Praise Be

The  swan plant I ordered to replenish my monarch caterpillars’ food supply came yesterday, just in the nick of time. It has been planted,

Praise be for more food

and my remaining caterpillars are now busily chomping on their fresh greens. Hopefully, the caterpillars will  have enough food to take them through their fifth  instar and into their chrysalis stage.  Most of them look big enough to be close to their final and complete metamorphosis.

Is this the 5th instar?

Whilst the caterpillars are nourishing their bodies in preparation for change, I thought we might do the same. Would you care to indulge?…..

in a taste of the last of summer in this delicious, spicy rhubarb cake

Spicy Rhubarb Cake

or, perhaps, in a little something that speaks of cooler mornings and the colder days to come; a gingerbread cake.

Joy of Baking; Gingerbread Cake

But, if you are wanting a lighter indulgence, may I suggest a serving of the apple, instead of the cake.  Again there are two choices; Cherry Gala apples lightly cooked with a squeeze of lemon, a pinch of sugar and a handful of rose petals;

Apple, lemon and rose

Apple sauteed in butter and sugar

or Royal Gala and Eve  apples , sautéed gently in a sliver of butter and a sprinkle of sugar.

Mmmmm…How was that? Delectable? Are you feeling suitably indulged and ever so glad that we are not limited to one food type like the monarch caterpillar; that we are able to experience so many taste sensations; that we have such variety in our menus.

Praise be to the  butterflies  and bees that make that possible.

~

At 12.51pm today we marked the  third anniversary of the  February 22nd earthquake. At the memorial service in the Botanic Gardens, the Mayor said “Let us unite as we did after the earthquakes. For those of us who have been able to move on, let us reach out to those who are still struggling. .. For those who cannot move on, please do not be afraid to ask for our help… We can get through this together.”

In caterpillar terms, ( because I have this essential life form so much on my mind 😉 ) most of us have made it through the first instar; some of us are almost ready to be butterflies; indeed, may already be  flying freely. Some of us, such as myself, are still  ambling along in the third instar. But there’s no rush. With nourishment and nurture, we will, eventually, be transformed.

( I think I will make a good  butterfly, don’t you?  🙂   Better keep my feet clean, though. Butterflies taste through their ‘feet’! )

© silkannthreades

Despond and a piece of humble pie

The other night, when I was putting the house to bed, (locking the doors, closing the windows, turning off lights, drawing the curtains), the curtain, plus rail, in the living room came galumphing down and nearly took out my shoulder. After a few  of these  #@!%@#*! , I galumphed in to a chair myself and thought, “Well, that just about sums up my week; broken and broke!”  And I went from being in a funk to floundering in the  Slough of Despond.

‘This miry Slough is such a place as cannot be mended; it is the descent whither the scum and filth that attends conviction for sin doth continually run, and therefore is it called the Slough of Despond: for still as the sinner is awakened about his lost condition, there ariseth in his soul many fears, and doubts, and discouraging apprehensions, which all of them get together, and settle in this place; and this is the reason of the badness of this ground.’

Isn’t that such a great description of despondency?  It made me feel better just by reading it and wallowing, for a while, in its awful miry  scumminess.

Most of my funk came from the outcome of 4 month-long pension review/battle with  our government pension department. It’s too vexing and complicated to explain in this post but, basically, the outcome was not in our favour. As a result, our pension income is, now, several thousands of dollars  lower per annum than we expected it to be. The review results were delivered, this week, in a pleasant letter, and came with the offer of taking the matter through to further reviews and committees; and was signed, yours sincerely, ( by a sincere young man whom I have come to know well, mostly through an exchange of  very annoyed letters on my part 😦 )

Yes, well, harumph and grump; I am not entirely sure I can be bothered with continuing my pension crusade. Whilst all this was going on, Vickie Lester at  Beguiling Hollywood   posted this quote, from Franklin D Roosevelt, which entirely suited my mood

Let us not be afraid to help each other—let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and Senators and Congressmen and Government officials but the voters of this country.

She was, of course, using the quote in relation to the shutdown of the US Government but, in my dealings with Government bureaucracies and officials and official forms, over the years, I have often felt that there is a complete lack of understanding by Government, (and its officials) , of its purpose and role; that is, it is OUR service and its workers are OUR servants whom we ask to use OUR money wisely and for OUR benefit. Democratic governments were never intended to be our rulers, our disempowerers,  forever telling us what to do, and not to do, and which part of form WXB para. 8 c, sub-clause 24  we forgot to complete or completed incorrectly, and, and, and………….oh, and, by the way, does anyone remember when they last received a letter from a Government official signed, ” Your most humble and obedient servant.” ?

Thought not! That practice went out the window a long time ago. The Queen is about the only one who still remembers to use those words 🙂

Well, rant, rant……enough of it. To cheer myself, I made, and ate, my humble pie, otherwise known as  Crostata. The recipe I use is based on thisone  by Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa.

I am relatively new to the art of Crostata-making but I love its easy, rustic free-form style. And it is very forgiving of mistakes and carelessness. My Crostata, this week, had a filling of rhubarb and apple, spiced with orange peel and ginger.  I used up some pastry I had leftover from a potato pie I had made earlier in the week .  Until quite recently,  I was afraid of pastry making, worried that it was too complicated for my culinary  skill levels. But, in a moment of epiphany one fine day, it occurred to me that pies were once the most commonplace of foods and, therefore, should be as easy as pie to make. And so they are;  with the help of a kitchen whizz,  a good helping of nonchalance, and a light touch with the rolling-pin and a good hot oven.

Free-Form Pie; rough as….

Perhaps it’s not the best looking pie you’ve ever seen but it tasted absolutely delicious.

A slice

of humble pie

for you

and me 🙂

And to cheer myself even more, I challenged myself to make a sound recording. It’s as rough and ready as my Crostata but, hey, I did it.  🙂 Perhaps there’s still a little filling left in the old girl yet!

© silkannthreades

Short and sweet, but not too sweet.

This post will be short and sweet, but not too sweet. It’s about cake; shortcake. Feijoa and Ginger shortcake to be precise.

Take a peek at the shortcake, freshly baked and cut. It’s rough and ready in appearance, exactly like the every day setting of my kitchen.

Now please help yourself to  a piece*….of shortcake

and take a bite and let your taste buds linger on the soft buttery crust and luscious feijoa and ginger filling.

Here’s how it’s made:

110gm( 4 oz) butter & 110gm (half cup) sugar & 1 egg & 225gm flour, sifted &  1 tsp of baking powder & 7 to 9 feijoas, peeled and sliced & 9 small pieces of crystallised ginger, chopped & 2 T of sugar.

Soften butter and beat with sugar until creamy. Add egg and beat. Fold in sifted flour and baking powder. Shape into a ball and roll out on baking paper into a large oval shape. Leave the rolled pastry on baking paper and carefully place on baking tray. Slice feijoas reasonably thickly and cover half the pastry with the slices. Scatter the ginger over the fruit slices. Sprinkle with sugar. Carefully pick up ends of baking paper to ease empty half of shortcake over the feijoas. Crimp two edges together.  Bake at 170C -180C deg for about 30 minutes until cooked through and nicely browned.

The recipe was dictated to me by a friend. It is one she uses a great deal but I don’t know its origins.

Finally, here is a photo of the  feijoas, or pineapple guavas, from a  previous post. For those of you who can’t find feijoas in your markets / shops, experiment with another slightly tangy, firm fleshed fruit. 

*Something to chew on:

In my paternal grandmother’s family, if you were offered a ‘piece’, it meant a piece  of bread. The piece of bread would be buttered and spread with jam and then sliced off the loaf.  I don’t know if the use of the word piece in this way was widespread in early twentieth century New Zealand or was something peculiar to our family.  Please note that there is a loaf of bread in the photo collage. You are welcome to a piece 🙂

© silkannthreades

The Pineapple Guava

At this time of the year, with autumn leaves in full fall, there is very little left to harvest from my garden, with the exception of pineapple guavas or, as we like to call them, Feijoas.  The Feijoa tree is a relative newcomer to my small plot but it is already a prolific fruiter. I think most Feijoa trees are.  It is also easy care and has beautiful flowers which appear around Christmas time.  And it is evergreen, so it provides visual delight all year long.

Feijoas are one of my favourite fruits but I find they are a very polarizing fruit in New Zealand. People seem to either hate them or love them.  I love them. I love them raw  and I love them cooked….. with, what else, but GINGER.  I make a delicious Feijoa and ginger short-cake (not available today, sorry 😦 ). Here’s a feast of photos instead.

Hidden fruit

Fruit basket

Feijoas

Raindrops on Feijoas

Waiting to Fall

Feijoa flowers

Feijoa flower for Christmas

Shapes

If you would like to know more about Feijoas/pineapple guavas here is a Wiki link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acca_sellowiana

One interesting fact about Feijoas is that the fruit is ready only when it falls on the ground. So we pick the fruit from the ground and not the tree, although I believe that, if you want to hasten the harvest, you can tickle the fruit and catch it as it falls.

© silkannthreades