Pretties In The Garden

Low 20s today and very sunny so the flowers are out in force. I've done a little weeding and pruning and snail squashing and have some photos of my 'pretties'!

gorgeous kalanchoe , new this year, called Tinker Bell

Bluebells from some bulbs Dad gave me years ago

No idea what these are or how they got into this pot but they are very happy

mini rose has so much new shiny growth

Roma tomato is growing well too

beautiful, fragrant freesias come up from bulbs every year

buttery yellow freesia

one of the last Indian limes

this could be elephant ears, a gift from the grandchildren years ago too

one of Nadia's succulents

a Docker's Pansy, named for the colour of our local football team!

my cherubs, a gift when I retired

hurray! my dill seeds have sprouted

shady front porch

Fire n Snow poppies that have self-seeded  every-where

one perfect daisy

these "stuffed shirts" made me laugh at the local op-shop.

All is well here, we're having a family lunch on Saturday at Elizabeth's to celebrate the up-coming 60th Wedding Anniversary of Mum and Dad's, it will be lovely to get every-one together to share a meal as it's been a while since we did that.

Hope all is well at your place too,

Love from Sue

Bean a Bit Busy

but here is my new favourite recipe

I have no idea where the inspiration for this creation came from but I love it! Any seasonings could be swapped for the peri peri sauce(I bought Woolworth's Select brand and love that too)

1/3 cup wild rice boiled for about 20 minutes and then a cup of basmati rice(any rice will do) added and cooked until tender. Drain very well and leave as long as possible to dry out as with regular fried rice.

Finely chop and sauté in a large fry-pan...

an onion
half a red capsicum
a stalk of celery
two cloves of garlic
a cup of chopped spinach/silverbeet/kale

Either drain a tin of your favourite beans or use 2 cups of ready cooked beans(I used tinned 4 bean mix this time and home cooked white beans last time) and heat them through, season with either 2-3 tablespoons of peri peri sauce/soy sauce etc etc AND the juice of one beautiful home grown lemon(if possible)

add your cold, dry rice and mix well until it is hot, check seasonings and add chopped fresh herbs.

It's a very versatile recipe that has been around since Adam I expect but there is a good reason for that...it's cheap, tasty and nourishing and you can mix and swap to use whatever you have on hand.

All is well here, blogging mojo has gone AWOL again but we're all well

Big Love as Jamie Oliver says!
Sue and Co
xx

And From Elizabeth in Appreciation

An epic shout out to my awesome family, friends and even the random strangers who have bent over backwards, in hell and high waters, to help me this last week.

I was just downstairs watching my big brother pressure cleaning my now empty garage…nearly $500 on a skip and 10hrs of labour later (unofficially, he's officially my favourite brother; just keep it on the down low, I don't need my other bro hearing about it)…

My Mum whom I almost drowned and sent home wearing a towel over the weekend…the Olivers (half of whom I almost drowned) whom have a bright future in furniture, toy and bike delivery (great rates too)…my incredibly generous Grandparents whom have a bright future in bunk bed assembly…Bree who may or may not have gone to work this arvo looking like my Nubian Cabbage Patch doll after spending all day in my sooty garage…Mandy & Co. for the mattress delivery and giggles (we had a ball camping out that first night)…

I've been totally overwhelmed with everybody's generosity, offers of child sitting (crazy bastards, you know who you are!) and furniture/appliance offers, new bikes, etc, etc. I'm totally feeling the good vibes coming in from Britain, Canada, a drill site somewhere up north, Bunbury, strangers on local FB pages… you're all incredibly, amazingly, unbelievably awesome and I can't ever repay you. And if I've forgotten you, don't feel bad; I can't even remember what day it is at the moment.

Family, nothing more, nothing less

xxx

House Fire and Twitch Pics

What a looong weekend....on Friday morning an electrical fire started in the garage of my daughter's home...it destroyed everything in there but fortunately the car and motor bike were out. Gone are a fridge, beds, the childrens' bikes, a dryer, baby photos, sewing machine, all her husband's tools and his guitar and amp, 3 of Elizabeth's best paintings and lots of other things but no-one was injured so we are very grateful for that. Unfortunately the smoke filled up the garage next door and caused a great of damage to the two valuable cars parked in there and the fireman had to break open the roller door to gain entry to turn off the power...

DD was in the process of moving out and got the keys to her new flat that afternoon so we have the spent a cold weekend moving her into there...family and friends quickly rallied and delivered 4 beds, a fridge and lots of kitchen equipment so we are very grateful for their work. You know who you are.
Even 7 yr old Baxter came over with another bike and some Lego and other toys for Caleb and David.

David is not staying under the bed btw

I'm having a quiet day at home today, baking muffins for Joe and for Elizabeth and my grandsons...I am using my Mum's recipe and my Nana's big spoon...five generations of love in that bowl and that makes me happy. 12 muffins are mixed berry and 12 are date and pear...Mum's recipe is here but these days I use 1/3 cup of apple puree/sauce instead of the oil. I put chocolate drops on the top of the second batch but they burned...learn something new every day!

Chilli sauce guaranteed to put hairs on your chest!

Our neighbour's pawpaws/papaya are huge now and this is only one of her 6 trees...she grew them all from the seeds of a pawpaw she bought locally...

I finished a knitted bunny in the Fremantle Dockers football colours for some-one who loves rabbits and the Dockers ;)

Yesterday evening I glanced outside and saw Twitch sitting in the mint planter so that he could reach the chilli bush...he was eating it's leaves! Joe grabbed the camera and took these lovely photos and Twitch made my day with his cuteness...

 He looks like a toy when he stands on his hind legs...it's called periscoping and rabbits often do that to see better or to reach tasty treats as in this case :) He's very cheeky and you can see he's fully recovered from EC illness he had recently.

Time to wash my baking dishes now, hope all is well in your neck of the woods,
Love from Sue
xx

Khoresh Bademjan or Spicy Eggplant in the Slow-cooker!

This was so very good that I didn't remember to take a photo until later on in the evening!

Khoresh Bademjan

Rinku at the Spice Chronicles had made Alu Gobi(spicy cauli and spuds) in her slow cooker and mentioned cooking this eggplant dish in it as well...so I tried it on Saturday and was thrilled with the result and the other bonus is that eggplant are in season now and quite inexpensive...here is my adaptation of her recipe

One large eggplant/aubergine peeled and chopped into 2 cm squares, it weighed about a kilo
1 tablespoon of oil
1 finely chopped onion
4 crushed cloves of garlic
1/4 cup tomato paste and a large cup of boiling water
1 teaspoon each of cumin and turmeric
3/4 teaspoon of salt(there is no need to salt the eggplant beforehand)
1/2 teaspoon each of cinnamon, paprika and pepper

I put the hot water, tomato paste and spices in the cooker first and blended them together with a spoon
Add the vegetables and stir well.
Cook until tender which was about 2 1/2 hours on High/Auto and stir 2-3 times to coat the eggplant in the sauce.
Add some frozen peas/corn/beans after an hour if you like.

That's it...sooooo easy! Served with a dollop of plain yoghurt, rice or naan bread and some Indian style pickles it was wonderful.

Today I am going to try the Alu Gobi recipe and my other recent success in the kitchen was Jamie Oliver's Happy Fish Pie without the fish tail. I used shark fillets and had sour cream instead of the cream and lemon juice...another very easy recipe as it's made without a white sauce...the three photos I took were spectacularly bad even for me...sorry :/

Yesterday I made 3 big jars of mandarin orange marmalade for the pantry, it's much tastier than using regular oranges.

On Sunday we had some fun news...my photo of Twitch won a prize in a local pet photo competition run by KiraJay at Phone a Mum The pic was taken when he was quite unwell recently so is extra special to me; not surprisingly he was the only rabbit entered with lots of cats and dogs and one lion(I think they were pulling our legs!)

We had a rather wild storm 2 nights ago with several planters being knocked over by the wind...it was refreshingly cold enough for woollies yesterday, I need to go and get some kale and silverbeet seedlings later today. Terry next door has planted lots of turnips, parsnips and carrots so we'll have a good variety....he's 80 yrs old and was joking about growing enough in his tiny garden to sell to Woolworths!

Hope you are keeping warm or enjoying Spring days where-ever you might be,
Love from Sue
xxx

Friday Round-up

Hallo every-one and thank you for all the good wishes for dear Twitch. I've had a much more productive week, I do love the cooler weather.

I've made ANZAC biscuits, here is my ANZAC slice recipe and I always use Sue Webber's biscuit recipe which you can find here , I always double Sue's recipe and freeze some. There are lots of ripe chillies on the habanero bush so I thought 'chilli jam'...oh heck, the fumes nearly killed us and it's more sauce than jam but lovely tasting...

I used 5 habaneros with their seeds, thinly sliced...would only use 3 next time!
1300gms tomatoes
500 gms sugar
3 tablespoons of lemon juice
2 teaspoons of salt and 2 tablespoons of Thai fish sauce

simmered until thick but it didn't reach a jam setting point...still will be very useful, the colour is beautiful...

I've also made 3 jars of plum jam and will make some mandarin orange marmalade next week.

I finished the little jumper I was making for a friend's new baby...she loved it, I do enjoy knitting baby clothes...

Yesterday I popped into a new local candle shop and bought some wicks for $4...I melted down all the stubs of the candles we've used and produced all these for next to nothing...I bought a small saucepan from the op-shop for $2 and keep that for candle melting, because it's small it's easy to pour into the jars...the one at the back is a 300gm salsa jar so you can see they are quite large. I also added some sweet orange essential oil...

Tomorrow is ANZAC day and we'll be going again to Medina to watch Dad march, Caleb and David are looking forward to that very much and Caleb is going to borrow Dad's medals for 'news' at school next week...

I wish you all a wonderful weekend where-ever you may be
Love from Sue
xxx

Up Close and Personal With Brer Rabbit

We've been indulging in lots of cuddles and bunny massages the last few weeks as Twitch continues his recovery from EC as reported earlier this month. Now I'm going to indulge myself again and share these close pics of the sweetest face there is!

 Finally, what Twitch would look like if he wasn't a lop-eared rabbit lol

Hope you're having a happy weekend,
Love from Sue. Joe and Twitch!

Cooler Days and Warm Dinners

This is warm and thrifty soup born of the need to use up all the celery stalks we have left after feeding Twitch Rabbit the leaves lol

It could be cooked in the 

slow cooker/crockpot 6-7 hours, 4 cups of stock
pressure cooker 7 minutes, 3 cups of stock
stove-top 1 hour, 3-4 cups of stock

a whole bunch of celery, sliced
2-3 large potatoes, chopped or sliced
1 white onion, chopped
2-3 cloves of garlic, crushed
3-4 cups of chicken stock
half a cup of cream or sour cream

Usual way, fry off onions, celery then garlic
Add potato and stock, season well.
Cook as above
Blend or puree the soup and stir in cream

Serve with croutons/grated cheese/fried crispy bacon

We've also had a thick minestrone soup this week as well as lots of chicken based meals all from one half of a rather chubby free range chicken that was slow-cooked with lemon juice and peri peri sauce. I want to make my own sauce for the next time and will try this recipe. I love the look of the Chickpea recipe too!

Filling, delicious and nutritious.
Have a great weekend every-one
Love from Sue

Noumea Photos

So Twitch is a million times better now but still wobbly and will need the panacur for another 2 weeks...it's a miracle to us as we were sure he was not going to recover...he's been out of his box and is able to sit up to groom himself which is great. Thanks for all the love and support this last fortnight xxx

Now here are the few pics I took from the ship of Nouméa in New Caledonia. The reason there are no photos from off the ship is that on the first night I stood up in the dark at 2am to go to the bathroom, my knee gave way and slammed into the hard beading around a full length mirror. The pain was appalling and I spent much of the next two weeks in bed...more anon.
Joe went ashore as he was keen to buy a bottle of French wine, Gaillac, which we first had in Paris in 2007. Mission accomplished he also came back with a large square of beautiful fabric for me...it was called a coupon in French! Next to the docks is a large nickel mining plant which doesn't enhance the view but provides work for the local people.

My photos...


the first is my curry and chips...obviously comfort eating that lunchtime..

view from the table at the back of the ship

the nickel plant is a blot on the landscape, I would have loved to get up into those mountains on a tour...

Now this is Joe queuing to get back on board taken from Deck 12...it really is a massive ship...he's in the middle about level with the back of the right-hand bus...

Our steward was most attentive and enjoyed surprising us with animal created from the towels...this bunny was our favourite of course...

  Monkey was cute too lol

The next stop was Fiji and the photos are pretty similar but will share one or two, then we visited 3 ports in New Zealand.

Love from Sue
xx

PS have recently bought this book about our ancestor Jennet Cragg, most enchanting story telling from 1877!