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As some of you know well, I’m a big fan of radishes. So I chuck in a row whenever we’re planting any other type of seeds. But Bec’s not that keen on them at all. Which is a bit of a problem when we’re faced with a whole row that needs eatin’ in a hurry.

So today I thought I’d give frying them up a go to see what they’re like prepared that way. And to see if Bec could manage a couple that way too.

Quartered, fried gently in olive oil until almost soft, then sprinkled with Maldon salt. Beautiful. All the bitterness and most of the heat had been fried out, leaving something that tasted kind of, but completely unlike, a turnip.

So did Bec like them? Let’s say I had trouble getting the bowl and fork back off her. So yes, I think she did. I think we’ll be making a few more bowls of them for snacks. A good reason to keep planting more rows!

Next up on the radish culinary trail – roast radishes cooked with the roast chicken…

Trying out a new bread recipe today. Ciabatta bread. Only I think I might have made just a bit much! Four loaves. Slightly more than we need for tonight’s dinner, I suspect! Good job I used the big oven.

But I’m sure we’ll give it a go and munch through as much as we can. We finished the first loaf in about 5 minutes. It’s somehow not quite ciabatta as we know it, but it’s damn nice!

It’s been all go here today! Plasterer and painter, as well as the wardrobe guys installing a straight wardrobe, along with the continued driveway and lawn works. My main contribution to things was to keep the cups of tea flowing and to stir the simmering Pinto beans. (The beans were for us for tea, nothing to do with all the troops). And to keep the kitties settled. As much as I could with so much going on. They found it all a bit much and spent most of the day sitting on chairs under the dining table.

But stage one of the driveway project was completed about 3:30pm. The whole drive had been dug out, and all the piles of dirt transported to the “lawn”, which looked like it had been visited by some sort of giant mole or something!

Then the hideous eyesore of the back area got a quick clean-up, and is now looking almost flat and quite presentable. I need to get out and do some shovel work tomorrow to clean up the bits close to the house, but I’m quite happy to do that small chore when I’ve seen how fast all the other stuff gets carted around and evened out. The thought of trying to do that with shovel and wheelbarrow isn’t a good one!

By 6pm a large number of molehills had been flattened out and spread around, and a level area was appearing in the courtyard area. It’s made a huge difference already not to have the ground sloping away from the house.

Assuming it doesn’t rain tomorrow I wonder what progress will be made then!

…was almost a success! At least this time it was quite edible!

I tried to be very careful with the whole process this time, just to make sure of things. I even ended up taking pics to try to confirm whether things were doubled in size or not.

But careful as I tried to be, I still managed to stuff up the baking slightly by not lowering the oven temp at the right time. Not sure if that’s why the crust was so crunchy or not, but at least I still have all my teeth.

Still a bit stodgy for my liking, so we’ll need to work on that. I suspect it’s the proving somehow being a bit slow. But the taste was about what I expected. Even Bec went back for seconds.

I’ll see what the next loaf is like!

…Also not a success. While some larger species of duck may have survived a direct hit from the loaf, smaller ones would still have been at a high risk of extreme deadness. Taste-wise it wasn’t all that either, once I braved losing a tooth to check.

So based on no real evidence at all other than the location of the moon last night I’ve decided it must be the starter that’s the issue, so that one’s gone-burger. Kaput. Gone to meet it’s maker. Oh. Wait. That’s me!

New starter was, erm, started today. In the hope of capturing some particularly tasty wild yeasts I even took it for a stroll down through the long grass while whipping it gently in it’s big blue bowl. Must have looked a bit odd to any neighbours that happened to be watching, but I’m sure they’ll see weirder things.

Crossing fingers this one works out a bit better. Otherwise I may well have to look into other parts of the process for issues…

…was not a success.

In fact, it was a duck-killer if ever I’ve baked one!

I’m not entirely sure just which part of the process went wrong, or even which parts went right! Although when I re-read the recipe this afternoon I did think that it’s entirely possible that I forgot to add any salt to the mix, which the book does highlight as being essential… I do remember adding the olive oil though, but the book said that was optional. Oh well.

So I’ll try again, starting the rather long process again tonight. And I’ll try to pay more attention to the size of the dough to make sure it’s actually doubled in size etc. If it goes horribly wrong again I think I’ll try making a new starter just on general principles. Why I think that will help I have no idea!

Everywhere we’ve looked lately we’ve been harassed by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall into trying to make our own sour-dough starter. On TV, on the net (although we didn’t use the rhubarb version of the recipe), in his latest cookbook that we’ve just bought, in his bread book that we’ve just bought..

Ok, so accusing him of harassing us might be a bit rich, but the constant bombardment about how easy and how nice sour-dough loaves will be got me to finally start a starter of our own.

I was a bit worried that I’d not managed to pick up any natural yeasts wandering around the kitchen whisking the dough, but after bringing myself to stop staring at the mix every 5 minutes and just sitting back and letting it do its stuff overnight we had some yeasty bubbly action in the morning.

So we’re now on day three of the starter feeding regime. Another week or so and hopefully we’ll have a starter ready to make bread with.

Looking forward to it!

Looks like the plasterers have now finished work. If they haven’t then they spent a lot of time cleaning up their (not inconsiderable) mess for nothing! So today’s excitement was seeing things that we’ll actually see once the place is finished coming into the site, ready to be installed.

Ok, so a few boxes of vanity units aren’t all that exciting, but it does seem like some progress to us! There was just something about seeing them that made me feel like we’d really turned a corner, and all the construction was now complete, and we’re onto the final stages. Finally!

Mind you, there are still a lot of skirting boards still to be cut and fitted, but seeing a lot of them in today was also another reminder that we’re into the finishing stages of making things look good, rather than holding things up.

And as an added bonus, we managed to increase our zucchini production 100% over the last few days, without doing anything! Today we harvested two, instead of the last record of one! I feel a graph coming on if you’re not careful!

We also harvested most of the rest of the beetroot as we desperately needed to find a bit of space to plant the potted celeriac plants that were starting to look a bit cramped. You can buy tinned beetroot, but I’m not sure you can get celeriac quite so easily!

A trip from Dunedin to Alex, or vice versa just wouldn’t be the same without a stop at the little ole pie shop! On our last journey we travelled through on a Saturday and were quite disappointed when it wasn’t open. Calling it a little ole pie shop probably still works, but it’s actually a lot bigger than it used to be and they have a much wider range of pies. Yes that’s right pies, pies and more pies!

It’s well worth the stop for a taste of that flaky pastry and delicious filling that you choose. And it was obviously on the minds of the motorists travelling on either side of us, as when we all arrived in Roxburgh we all stopped at the ‘Jimmy’s’ shop. For those of you that have had a ‘Jimmy’s’ pie they are still as good as I remember! And for those of you that haven’t, well if you like pies you should add it to your must do list when you visit!

Jimmy’s pies = yummy!

(And no, we are not being paid for this advertisement!)

Have I mentioned that the weather has been fantastic here lately? While the rest of the country seems to have been hit with rain and other grot, we’ve been lucky enough to get away with the occasional blustery day, with the rest being blue-sky stunners!

We decided that last night was just too good to waste, so a quick trip to the supermarket later as a happy troup of four so we could consult on the purchases, a bit of a scrub up of the BBQ, and we were good to go with the first BBQ since we’ve been back.

Normal division of labour was maintained, of course. Women in charge of the salads, and a bloke on barbie duty, but I think that worked out well! Bec does like her salads, and Nathan looked right at home with tongs in hand. I just handed out the beer, really.

Just a tad too cold to eat outside, but it won’t be long till we can hang out in the backyard all evening, I suspect. YAY!