If you’re older than 62…

A notice appeared on the door between the dining-room and lounge: “Brynn’s Dance”. Free - tonight 8:00pm – 8:30pm, and in red “You have to Dance.” Please No Cameras, No Video and Not too meny (many) people!

Free “ticket” vouchers: numbered and signed personally by the host.

To accommodate Granny and to encourage the old fogeys, she added the reassurance “You don’t have to dance if you are older than 62!”

We will now sit tight and wait to see what transpires. It will surely be a bit of a battle to convince Brynn to allow a camera, let alone video, but I will try my best. The dance rehearsal went on for the larger part of yesterday.

You know you’re in…. when

You know you’re in Reikorangi… …when the 10mm overnight rainfall in the rain-gauge outside is far more important to you than the M6.2 earthquake and numerous aftershocks felt less than 60 km away in Eketahuna.

I was always fascinated by the importance that the farming community placed on the rainfall data. Now I realise how it is elevated in importance when you’re dependent on the sky for your drinking water, your bathwater and irrigation for the plants! Yay, we can bath again – every millimetre of rain translates into hundreds of litres of fresh water in the storage tank!

A.P. & I. Show

The town of Levin (pronounced so as to rhyme with “begin”) lies in the Manawatu-Wanganui region, and is the largest town in the Horowhenua (pronounced Hoh-roh-fen-u-ah) district. (the town is called Taitoko in Maori), about half an hour north of Waikanae, and that’s where we were headed on Saturday 18 January.

Why? Because the annual two-day Horowhenua A.P.& I. (Agricultural Pastoral & Industrial) Show took place on Saturday/Sunday at the spacious Levin show-grounds. With sheep, dogs and ponies and ponies (did I mention that there would be ponies?), you can hardly keep Brynn away – unless you cancel the show completely!

I certainly would not want to insult anyone’s intelligence by describing our tour around the grounds, so that’s the reason why I will keep the text to the minimum, and simply post the photographs.

The MC for the sheep-racing – at a distance, he was a typical “crocodile Dundee” Paul Hogan!

• Sheep dog trials
• Show-jumping ponies
• Dairy and beef cattle judging
• Alpaca judging
• Sheep and pig judging
• Indoor trade space and craft stalls
• Horowhenua Vintage Farm Machinery Club – 110 years of tractors in NZ
• Wood-chopping competitions
• Poultry
• Sheep racing

Tyler’s Project O.D.S.

Tyler has embarked on his first project for 2014 – Operation Demolish Shed (O.D.S.) in which he will dismantle the galvanised sheet-metal garden shed and prepare the parts for re-assembly as a chicken-run for the Egg-layers-to-be of Chartwell.

The first part of the task consisted of clearing the undergrowth around the garden tool-shed and exposing the timber base beam half-buried all round the shed. A large perimeter tree had apparently been felled some time in the past, leaving the rotting trunk.

After three days of unscrewing panel components and the two large roofing sections, Tyler agreed to “pose” with the final “rear” panel before removing it completely. He had the vision to index-label each of the 20 individual wall panels at the start, so that re-assembly would be an easier job. Here he stand next to panel B(ack)2 of 6.

The panels were all carried down to the shed outside the proposed chicken run, in readiness for their cleaning, de-rusting and re-painting.

The A-Frame which will be refurbished to house future hens and chicks. The new Chicken Coop will be located somewhere near here. I am sure that such construction story will provide fodder for the base of a future blog or two.

The English (Labrador) Patient

Benny came dashing in from outside on Wednesday. Nothing unusual in that. Except that there were dozens of doggy paw-prints all down the passageway, to each of the bedrooms and the bathroom/toilet, as if he was searching for someone…

He was searching… Please help me, he seemed to be saying (in a doggy sort of way), “Please help me, my left-back paw is covered in this sticky red stuff!"

Long story short: Bloody footprints all over. Telephone call to the Vet, copious licking (by the dog, not the Vet). Rested overnight, another telephone call to the Vet. Foot not good, come in for stitching, etc and overnight stay. Still cannot fathom how his foot got cut. Sister Sophie sulking and pining at the absence of Big Bro’ Benny.

This morning Bianca collected a heeled healed Benny, with instructions that he should wear the (clear plastic) doggy gumboot and be kept to the grassy surfaces. Everyone was happy to see the Big Boy back, not least of all Sister Sophie.

With this huge “TV dish” around his neck to discourage any licking of the bandages and dressing off. Benny looking a little forlorn.

Does this protector make my bum look big?

Close-up of the repaired paw. Get well soon, Benny! We all love you!

Ow, Ow, Ow… Woe is me! How did this happen?

We have been welcomed

After spending three weeks in our new country, and (generally) being made to feel welcome wherever we go, I find a comprehensive 183-page e-book to help us acclimatise, in my inbox.

Near the beginning of the book, there is the stark reminder: something of which we are acutely aware, but one always needs a gentle reminder. Mood-wise, we find ourselves in the “up” swing of the cycle – the start of the “down” will coincide with the onset of the wet and cold of winter.

Oops! They have inadvertently left us off the map. No worries – I have set the record straight with a prominent yellow arrow! Nice.

Cooking with Lemons (Part II) – Cordial

The final cooking aspect of last Sunday’s garden harvest involved making a lemon syrup for a Lemon Cordial drink, to be diluted with water or carbonated water 1:5 or so.

The first step, surprise surprise, was to slice and prick as many lemons as you like, and then to juice them on the electric juicer, avoiding inclusion of the white yucky pith wherever possible. Then you add to the juice approximately a ton of white sugar, some Tartaric Acid and Epsom Salts (Magnesium Sulphate).  [Aside: Magnesium Sulphate is known as Epsom Salt, because the salt is mined at the springs near Epsom in Surrey]

And some other stuff, but I am only allowed to slice, juice and boil – the technical stuff such as ingredient selection and weighing is reserved for the Chartwell Ladies portfolio.

 
I made a technical observation that any world-class Lemon Cordial, worthy of a good reputation, should be transparent pale yellow in appearance, and not a murky mass. Therefore, I invented a straining device using a square of clean linen and 9 clothes pegs. This proved to be insufficient, as the pores in the linen cloth were inclined to block up very quickly.

Therefore, a second time, I invented the double-filtration method, in which the murky liquid is pre-sieved before entering the linen filter.

The double-filtration slowed down the overall process tremendously, but the result was most pleasing – a reasonably clear and transparent cordial. Yum.

The final yield was quite a number of litres of Lemon Cordial Concentrate, which can be diluted five times by volume to give a refreshing drink on a hot day.

Cooking with Lemons (Part I) – Curd

Having completed and bottled the Plum Jam, the Chartwell Ladies next tackled the huge harvest of lemons. Lemons big, medium and small.

What to do with all these lemons? A large and very heavy Garby bagful. Google gave us at least 45 uses for lemon in one single article alone! After a lot of thought and even more discussion, the decision was made: Lemons Part I would consist of Lemon Curd and Lemon Preserve, while Lemons Part II would see an attempt at Lemon Cordial.

This post shows some of their labours at producing the Curd and the Lemon Preserve.

 
The first step in most recipes using Lemons is to extract as much juice as possible, without contaminating the supernatant fluid with the bitter pith. So, we set up a sort of conveyor belt system, starting with slicing and pricking the lemons, then juicing (fortunately with an electrical juicer – nice). The juice get strained in a multiple strain operation to minimise the bitter stuff as far as possible.

After combining the juice and sugar, the eggs are blended into the mix using a double-boiler set-up. This is the tricky bit, where the stirrer must get the consistency to the correct viscosity, without allowing the egg to scramble.

I think.

Or something like that: Don’t look at me – I had the technical engineering job of slicing the lemons. Oh, and slicing my left thumb slightly, leading to my retirement to the TV on sick leave for the rest of the evening. The lemon juice, by the way, did wonders for the wound.

Naturally, I couldn’t claim any involvement in the preparation of the Preserved Lemons, because of the unfortunate thumb incident, but I understand it consists of slicing lemons into 6 segments, removal of the excess pith and other white stuff, and then dabbing in salt, and finally packing in a sterilised jar as in the large one below.

I think. Or something like that.

The Lemon Preserve in the large jar on the left, the Lemon Curd (Yum) is in the centre bottle, and the Plum Jam in the jar on the right.

Jam of Plum. Yum.

 
After considering the large stock of ripe plums harvested on Sunday by Tyler and Brynn (some of the very ripe ones have already been consumed), the ladies decided to take the plunge, get the sugar and other secret ingredients, and to convert them into Jam.

Two pairs of dextrous hands and a couple of sharp paring knives later, and the tray of innocent shiny plums was soon converted into two pots of dissected red-bodied fruit ready to be married to a 1:1 sugar relationship.

The preserving jars were subjected to the sterilising process, with final heat treatment in the oven. Meantime, back on the range…

The cooking process of the jam mix was underway. Bubble, bubble, yummy plum jam on the double. Careful – no finger-taste testing here – this is hot-potato temperature stuff, and I have a scalded index finger to prove it.

Testing… testing… At last, the jam mix reached the gelling point at which the product thickens. Using a makeshift disposable funnel (made from the top of a milk bottle), here the mature jam is filled into the preserving jars.

After filling the allocation of jars, the remainder of the plum sauce filled the white gravy boat, destined for indulgent consumption at the evening dinner table. Yum.

Three large and four half-size preserving jars stand filled with first grade organic plum jam, cooling after a couple of hours of effort. Well done, ladies: your work will be rewarded by the plum jam sandwiches we will be eating. Thank you.

The indulgent pudding course after supper was ice cream with a generous serving of our newly-made plum jam/jelly.