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Christmas. A whole leg of gammon (cured pork), poached with bay leaf and mace, then roasted in hay. Home-kill chooks. Rich, roasted eggplant with a concentrated tomato sauce. Incredible biscuits. Cherry trifle.
It did get hot for a couple of days, enough to get the pigs seeking a wallow. Enough to nearly melt the customers at Salamanca. Enough to get to the beach. But it’s raining again, now – though, in comparison with those poor folk in Queensland, this is drizzle. Welcome drizzle that is nourishing the grass in the paddocks. And there is grass in the paddocks. That could be thanks to consistent spring rain and the new bush block, and maybe my efforts in isolating and organically fertilising parcels of land.
The barn is full of hay. I’ve bought a new cow from a local dairyman. Another Jersey, though smaller in stature and paler in colour [than Maggie], I’ve called her Priscilla. She’s less flighty than Maggie, more used to being handled, perhaps, but just as bossy. She’s in calf, we believe, so there’s no milk at the moment, but there is the promise of some in a few months. Meanwhile, the orphaned calf, Bobby, is still being bucket fed. When calves suckle, they bash their mother’s udder with their nose to help let the milk down. When Bobby has been fed, and he wants more (he always wants more), he will aim at parts of your body with his head and give you a whack. It’s not the first day he’s almost taken me down. Sometimes from the back with a nuzzle to the back of the knee. Occasionally, with a well placed shot to the crotch. And if that doesn’t work, he trots in front of you as you walk around doing chores and trips you up. It’s all part of his natural instinct and urge to bond with us as we feed him. He’s fun and feisty and is loving the company Priscilla brings, but we are more like his mother come mealtimes.
Finally got on top of the weeds in the vegetable garden. Have had my first ever handful of raspberries grown in my own patch. There have been strawberries, too, and alpine strawberries where every fourth one tastes incredible. Wish I knew how to get them all to get that sherbety zing and fantastic aroma.
It’s cherry season. And Mary’s cherries from just up the road rate as good as any I’ve had. My hands look like a faith healer’s as I pit them for my son, and the road up to the house must be getting lined with stones as I spit them out the car window. Cherries astound me. They’ve defied so many attempts to get them to grow over a longer season, so there’s still this excited wait until the local signs go out for farm-gate sales. Then this joyous edible celebration of summer; we know the cherries will only last a month or a little more. It’s eating with the season, which supermarkets have had us try to forget, with everything available all year and fruit flown in from everywhere.
I read an interesting quote the other day where a farmer said that the fresh fruit and vegetable market was all about shelf-life and appearances. Perhaps he’s talking about the stuff he sells, not the stuff he’d like to eat.
Tasting a cherry that has travelled only as far as I carry it, on the day it was picked, is something else entirely.
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20 Jan 2011 20:14 AEST
From:
I've never left a comment anywhere before...
I'm fascinated by the journey you've made and the things you've tasted and the people you've met... I grew up in north west NSW, and I came straight to Sydney after high school and I've been living and working in the city since uni. Far to many years of dreaming on the quiet country. It's such a hard city... And I understand your desire to get out and live on the land. I think this year's my year too. You're a very switched on gentleman Matthew.
19 Jan 2011 16:21 AEST
From:
Gourmet Farmer
Good afternoon Matthew, Like so many others, I really enjoy your show. My home town is Young, the cherry capital of australia, and you are right about the cherries. As children, we picked cherries for about 10 cents a kilo. One for our gob, and one for the cut down kero container, the owner of the orchard provided. Nothing like a big fat juicy black cherry, fresh from the tree. Goodness knows how much poison we ate with the fruit !. No organic farms back then. All the best !
18 Jan 2011 8:36 AEST
From: QLD
Heratige apples
Matthew What varieties of apple do you grow? I am looking at getting some from Bob Magnus and am not sure which ones to get.
16 Jan 2011 9:52 AEST
From:
Life is a Jersey
So glad to hear you have another Cow. Once you have had a Jersey life is not complete without one. Our old girl had her last calf last July, assuming I can stop her crawling out through the fence to the bull and we have kept her now 6 month old calf to become mum's replacement - we called her Maggie.
14 Jan 2011 20:55 AEST
From:
Hi Matthew
Hi Matthew. We are planning a trip down to tassie in the middle of March this year for his birthday. He is such a huge fan of your show! We dream of coming to Tassie to live the lifestyle you have... We watch your show every week & want to explore the Huon Valley whilst visiting. I know it is a huge favour to ask, but i would love to surpise him & meet you. Is there any chance of catching up whilst we are down that way? My email address is sky-@live.com.au. Hope to hear from you! Thanks, Sky
14 Jan 2011 18:20 AEST
From:
Homegrown
There is nothing as satisifing as growing your own fruit and vegetables. The flavour is out of this world. I don't have a big enough block for larger farm animals but have a few chooks for the eggs and pest control. Watching your program has made me think I'm living in the wrong state and will be planning a trip down to see for myself if its for me. Keep up the great work.
14 Jan 2011 10:19 AEST
From:
Love the show
Hi Matthew, Really enjoying your show. Our family all watch it together, including my teenage sons, and love it. You bring a warmth and a humblesness to your show that makes my husband think he knows you, "He seems like an old friend" and my 14 year old walking out on the Anthony Bourdain show calling him a stuck up douche who loves himself. Your sidekicks are cool too.
13 Jan 2011 20:45 AEST
From:
How is it actually going
I've watched you on that show you did where you removed Mat Moran's "star or hat or whetever it was" and gave Luke Nguyen a "star or hat" at the Red Lantern, he seems to be doing alright for himself these days. I am watching your show and I'm thinking Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall...Escape to River Cottage, is that what you were aiming for?
13 Jan 2011 2:20 AEST
From:
Published 'Growing a Farmer' interview with Kurt Timmermeister this morning
Matthew You might find echoes of your experience in 'Growing a Farmer' , a new book by former Seattle restaurateur turned farmer and cheesemaker on Vashon Island. I just published my interview with Kurt http://www.sergetheconcierge.com/2011/01/amazing-bees-big-on-cheese-growing-a-farmer-interview-with-kurt-timmermeister-.html Serge 'The French Guy from New Jersey'
12 Jan 2011 20:53 AEST
From: lucaston
Happy New Year
I would have to agree with you about the cherries, we are surrounded by them, its like going to the lolly shop when i come home and drop in for another bag of them. You mention Alpine Strawberries, i have some wierd looking plants that look like strawberry leaves but the fruit is funny looking, it looks like a fake strawberry and inside it is white - is that an Alpine Strawberry??
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About this Blog
Ever wondered what it’d be like to leave a cushy city job and set up a small farm without any experience of rural life? Join Matthew Evans as he adjusts from being a restaurant critic to learning exactly where his food is coming from, on a farmlet in Tasmania’s beautiful Huon Valley.
Matthew Evans was once trained as a chef, before crossing to the dark side of the industry and becoming a restaurant reviewer. After five years and 2,000 restaurant meals as the chief reviewer for The Sydney Morning Herald, Matthew realised that chefs don’t have the best produce in the land, normal people who live close to the land do. So he moved to Tasmania, to a small patch of earth where he’s raising pigs and sheep, milking a cow and waiting for his chickens to start laying.
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