Landcare and other things

While I was away and swanning about on Swanston Street,  David and Marjory were doing some land care. Last time we had a walk on Diamond Beach with Chris and Robyn, Chris identified a suitable patch of foreshore that is in need of rehabilitation, so a Landcare project has begun. Step one is to identify what plant species are there, so we know where to start.  For this, the help of local horticultural guru, Terry Wright was enlisted. Terry is a maniac photographer and has established a patch of rainforest on his land at Diamond Beach that ought to be listed on the national register of Important Sites.  http://www.flickr.com/people/blackdiamondimages/

 Marjory was recruited to help out at the first workday, and tells me she spent about three hours pulling out veldt grass. The pictorial record suggests that the other volunteers present ie David, Chris and Terry, did nothing but take photos and talk.

 Inspired by the idea of land care, David later went to our block and cleared up the broken and half buried remnants of an old plastic picnic table that had been abandoned by the previous owners. One table leg was  quite heavy and no dirt came out when it was banged up and down.

 And this is why, a poor terrified little blue tongue lizard hiding inside.  David left him there, no doubt nursing a headache.

Feeling the lack of any real gardening and looking forward to getting the house built so we can get going.  But there is some blossom on our potted finger lime.

Last night, the Bunker Restaurant just across the road had a Degustation Dinner.  Michael James the chef told me it was a menu of dishes that had formed and influenced him over his career. There were eight courses and it really was one of the best meals I have ever had in my life. Michael seems to be a bit of a mad bugger, one of those obsessively good food artisans who are driven more by the challenge of it than anything else. He confessed he hadn't slept for two nights prior to this presentation and the food was incredibly good. Matt and Trisha joined us. Of course the night was sold out weeks ago. They never advertise, it's just word of mouth.

Below is course number three, triple cooked pork belly, roast Dublin Bay prawn, crushed peas. The jus was complex, subtle. The black circle is some kind of blood sausage.  There were two more savoury courses after this one, duck breast with barley risotto and orange jus, followed by veal Zurichoise, pomme galette, fricasee wild mushroom and cep cream foam. Then a couple of desserts, coffee and petit fours.

Matt and Trisha seemed similarly impressed with the food.

We will see Matt, our architect again on Monday and hopefully bed down some more details of the project.  One thing we need to talk about is colours. Below is one of the colour schemes we developed by picking up stones at Red Head, nearby and matching them to paint samples.  We won't use this particular scheme, but you get the idea.