October garden journal

I love the month of October, before the season gets too hot, when the garden looks fresh and green and bursting with colour. I find that tending the garden, or just spending time in it relaxing and being amongst Mother Nature, feeds the soul, relaxes the body and stills the mind, allowing room for daydreams, imaginings, and creativeness to wander in.

This month has brought lots of lovely sunshine, warm days, and a little rain. Birds are nesting in the trees and the garden is full of life. Beside our front porch, the wisteria is dripping with cascading white blooms, its delicate fragrant scent welcoming visitors to the front door.

Anemones have continued to bloom, as well as poppies and dianthus, and the beautiful crimson Sweet William that we planted last year.

The trusty cinerarias return with their cheerful blooms year after year. They thrive in shady spots beneath trees, and pop up throughout the veggie garden, too. I love the wonderful variety of shades they come in – especially the blues and purples.

In the backyard, our orange tree is laden with blossom, filling the garden with its divine scent and attracting the bees in droves.

We continue to pick oranges, as well as lemons, chard, kale, spinach, lettuce, parsley, carrots, rhubarb, and herbs. Our little apple tree has its first leaves. In the veggie garden this month I planted tomatoes, zucchini, cucumbers, radishes, spring onions, beetroot, and more carrot seed as not many of the last ones grew (I think they must have been eaten).

Calendulas have self-seeded throughout the veggie garden and I have been picking the flowers and infusing them in oil to make lip balm and body lotion.

I have picked and pressed flowers throughout the month to use in art projects. It is always exciting to open the pages of a book after a few weeks and see how the flowers have held their colour. Pansies, in particular, always seem to produce a lovely result.

This is my seventh year of keeping a garden journal. I love looking back at my garden through the pages, month by month, season by season. Seeing all the loveliness of nature fills my heart with joy.

Hello from Finn!

September garden journal

Now that spring has arrived with sunshine, warmth, and longer days, there is lots to do in the garden. This month has been busy with planning, browsing catalogues and ordering seeds, composting, and planting. Carrots and potatoes have been planted in their garden beds, while trays of vegetable seeds, and seeds saved from last year’s flowers, are starting their growth under cover of the greenhouse, protected from late frosts and inclement weather.

The vegetable garden continues to provide us with a steady supply of greens – chard, spinach, kale and lettuces, as well as parsley, which has flourished alongside, and which I add to many dishes as it is highly nutritious and packed with vitamins and minerals.

Our rosemary is in full bloom and the bees are loving it! We often enjoy potatoes roasted with olive oil and rosemary.

The anemone bulbs we planted last autumn have produced these beautiful purple blooms.

Forget-me-nots and primulas self-seeded and sprung up throughout the garden.

I have been neglecting my garden journal over the winter months, but am back into it again with the new season, beginning with a garden plan of what will be planted over the next month.

Finn is loving the warmer weather and sunshine.

“Just living is not enough,” said the butterfly. “One must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower.”
Hans Christian Andersen

 

Garden Journal

There is still lots of colour in our autumn garden. Taking pride of place is the pretty cosmos, which is flowering after many of the other plants have finished. The weather is still warm and sunny, although we had a cyclone sweep through the country the day before Easter. It caused much destruction, with trees uprooted all over the town, including, sadly, our own lime tree, which we planted about ten years ago. In its place we have planted a bay tree, which we had growing in a pot, but it should do much better now it is in the ground.

I have planted a Camelia sinensis to have a go at growing my own tea! From the one plant you can make green tea, black tea, or oolong tea, depending on how the leaves and buds are processed.

The winter vegetable garden is planted with broccoli, cauliflowers, cabbages, lettuces, spinach, kale, and silverbeet. I still have leek seedlings to go in. I haven’t tried growing leeks before, so it will be interesting to see how they do.

These are my garden journal pages for March and April.

A book I have enjoyed reading this month is A Cottage and Three Acres by Colette O’Neill. Thirteen years ago Colette left behind her life in London to begin a new life in Ireland. She bought an old cottage with three acres of bare, wet, rushy land and set about transforming it into a beautiful, lush, permaculture garden, planting thousands of trees, as well as herbs, vegetables, and even a fairy wood. The book tells the story of what one woman with a dream can achieve on her own, and how a woman’s love of nature and incredible affinity with Mother Earth was able to heal, in her words, “Some of the saddest looking land I had ever walked upon.” Colette truly is an inspiration and I would recommend this book to anyone with a love of gardening, and of nature.

Colette has thousands of pictures of her garden and cottage on her website bealtainecottage.com and hundreds of videos on YouTube. Her book can be purchased through her website, and she is happy to sign it for you!

Garden Journal

It has been a busy month in the garden, in these last weeks of summer, with our vegetable garden cropping abundantly. We have been picking salad greens, beetroot, spring onions, tomatoes, basil, beans, cucumbers, cabbages, zucchinis, and strawberries. I was worried last month that we weren’t going to get many tomatoes as they were small and the birds were eating them as soon as they ripened. But what they lacked in size, they have more than made up for in quantity, and after one week of pecking, the birds have left them alone – not sure why, they must have found something tastier to eat elsewhere. I have made several batches of pasta sauce, bottled enough beetroot to last through the year, frozen loads of beans, dried herbs for use in body care products and for herbal teas, pressed flowers to use in my art, and had a go at eco-dying with plants.

These are my garden journal pages from last month and from this month.

I wanted to share with you a lovely book that I got for Christmas –  Garden Made: A Year of Seasonal Projects to Beautify Your Garden and Your Life by Stephanie Rose. Stephanie is a master gardener who became interested in gardening after a debilitating illness. She writes the blog Garden Therapy where she shares garden-related projects from making your own herbal skincare products, to growing food, recipes, and crafts. The book has fun projects to make, season by season. It has lovely pictures and is chock full of inspiration. Some of the projects I am looking forward to trying are homemade seed paper, teapot planters,  terrarium ornaments, and a bug hotel.

Wishing you all a happy day in your garden!

 

Garden Journal November

The month began with the wisteria in bloom over our front porch, dripping cascades of white blossom. It makes a lovely display, but is over in such a short time, lasting barely more than three weeks. With November being a windy month, the path beneath soon became a carpet of white petals while the tree filled out with dense, lush green foliage.

On one of our walks with Finn last year, we collected seed pods from wild sweet peas we found growing along a walking track. I planted a few along our side fence, with a trellis behind for support. They are the most beautiful shade of deep magenta and have flowered profusely throughout November.

The larkspur in our front garden self-seeded from last year and have come up in lovely shades of blue and purple.

I grew violas from a packet of seeds and planted them around the garden and in pots.

The strawberries are cropping abundantly now the warmer weather has arrived. We are enjoying them for breakfast and desserts. One of my favourite recipes to use them in is strawberry shortcake. Yum!

I have been drying lemon balm to use in herbal infusions over the winter. Lemon balm is a calming herb. It also has anti-viral properties, and can soothe an upset stomach.

Curious Finn!

Pages from my garden journal.

I pressed a few of the sweet pea flowers and have left a space on the journal page to put one when they are ready.

I hope you have a happy day in your garden!

 

Garden Journal October

I love the month of October in the garden when there is a sudden surge of spring growth and new life bursts forth. At the moment our garden is filled with the divine scent of orange and grapefruit blossom, which is especially strong at night time. Most of the seedlings I raised in the greenhouse have been transplanted into the vegetable beds. The bean plants are climbing up their strings, and the strawberry plants are covered in flowers.

Poppies are blooming in the front garden.

The foxgloves I planted last year are producing tall spires of pretty cream bell-shaped flowers.

Finn loves to doze on the sunny bench seat outside the studio.

I planted pots of mustard and cress to cut for use in sandwiches and salads.

These are the October pages from my garden journal.

The card lifts up to reveal the cupcake recipe beneath.

I hope, wherever you are, there is something blooming in your garden.

A Flower a Day

While it is mid-winter and there is not much going on in my garden at the moment to document in my garden journal, I decided to practice painting watercolour flowers. I have begun A Flower a Day project, challenging myself to paint a different flower every day. I paint them onto watercolour paper, referring to photos taken of my garden last summer, then I stick them into my journal. It is a good way for me to practice using watercolour paints and I am loving the process. Sometimes I like to add mixed media embellishments, such as washi tape or fibres, to my mini flower paintings.

This is what I have painted so far.

 

Garden Journal

There is a lovely lot of colour in the garden at the moment with all the spring flowers in bloom. Last summer, on one of our walks, we saw some pretty poppies growing wild and we took a flower head home to save the seed. We planted the seeds in our front garden, and they have been flowering the past few weeks. Nick took these lovely photos.

Yesterday I planted the veggie garden with the tomatoes, zucchinis, lettuces and spring onions that I raised from seed. I still have a lot of planting out to do of flowers and herbs. Hopefully we won’t get any more frosts. I’ve planted the beans, saved from last summer’s crop. Nick had to erect a new bean frame, as our old one blew over and broke in the wind. There are still a few cabbages, red onions, silverbeet and spinach growing in the garden from the winter, although the silverbeet and spinach are starting to bolt and go to seed now.

These are the October pages from my garden journal.

Garden Journal

September has been a very wet month here in Hawke’s Bay, but the beginning of spring has brought plenty of growth in the garden. Daffodils and tulips have been blooming, pretty blue forget-me-nots have sprung up all over the garden, the lavender and rosemary have been abuzz with bees, and the orange and grapefruit trees are laden with fruit, although not quite ready for picking yet. I planted trays of vegetable and flower seeds in the greenhouse, and we dug compost through the garden beds, ready for planting in a few weeks’ time after danger of late frosts has passed.

Garden Journal

Our garden has been fairly dormant over the winter months. A few annuals add colour – pansies, snapdragons, primulas – and lavender and feverfew flower continuously. We have a Wintersweet shrub in the garden beside our front porch, which in the winter has tiny, pale yellow flowers with the most divine scent. I love to breathe in their aroma whenever I walk past them.

Wintersweet

These are the last few pages from my garden journal. I used some pressed leaves for the autumn page, and I pressed some pansies, lavender and feverfew from our garden to use on the July page.

Garden Journal – The End of Summer

The last month of summer, here in Napier, New Zealand, brought lots of sunshine and hot temperatures, but little rain. Flowers bloomed in the garden, while in the vegetable beds, beans, zucchinis, beetroot, chard, and salad greens were plentiful. Our blueberry bush provided a steady supply of berries throughout the month. The tomato plants gave us enough for salads and sandwiches, but not enough for preserving. We had loads of basil in the garden that we wanted to use, so while tomatoes were cheap to buy, we bought some for making pasta sauce and we now have several jars in the pantry and the freezer to see us through the next few months.

Garden Journal

I started a new garden journal this year that I plan to fill with collaged pages of photographs, sketches and journaling. These are the first pages. I’ve added some embellishments from Graphic 45s Time To Flourish collection, which has lots of pretty floral stickers, scrapbooking papers, chipboard tags and journaling cards. On January’s page I included a layout plan of our veggie garden to aid in planning for crop rotation next season.

Garden Journal – August

With another winter almost over and spring just around the corner, the gardens and roadsides are coming to life with blossom-covered trees. The tuis adore the nectar they provide at this time of year. Nick took these photos of a tui drinking from the blossom flowers where he is working at the moment.

Tui

The bright yellow flowers of the wattle trees have been adding a splash of sunshine to the winter days. I wish we had room for one in our garden. I love the Golden Wattles with their clusters of small pompom flowers that we see when we go for walks.

Golden Wattle

The weather is warming up and new growth is emerging, with flowers appearing that have been dormant over the winter months. I’ve been planning what to plant in my garden this year, drawing diagrams, making sure to rotate the crops where I have room, and reading through my companion planting book to make sure not to plant things next to each other which don’t get on. I’ve started a few seeds off inside to get a head start. A little glasshouse is on my wish list, the trouble is finding somewhere in the garden to put one!

I have been keeping a garden journal for a year now. I started last September, at the beginning of spring. It’s interesting to look back over a complete cycle of the seasons and see how the garden changes.

Our broccoli are finally ready for harvesting. I cut the main heads off and and let the plants continue to grow so that they form side-shoots.

Broccoli and Mushroom Gratin

1 large head broccoli
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
2 cups button mushrooms, sliced
1 tablespoon butter or non-dairy spread
2 tablespoons flour
1½ cups milk (or soya milk or oat milk)
2 tablespoons chopped parsley
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon black pepper
1½ cups grated cheese
2 tablespoons butter or non-dairy spread, melted
1 cup fresh breadcrumbs

Preheat oven to 180º C.

Cut the broccoli into florets and steam until bright green and just tender, about 5 minutes. Place in lightly greased baking dish.

Heat the oil and saute the onion and mushrooms until the onion begins to soften and the mushrooms are lightly browned. Spread mixture over broccoli.

Heat the butter or non-dairy spread in a saucepan. Stir in the flour until smooth, then gradually add the milk, stirring constantly until the sauce is thickened. Add the parsley, salt, pepper, and 1 cup of the cheese, and stir until the cheese is melted and the sauce is bubbling. Pour the sauce over the broccoli mixture in the dish.

Stir together the melted butter, breadcrumbs and remaining cheese, and sprinkle over the gratin.

Bake about 20 minutes until the breadcrumbs are golden brown.

Garden Journal – July

The first of our winter bulbs are blooming. The sweet little snowdrops with their hanging heads of pure white were the first to appear, closely followed by the little double jonquils in the corner of the garden beneath the trees. They look like miniature cream roses and their scent is amazing!

Snowdrops

Jonquils

Our citrus trees are producing an abundance of fruit this winter. Lemons, limes, grapefruit and oranges – infusing the cold winter days with the tangy taste of summer.

Grapefruit & orange trees

There is nothing nicer on a cold winter’s night than a comforting pudding. Self-saucing puddings are easy to make and can be adapted to different flavours. For this one I used lemons and limes from our trees to give it a nice citrusy flavour. If it doesn’t all get eaten the first night, it is nice cold the next day when the sponge has soaked up the flavours, leaving a little jelly-like  sauce on the bottom.

Lemon and Lime Self-saucing Pudding

50g butter, melted
¾ cup sugar
1 egg
grated zest of 1 lemon and 1 lime
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon lime juice
3 tablespoons milk
1 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder

Syrup
¾ cup brown sugar
3 teaspoons cornflour
2 cups boiling water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon lime juice

Preheat oven to 180ºC.
Cream butter and sugar. Add egg. Stir in zest, citrus juices and milk. Add sifted dry ingredients. Mix well and place into deep, greased baking dish. Mix syrup ingredients together and pour over batter. Bake 30 minutes.

Garden Journal – June

Winter has brought us an interesting mix of weather this month with some rain and cloudy days, interspersed with chilly morning frosts followed by brilliant sunshine that just makes you want to get out in the garden and mingle with nature.

We made a little memorial garden for Cody next to the decking in our backyard, where we see it every time we go outside. We miss her terribly and still feel her presence everywhere. We planted winter flowers – pansies, primroses and dianthus, and I transplanted some forget-me-not seedlings to flower later. The little dog ornament looks so much like Cody!

Our wonderful friend, Erica, gave us a tin of  Yates heritage seeds to plant in our garden in memory of Cody. The seeds commemorate 130 years of Yates in New Zealand, and the tin comes with a little booklet telling the story of Arthur Yates, who emigrated to New Zealand from England in 1879. Following in his family’s tradition of seed merchants, he opened the first of his seed shops in Auckland, New Zealand, in 1883.

Inside the tin there are 10 varieties of heritage flower and vegetable seeds – pansies, sunflowers, tomatoes and carrots, to name a few. I can’t wait for spring to come so I can start planting them!

It’s lovely to have herbs in the garden over winter to add to stews and soups, stuffings, breads and vegetable dishes. One of my favourite winter meals is soup and crusty bread. For this vegetable and lentil soup I used seasonal vegetables from one of our local market gardens and garnished it with parsley from our garden. For the herbed cheese bread I used organic goat’s cheese, and rosemary and sage from our garden. You can use whatever seasonal herbs you have in the garden. In the summer it would be nice with basil and oregano. Or if you don’t have herbs growing in the garden, it can just as easily be made with dried herbs.

Herbed Cheese Bread

3 teaspoons dried yeast
1 cup wholemeal flour
2 cups white flour
2 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup grated cheese
½ cup chopped fresh herbs or 1 tablespoon dried herbs
2 tablespoons oil
1¼ cups warm water

To make by hand:
In a large bowl, mix together flour, yeast, sugar, salt, cheese and herbs. Make a well in the centre, then slowly add the oil and water, stirring to form a soft dough, and adding a little extra flour if necessary. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and and knead for 10 minutes until the dough forms a soft ball. Shape into a round and place in a lightly oiled bowl, cover and leave to rise in a warm place for about an hour. Knead the dough lightly in the bowl, then shape into a round loaf and place onto a greased baking tray. Leave to rise in a warm place for about an hour, or until the dough has doubled in size. Preheat oven to 200º C. Dust bread with a little flour, cut criss crosses into the top, then bake for 30 minutes, covering top during cooking if it starts to burn.

Alternatively, the dough can be made in a breadmaker, then shaped into a round, placed on a baking tray and left to rise as above.

Vegetable and Lentil Soup

400g pumpkin, peeled and chopped
200g potatoes, peeled and chopped
100g broccolli, cut into florets
1 small onion, chopped
2 tablespoons lentils
1 teaspoon curry powder
4 cups water
salt and pepper to taste
¼ cup milk or cream (or soya milk or oat milk)
parsley to garnish

Place first 7 ingredients in large saucepan. Bring to boil and simmer 30 minutes. Puree or blend. Add milk and seasoning to taste. Heat without boiling. Garnish with chopped fresh parsley.

Garden Journal – May

May has been a sad month for us with the death of our beloved dog, Cody. After having her in our lives for fifteen happy years, her passing has left a big gap in our hearts and our home. I miss having her with me when I work in the garden. She used to lie in the sun and watch me while I weeded and planted, and sometimes she would come and help me dig. For many years, she loved to play ball in the backyard, or lie beneath the orange tree and chew her bone. She still enjoyed her daily walks right up until the end, but for the last few months, when she was home, she just enjoyed basking in the sun, with a token attempt at chasing a ball. We’re going to make a special place in the garden for Cody. Her presence will be felt in our home and garden for a long time, but I know that she is out there somewhere, free from her pain, running and having fun like she loved to do.

I haven’t done very much in the garden this month apart from weeding and pruning, and planting some more lettuces to replace the ones that got eaten by snails.

The delphiniums that I planted from seed last spring began flowering early in the month. The beautiful blue blooms have added some colour to the autumn garden.

Silverbeet, or Swiss chard, is a good staple to have in the veggie garden. It is a rich source of minerals and vitamins, including potassium, manganese, iron, folate, and vitamins A, C, E and K. The young leaves can be eaten raw in salads, and the mature leaves can be sautéed or cooked in vegetable dishes. Hunza Pie is one of my favourite ways to use silverbeet.

Hunza Pie

Pastry

2 cups wholemeal flour
140g butter or non-dairy spread
cold water to mix (about ¼ cup)

Filling

3 cups cooked brown rice
1 bunch silverbeet (6-8 stalks)
2 cups grated cheese
2 eggs
½ tsp curry powder
salt and pepper to taste

To make Pastry: Rub butter into flour. Add water and mix to form dough. Line pie plate with pastry and bake for 15 minutes at 160ºC.

To make filling: Lightly steam or sauté silverbeet until just wilted. Squeeze out moisture and roughly chop leaves and stalks. In a bowl, beat eggs. Add cooked rice, silverbeet, cheese and seasonings. Mix to combine. Spread in pastry shell and cook at 180ºC for 45 minutes.

Garden Journal – April

April is a pretty time of the year with trees turning beautiful shades of autumn hues. Although we are only a month away from winter, it is 25º celsius here today! The seasons seem to be getting later and later every year. We picked the last of our zucchinis last week and our blueberries have finally come to an end. We got a lovely lot for the freezer. While there isn’t a great deal to harvest from the veggie garden at the moment, I have planted more cabbages, broccoli and cauliflowers, as well as lettuces and beetroot.

We had heaps of cineraria seedlings spring up throughout the veggie garden from a couple of plants we had in there last year. They are one of my favourite flowers – especially the blues and purples. I have transplanted them throughout the rest of the garden, as well as borage plants which also self-seeded readily. Borage is a great bee plant, with its pretty blue star-shaped flowers, so is a good one to grow near the veggies.

Rhubarb is a wonderful plant to have in the garden. Tucked away in a corner, it pretty much takes care of itself and it lasts for years and years. Although the leaves are poisonous, the stalks are high in dietary fiber and are a good source of vitamin C and vitamin K. Stewed rhubarb is nice to have for breakfast with cereal, and it can be used in all sorts of desserts. This month’s recipe is a rhubarb crumble, which is delicious served with cream, ice cream, custard, or yoghurt.

Rhubarb Crumble

3 cups diced rhubarb
¾ cup sugar
grated rind of 1 orange
2 tablespoons water

For the crumble:
50g butter or non-dairy spread
½ cup flour
½ cup rolled oats
½ cup sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 180ºC.
Place rhubarb in a dish. Sprinkle with sugar, orange rind and water.
To make crumble, rub the butter into the flour, oats and sugar until mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Stir in cinnamon.
Cover rhubarb with the crumble mix and bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.

Garden Journal – March

This month we finally had some rain to break the drought, but not nearly enough. The days are still warm, but the early mornings are cooler. Our tomatoes and beans are finished and have been pulled out, leaving the garden looking a little bare. I’ve planted some more spring onions, as well as some broccolli, cauliflower and cabbages. I’ve surrounded them with crushed eggshells to deter the snails, and covered them with mesh frames to protect them from birds, so hopefully they’ll have a chance to grow before being eaten.

We have a lot of birds in our garden as I encourage them by tossing a couple of handfuls of wild bird seed onto the back lawn every morning, as well as stale bread when we have it. The sparrows sit and wait on the trellis outside the kitchen every morning, as soon as they see movement through the window. I love a garden full of birds.

We have a new addition to our garden. I rescued a bird bath from my aunt’s house when she moved. It is very old and rustic, but it looks very much at home in our garden, replacing our old one that fell over and broke when a cat jumped on it. The birds love the new bird bath, so I’m sure it will get plenty of use!

We have been picking blueberries throughout the month, and this month’s recipe is a Blueberry and Peach Cobbler with Vanilla Custard, using berries from our garden and Golden Queen peaches from the local market garden.

Blueberry and Peach Cobbler

80g butter or dairy-free spread
½ cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
5 ripe peaches, sliced
¾ cup blueberries

Cream butter and sugar. Beat in egg and vanilla essence. Sift in dry ingredients and mix.
Place peach slices in a baking dish. Sprinkle over blueberries. Spread batter on top.
Bake at 180ºC for 30 minutes.

Vanilla Custard

2 cups milk (or soy milk or oat milk)
2 tablespoons custard powder
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla essence

Pour 1¾ cups of the milk into a saucepan. Mix sugar and custard powder into the remaining ¼ cup milk. Add this to the rest of the milk in the saucepan. Add the vanilla essence. Heat, stirring constantly until boiling, then simmer for 2-3 minutes or until thickened.

Garden Journal – February

February has been a hot, dry month. While there is still lots of colour in the garden, all of my pot plants are looking a little tired, and the trees could definitely do with a good drink. The air has been filled with the cheerful chirruping of cicadas, day and night, a sound I always associate with summer.

The heat-loving tomatoes have been doing well. I’ve made two lots of relish, pasta sauce for the freezer and we have been eating them in salads and sandwiches every day.

We’re still picking runner beans, but the zucchinis have almost come to an end. We have been picking blueberries all month, with enough to freeze for future use. Yummy with breakfast cereal or oatmeal, and in pancakes, smoothies, crumbles, or muffins.

Our thyme is in full bloom at the moment. I love its distinctive aroma. The small pink flowers are so pretty and attract the bees to the garden. It’s lovely to be able to go out the back door and pick a few sprigs to use in cooking. The sprigs look pretty in a vase as well.

Although it is sad that another summer is almost over, I am definitely looking forward to some cooler weather and the changing colours of autumn.

Blueberry Muffins

1 cup plain flour
1 cup wholemeal flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
pinch salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ cup raw sugar
100 ml oil
1 cup milk
1 egg
1 cup blueberries

Preheat oven to 200º C.
Sift flours, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Stir in sugar and blueberries. In another bowl, beat together egg and milk. Add oil and mix. Pour wet mixture into dry ingredients and mix to combine. Grease muffin pans and place spoonfuls of mixture into each one. Bake for 20-25 minutes. Let stand for 2-3 minutes before removing from pans. Makes 12 muffins.

Garden Journal – January

This month has been busy harvesting foods from the garden and making jams and preserves from local fruit. We have been picking our runner beans regularly throughout the month and started picking our tomatoes the last week of the month. The tomatoes are from a packet of heirloom tomato seeds that I planted, so it has been fun to see what they turn out like, with the tomatoes evolving into an interesting variety of shapes and sizes. I have continued to plant beetroot, carrots and spring onions for an ongoing supply into the autumn.

Harvest from our garden

I had a go at making blueberry jam but it was a bit of a flop as it didn’t set properly. Apparently blueberry jam is tricky to get right. However, it will no doubt get eaten as toppings for desserts etc.

One of my favourite fruits, Black Doris plums, came into season at the end of the month. We found an organic orchard that sell them, not far from where we live, and bought loads to make jams and preserves. The Black Doris jam was a success, and there are plenty of plums left over to make desserts as well as stewed plums to have with our breakfast cereal.

I have continued to make zucchini slices and loaves for the freezer. The one zucchini plant has been providing us with an ongoing supply. I also bottled nectarines and beetroot. This is the first year we have grown our own beetroot and we have been enjoying it roasted and with salads. It’s great that it is so easy to grow, as beetroot is highly nutritious, high in vitamins, minerals and anti-oxidants, and good for the heart. My new favourite cake is Red Velvet Beetroot cake. There are many variations on Red Velvet Cake, some using red food colouring and some using beetroot. I have adapted the recipes to make my own version  – see below.

There are lots of herbs flowering in our garden at the moment. The blue and purple flowers are very pretty and are good for encouraging bees to the vegetable garden.

Red Velvet Beetroot Cake

This is a moist cake. If it is a little gooey in the middle, don’t worry, it will be all the more delicious!

250g cooked beetroot, grated
3 eggs, beaten
1 ¾ cups raw sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
250ml vegetable oil
1 cup white flour
1 cup wholemeal flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
¼ cup cocoa powder

Preheat oven to 180º C.

Beat together eggs and sugar. Mix in vanilla, oil and beetroot until well combined. Add sifted flours, baking powder and cocoa to mixture and mix well. Pour batter into cake tin.

Bake for 45 minutes. Cool and spread with chocolate vanilla cream cheese icing.

Chocolate Vanilla Cream Cheese Icing

2 tablespoons cream cheese
1 tablespoon butter or non-dairy spread, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
1 ½ cups icing sugar

Beat cream cheese and butter together. Add vanilla. Sift in cocoa powder and icing sugar and mix until smooth and creamy.