Purple Congo Gado Gado (say that 10 times quickly)

When I went to write this the monitor died, then the flash card wouldn't read and the computer said the disk had been corrupted. Needless to say it has taken a bit of the joy out of blogging fixing these problems. Don't you just hate computer problems? They're so boring and time consuming, and that's putting it nicely. I wish my card would stop messing with the dark side. I bought a new card reader but I think the disk is the problem so wasted some money as well.  The good news is I did manage to rescue my pictures, of which there were many, using some free software. I have no association with this business but if you have similar problems I can recommend using Mini Tool Power Data Recovery. The software is free for the first 1GB of rescued data. It was amazing how it even found pictures I had deleted from months ago (handy to know for the accidental delete) and it was quite user friendly.

A recent harvest wrestled from the earth.  Some of the carrots are becoming firmly wedged and I am reminded of a story about a turnip. I loved hearing my mum tell this story as  a child, all that pulling and effort. There has been the odd snap at our house - an unscrewing action seems to work better

credit http://www.childrenstory.info/childrenstories/thegreatbigturnip.html

There is much enthusiasm for digging for potatoes at our house - the little one climbs over everyone to get in on the act. These are Kipflers and Purple Congos which taste like a yummy normal potatoes and are not at all sweet, despite their rich colour. Amazingly these tough old beetroot that were going to seed still tasted good when grated up.

 

Home made Satay sauce, noodles and free range eggs. Did you know if you play dodgem cars with your eggs in the saucepan (shaking them so they bang into each other) they peel much more easily? - first time I have tried this trick and it worked a treat! (One got broken by the big Bowerbird before we used the ricochet technique).

Last year I talked to our kids at school about eating a rainbow and it really struck a chord with my own children. The littlest comments on how she will make a rainbow on her plate frequently. We managed a good part of the colour spectrum in our Gado Gado, It was interesting to see how each family member arranged their rainbow. I am in love with the Puple Congos for their colour alone.

 (LittleBowerbird)

 (Papa Bowerbird)

(Mama Bowerbird) 

(Big Bowerbird)

Only the middle bowerbird's rainbow is missing - that's because it's dominant colour was white and not so exciting.

We made Gado Dado in December with our harvest but this one is definitely prettier.

More Raspberry goodness and Gado Gado

 I came home from Xmas shopping on Sunday to the smell of this.  The big Bowerbird daughter had been in the kitchen whipping up not just one, but two raspberry and apple pies.  I think she found the recipe on Taste.com.  Would you believe there are about 5 punnets of raspberries in these, only a dish for the home grower with a bumper crop.

 

 It disappeared pretty fast.

  Strangely the little one didn't want hers, not that that posed much of a problem.

We had our first burst of really hot weather last week. After intending to make Gado Gado Thursday then napping on the couch instead, it was the perfect cool dinner for a hot Friday night.

 Home grown potatoes, the first of the bandicooted spuds.  It's the satay sauce that really makes the dish.  We mixed up peanut butter, water, fish sauce, shrimp paste, brown sugar, soy sauce, and lime juice - the result was a tasty salty sweet sour concoction to drizzle on fresh crunchy salad, boiled eggs and home grown potatoes. it's a great harvest dish as you can just use whatever's growing in the garden. Most of our meals are served up like this - smorgasbord style - to cater for all the different taste buds in our house.

More raspberry jam made by that clever daughter of mine, this time using our home made apple pectin as we didn't have any lemons. Sooo good and quick to disappear.