Tag: crostata

Is Your Mother Sweet or Savoury?

Mothers’s Day, La Festa Della Madre, always presents a few dilemmas. To celebrate or not, to give gifts or not. The commercialisation of the day is viewed with suspicion in my family, however for grandmothers and great -grandmothers, this day often has more significance. In the past, we’ve enjoyed small family gatherings with my mother, often in the dining room of the Lomond Hotel. A table for nine, set with white linen and fresh flowers, free bubbles for the ladies, followed by a simple three course meal, it was an easier way to get together than at Christmas. My mother always gave small gifts to her three daughters on this day, recognising that we are all mothers. This year, as my mother is in residential care, visits are not yet permitted. The facility management is adhering to very strict guidelines and has partially opened up: one designated family member may visit her once a week. To err on the side of caution makes sense, given that the elderly are so susceptible to the devastating effects of this plague. And as for my immediate family, none of us are planning to break the gathering rules. I’ll miss her today, but she does enjoy a long phone chat.

Crostata di albicocche

My biggest dilemma today is this- sweet versus savoury for Mother’s day? I’ve gone with both. For my daughter, a mother of three daughters and two leggy whippets, a crostata filled with apricot jam, Crostata di Albicocche, and for my caring son, a sourdough Panmarino bread filled with baked garlic and fresh rosemary. 

Panmarino sourdough with baked garlic. A small blowout in the centre of the salty crown. Sourdough, like life, is rarely perfect. ‘There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance; pray, love, remember.’

When it comes to sweet versus savoury, I think I’d choose the garlic- laced bread. I may need to steal a slice or two of that loaf. How would you choose, dear reader? 

Buddlea in late bloom
My Mother on her 97th birthday
Buddlea, bee attracting flowers.

 

 

The Winter of Our Content

As June creeps toward winter solstice and the day’s light compresses at both ends, I consider the good fortune we have had to date. No ‘wrathful nipping cold’ or visits from ‘the secret ministry of frost’ so far. No howling winds straight from Antarctica, winds that rattle the rafters and provoke dark insanity. The Black Dog month of August is still a distant thought. No long, damp windless weeks where the fog refuses to lift and the cold wet air rising from the Diamond Creek invades old bones. No, we have been lucky so far.

Oak Trees along the driveway slowly shed their leaves.
Oak Trees along the driveway slowly shed their leaves.

I do really like many aspects of winter, the guiltless indulgence of reading in a sunny window or collecting kindling for slow combustion fires.  Or looking forward to watching a repeat of a Danish Drama Series in front of the fire, cosy hand knitted blankets strewn about for extra warmth. Big bowls of soup, puddings and cream, parsnips and swedes, slow cooked Indian black lentils, smokey chowder and good bread. Baking. There is a lot to like.

Only in winter, the little red robin visits.
Only in winter, the little Scarlet Robin visits.

Only in winter does the tiny Red- capped Robin flit about the garden, its shocking red breast startling those behind glass windows. The Petroicidae are not closely related to either the European or American robins although they do go by the familiar name of red robin.

King Parrots
King Parrots

The King Parrots have remembered us, encouraged by a handful of sunflower seeds on a ledge. Sociable and noisy, they don’t mind you getting close.

Mother Kangaroo and Joey
Mother Kangaroo and Joey

Unlike the King parrots, the kangas keep a respectable distance, even though this young grey kangaroo appears to be posing with her joey for the shot. The birds and kangaroos draw us outside. On clement winter days, when the sun lights up the back paddocks, the kangas behave just like humans and enjoy sunbaking. My winter pastie dreaming finally came to fruition, thanks to Beck who, with this link, inspired a Cornish method of making pastry. Only in winter do these deep cultural yearnings for pasties resurface, like a Cornish miner returning from the tin mines.

Vegetarian Cornish Pasties.
Vegetarian Cornish Pasties.

Cornish pasties are not supposed to contain carrots, must be D-shaped and be filled within Cornwall, according to an EU document! I’m thinking about Mr Tranquillo’s great great-grandfather who died down one of those Cornish tin mines. He probably took a pastie to work. So, bad luck Cornish cousins, mine have carrots, no meat, are filled in Australia but are crimped and taste pretty good. Winter is a time to make Crostata. There is always plenty of jam to use up. A little sweet hit goes down well after wood gathering or fencing. Crostata with Mirabella Plum Jam and Almonds Salads of young winter leaves and herbs make a refreshing contrast to heavy winter dishes.

Winter Herbs and Leaves,
Winter Herbs and Salad Leaves.

A winter’s hearth is a great spot for warming rolled out pizza dough, then eating the lovely thing by the fire.

Pizza on the Hearth
Pizza on the Hearth