Mallacoota

The country around Mallacoota is simply beautiful. We came in from Genoa (where we went past a very busy free camp on the river) along the windy, wet road. There was so much more we could have done in Mallacoota but it was wet & the seas were huge! 

We arrived in the afternoon and took refuge in the camp kitchen where the kids had a ball playing in the fireplace & toasting marshmallows after homemade pizzas. 

It was a windy, rainy night but we were tucked up in our little home on wheels. 

The cost of powered caravan park sites varies. Mallacoota Foreshore Holiday Park cost us $28.50 and our kids stayed free. We are finding that the kids, more often than not, incur a fee. 

Tanja to Mallacoota

It was time to farewell the farm. The rain was setting in somewhat & we were eager to hit the road. 

Before we left we planted a red cedar to signify Baby A's birth seven months ago. The tree was a gift from my mother & has a healthy headstart. The big kids had fun teasing its roots & watering it with water from the creek in the rainforest gully. This tree will soon take off & A can visit it in years to come. 

While we packed our daughter, P, who overheard A's cries, realised he was tired. A few minutes later I came back in the shed to find that P has rocked A to sleep in her arms and this is where he slept for forty-five minutes. 

Farewell Tanja! 

We had a short lunch stop on our way to Mallacoota in Pambula at Wild Rye's before heading to Mallacoota - a fabulous bakery where we stocked up on sourdough bread (& pies for lunch). Our favourite pie was the beef in red wine. Erin, the barista, made a great couple of coffees too! 

we'll be making jam.... blackberry jam

As the Michelle Shocked song goes "if you want the best jam you've got to make your own." 

That's precisely what we did today. While Baby A slept the big kids & J went out to harvest more blackberries. 

I used the Thermomix to make this batch of jam and despite the lemon being omitted (it was full of grubs) there must have been enough pectin to thicken it. Again I read a few recipes and came up with this one with a slightly less sugar to berry ratio. 

This recipe makes about a litre of jam. 

ingredients 

700g blackberries 

500g raw sugar 

 

method 

Rinse the berries under cool water and drain. Add 500g of the berries to the Thermomix bowl. Add the sugar. Set the timer for 45 mins/speed 2/100°c. After 45 minutes add the remaining blackberries and increase the temperature to Varoma. Cook on 15 mins/speed 2/Varoma. 

To test the jam place a teaspoon full on a saucer. Wait until it's cooled slightly & run your finger through the mixture. Place saucer in the fridge. If, after a few minutes, the jam doesn't run then it is set.

Store jam in hot clean sealable jars or just scoff it! This is good on toast or with ice-cream!

Want some crackling with your pork?

We bought our Weber BBQ just before we left Sydney & we've have only used it a handful of times so we wanted to use it on the farm and see what we could do with it. A very crackly pork appears regularly on the Weber Facebook page I follow. 

I've only ever made one other roast pork with crackling & probably eaten pork a dozen times at most so it's not something I feel comfortable cooking & I was a little worried about the outcome yesterday. 

Before I started I made sure I read lots of recipes so I didn't miss any vital steps. 

This recipe is based on a few. 

ingredients 

1.5kg rolled pork (deboned) 

oil (I used EVOO)

salt (I used pink himilayan salt) 

Any vegetables you might like (we had carrots, potatoes, Brussel sprouts & broccoli)

Apple sauce (I used store bought because I wanted to focus on the pork but it's dead easy to make. I'm sure there are plenty of recipes flying around on the web). 

 

method 

Leave the pork out of the fridge for up to two hours so it reaches room temperature. 

Turn your BBQ on the highest setting & leave to preheat for 20 minutes. You don't need to lift the lid during this time. 

While your BBQ is heating up prepare the meat. Firstly pat the meat dry with paper towel. You will need to score the fat ensuring you don't cut in to the meat. I remember seeing Jamie Oliver using a retractable art knife and measuring the fat from the side of the cut of meat & retracting the art knife just a few millimetres so the knife would only cut in to the fat. 

To score the fat cut along the shortest side of the cut in lines measuring about a centimetre apart. 

Now baste the meat with oil. I used EVOO but plenty of sites recommend vegetable oil. Using your hands rub the skin with salt enduring you push it in to the cracks. I used a handful & it was a lot. You don't need to layer it on (like I did) but it does need to coat the skin. 

Place the meat on a Weber trivet & then on a convection tray. These are designed to let the air flow around the meat, acting like an oven.  

Leave the meat to rest for 30 minutes. 

Now that the BBQ has heated up place the meat (on trivet & convection tray) on the BBQ. Leave the temperature on the highest setting & cook the meat for 25 minutes. This will crackle your crackling. After 25 minutes lift the lid and you'll see that the pork has crackled. 

           This was our final product.

Reduce the heat to medium (half way) and leave the meat in the BBQ for a further 1 hour & 5 minutes. Do not lift the lid during this cook. This will give you time to prepare the veggies. If you're organised (I wasn't) you could cook these for the 1hour & 5 minutes around the meat on the BBQ. 

After 1 hour & 5 minutes turn the BBQ off but, without lifting the lid, let the pork rest (as the oven cools). 

After 20 minutes carve the pork and divy up the veggies & crackling. Don't forget the apple sauce! 

This is best eaten by an open fire looking down the paddocks out to sea (if you're lucky). 

blackberry crumble on the farm

Each time I make crumble I think of my first few weeks of Uni & living out of home. A friend from uni called in & I was pleased to offer him some apple crumble I'd made with an oaty topping - very improvised. I'd never looked at a recipe for crumble & it was pretty ordinary really. I applogised to my friend but it wasn't until after he'd eaten it that my mature-aged uni friend kindly told me he trained as a chef before doing teaching. 

I didn't make another crumble until I found this - my favourite crumble recipe - for peaches or nectarines. (http://missmayblossom.blogspot.com.au/2012/01/just-desserts.html?m=1) 

J & the kids were out in the paddocks for the morning. They had the biggest grins on their faces when they returned with a shopping bag full of blackberries. 

They'd put on their long sleeved tops & trousers to protect them from the thorny bushes with gifts of black gold. Yum! 

I was kicking myself that I didn't have my scrap book with my crumble recipe in it when I realised is probably posted it on my foodie blog (missmayblossom.blogspot.com) and there it was! 

You may wonder how I managed to bake a crumble in a caravan but the truth is I used an oven that's in the shed on the farm although I do have an oven in my caravan. (Virtual tour to come). 

I turned those tasty morsels in to a jammy apple & blackberry crumble. 

ingredients

filling

shopping bag full of blackberries

5 large Granny Smith apples 

1.5 cups raw sugar

1 cup of water

crumble topping

1/3 cup brown sugar 

1 tspn baking powder

1 tspn each ground ginger & mixed spice 

3 tblspn flaked almonds (I didn't have any this time but I do recommend them)

60g unsalted butter, chilled and chopped into 1cm cubes 

100g plain flour

Preheat oven to 200°c. In a saucepan over a medium heat place 1.5 cups raw sugar and a cup of water before adding five green apples (cut into 2cm cubes with the skins on. Cook the apples until soft. 

In the meantime make the crumble topping by mixing sugar, baking powder, ginger & mixed spice. Stir in the flaked almonds. Crumble butter in to mixture to form pea-sized pieces then toss the flour mixture with the sugar mixture. 

{Note: I wouldn't want to make this topping in the Thermomix as it can easily be overworked & needs to be kept coolish but I do love that I can easily weight the ingredients on top of the bowl.}

Once the apple is soft add the shopping bag full of blackberries. Stir for three minutes over the heat before transferring to a pie dish. I liked to keep the form of the blackberries. 

Strew topping over fruit. Bake at 200°c for 25-30 mins until the topping is golden brown & the fruit is bubbling through at the edges. Serve with cream or ice cream. 

at the farm

Readers of my food blog, Miss May Blossom, will recognise the backdrop of the farm (http://missmayblossom.blogspot.com.au/search?q=Farm+&m=1). After visiting friends in Tathra today I returned to the farm. J had harvested some almonds from the old orchard planted by his parents about thirty years ago. By some almonds I mean two. In total. But J was determined to find more & the kids scoped out the orchard to identity the almond tree before they collected J to see if they could find more to add to the measly harvest. 

While I wouldn't suggest the tree had given a good return for investment when they came back with four more almonds, I would say that there's nothing more special than harvesting fresh food from plants that you know have been lovingly planted and care for. The almonds were like nothing I've ever tried - crunchy and succulent at the same time. I'll never look at a store bought almond the same again! 

While I was out J also set up our new annexe. We didn't have the time to set it up before we left Sydney but it's very pleasing to see it has met our expectations. We ordered the annexe through Winston at Express Annexes at Calga on the Central Coast. We were specifically after a versatile annexe that made from Australian products & with sturdy poles. This will add an extra room to the caravan and will be particularly useful when we're staying in places for more than a few days at a time. The windows mean we'll have light coming in because we won't have to close canvas covers when it's raining. 

We've been making the most of our outdoor shower. Does anyone else have one on their van? We've used it to wash sand off after the beach but we've loved having our evening showers outside. The photo isn't great but you get the picture! I can't see out the farm shower window because I'm too short but this means I can still take in the view. 

overnight trip: Lane Cove National Park

November 10, 2014: I just can't believe it's taken us this long to visit Lane Cove National Park! The park is only about 35 minutes drive from where we live so we decided it would be a great option for a one-nighter in the caravan while we're learning the ropes.

Our kids are making themselves at home in the new caravan.

As well as being so accessible from the city (Sydney) the other beauty is that, once there, in the bush, you can forget that you are close to the city at all!

The flannel flowers are out in full bloom at the moment and the forest is full of Xanthorrhea Australis' (grass trees). 

Lane Cove River Tourist Park 

Upsides

* The river is a short, easy walk from the caravan park. You can meander along the banks of the Lane Cove River or pack a picnic & have lunch at any of the many picnic areas along the riverside. You can access these by car too in a day trip. 

* The caravan park is surrounded by bush. 

* The amenities in the park are clean and there is a small playground. 

* Powered and unpowered sites are reasonably priced. See the website for details.

Downsides 

* If you've promised your kids a swim in the pool you need to know that it is unheated. You'd probably rather get out and walk instead of being stuck by the pool anyway! 

Tip:

* The CP is spread over a large area. You could end up with a site at the top of the park but I'd recommend asking for a site with a view of the bush to take full advantage of the surrounds. 

And who says you can't eat well when you're on the road? well we fired up the Weber for the first time and this was our smorgasbord: steaks (thank you Millin's Fine Food Butcher for the 8 week aged steaks) on the bbq with homemade sauerkraut (remember this?); a beetroot, avocado and carrot leafy salad dressed with lime juice & olive oil; snappy blanched beans & asparagus with lime juice, salt, pepper & olive oil. The kids had beef chipolatas with the salad and veg.

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October 2014: Melbourne to Sydney

Some of my loyal readers have been sent here from my Miss May Blossom blog or Facebook page. How ever you've come to find me, welcome! You'll notice that I have a keen intersperse in food but this is interspersed with other things and will definitely include travel now that we've finally hit the road!

This is a post from October 30th which will give you a bit of background but I'll elaborate more in future posts. As we've just unhitched for our first night of our big lap of Australia I'll have a little more time. 

I'd love to hear your stories of travelling through Australia so please feel free to share! 

October 30, 2014: t's been busy busy week for us. We collected our Elite Caravan & stayed two nights in it in Melbourne before heading back to Sydney.

I have to admit that I was surprised that our favourite meal of the week away (including the food around Fitzroy) was dinner at the Snowy Mountains Historic Bakery in Orbost. These guys opened in Orbost a few months ago from the Mornington Peninsula & I just hope they do well. 

When I hear "Woodfired Pizza" I expect gourmet. The seafood was fresh and local and gorgeous! Can you see the sea veg? 

They don't just make bread and pizza. I picked the winner! This was my fritto misto with flash fried prawns, mussels, scallops & topped with sea veg which is farmed locally in Newmerella. I can't describe how satisfying this meal was!

And before we left town the following day we grabbed coffees (great!) and an organic sourdough loaf! 

Orbost is on the Snowy River Cycling Rail Trail. I'd love to hear from anyone who has been on the trail which includes sections of track along the old rail bridges. It would be a beautiful ride.

We had a quick overnight stay on the family farm in Tanja on the way home and stayed with friends further north. And we ate dinner on the van two nights ago because we can't get enough. Ask us if we feel the same in a year after our big lap!

P.S. I have to add that the Orbost Caravan Park was a great spot to stay. Greg was very welcoming. An added bonus to the clean amenities block was a bath (at waist height) for the kids which our littlest boy loved. 

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