The Backroad

It's always a real pleasure to have something new presented to you.
This was the case a few weeks ago when Nikki Wilson came calling with her family made wine.
For ten years grapes have grown on the north facing slopes of Cox Vineyard in the Gibbston Valley.
Production is limited to Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris and both wines show great promise.
We are pouring the Gris by the glass or if you'd like to know more you can email Doug Cox here.

Marmalade

We got a delivery of lovely Meyer lemons from Sabzi Organics last week. They've been turned into sweet and fragrant lemon-vanilla bean marmalade. We've also cooked up a batch of grapefruit marmalade. This batch seems full flavoured but not bitter, with lovely thin threads of translucent peel. I have Margarite to thank for her patient slicing. We've got jars on the counter along with some old fashioned lemonade syrup.

For a proper bitter marmalade we're waiting for the Seville oranges - they seem pretty hard to get hold of, so if anyone knows of a secret backyard Seville tree, let us know!

I'm looking forward to the citrus season - it seems perfectly timed to get us through the last tedious months of winter. At Commonsense today, and there were new season navels. Caramel oranges? Orange, feta and cress salad with the organic red onions I pickled last summer? Let's see...