Jams and preserves

One thing that few people know about me is that I like to make my own jams and preserves. I grow a lot of my own food, and jams and preserves are a great way to use surpluses at the end of the season.

This photo shows some of my recent efforts: there's my old reliable green tomato relish, my berry and rhubarb jam, tangy strawberry jam, a new one I can't wait to try, spicy tomato and ginger jam, and my three fruit marmalade (lemon, lime and kumquot).

So, for a little context, here is how my home garden currently grows:

Vegetables: Asparagus (green and purple), snow peas, broad beans, carrots, zucchini, tomatoes, capsicum, pumpkin, cucumber, onions, sometimes potatoes. In winter I also grow broccoli, spinach, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts and cabbage - all with mixed success. Winter vegetable gardening is a pretty new thing for me, and with Canberra's frosts you need to know what you're doing.

Fruit: Lemons, limes, kumquots, peaches, nectatines, strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, gooseberries, feijoa, rhubarb (although that's not really a fruit is it? But we use it like one).

Herbs: Parsley, corriander, tarragon, marjarom, basil, rosemary, dill, chervil, mint, sage, thyme, oregano, aloe vera and a Bay tree (the last two aren't really herbs, I know, but where else to group them?) I used to have chives but they've disappeared - must plant some more as they go really well with scrambled eggs.

Now let's talk about the jams. I found a great way of making jams thanks to the Australian Women's Weekly - use the microwave! It makes it so much easier to avoid burning it. You basically cook up your fruit with any juices, then mix in your roughly equal portion of sugar and heat again until it's all disssolved, then bottle it up. Voila!

My favourite is the tangy strawberry jam. It comes straight from the Women's Weekly microwave recipe book. I make versions of it with other berries and rhubarb, and I also make a rhubarb jam which is delicious too.

The green tomato relish comes from a recipe someone gave me years ago. You chop up all the tomatoes left on your vines that have yet to ripen, cook them up on the stove top with malt vinegar and apple cider with some onion and a few other vegies (I always use carrots and celery) and some other condiments (I always add some sultanas, and usually a bay leaf whilst cooking), and of course a truckload of brown sugar, then - voila! A really yummy relish that goes well with any sort of cold meat on a sandwich or, my favourite, with some strong vintage cheese and crackers with a glass of wine.

Recently tried my hand at preserving asparagus - not sure how that will turn out yet. We'll know in a few months I guess...

Afternoon tea review: NGV Tea Room

I always try to have my birthday off work if it's at all possible. This year I managed to swing not just 1 but 3 days. Tom and I will be having 2 days in Melbourne and then 2 days in the beautiful Yarra Valley. Top of the agenda is eating. I am quite looking forward to it!

Today is the first day of the special long, long weekend, and I was lucky to spend a delightful afternoon with one of my favourite people in one of my favourite places. My friend Anna is a children's writer and academic whom I have known for over 20 years (we met in high school) and who lives in Melbourne. Her birthday happens to fall the day before mine, and every now and then comes an opportunity for us to celebrate our birthdays together.

I tend to shun parties in my own honour, finding it awkward to be the centre of attention. I have only ever had two birthday parties in my life: my 6th birthday party was not a great success (as you will deduce from the attached photograph at left which commerorates that day). The only other birthday party I ever had was a joint 18th birthday party with Anna. In those days we had many joint friends, and both of us thought that having a joint party would take the spotlight (and the pressure) of each of us as individuals. It was held at a restaurant in Canberra now closed but which I still remember for its lovely desserts. Anyway, that birthday party was a great success. We were chuffed that everyone we invited actually came, and even more chuffed that we both, surprisingly, had a good time.

But back to the present day. Today Anna and I had afternoon tea at the NGV tea room, with browsing at the NGV bookstore before and after (of course) and capped off with a glass of wine at La Vite Buona, a lovely wine bar which makes you feel like you're in a musty French cellar (but in a good way!).

Now, I just love the idea of tea rooms in cultural institutions, but sadly they are so often disappointing affairs with no elegance whatsoever. They are usually uninspiring, over lit, sterile feeding pens with overpriced bain marie slop and dreadful chairs dragging constantly over bare floor surfaces. Many of these places feel as inviting as the cafeteria at IKEA, but without the lovely Dime cake you can at least get at the otherwise soulless IKEA cafe. And usually no one knows how to make a cup of tea in these 'tea rooms' of the modern day cultural institution (I note that apparently in England there are many good tea rooms and even champagne lounges in cultural institutions; that is not generally so here in the colonies).

I am delighted to report that the NGV tea room is quite refreshingly elegant, yet understated. It is a proper, modern tea room - not a cafeteria nightmare.

We had a seat right on the balcony edge, so we could peer and sneer at the comings and goings in the lobby below with the lovely water wall providing a restful backdrop. The only gripe about the setting was that the seats were just far too low and deep - a common sin.

The tea room does offer a three tier platter but we decided instead to just order a couple of plates of sandwiches and a small petit four each. This proved to be an excellent idea. The sandwiches, whilst a little expensive for what they were, really were quite delicious and creative. The selection of teas was very satisfactory. The petit fours were delicious, but it was very hard to decide what to have from such a tempting selection.

The NGV tea room proved a great location for a relaxing cuppa and catch up with an old friend, with very good food. Service was friendly, if a little bit patchy at times. Those uncomfortable seats though were not a delight, and it was a bit pricey. Overall, it gets a seal of approval with 7 out of 10 on the Scott Scale.

The picture below shows some of the food and tea ware. And Anna's leg - you can see how impractically low both the lounge and the table are. But the food looks, and was, good.

Afternoon tea review: Gooromon Park, Hall

Surprisingly nearby to Canberra there are many delightful rural areas full of rolling hill vistas, boutique wineries, and gourmet food providores and cafes. Each time I venture into the countryside, which is not very often, I vow to see more of the local region, to try all of the local wines, to eat all of the wonderful seasonal produce. Did you know that the Canberra region is one of the main truffle producing areas in Australia? That it is famous for its cold climate ones, notably Riesling and pinot noir? It's so easy not to appreciate how much there is so close to where one lives. But, then again, there are only so many hours in a weekend (48), and it can be hard to find the time to enjoy the local countryside by the time one tends to one's own gardening and household chores, reading of the weekend newspapers, grocery shopping and cooking up the forthcoming week's supply of soups and casseroles, occasional socialising and family duties (this weekend was my father's 60th birthday party; my sister and her husband, who live in Goulburn, hosted a really lovely surprise birthday for him).

Also this weekend, however, Tom and I found time in our hectic schedules to take the 20 minute drive out to Hall, which is a very pretty area of rolling hills so close to Canberra you can (unfortunately) see the western suburbs from some spots. I had wanted to take afternoon tea at the Homestead Cafe at Gooromon Park for some time now, and fixed that now was the time for us to wile away an afternoon on the veranda of a country cottage and enjoy some homemade delights.

Well, we did not book early enough for the veranda, and the popular parlour was booked for a (what else?) hen's night afternoon tea, so we just had a seat in the regular cafe. The house is an old weatherboard, relocated from Canberra. The whole place has a quite nice rustic, but not twee, feel about it.

The food was really good, especially the sandwiches which were delicious (so often overlooked) and the savoury snacks. The sweets were all very nice too of course, as was the complimentary glass of champagne. The tea selection could have, in my opinion, been a little better, but I'm not really complaining about it - it's just that they could offer a little more choice of nicer teas for not really much more money; say, a selection from T2 or The Tea Centre in Canberra. In many settings, I would not have found the floral china to be charming, but in this setting it was. It was a very relaxing afternoon in the country, with good food. I therefore happily recommend high tea at the Homestead Cafe.

On the Scott Scale, it gets a solid 7.5 out of 10, which would be an 8 with better tea. That puts them on equal footing with the Ritz-Carlton in Singapore.

Redwoods in Canberra?

I was pretty fascinated to read in a recent Tim the Yowie Man article in the Canberra Times that there was an experimental grove of redwood trees planted in Canberra, just near the airport (which is actually where I work). I have driven past these trees many times and never really noticed them, thinking they were an abandoned pine forest. Apaprently, they are the remnants of a failed attempt to create a redwood forrest that was planted on the instructions of none other than Walter Burley Griffin.

When we were in San Francisco a few years back we did a day trip to the Muir Woods and I found these trees so powerful - the way the light tentatively dappled through their high branches, and their towering, silent presence. Instinct suggests that the Canberra climate would be far too dry for these beautiful, ancient giants. Canberra may be cool in summer but it is nothing like the wet Pacific north west of the US and Canada where these trees are from.

Turns out, instinct is correct. The trees have made a valiant effort but they are slowly dying from lack of water and heat stress. Apparently much of the original forest has been destroyed for airport expansion.

Still, walking through what remains is a peaceful experience. Although they are adjacent to the airport and a busy road, something about these trees wraps you up in a cocoon of quiet reflection. The light does dabble through the branches. It is such a shame they could not be saved, but one does get the feeling their days are probably numbered.

This picture comes from the Redwood Grove Park. I highly recommend a visit if you're driving past some time - it is a very peaceful place.

Bumper pumkin crop

Very pleased with the harvest from my two Australian butter pumpkin vines this autumn - three huge pumpkins and eight smaller ones. There will be plenty of delicious pumpkin soup this winter!

Elizabeth Taylor

Sad news today that Elizabeth Taylor - truly the last of the great movie stars - has died aged 79 after many years of illnesses.

I thought she was astonishingly beautiful in her heyday, and not a bad actress despite making many not so great films - but in her good films she really was terrific. I loved her in National Velvet, Jane Eyre, Suddenly Last Summer and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. Even in her lesser films she was always good.

She was so glamorous but seemed to have a wonderful earthy and self-deprecating sense of humour - in interviews she was always witty and seemed not to take herself too seriously.

Yes, she had that soap opera life with all the marriages, the illnesses and near death experiences, and all those diamonds she collected. But she also did much fine and pioneering work for AIDS research, and by all accounts she was kind, generous, loyal and very funny person in her private life.

With her dying, there are no more real movie stars left.

Afternoon tea review: Mint Hotel, Manchester

We stayed for a couple of nights at the simple but lovely Mint Hotel and enjoyed their surprisingly good (not to mention good value) afternoon tea. They had a lovely selection of sandwiches, nice scones, and nice, not too heavy cakes. The Piccadilly Lounge is a lovely place for people watching.

It gets a solid 8.5 out of 10 on the Scott Scale.

That makes my current rankings look like this:

1. Peninsula Hong Kong 9.5/10

2. Lovejoy's San Francisco 9/10

3. Mint Hotel Manchester 8/5/10

4. Mandarin Oriental Hong Kong 8/10

4. Westin Melbourne 8/10

6. Ritz-Carlton Singapore 7.5/10

7. Four Seasons Hong Kong 7/10

7. Hyatt Hotel Canberra 7/10

7. Langham Place Hong Kong 7/10

7. Regent Singapore 7/10

7. Sheraton on the Park Sydney 7/10

7. Swissotel The Howard London 7/10