Autumn : Walnuts & Persimmons

What fun, getting this neglected ol' Blog of mine up and running again!
These posts are going to be all over the place for a while though.
I've got so many drafts written and my finger is hovering over the publish button.
I'm starting to feel excited about everything again, but in a different way now.
This space motivates me and keeps me on track,
it reminds me of what I am striving for and the importance of  what I can achieve in the everyday.
This Blog reflects all the wonderful things around me
so you will never see dirty dishes, smelly laundry,
cake crumbs all over the floor and unmade beds on these pages.
You will not hear about my two year old Tanties and my Teenagers woes,
you will not see my unsuccessful craft attempts , burnt jam or moth eaten cabbages.
Well, maybe sometimes you will but mostly I'm just keeping track of all the lovely,  fun, successful  homemaking stuff
thrown in with a few random pics of our farm life, as we know it.
I hope you enjoy these pages again,
or if your a new reader,
Welcome. I look forward to meeting you.

Oh I nearly forgot:

Homegrown from the front yard -  Walnuts & Persimmons    xx

More Lovely Autumness below - better late than never!!

A field of Gooseberries

Blackberries

and Blueberries

 

 I finally met a real Gooseberry on a very berry enjoyable day trip to a local Berry Farm the day before we headed off for a busy two week family holiday throughout Qld and NSW. My reason why I've been away from this space for a while.
A belated Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all

Another busy year ahead for us, how about you?

The Juice Factory

What a productive weekend we've all had. In our backyard we have two decent size imperial mandarin trees which produce loads of fruit each year. Mandarins are one of my favourite fruits, they are great to pack into the childrens lunchboxes easy to peal and great to juice up for a refreshing hit of Vitamin C and apparently, they also go well cooked with chocolate. . . 

Master Sam is usually the driving force behind our juicing day, his little helpers collect the  mandarins, the kitchen is set up,  and the juicing begins. This is where I usually leave the room with my face screwed up thinking about the sticky mess they are about to create, but the kids don't mind, it's such fun, it 's messy, and of course its Yummy!  

We picked over 100 mandarins off the trees and squeezed out about 5 litres of fresh juice to enjoy

and look, we've still got heaps left for those Lunchboxes...

Passionfruit under attack!!

THE CULPRIT

 Grrr....My mouth has been watering awaiting the ripening of the passionfruits and then this! They're nearly all gone! My Passionfruit vine actually climbs over the chook coop, the Cockatoos are still able to take the ones growing on the outside of the coop but I don't think they have realise that when they bite the fruit off the stems, ready to devour them, most of them being on the inside of the coop, drop down and out of their reach. HA! 

 The problem I do have though is most of the ones they do bite off are not quite ripe . . . I have put them aside and waited  for them to ripen up but they tend to go rotten before they ripen and sweeten ready to eat, so I've just had to come up with some ways of eating them on them still a little on the SOUR side.

I have two vines, a Yellow Panama Passionfruit and a Purple Panama Passionfruit.

I have managed to save about 3 cups of passionfruit pulp, I have frozen this and will use it up in my Baking as it is needed.

If it lasts that long....They may be a little sour but it doesn't seem to mater when they're ICE BLOCKS!

I made up a nice batch of Fresh Yogurt 

Stirred through a couple of Passionfruit and a good drizzle of Honey, You would never have known they were not sun ripened fruit.

I made Passionfruit and Dried Apricot Jam, 

The Sweetest Jam you'll ever taste!

 And mixed with Condensed milk it makes for a wonderful Passionfruit Slice

I still have plenty of ideas up my sleeve, next raid I plan on making Pavlova and Melting Moments with passionfruit Icing.  

Any other ideas would be greatly appreciated, as would some advice on keeping Cockatoo's out of the Garden!  

But now, I'm off to enjoy some more fresh Passionfruit Yogurt!