In my kitchen ~ April 2015

It's that time again, time for In my kitchen where I hook up with 

Celia from Fig Jam and Lime cordial along with hundreds of other food obsessed bloggers from around the world.  If you love to see what's in other peoples kitchens, pop over to Celia's blog and get stalking!

Lots of things have been happening in my kitchen this month.  April would have to be my favourite month of the year - crisp mornings, sunny days with some rain and cold nights and lots of produce coming in to be made into treasures.  So here we go.....

Our girls have been laying the most beautiful eggs, well 2 are and 2 aren't as far as we can tell.  It's like Easter everyday at our place!!

I must admit, I was a little shy at eating our eggs for about....5 minutes, but then I poached them and I have never had such perfectly poached eggs, I almost cried!  

We have been letting the girls out to free range most afternoons and you can see here our cat Coco keeping an eye on them....not long after this photo was taken the cat was attacked by the chooks!!  Phew, I was a bit scared Coco might attack them but no, she knows where she is on the pecking order now.  I have to keep a good eye on these girls as they could whip through a pot of rocket in seconds flat!!  We love sitting and watching them, funny little entertainers they are.

I've been pickling beetroots but I used a new method to preserve them this year.  Mr. GW and I are always trying to shorten our preserving ways if we can without ruining the end product and this way worked a treat.  I peeled and quartered the beetroots, put them into the jars raw and made up the pickle liquid and poured it over them, adding some mint and peppercorns.  

I then placed the jars - I used Hoyts pickled chilli jars that are 430g size - them into a big pot of cold water and let it come up to the boil.  Simmer for 15 minutes and then drain off water and let them cool.  So much less mucking around and they are beautifully tender.

I keep 2 big pots of basil along the back porch and they thrive there, protected by the wind and in sun for most of the day.  Sadly they are coming to an end so I've been try to preserve them in different ways.  Blitzing them with some nuts, in this case macadamia & walnuts, with extra virgin olive oil to make a mock pesto lasts for ages as long as you keep the pesto covered in oil in the jar you put it into.  

Lots of Parsley and basil garlic butter for the freezer for later.  These parsley stalks will be frozen to make stock another day.  I love adding a slice to fry prawns, to scramble eggs, on top of a steak, or to make a potato heavenly...the options are endless really.

Now the nights are colder, it's perfect red wine weather :)

I've been reading this Ottolenghi cook book over my breakfast.  I just love his use of fresh ingredients - very inspiring.

I was sent these darling little earrings from a friend - they are little tomatoes - aren't they just sweet!

We've been playing uno in our kitchen and let me tell you that Miss 8 yr old is a very cunning player!!

I've been making these baked cauliflower flowerettes (recipe here) and used some of the hundreds of zucchini that are still coming in - I also added chilli to this recipe.

And lastly in my kitchen, we have made a batch of apple cider to use up our poor apples that have been attacked by codling moth this year....never fear though, the chickens should have them cleaned up for next years blooms.

This bad brew takes around 45 days.  It's just apple juice, sugar and some brewers yeast we got for a few $$'s off the internet.....can hardly wait to see how it turns out.

What's been happening in your kitchen? If you want to leave me a comment I'll pop over and check out what you have been up to this month.

Ciao, Jan x