Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Happy Easter

 We've had a busy Easter over here, Family lunch Good Friday, lovely picnic in the amazing childrens garden at the Botanical gardens for Easter Sunday, a drive to the country to visit friends today & of  course lots of baking & cooking for it all.  Here are a couple of Easter treats I delivered this year.  Above white chocolate chip/chocolate cupcakes topped with butter frosting, Persian fairy floss & Easter eggs.  I loved the overall look thought found them overall to be too sweet.  If I made them again would change the base cupcakes & frosting to something a little more adult in flavour.  Having said that though I didnt hear any complaints & they all disappeared pretty quick!

Below are my hand made Easter eggs that I gave out to the family, Chloe loved making them with me & loved even more making the packaging.  We cut up egg cartons & painted them, then tied them up with ribbon to secure the eggs inside.  The eggs were chocolate crackle eggs, held together with melted dark chocolate & topped with melted white chocolate & freckles, inspired by fast Ed on Better Homes & Gardens, a great Easter treat to get the kids involved in.

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Autumn Garden


Lovely long chillies, waiting for them to turn red, chose a variety with not too much heat in the hope I can sneak some into the kids meals too, miss cooking with chilli....

A couple of rogue pumpkins that sprung up from the compost in the weed patch behind the garage that we have not done a thing with yet.  They are different colors so not sure if they grew on separate vines & are different varieties?, hard to tell in the jumble of vines & weeds.  Interestingly the pumpkins I planted didnt grow so might have to plant them in this spot next spring


Capsicums turned from green to black, now waiting for the red to kick in, these grew on last years plants which I left in


Garlic coming through, not much success with my last batch so hope this spot does better.  You can also see some of my masses of basil bushes alongside


Peas growing up the fence, then a row of carrots, row of coriander, row of beets & some marigolds to ward off the pests


Bright & cheery nasturtium, again to help with bugs

Joshie lending a hand with this mornings garden chores, raking leaves & bug spraying (my garlic & oil mix from Vasili), Chloe still sound asleep...

And the asparagus plot coming up nicely, believe in a year or 2 I might even be able to harvest.  Meantime I am growing some carrots in the space at the back.

Have also planted some broad beans, show peas & rainbow chard which are yet to poke to their heads up through the soil, love waiting for everything to grow & ripen & nice always having something ready to harvest.  At the moment the tomatoes have just come to a halt, cucumbers said bye bye & beans which we have been eating almost every night dug up too though I do have one stalk in a pot that looks quite vigorous & may produce some late beans yet.  Meantime masses of herbs for the picking, waiting for chillies & capsicums to ripen & some rocket & lettuce just about ready for my lunch