Struan Farm

Plum Crostada

At this time of the year most people have plums coming out of their ears, and are looking to deploy them or give them away. Unfortunately this is not the case for us at Struan Farm just yet, the plum trees we've planted in our orchard have yet to fruit, and the one heirloom plum tree we have in our old orchard was stripped of fruit by marauding birds before we could get to it.

So I actually had to BUY fruit to try out this recipe for a "Plum Crostada with Walnuts and Star Anise."

 

It was worth the expenditure! Soft sweet crust, very easy to make. And it lasted three nights for us over the weekend. The recipe calls for ground star anise, an ingredient I hadn't seen or used before. I ended up grinding whole star anise in my mortar and pestle, which worked fine. Caster sugar, ground walnuts, ground star anise, ginger and clovers are sprinkled on the bottom of the pastry and on top of the fruit after it's laid out in rows. The edges of the pastry are folded over the fruit in a rectangle, then brushed with milk. Simple and seasonal.

Served with a bit of mascarpone whipped with brown sugar.

Piopio's Pink Post Office

The old post office building in Piopio, right along the main street in our little village, has recently undergone a much needed restoration and facelift thanks to new owners.

It was built circa 1910, and at one time operated as the town's post office, telephone exchange, and bank. Actual operators manned the telephone exchange, connecting the various party lines (Struan Farm was "seven line") and placing long distance calls.

The building has beautiful native timber floors, great bones, and a huge walnut tree in the backyard. So it's great to see it reincarnated as "The Old Piopio Post Office Gallery."

The Gallery offers an interesting mix of original art, hand crafted jewelry, collectibles and pottery, something for everyone. It's a great addition to the village and definitely worth a visit!

p.s. I might have called it "The Pink Post Office" for the fun factor alone....

The Magic of the Tawas

The tawa grove at Struan Farm has always been one of my favorite places at the farm. I love the trees, they are rather majestic and have lots of character, with interesting undulating trunks and roots.

Of course the grove is now home to our residents gnomes, but at this time of the year scores of wood pigeons converge to eat the fruit. We watch them swooping in from the deck of our house. At any time there might be five-six up in the trees, hanging out patiently on limbs under the cool canopy or eating away.

The grove is beside one of our two QE II Trust protected bush reserves. We find ourselves wanting to extend the bush area to incorporate these tawas too, have effectively already done so by fencing out the stock to protect the trees.

Warm Apple Salad

I came across an interesting recipe for a "Warm Apple Salad with Honey, Pecans & Thyme" in the current issue of NZ House & Garden magazine (March). As previously reported, we've got greens coming out of our ears in the veggie garden at Struan Farm, along with some apples from our orchard, so the planets were seemingly aligned on this one.

 

Yep, they were. The salad was excellent! Sliced apples and pecans are cooked until tender in a small amount of butter, then a bit of red wine vinegar, neutral oil, honey and fresh thyme are added to the pan. Once everything is warmed through, it is poured over greens (mesclun and rocket/arugula) and served immediately.

Greens, Greens, & More Greens

At one point a few months ago I was worried about not having enough fresh salad greens in the veggie gardens at Struan Farm, they couldn't grow fast enough for me.

 

Clearly nothing to worry about now! I am distributing fresh, organic greens nightly to our farmstay guests as well, along with tomatoes, zucchini and radishes. Works for everyone, plus nothing is going to waste. I've just planted some winter varieties to test those out next.