Merry Christmas!!

May your Christmas be full of love and happiness - merry Christmas, everyone.

NZ Blogging By Post

I came home from work last week to discover a large mysterious package sitting on my doorstep. Thinking it was some wild, forgotten purchase made on ebay or trademe while in a drunken state, I opened it to discover it was in fact my 'NZ Blogging by Post' package. This had been sent to me by the very generous Barbara of Winos & Foodies (bless!). Take a look at the goodies!
We have:
-Kiwifruit chutney, home-made (would go well with a hard cheese in a grain bread sandwich, according to Barbara)
-Cranberry & Blueberry Jam, home-made
-Red Pepper Jelly, again home-made
-Cucumber & Mint Dip, from Shadie Stables in Pukekohe
-Macadamia Nuts grown on Waiheke Island
-a bar of Lindt Dark Chocolate
-a packet each of Sweet Basil, Mesclun & Parsley Seeds (a well received gift)
-doggy treats (unfortunately I don't have a dog, but I have friends who do so they won't go to waste)
-a Grand Marnier miniature, made with cognac over 25 years old
-a packet of Jaffas - apt given Barbara's location!

In absentia: oatmeal chocolate chip cookies (devoured minutes after the package was opened!).

Many, many thanks to Barbara for her generosity - isn't she lovely! Also, a big thank you to Emma for organising 'NZ Blogging by Post' - well done! The recipient of my package (!) was Celine at An Angel at My Table - glad to hear she liked her goodies.

I have a post coming up soon - I hope you'll bear with me. Work is still hectic (apples, apples, apples), but I have my holidays coming up soon...

From the lovely Catherine...

Harvest Hawke's Bay Wine Festival - February 3-4th, '07

Click on the picture above and you'll be taken to the festival's official website. The principal sponsor for 2007 is EIT Hawke's Bay - a fine tertiary institution and producer of some of the country's best viticulturists. Get your tickets now because they sell like hotcakes (something I might just blog about one day...that, and catfish).

Apologies too, for the lack of posts - I'm swamped with work (I'm an orchardist), this being a busy time of year. There will be new material soon - bear with me!

Cooking with Puha

Puha (pronounced "poo-ha")
- aka Sow Thistle (Sonchus)

Puha and Pork Bones

Puha and Sesame Salad

As a child, puha was the bane of my existence. While mums the length of the street would lovingly caw from kitchen windows, "do you kids want sausages or saveloys for tea?", mine would say nothing, employing the power of surprise in the battle to feed her two picky children.

Arriving home in the early evening after hours of play always held an air of dreadful mystery for me and my brother. Unlike the other kids in our street, our mother was Maori, which meant that while the other children in our street always got 'proper' food, we, at least once during the week would encounter something 'different'. This often meant finding a steaming plate of muttonbirds, left-over hangi, paua fritters or if I was unlucky, pork bones and puha.

Lamb tails

Spring: bright yellow daffodils, the fragrance of blooming daphnes, lambs gamboling in verdant fields... The acrid stench of wool burning on a rickety barbecue appears as welcome on that list as a knife-fight in church. However, spring is the time when the cooking of lamb tails occurs and not having had them in ages, it seemed the perfect excuse to give them a go. Fortunately for me, a workmate (many thanks, Joe!) had just finished a week docking lambs. A dozen beer later, the supermarket bag of tails I requested turned up having changed into a very large fertiliser sack full of the things - time to get to work (just a quick note - click on the photos if you want a closer look - if you dare!).

Nigger, please...

Slight digression here - I'm in the process of sorting out my first proper 'investigative' post (should be ready tomorrow). In the meantime, here's a wee story to keep you interested...

In setting up this blog, I was sorting through my cookbooks to see which I would place in my "Recommended Reading" list. When I came across my Good Housekeeping cookbook, I remembered the rather eye-catching recipe for children's party food listed inside:
Nigger Minstrel Cakes (the book was published in 1962)! While the racism may not be entirely surprising given the era, what catches me is the sheer nonchalance, the casual manner in which it's used - in this instance, a fun recipe for the kids. A picture of the cakes (click on the photo for a closer look):Finger's crossed, tomorrow's post will be about...lamb tails!

Wildfoods Festival - Hokitika, March 10th, 2007

Tickets go on sale from the 13th of November; $25 for adults, a fiver for 5 - 18 year olds & littlies are free. Buy them from the Wildfoods Festival website or at your local Postie + store. What will you find? Scallops, mussels, ostrich, west coast whitebait...and then sphagnum moss candy floss, gumboot milkshakes...not to mention magpie breast, huhu grubs, seagull bits, barbecued bollocks...I'm thinking a bucket and a change of clothes wouldn't go amiss should you decide to go (which I certainly intend doing).

The inaugural post!

What springs to mind when you think 'New Zealand food'? Salt-sweet mussels, scallops & paua; the freshest fruit & vegetables; not to mention our reknown beef & lamb. But how many of you have tried Romo? Or Karengo? Lamb tails? Toheroas? Mountain oysters? These foods & many more are held in high regard in certain circles. Outside these circles however, very little (and in some instances nothing) is known about these foods. The purpose of this blog is to record my experiences in finding, cooking & gobbling these quiet delicacies...