It’s hard to remember sometimes that December is only the first month of Summer. The growing season has taken her sweet damn time to get to this point, and our expectations of settled weather are always higher than the reality. Mother Nature has no regard for our imported northern hemisphere traditions, and it’s almost part […]
This month on The Food Farm is more of a hurtle towards summer than a gentle meander through spring. November seems awfully close to the end of the year, and that crazy deadline that is Christmas. Locally we use Show Weekend (2nd weekend of November) as the supposed ‘end of the frost season’ measuring stick, […]
Last week I went to a fascinating evening created by wine writer Jo Burzynska. It was about wine and the effect sound has on what we taste. I have to admit to being a cynic at the beginning of the evening, but the same wines really did taste different depending on the type of music […]
I’m surrounded by constant reminders this week about how fragile life is. It’s clung to rather than embraced. There is no ‘summertime, and the living is easy’ happening here yet . As another southerly front approaches you can almost hear us collectively draw breath and hold it. As it passes we exhale again. I’m looking […]
One of a good winemaker’s most impressive skills is to look at the components of a wine and work out which barrels will come together in the bottle for great future drinking. There’s always a little leap of faith, a letting go of the science and believing in the magic for a moment. Growing food […]
I think pruning is cathartic. Or it may be just a need to assign more meaning to something which requires dedicated attention and a long amount of time. I’m not sure really. I would just say that there is something about cutting off what has gone before, and leaving behind the hope and promise of […]
When you live in the country there’s something about stepping out onto a busy street in the middle of a big city. It makes me suck in my breath, inhaling life, elevating me to another level of alertness. I have to move quickly to avoid being in the way, change my pace and rhythm […]
My son rushed inside a few days ago with the first duck egg of the season. There was great celebration on The Food Farm, not just because it was a magic find (ducks are notorious for laying on the go, and at this time of year they are free-ranging the property). The cause for excitement […]
Today is not Halloween. It may be All Hallow’s Eve (or Samhain) on the other side of the world- the celebration of death (particularly of the growing season), but you literally couldn’t get further away from that here. Instead, tomorrow (November 1st) is Beltane in New Zealand. This is a celebration of flowering, fertility, or […]
I’ve been out there for 5 mornings in a row. I’ve got down on my hands and knees, even in the rain, so I can put my head at the same level as the earth in the hope of its appearance. But there is nothing. More than any other season spring is a time of […]
