Do you have a sweet tooth or just love the flavour of lavender. Then why not try our new Lavender Infused early harvest EVOO. It’s great just poured over ice cream or a cake and cream. You can also use it in savoury dishes such like roast meats or roast potatoes. For an extra flavour you can pair it with our Tuscan Herb EVOO for a taste of herbs de provence. Now available on the website or at our local markets.
Happy New Year to you all. We started this year by picking up my beautiful new donkey called Esmée. She is a 12m month old Teamster donkey. Her parents are from wild rescued donkeys from Qld and NT. I am looking forward to our learning journey together. She will take over dear Gus’ page. I could not delete his memories so i thought it would be nice to just carry them on with her.
We are also very excited to have secured some permanent spots at 3 VFMA farmers markets. Coburg every 3rd Saturday and Flemington every 1st and 2nd Sunday. These markets run from 8am to 1pm.
One of our biggest sellers now is the Olive Paste and Olive Jam ( a sweet version of the paste made with apples and orange juice and sugar) , both are lovely with crackers and cheese. Even if you don’t like olives most people enjoy the jam
We have been busy planting tubestock Lavender. Unfortunately we lost over 2000 due to the heat here as they had been growing in Melbourne. The temperatures have slowed down production there but it left it too late in the season here due to our temperatures. Luckily we were able to source some bigger plants and have planted these in. The total area planted will now be a bit smaller but will be still as amazing. We have planted 16 varieties of which 12 are culinary. We have bought a copper alembic still this year so you can all come and watch the distilling process for essential oil hopefully around xmas time this year.
Keep well everyone and we look forward to catching up with you through the year at Markets or at our grove at the end of the year when we open for bus tours or weekend farm tours.
Well as most of you most likely know I have spent the last 30 years working as a Podiatrist, so I thought this was a suitable title for this blog. Even more so now since I broke my left ankle at a recent market. I certainly now have only one foot in the grove.
So we finished hand picking the table olives so now the patient wait begins as these beauties ferment in brine. It can take 12-18 months.
The tests came back from our Extra Virgin Olive Oil harvest and we are very happy with the results. The oil is high in polyphenols which gives the oil is bitter taste. Our oil is also light and fruity with a peppery aftertaste.
We have a range of this oil infused with chilli oil, garlic oil, lemon oil, basil oil and a tuscan oil ( a mixture of herbs).
We decided this year to start selling 250ml in a 3 gift pack to be used as a gift , or for people in a family who want different ones.
These are perfect for salad dressings and in winter marinating your meat or adding to roast veggies before and after cooking. Did you know that cooking your vegetables in EVOO increases the antioxidant levels of your meal.
My favorite dish is easy pumpkin soup. It is made by roasting butternut pumpkin and sweet potato ( cut in half and leave in the skin), garlic and onion in chilli and garlic infused oil with a dash of salt and pepper. Roast in the oven until cooked and slightly caramel. Then scoop the flesh out of the pumpkin, sweet potato, garlic and onion, blend together with some vegetable or chicken stock, add a dash of cream. Lovely easy pumpkin soup.
The next job we have is pruning the trees. I will of course be sitting in the polaris directing Gary in the tree as to what branches to cut off. Only 3 more weeks in a cast and then a moon boot for a few weeks.
Gus the Donkey is certainly missing me not going in the paddock to give hime a brush, poor love. He doesn’t get quite this loving from his equine friends.
Bye for now from Izzy and Gary and the menagerie of animals.
