Funday - Dogs With A Mission!

For our Funday today, I thought we'd celebrate some very special dogs - Guide Dogs!  I've found a selection of gorgeous, clever ads.  Whether they're humorous or serious, they all have a very important message.

I hope you enjoy spending some time with these wonderful animals!

CATWALK - Adventures of Crystal and the Baby Possum!

Picture No. 1

I'm so delighted to bring a very unusual rescue story to the CATWALK today!

Towards the end of spring last year, we had a severe windstorm that affected many areas of Victoria.  This is the experience our friend, Norm, shared with us after the gales...

"I was out for a walk around 7:30am with our miniature poodles, Crystal & Pearl.  They were sniffing everything as usual when a baby ringtail possum peeked out from under a bush - then tentatively approached.

Crystal leaned forward to gently sniff the arrival.  That presented her ear tresses as an excellent ladder and the little possum climbed to the top of her head then onto her back.  Poor Crystal was initially concerned but I settled her down and she decided her unexpected passenger was acceptable.  The possum bub seemed much happier riding around than on the ground and I suspect Crystal's litters of pups predisposed her to accepting something small hanging on. 

Mother Possum was nowhere to be seen.  I guess the little possum fell off his transport during the night in the high winds.  He appeared to be unhurt and in excellent health and was collected by a Wildlife Rescue person later in the day."

Anyone got a caption they'd like to share for any of these gorgeous pics?

Picture No. 2

Picture No.3

Picture No. 4

Lemons and After the Bushfire

Glenn looking at the fallen trees.  Where to start!

You know the old saying, if life hands you lemons, make lemonade. Such a great philosophy to find a positive in a less than positive situation.

In the wake of the bushfire we had a lot of our trees down because they'd been weakened by the burn.

So we spoke to friends, who spoke to friends who were in the process of organising a chainsaw course.  

And what do you need for a chainsaw course? Lots of wood to practise on!

And guess what we've got?!  Lots and lots and LOTS of wood to practise on!

The course was held last weekend and the weather was kind to us being a pleasant, low 20s both days (unlike today which is a sweltering 38 at the moment... but I'm trying hard not to think about that!)

Anyway, our back paddock was a mini-tent city as the participants set up an impromptu camping ground for the weekend.

And during the day, there was the gentle buzz of chainsaws as a dozen "students" practised their cuts...

• vertical cuts
• horizontal cuts
• standard cuts across the grain of the wood, 
• ripping cuts along the grain of the wood
• plunge cuts
• reducing cuts

Standard cuts and plunge cuts...

... close up of the plunge cut practise...

... and I couldn't resist a picture through the plunge cut tunnel.

A pile of wood from the ripping cut.

And at the end of the course, the students went away with lots of knowledge and lots of practice.

And we had a great start on converting the trees down in the paddock into firewood for winter!

Ready for winter!

Win-win, I say!

So have you had an occasion where you've "made lemonade" from something that's less than positive? 

And while I'm here, I thought I'd share some random pictures from around the place.  It's really fascinating to see what plants are coming back after their scorching experience.

My camellia is sprouting! Green shoots among the scorched leaves.

Tender eucalypt sprouts on a blackened trunk.

A foggy morning and the burnt shell of the horse float.

The petunias are still going strong!

Bushfire Aftermath

Everything changed at our place on Saturday 19th December.  It was a brutally hot day, with a fierce north wind, severe fire danger. A total fire ban.

About 2.30pm, a fire had started in a road just to the west of our place. It swept to the south of us and a reasonable distance away.  For a while it looked like it was going to miss us.

But it didn’t.

At around 5pm, the wind shifted to a westerly and then a south westerly and the front roared our way heralding its approach with a vanguard of noise and smoke, embers and spotfires.

The power went out

We had a small window of opportunity to evacuate with the fire crews - we took it.

And waited with the car just under a kilometre away to see what would happen next. The wind changed again and the fire veered back onto the southerly track.

The front had passed on to wreak its ruthless havoc on other properties leaving us on a flank.

We couldn’t get back home via the road because of the risk from fire weakened trees.  But we were able to travel over blackened ground in the paddocks next door to our place.  Our house was still standing!  We started working to put out the spot fires, starting with those closest and working out.

We lost the sheds and everything in them.  But the two of us and our house were still standing – the house, a little scorched, and us, a little traumatised!

We know we were very, very fortunate! 

There’s a lot of work to be done. But, thanks to help from friends, we’ve made real progress with clearing up. 

Everything about the property is different, stripped bare. But that’s slowly changing too.

It’s hard to believe this was just over 6 weeks ago now and Nature has moved on!  Green shoots are bursting through blackened tree trunks.  In the herb garden, the sage and oregano and thyme are sending up tender green leaves.

Hot spots after the fire front had gone

A couple of days later: Stark and bare... but still rather beautiful.

The hakea enjoyed its toasting ...

...as did the protea.

An odd "treasure" we found in the remains of the shed.  This used to be a brass padlock.

A friend gave us a punnet of petunias.  They're a splash of colour in the sepia!

Vindaloo To Go

I thought I'd share a new favourite recipe!  I've been looking at vegetarian recipes and especially those with chickpeas (also known as garbanzo beans) because they're full of goodness and they come in convenient, easy to transport, tins!  After a bit of combing through recipes online and in books and then a little adapting I've come up with this chickpea and vegetable semi-vindaloo!

We're on the road at the moment and I've just made this in the caravan.  The great thing about vegetarian cooking is that the clean up is easier.

This is us on the banks of the Lake Cargelligo Weir

So here's the recipe for...

Chickpea and Vegetable Semi-Vindaloo

Ingredients 

• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil or butter
• 2 heaped dessert spoons of crushed ginger (or less if you don't want it too hot!)
• 1 heaped teaspoon of crushed garlic
• 3 tablespoons curry powder(again add a little less if you prefer)
• 1 x 140gm tin tomato paste
• 1 x 400ml tin coconut milk
• 1 cup vegetable broth – (a teaspoon of vegemite dissolved in warm water works here too)
• 1/2 head cauliflower, cut into florets
• 2 or 3 carrots, peeled and sliced
• 500gm diced pumpkin
• 2 x 400gm tin chickpeas, drained and rinsed
• 250 gm mushrooms, diced
• Salt and pepper as needed

Prepared vegetables

 

Directions

1. Heat the vegetable oil/butter in a large heavy-bottomed pot over medium-high heat. Stir in the ginger and garlic. Saute 2 minutes.
2. Stir in the curry powder and heat for about 1 minute
3. Add the vegetable broth/vegemite and stir until any lumps have gone
4. Add tomato paste and again stir until smooth
5. Stir in the coconut milk.
6. Add all the fresh vegetables, mushrooms and chickpeas and stir.
7. Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until the vegetables are tender stirring occasionally.  (I like it when the pumpkin is slightly overcooked and it starting to become part of the sauce.)
8. Serve with rice or noodles or on its own as the fancy takes you!

Ready to serve

I'll have mine with noodles, thanks!

And a slice of freshly baked bread!

Got any favourite spicy dishes or meals cooked with chickpeas you'd like to share?

Winter Warmers

Frost whiskers on bracken

We've had frosts and hail and sleet!  

The goose-feather doona and my woolies and thermals are out.

The fire is lit and making the place all lovely and cosy!

Broken glass?  No, indeed! Ice from a puddle!

It's winter and I love it!  It's soup season.

One of our favourites is chicken noodle soup so I thought I'd share the recipe for the Chez Archer Chicken Noodle Soup.

Stock:

• I make my own because the shop-bought ones often have corn or maize hidden in the ingredients as "dehydrated/hydrolysed vegetable protein"

• about 2 kg of chicken with bones because stock made with bones has all the great immune boosting goodness. - drumsticks are good.
• garlic - at least 3 cloves - crushed
• ginger - a good 2" grated
  .
• Simmer until the chicken is cooked.
• Drain through a sieve.
• de-bone (bones to the freezer for a batch of bone broth later)
• cooked chicken (can use some in the soup and the rest for a meal)
• cool the stock overnight in the fridge and discard the fat off the surface.

 The Soup:

Vegetables ready to add

• 4 cups of chicken stock
• 1 medium to large carrot - grated
• 1 stalk of celery - thinly sliced
• a handful of snow peas - chopped
• half a red capsicum - chopped
• more garlic - crushed clove (because that's good for winter ills too!)
• and noodles (I use Wokka Shelf Fresh Singapore Style noodles)
• salt and pepper to taste
  .
• saute garlic in a little oil
• add stock
• add prepared vegetables and noodles 
• heat through until the vegetables are lightly cooked - we like them to be slightly crunchy still rather than cooked to limpness.

Serve with toast soldiers!  We had it last night with toast soldiers made for leftover homemade pumpkin bread!  

Between the bread and the soup we got our recommended five daily servings of vegetables!

Are you a soup fan?  What's your favourite?
.

Murphy's Law Of Having A Visitor

So, I'm a super excited little LoveCat because I've just had lovely Rachel Bailey to stay at Chez Archer for a night!

Rachel and me!

And Murphy's Law being what it is, a few big things that could go wrong before Rachel's arrival, did go wrong!

• Firstly, we're renovating!  The painting is finished but the carpet hasn't arrived as hoped to make the room as lovely as I wanted it to be. (Still hasn't arrived but that's another story!)  So we moved all the tools and paint cans and brushes out, put up the curtains, rolled out a carpet square and moved a bed in!

• Secondly, on the morning Rachel was to arrive, the power went out!

• One minute everything was working and then next, nothing.  And we're on tankwater so no power, no water!  Argh!  We investigated.  The neighbours still had power and we realised all our lights were working so the problem was at our house. The safety switch was tripped and wouldn't re-set. We turned off every appliance in the house - then turned them on, one by one. And finally found the culprit.  The dear old electric jug had boiled its last kettleful.

• All I can say is, YAY for safety switches and if you haven't got one, you should seriously think about having one installed.

• And thirdly, and if I might modestly say, most disastrously, I picked Rachel up at the airport.  Actually, picking Rachel up was great - it was what came after the pick up that was bad.  I got totally, utterly, and comprehensively LOST leaving the airport. It was... bad!

Even Google Maps on my phone couldn't help me!

• I had to 'phone a friend' and luckily, Mr Archer was home and able to be a remote GPS for me.

Anyway, I'm so pleased to say that I got Rachel safely back to our place for the evening and one sleep and then popped her on the bus the next morning for the next stage of her journey.

Here we are enjoying our morning cup of Earl Grey tea!

So has Murphy and his Law of maximum obstacles affected you lately?  I'd love to hear! How do you react to challenges?  Do you welcome them or do you prefer smooth sailing?  

A CakeWalk with Sharon Archer

I changed blogging days with Bronwyn Jameson who must have had baked delicacies on her mind because she put Sharon Archer/CakeWalk into the roster instead of CatWalk!  And since I've definitely had baked delicacies on my mind, I took it as an omen!

We went camping with a group of friends on the banks of the Murray River a couple of weekends ago...

This is our camp site!

... and Carol brought a flourless orange cake to share.  It was TO-DIE-FOR delicious! 

This recipe has been passed from friend to friend and now I have it, too!  Thanks, Carol!

I doubled the recipe because we've got visitors coming at the weekend and I've got a course on as well, so I'm planning ahead.

So this is the recipe...

Flourless Orange Dessert Cake  
(NB this has semolina in it so is not gluten-free)

• 4 medium oranges
• 370 gms butter
• 2 cups caster sugar (unless you run out like I did, in which case 1 1/2 cup caster and 1/2 cup brown)
• 6 eggs
• 1 cup semolina
• 2 cups almond meal
• 2 teaspoons baking powder

Syrup

• 1 cup brown sugar (because I'd run out of caster sugar -see above!)
• 2/3 cup reserved "water' from cooking the oranges
• As soon as the cakes are out of the oven, heat sugar and "water" in saucepan until the sugar is dissolved.

 Method

• Coarsely chop whole oranges (remove seeds) and place in a large microwave bowl. Cover with boiling water. 
• Cook in microwave for 10+ minutes on high until orange skins are tender. (The kitchen smelled divine while these were cooking!)

• Cool, drain oranges. Reserve the "water' for the syrup.
• Blend until smooth.

• Prepare 2 x 22cm cake pans - grease and cover base with baking paper. (My cake pans were slightly smaller so I prepared a 6-muffin tray as well)
• Heat oven to about 160 degrees C
• In a bowl, cream butter and sugar.
• Add eggs one at a time and beat until combined.
• Mix in dry ingredients and orange puree.
• Pour mixture into prepared cake pans. (I got a little carried away with beating in the eggs so I had to spoon my mixture into the pans!)

• Cook cakes for 1 hour (I did the muffins tray for 35 minutes)
• Stand for 5 minutes then turn out on to a rack.
• Pour hot syrup over hot cakes.

Do you like the caption on the tea-towel?  I bought it as a gift for someone because it really tickled me... but then I wondered if it could be taken the wrong way so I kept it.  If you'd seen the kitchen when I finished cooking you'd know how very appropriate this tea towel is for me!

The little muffins!

Slices of heaven!

I was thinking about this and wondered if you could use polenta instead of semolina if you wanted to make a gluten-free version of this cake.  Any thoughts? 


So now I'm off to make a cuppa and have an early morning tea! 

Reflections on Post-Storm Renovations

We're having an interesting couple of months at Chez Archer and I've realised:

• Problems don't just come in groups of three.  They'll arrive in any darned number they like and probably at the least convenient time!
• and there really is a silver lining to some of them!  Not all, but some!

So a few weeks ago we had a big storm - nope, make that a BIG BIG storm!  It was centred right over our area and lightning and thunder were happening almost simultaneously. Frighteningly loud!

The gathering clouds

The temperature plummeted and we had a huge hail dump...

Almost looked like snow!

... and then the rain started.  Hail stones had clogged the gutters so the water had nowhere to go...

Overflowing gutters

So I'm running around taking photos (as you do!) when I found the water was coming into the house.  Back flowing from the gutters.

I put the camera down and started running around with buckets and towels.

The carpet was sodden.  And it's very very old so it got unpleasantly stinky as it was drying out.  We decided it needs replacing... actually it needed replacing 20 years ago when we moved here but we'd put it off and somehow time just trickled on.

It seemed silly to get new carpets without painting... and it seemed silly to paint without:

1. replacing the ghastly laminated ply on two walls.  And when that came off we saw the walls needed insulation and there were all sorts of interesting cracks that needed filling!
2. and stripping the equally ghastly wallpaper off the other walls.

The carpet's so old it has wrinkles!

This is Bob lounging about in the paddock while we worked

Now the new carpet has been ordered - it's a pale nutmeg colour called "burnt oak".  I hope we like a whole room of it as much as we liked the 1' by 1' sample square!

We're now mid renovation and I'm looking forward to seeing the end result. 

So that's our silver lining from the big storm.  

• The old carpet, which has always been pretty gross, is finally going to be replaced.
• The tired old walls are going to be gleaming under a lovely fresh coat of paint.

What "silver linings" have you found lately?  Do you enjoy renovations? And if you do enjoy them, please share your philosophy because I confess I am not a fan so any renovation "zen" would be most welcome!