Week 13 - Shaping Up For Winter

Hi all,


Lots of people have asked what in Rudolf's name I'm going to eat over the winter. Perhaps they think that we are living deep in the southern hemisphere: where Autumn reigns; where all the leaves turn golden brown and fall from the trees, where furry little animals become torpid as a thick layer of snow covers the ground. Perform your rituals, stock the cords of firewood, harvest the grains and hunker down in front of the stove for a long dark winter of eggnog and scrabble.


Pifflecock I say! This is the subtropics!


Let's be Frank, if he doesn't mind. There is no snow. There is not even any frost. We have tonnes of firewood stashed away in the leanto but this is for the barbie that probably won't get too much use over the colder periods.Very few of the trees are dropping any leaves at all and there are many that are experiencing lush new growth. This is true of the vegetables down in the front garden too. If any of you have been in the sun in Brisbane lately, there is still enough bite in it to burn skin, as well as promote healthy leaf growth. As far as furry little creatures go, I must say the bandicoot is less conspicuous in his trashing of my seedlings as he noses around looking for worms. Maybe he is hibernating. That'd be nice.

As an aside, do you know you aren't allowed to kill these little critters, even to eat, because the are native and therefore protected. Same goes for Bush Turkeys. I can kind of appreciate why, but have you ever had a whole bed of seedlings ripped asunder the day after you've busted various parts of your body planting them? In my dreams I have happily watched their little eyes bulge as I wrapped my hands around their scrawny little.....

As I mentioned earlier we have no frost here at Lofty Meadows so there will be no damage to any crops we try to grow over winter, at the worst just sluggish growth. Much of this can be mitigated with some attention to the creation of microclimates. You can do this by creating shady areas with larger leafy plants such as Citronella, Amaranth, or Corn in the hot months for shade loving plants such as Ceylon Spinach or herbs. You can also do the inverse in winter most easily by preventing shade from the previously mentioned plants, or by positioning rocks that trap and store heat or by creating mini greenhouses using plastic, Alsonite or if you're super keen, glass. All we do here at Lofty is to make sure there is plenty of sun able to get in. We are lucky to have a sloping site that faces the north east which catches sun all year around.


I have mentioned in previous posts that there is a certain mystery maintained by "real" gardeners as to how things are grown and when the best time to grow things is. This too, for me, is pifflecock. Sure, use the seasonal guides for your area, but don't listen to any nay sayers. Try things for yourself and you might be surprised by what grows at a particular time, in your particular area, with your particular microclimate. This is especially true the tropics and subtropics.


"Yes, yes. But what are you going to eat over winter you verbose blogmeister?" you mutter, impatiently tapping your finger and glancing at your left wrist where your non existent watch is telling you it is half past waffletime.


O.K. Check it.


I have been planting bulk (hundreds) of cabbage and broccoli seedlings around the garden. The garlic is in the ground; big fat Russian Garlic. I bought a kilo from our local organic shop "Four Seasons". I heard once the wisdom was that you plant garlic on the shortest day of the year and harvest on the longest, but I am trying something different this year.

Hundreds of Cabbage and Brocolli Seedlings in part of our seedling beds. The Brocolli are in the back half. You have to tilt your head 90 degrees to the right to get the correct orientation.



Aren't they Gorgeous? The same seedlings planted out into beds and "tucked in" with their little blankies of mulch. "There, there you little darlin's"

The amaranth is still growing, both grain and leaf. We have also been planting lots of beans and will be moving into other legumes that favour the cold such as peas and broad beans. Now that it is drying out a little  I hope that the greeens such as silverbeeet etc. will stop disolving into the ground. The Eggplants are absolutely laden with flowers and baby fruit. It is difficult to wait until they put on weight.

 

The plant on the left is leaf Amaranth that came up everywhere in our garden after I made the fortuitous mistake of putting a seeded plant into the compost heap. As the heap was spread, so too the seeds and now it comes up as a very welcome weed. This is a great way to garden and mant of our plants are propagated in this way. The plant on the right is grain amaranth which can be used as a cereal or flour if ground. It spreads in the same way.





Good old fashion climbing beans - Purple Kings produce very well and also tend to come up like weeds all over the garden if you broad cast the dried out, shrivelled up seeds that you missed on the first harvest.



A few random Solanacae for you. Note the tasty looking red chilli for you bottom right. All the other ones are in the dehydrator.

We are going to keep trying corn, potatoes and tomatoes as long as they keep fruiting. The last batch of corn that we have in is popping corn. Like the Russian garlic we bought some from the health food shop and popped it in the ground (pardon the pun) and away it grew. Organic, biodynamic Lofty Meadows popcorn - can't you just taste the carbs. 

We are trying to keep the chooks full of high protein food (we are setting up a worm farm for this purpose) to keep them laying over the long dark winter. According to Ness' research that is all they need. I thought it might have something to do with giving their cloacas a bit of a rest, but if it is just a matter of their diet I was thinking of dropping by the Gym and picking up some "Beefcake 5000 Whey Powder" and mixing them some high protein shakes to wrap their little beaks around.

The Muscovy ducks....

 ...and the girls, munging out on on some not so high protein food - grain. Note Rocky the rooster bottom right. He is a very handsome Barnvelder rooster I'm sure you'll agree.

Breaking news! You can do all sorts of crazy things with cucumbers! I know what you are thinking. Sure, you can chop it and pop it into a salad, or grate it into some yoghurt as Tzatssiki, but is there much else?
Let me tell you:

1. Perhaps not so ground breaking - munch on them like a banana.
2. Pickle them of course with some water, white wine vinegar and mustard seed. Fantastic on oily roast pumpkin.
3. Grate them and fry with grated pumpkin, chopped greens and mix with egg to make a delicious Frittata. 
4. Cut into "cubes" and roast. I kid you not! Very similar to roast eggplant.
5. Slice and fry in the frypan to eat by themselves. This works for the pickled ones too.

When your cucumbers are producing you find ways of eating them.


Congratulations to Russ from the "Turkey's Nest" up at Mount Glorious who won the Inaugural Compendium of Lofty Meadows Cuisine competition with his answer to the cryptic question - "Sit on it but don't stand in it."


The answer of course - A stool.

Anyway if you are reading this in the tropics or subtropics I hope that this post has helped you to reclaim Autumn. Make your new Autumn colour the pale redish green growth of a fresh Eucalyptus leaf. Don't be like a furry little animal, get out and about in this most beautiful of weather.

And now for the weigh in:

Same as last week! Getting close to the magic eighty-four kilos where I can start supplementing with some rice.

Till next time, toodles,

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