Day 27

Hunting and Gathering in the EcoVillage

Here is what we were able to find in the village orchards -a bit of a disappointing crop from approx. 600 fruit & nut trees:

• The pears were windfalls, and may not ripen sufficiently to be eaten;
• The carob may or may not have been picked too soon depending on who you listen to - I thought it tasted OK, and I will try grinding it in the food processor;
• Tomatoes are from my mother-in-law's garden (she lives in the village too);
• apricots from Hakea orchard
• nectarines from Gina's and townhouse orchards

It was an interesting process, I was glad I was not relying on this for my dinner. Fortunately we have our own garden abundant with silver beet, tomatoes (green at present), lettuce, beetroot, asparagus, rhubarb, chillies, cucumber, pumpkin, spring onions, capsicum, zucchini, and herbs. (the photo I took of the lettuce mysteriously disappeared as I was trying to format it). I found myself wondering how many fruit trees we actually need to feed 160 households, and how large a vege patch needs to be to feed a family?

Today for breakfast I ate the last of the organic ancient grains cereal and opened the last carton of organic oat milk. The pantry stores are dwindling, tonight we will eat the last of the spelt pasta, second to last can of organic tomatoes, and the last of the anchovies, although, I found a small jar lurking in the back of the pantry - phew! Did a google search on SA anchovies, it seems they do breed in the Spencer and St Vincent Gulfs, so there is a chance that they would be within our range if I can find someone who sells them. From what little info I found, I get the sense that they may only be available fresh. I was discussing pantry life with my friend Kylie, and she said that it takes her about 3 months to empty her pantry. I guess at that rate, we will not be fully signed up to the 100 mile diet till April. This information had a strange impact, as I have heard that the supermarket shelves would empty in 3 days when we run out of petrol. That gives the average household 93 days from 'oilopause' to starvation.

On the way back from Byron Bay we found Icons South Australia - a store promoting SA produce. Most of the brands that we have mentioned in this Blog were represented, including a few others we had'nt heard of, including :-

Tumbeela Native Bushfoods - Verdun - http://www.tumbeela.com/
(also available at Stirling Market)

Many of the other products were packaged and produced in SA. but the ingredients were not neccessarily sourced in SA. Many included chocolate and coffee, and "Local and imported ingredients". Of course, all of the sweets, chocolates, biscuits and jams contain sugar, which brings us to the sugar dilemma - if we say that we are deleting all non-local ingredients, then to be authentic, we are removing sugar from our diet which eliminates practically all packaged foods, and pretty much all eating out. This debate still continues in our household, with michael firmly in the "No sugar" camp and me in the "Lets allow sugar" camp

Above is breakfast dessert from Aarod, via Russell's - panacotta with one nectarine from "Gina's orchard" in the EcoVillage.

Right is a happy meal smile Michael made for my Birthday breakfast - awww!

24th January Birthday Lunch at Locavore restaurant in Stirling - Their creed is :- "If not Local, Family farmed, if not Family farmed, Organic, if not Organic, Fair Trade."

Locavore

Shipping is a terrible thing to do to food. It probably gets jet-lag just like humans

EAT LOCAL !!!





We chose the Tapas Yaddah Yaddah the lot:

• [ABOVE] Smoked Paprika Organic Aldinga almonds;
• Coriole mixed olives marinated in garlic & chilli;
• Stoned chicken liver pate' with Stone ginger wine;
• Willabrand fig fennel & chilli chutney;
• Woodside Goats cheese tartlets;
• Smokehouse salmon (Hahndorf) with Mannum caper berries and horseradish (Langhorne creek) cream;
• Lemon Myrtle sobet palate cleanser
  

• Followed by asparagus wrapped in San Jose gamon with Hollandaise sauce;
• salt/pepper lemon myrtle squid with house made sweet chilli sauce;
• chicken roulade with Paris Creek Nuage blanc, Aldinga almonds, sage, & Buzz honey;
• Abondigas spanish style meatballs with Napolitana sauce and La Vera Pecurino cheese;
• All accompanied by Pawn local wines - Jeu de Fin Savignon Blanc 2008, and The Gambit Sangiovese 2007. Aarod chose a Bickfords Cola.

The meal was delicious, good service, excellent wine, and plenty of food.

After lunch we went across the road to the Stirling market.

We bought Udder Delights Camembert, 2 Goats curd packs, and a Blue cheese for $20 because they were closing shop for the day - yum. They no longer produce their own milk, but buy in from local dairies in the hills and the Fleurieu. They have a Cheese Cellar in Hahndorf where you can taste their cheeses, open 7 days. http://www.udderdelights.com.au/

Michael was delighted to find local Valencia oranges from Dave and Joy Schultz from Nildottie on the River Murray. Their disclaimer says: "We hold a small permit to sell this fruit to consumers only. We are not required to treat the fruit with a fungicide or wax." We bought 2 4kg bags! Either Dave or Joy's mother has a farm North of Swan Reach which has Apricots - so we bought a bag of Dried Apricots!

I was very happy to discover that Naturally Nice (Lenswood) Raspberry jam raspberries are grown in Maccelsfield. We had a taste - delicious, we bought a jar. Their strawberries are sourced from Maccy too. I was also impressed that unlike most jams, the first ingredient is fruit, not sugar, at 49%. Approx $4 for 450g.

We also bought more Organic seedlings from Bickleigh Vale farm Greenseed's stall: Celery, beetroot, lettuce, & asian greens. I am so grateful to Diana & Jen for making these seedlings available, they save me a lot of time; and when one occasionally gets eaten I am not so disheartened as I was when I had grown them myself from seed. They have an excellent survival rate too, except when I forget to look at the weather forecast and I plant them in the lead up to a heatwave!