freezer, to bake another week.

**If you want to have these for breakfast, cover the pan with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight. Allow to stand on the kitchen bench for about 30 minutes to warm up before baking.

A week later … PS: the buns I put in the freezer for a week were every bit as delicious as the ones baked right away. I moved them to the fridge the night before, then let them sit out for 45 minutes before baking. They took about 5 minutes longer in the oven than the first batch, but otherwise, you’d never know they had been frozen. Yum!

Winter Gardening

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

It’s not quite winter here yet. There are a few more days until it officially starts. And the weather has been unusually warm. 

It’s a far cry from gardening in Minnesota, where I used to hack my parsnips out of the frozen ground in November and December, and the garden spent much of the winter under a blanket of snow.

Here, the garden is reduced and slow growing in winter, but there’s plenty happening.

We’re still picking tomatoes, peppers and eggplants from the greenhouses, though many of the plants are looking pretty sad. They will almost certainly give up in the next month.

The winter broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage are doing nicely. We’ve been enjoying plenty of these cool-weather crops over the past few weeks, and they will continue to give through winter. The leeks are gorgeous and ready to pick. They’ll provide onion flavour in dinners after the stored onions are gone, and before the first spring onions are ready in October. 

Leafy greens like Beet Erbette and Silverbeet (Swiss Chard) are in their prime through winter—they’ve been largely ignored through summer while so many other crops were available, but now they offer fresh greens to add to the frozen and bottled vegetables in winter dinners.

Weeds are slow growing in winter, and the vegetables require little work. Much of the vegetable garden is tucked up under mulch or green manures all winter.

But there’s a fair bit of maintenance to be done over winter. Perennial crops like berries and fruit trees need pruning, and winter is a good time to tackle the really pernicious weeds like twitch (couch grass), because the soil is soft and wet. Winter is also a great time to top up mulch and add compost to the soil, to mend fences and bird nets, to shift plants.

The beauty of winter gardening is that the urgency of the spring and summer gardening seasons is gone—there isn’t so much to do that you can’t enjoy a rainy day indoors, but you have a perfect excuse to be outdoors on those glorious sunny winter days.

And speaking of glorious sunny days … I think it’s time to get out of the office and into the garden.

Happy Autumnal Equinox!

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Some years still feel summery at the equinox, but this year, the weather is decidedly autumnal. Monday, we hit our highest temperature of the summer—a blustery nor’westerly day that had my students wilting by 10 in the morning. It was 31 degrees at 5 pm when we left work. Dinner was a summer feast of sweet corn, soybeans and zucchini.

We slept with the windows open, covers kicked aside on Monday night.

Tuesday morning, I went out in the dark to water the plants at about 5.30. It was still 23 degrees. As I watered, the wind shifted.

By the time I left for work an hour and a half later, the temperature had dropped to 16, and rain spattered the windshield in fits and starts.

By ten o’clock, the skies had opened up. Wind drove the rain in sheets, and the temperature continued its slide downward.

Driving home from work, the temperature registered 11 degrees. Traffic moved slowly through the downpour, wind rocking the car and thrashing trees alongside the road. When I got home, I stripped off my rain soaked cotton clothes and replaced them with cosy wool. We had potato soup for dinner.

We woke on Wednesday morning to full autumn. Summer had been scoured away by over 40 mm of rain, and stripped bare by gale force winds.

A dramatic entrance for the season. But the truth is, autumn was already well underway. Our first frost came weeks ago, on 6 March. I picked the pumpkins last weekend. And the zucchini, tomatoes and other summer-loving plants were all showing signs of being nearly done for the season.

And, of course, squirrelly me has been in autumn mode for weeks, preserving everything I can in preparation for the dark days ahead.

Today we step into the dark side of the year. Although I very much enjoyed our last couple days of hot summer sun (and today promises some beautiful sunshine), I’m looking forward to all that the dark side has to offer. 

Autumnal Harvest

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

The weather has turned decidedly autumnal, so while the sun is still summer-hot, the air has gotten chillier, and the weather more unsettled.

And it means I’ve gone into my annual squirrel mode—harvesting and preserving summer’s bounty so we can enjoy it all winter.

Last Saturday was summer soup day. Long time readers of my blog will know this is a key part of my gardening year. When the children were young, it was a whole-family event, with everyone pitching in to pick and chop vegetables. It’s become a more solitary activity for me in recent years, but no less important in my annual calendar. 

With just my husband and me at home now, I always think I’ll make less soup. And this year, I was a little worried I wouldn’t have enough vegetables for a big batch, because January and February were so cold and wet, the heat-loving vegetables sulked.

I should have known better.

I needed both my 20-litre and 18-litre pots to cook the soup, plus the 12 litre pot for making vegetable stock from the vegetable off-cuts. In the end, I made 23 quarts of soup and 13 pints of stock. That’s Monday dinners for almost six months, plus stock to flavour 13 more meals. Not bad for 13 hours of work.

The day after summer soup day, I tackled the sweet corn. I usually sow three plantings of sweet corn, two weeks apart, in the spring. The first two plantings were desperate to be picked, so I harvested 63 ears of corn. Blanched and cut off the cob, it yielded 5.3 kilograms of corn, which went into the freezer. That’s a year’s supply of sweet corn for us, to be used in casseroles, stews, and side dishes. 

I had hoped to also freeze some soy on Sunday, but I’d waited too long to harvest, and about half the beans were too mature. So we’ll save the majority of this year’s soy as dry beans instead.

And speaking of dry beans, in the last fortnight, I’ve harvested my Borlotti and Black Turtle beans, and have started harvesting the climbing beans: Blue Shackamaxon, Bicolour Peans, Bird’s Egg, and Cherokee Cornfield. The harvest of the climbers will go on for the next month as the plants continue to grow and put out new pods while the older ones mature. Not quite as neat and tidy as the bush beans, which all mature at the same time, but in the end, I’ll get more beans from the same amount of garden space off the climbers than the bush beans.

I’ve also now harvested most of the potatoes, which did beautifully this year, with the cool rain. The spuds are tucked away in a dark corner of the laundry room, and should last through much of the winter.

There are still more vegetables to squirrel away in the next few weeks: pumpkins, hopefully more tomatoes, more basil (in the form of pesto), and the rest of the beans and potatoes. As I do every year, I mourn the end of summer’s bounty, but I look forward to the ease of winter meals that come from the freezer or pantry instead of directly from the garden. There is something delightful about knowing that the hard work has been done, and the food is tucked away, ready to be eaten.

Oven Fried Zucchini Sticks

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

Many years ago, I posted a blog titled 50 Ways to Eat Zucchini. Since then, I’ve gotten much better about my zucchini planting—I plant half as many as I used to. Of course, that still means we have too many. We’re currently giving away 5 to 10 kg of zucchini a week, eating it in every dinner and baking it into desserts.

I don’t mind having too much zucchini. It’s a versatile vegetable that can be grated into all kinds of dishes (chilli, pasta sauce, enchiladas, burgers …) or featured in beautiful slabs or rounds (zucchini and tomato tart, grilled zucchini, frittata …).

One of my favourite ways to eat zucchini is as breaded, oven fried sticks. These tasty ‘fries’ take a little work, but are well worth the effort. I fill a large jelly roll pan with them, and they vanish, even when it’s just my husband and me for dinner.

I don’t have a set recipe, but here’s an approximation of what I do:

2 small to medium sized zucchini
1 egg
1 cup bread crumbs
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
2 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp chipotle
1/2 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp dry oregano
small handful of fresh parsley or basil, finely chopped

Cut the zucchini into thick sticks, about the length and thickness of a finger. Whisk the egg in a small bowl. Combine all other ingredients in a separate bowl. Generously oil a large baking sheet.

Dredge each zucchini stick in the egg, then the breadcrumb mixture and set on the pan.

Bake for about 20 minutes at 200℃, until browned and cooked through.

Serve hot, with your favourite dip, if desired. We love chipotle mayonnaise with them, but they really need no further embellishment—they’re delicious as is.

January in the Garden

/ Robinne Weiss / Leave a comment

It is the last day of January here, my favourite month in the garden.

This January has been more difficult than many, with cold wet weather rather than the usual dry summer warmth. But the garden has still been a January garden.

December is a month of weeding, because my vegetables aren’t yet large enough to compete against most weeds. The weeding effort spans the entire month, and I always aim to have a weed-free garden on Christmas Day. 

All that effort pays off in January, when, as if by magic, the vegetables are suddenly huge, crowding out the weeds and basically looking after themselves. I pull the occasional weed that manages to pop its head above the vegetables, and I keep the paths relatively clear, just so I can move easily through the garden. I water as needed. Otherwise, there’s little to do to as far as maintenance goes.

In January, the gardening effort switches from establishment and maintenance to harvesting, reaping the benefits of my hard work. It’s not that we don’t eat from the garden all year long, but the stretch from January to March is a magical one, where production vastly outstrips our ability to eat. In January, the freezer and the cupboards begin filling up with fruit and vegetables preserved for winter enjoyment. The squirrel in me chitters smugly as I stash away the fruits of my labour, already savouring the meals, snacks, and desserts to come.

It’s as much work as the establishment and maintenance phase of the year, but the reward is immediate and tangible. By mid-March, I’ll be exhausted by the harvest, tired of making sauces, jams, and preserves. Tired of having to deal with overflowing baskets of vegetables every day. But here in January, the novelty hasn’t worn off. The excitement of each new crop coming on is palpable. The thrill of lining up jars of preserved food on the shelves banishes any fatigue.

So I say farewell to January with reluctance and look forward to several months more of deliciously exhausting harvest. And I’ll take you on a tour of my January garden. Enjoy!