out back tania: January 2013

Sunday, January 27, 2013

Around Home

Gifted

An old stand.

Not sure what to do with this yet.

Any ideas?

Made in 1923 by the writing scribbled in pencil on the bottom

Celebrating

Australia day

Cleaning

The front entrance

following Becci's zone challenge over at the Down to Earth Forum

Come on over and join in the fun :)

Making

smoothies,

from orange juice, yoghurt banana, pineapple and mango...

using my vintage blender.

Reading

One thousand gifts by Ann Voskamp

You can see here beautiful blog here

Doing...

Keeping hubby busy.

Putting wooden flooring in the pantry...

Making a plant box for an old wheelbarrow...

Adding legs to an old bath ready for the garden,

we are going to plant potatoes in there...

Garden

I have planted out some new zucchini plants.

Picking

Nectarines, eggplant, potatoes, capsicum, apple cucumbers, green cucumber and rhubarb, and the tiniest tomato.

The garden is loving this cooler weather.

Baking

Anzac Biscuits

These ones are the chewy kind.

INGREDIENTS

1 cup (150g) plain flour

1 cup (90g) rolled oats

1 cup (85g) desiccated coconut

3/4 cup (155g) brown sugar

125g butter

2 tbs golden syrup

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

2 tbs water

Method

Preheat the oven to 160°C. Line two

baking trays with non-stick baking

paper. Sift the flour into a large bowl.

Stir in the oats, coconut and brown

sugar.

Put the butter, golden syrup and 2

tbs water in a small saucepan. Stir

over a medium heat until melted. Stir

in the bicarbonate of soda.

Pour the butter mixture into the flour

mixture and stir until combined.

Roll level tablespoons of mixture into

balls. Place on the trays, about 5cm

apart.

Press with a fork to flatten slightly. Bake for

10 minutes or until golden brown.

Set aside on trays for 5 minutes, then transfer

to a wire rack so they cool completely.

Welcome to my new followers, I am so glad to

have you here.

Three hundred followers, WOW!

What have you been doing? And what is the

weather like where you live?

xTania

Saturday, January 26, 2013

HAPPY AUSTRALIA DAY!!

From Our House to Yours :)

Lamingtons...

LAMINGTONS

125gms butter (1/2stick or 4oz)

125gms sugar (1/2 cup)

1/4 teaspoon vanilla essence

2 eggs

250gms self raising flour (2 cups)

pinch salt

1/2 cup milk

Chocolate Icing:

250 gms icing sugar (2cups)

6-8 level teaspoons cocoa

1 teaspoon butter

few drops of vanilla essence

desiccated coconut for coating

Beat butter and sugar until creamy. Add vanilla. Add eggs one at a time and beat well. Sift flour and salt together. Add flour alternately with milk to the mixture. Turn into a greased and floured lamington tin. Bake in a moderate oven (180 -200C) (350 - 400F) for 30 minutes. Allow to cool. Cut into squares.

Icing: Sift icing sugar into a bowl. Blend in cocoa with a little boiling water, add a few drops of vanilla essence. Add butter, mix well, adding a little more boiling water if necessary, until icing is smooth. Dip each cake into icing and then roll in coconut. Set aside until firm.

(I freeze the cake part, that makes it easier for adding the icing)

Have a great day!

xTania

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Scorched

After days and days of relentless hot weather,

here are the results.

No words needed...

On the upside, there are some plants doing okay

like this Japanese eggplant. It seems to love this weather.

Rock melon.

Watermelon, although some of the leaves are a little crisp.

The promise from the Bureau of Meteorology is that the worst of the heat is over, we shouldn't experience any more such heat this Summer. No promise of rain though. I cant remember the last time we had a decent rain. Do I plant some more veggies, that is the question?

Sorry to be so long winded between posts, but my old laptop finally gave up the ghost. I have nice new red one, but the new technology is getting too much for this old girl. It is taking me ages to work my way around the new programs.

How did your garden fair in the hot weather? Did you get some rain?

xTania

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Hot Weather Breaking Records

(picture sourced via facebook)

This photo was taken outside the local newspaper office in Port Augusta last Friday when the temperature reached 51C (123.8F)

(Picture sourced via facebook)

The records are breaking with a heatwave in Australia. On Monday the average temperature for the whole of Australia was 40.33C (104.59F)

Where we are located our temperature on Monday reached 49C (120.2F).

I am loving my weather station :)

The heat has started a lot of bush fires around the country with the worst being in Tasmania...images here

Thankfully we have a bit of a cool change today, but it will be short lived, as tomorrow it starts to heat up again!

So as you can guess there is not much happening around here, just staying cool, and keeping the garden and chickens well watered in this heat. Surprisingly the garden is doing okay :)

xTania