The Ultimate Coconut Ice Recipe

This was a firm favourite growing up and I have memories of Mum making this recipe in triple batches and more for Christmas giving and for school fetes. It is not the average run of the mill coconut ice recipe, You'll want to pin this one. I know, because Mum lost the recipe about 30 years ago and it has been the subject of regular hunting ever since. She vaguely recalled the ingredients but not the quantities and every likely book she saw in an op-shop had us checking indexes and suffering endless disappointments. 

At last! The recipe is found. In an old school recipe compilation from her old home town in outback Queensland (with contribution credit to a relative of hers) I give you the ultimate Coconut Ice recipe, that it may never be lost again!

Be warned though, it is seriously divine and you will NOT stop at two pieces....

Creamy Coconut Ice

1lb icing sugar

8oz desiccated coconut

1 teas vanilla

2 egg whites

4 oz butter

pink food colouring

Mix sifted icing sugar and coconut in a bowl. Pour on the slightly beaten egg whites and vanilla.

Melt butter over a gentle heat until barely warm, not hot, test temperature with your finger tips. 

Pour onto the ingredients in the bowl and mix thoroughly.

Press half the mixture into a cake tin 7" square or similar.

Add just a couple of drops of pink colouring to make a pretty colour and press this onto the white layer. Pop into the fridge and allow to get quite cool and set before cutting into squares.

Looks perfectly ducky in cellophane bags tied with ribbon and is much more sumptuous than the usual recipes found in old cook books.

Another Door Opens

As we close the door on 2016, here is a look back at the year that was for Suburban Jubilee.

If I had to sum up the year in a few words, it would have to be,

"Before And After"

Our year was mostly about renovation and they proved to be popular posts.
(Before and After - Front Room)
(Before and After - Hallway)

Not the least of which was the new kitchen finally going in at the beginning of the year just in time for the big preserving season.

We kicked some goals outside too with a major shed renovation

Saving a fortune and gaining some much needed storage space.

We built a new chook yard and a poly-tunnel.

And the gardeners loved our before and after wrap up of 12 months in the garden.

Lots of preserving from our new hedgerow; quinces, elderflowers/berries and plums.

Favourite recipes were

The (sooo easy) Date Slice from our Yarn Tour 2016

It was a very, very wet year.

We flooded

TWICE!

But no real damage done. Our dear neighbours have been heroes accommodating some of our equipment in their shed when the waters rose and we can't thank them enough. 

We lost three of our old chooks in the flood but we are working on renewing the flock. Izaac and I have purchased a couple of Black Australorp roosters who are currently in quarantine and will shortly join our girls in the hopes of some new blood. But that's a story for the new year.

Lots of knitting....

Back into soap making....

A couple of Kidney Australia fund raisers.

Lot's of cooking and entertaining.

Old school friends and family visited from the Mainland making it a very special year in the new house.

Getting the work/life balance just right!

We've learnt so much this year and embraced our seasonal life in a rural setting.

I've been grateful to the beautiful people of Campbell Town and the way they have opened their arms and welcomed us in. When pesky work permits, I am a member of the local gardening group and the singing group. We have started to forge lots of lovely friendships.

(view from the kitchen window)

Our year has been all we could have hoped for and we feel Blessed.

As we open the door on another year and another chapter,

we wish you a prosperous and healthy New Year.

Thanks for your support and friendship throughout the year.

Love T.

The Bullock Team

Yesterday we travelled about 30 mins south to Oatlands in the southern midlands for an historic skills day. The bullock team was definitely a highlight for everyone. The team were part of a reenactment of taking wool bales to sale and came right up the main street.

There were people everywhere but quite by accident I took these two photos that collage together almost perfectly! There was a major frost in the morning and the temperatures were below zero but as always, a brilliant and dazzling day followed. 

These bullocks are trained by Brian Fish, this guy in front is named Major and he is 18 years old. 

They are so well trained and handled and Brian has a true passion for this skill set and an obvious affection for his team. 

Many farms in the district supplied a bale of wool for the "big load" reenactment carted on this wool wagon built in the 1880s. 

The team headed up the lane to the grounds of the famous Callington Mill where there was also a wonderful display of various carting and transport memorabilia.

It is quite probable that this very passenger and mail coach went past our front door regularly back in the 1840s and until the railway saw their demise.

Another valuable piece of Tasmanian history - the cart used by Campbell Pottery of Launceston to cart clay.

Oatlands made the perfect backdrop for the display and because we arrived early with the frost thick on the ground, I managed to get lots of photos before the crowds arrived.

How's this for a piece of branding!

Made by Ransomes don't you know...of Ipswich.

A beautifully made piece of equipment, not sure, but Craig and I speculated that it may have been a rock flicker type plough.

A wonderful day with more photos to bore you with another day.

Date Slice - soooo EASY

I've had a few requests for the Date Slice that we had at morning tea on the yarn tour.

This is soooo EASY and quite a nostalgic recipe for me too. It was given to me by a fellow classmate at school, we were about 16 yrs old, and that's what she said to me,

"you'll love it and it's sooooo EASY"

so without further ado....

Sharon Ellis' Date Slice Recipe

1 cup of Self Raising flour

1 cup of coconut

1 cup of chopped dates

1/2 cup sugar

125g butter

2 tabs of milk

Pre-heat oven to moderate 180C

Mix all the dry ingredients

Melt the butter and add the milk to it

Mix the wet into the dry and spoon and press into a slice tin.

Bake for about 20-25mins. You'll know when it's ready.

My tin of choice is a long rectangular fluted edge tin with loose bottom.

Always slips right out and is easy to cut into fingers.

I've been baking this for over 30 years now and I think and smile of Sharon whenever I do. 

Lots of love x

Guest Book With A Twist

One of my family's most treasured possessions.

THE DOOR

It used to be the back door on the Granny flat at my mum's. For now it is in our new garden shed.

All through the years, we have recorded everyone's height.

Family, dogs and friends.

A guest book if you will but with a twist.

It makes me smile to see the girls growth charted year to year and fondly I think of special school friends that grew with them and recorded along side.

A tear comes to my eye when I see "Nanny 21.11.98" exactly a year bar one day before she died. Roxy, Jet and Indy the wonder dog, gone but never forgotten.

I see brothers, sisters-in-law, cousins, partners and

ME.

And now it waits for Julien and his cousins - the next generations.

True family treasures are irreplaceable and un-insurable. They are warp and weft of intangible weaves.

Racket Match

My friend Jen spotted the tennis racket over in the corner and asked if it was Margaret Court?

No, this random item is of another great lady in tennis,

Evonne Goolagong

Don't you just adore old wooden tennis rackets with their natural gut strings and soft worn leather wrapped handles.

I did tennis for such a brief time when I was about 9 years old but I was captivated by Evonne Goolagong....what a great name, I used to sing-song it over and over in my mind like it was a powerful hypnotic chant. It's the perfect rhythm for  the sound of white Volley runners slapping the red dirt court on a warm up jog before a lesson. She was really successful in the 70's and 80's and some of her records still stand.

Evonne was on TV often and I admired her open friendly face and smiling white teeth, her brown skin and cute white tennis outfits. She was never without a smile and I thought she was charming.

It was not so much her tennis ability, but rather her grace and friendliness I aspired to. 

A bit of trivia - The first laminated wooden tennis racket was made in Launceston at the Alexander Patent Racket Factory. Craig's father worked there before it closed down in 1961. They tried growing English ash at Hollybank (see this post for photos of our visit to Hollybank) but it failed to thrive.

And thus ends my story of a randomly un-packed possession, a childhood memory and it's six degrees of separation.

Game, set and match?

Racing Raindrops

My paternal grandmother was named Ellen Irene but everyone I knew called her Nell. She was small and birdlike,only about 5' tall and with a fine frame, it was hard to imagine her bearing four children. 

I have many memories, snippets of stories and shared learning but if I had to use one word to describe her it would be "Victorian". She was not at all like cuddly, comfortable Nanny (my maternal grandmother) but rather formal and of high expectations and moral fibre, but I loved her just the same.

When I was little and complaining of being bored on a wet miserable day she told me she and her brother would watch the raindrops on the window and "race" against each other. They would have competitions to see whose raindrop would reach the bottom first. I found it hard to believe because it requires a certain type of rainy day and window aspect to achieve a good race which eluded me for a long time. Once I came close on a car trip. 

A.A. Milne also wrote a poem about racing raindrops in his poem called "Waiting At The Window" from his book of poetry "Now We Are Six" first published in 1927 and wonderfully illustrated by E.H. Shepard. Presumably children were doing it well before then, I wonder do they do it now? 

I once contrived to race drops on the side of the bath by gently running water from my cupped palm, watching as rivulets ran into each other and trickled away adding to other drops making them full and heavy and in turn running down to join the bath water.

It is meditative and calming to become lost in the small world of water drops. Even now I gaze at droplet covered windows looking for my mark.

Wet wintry July days....

Rainy days remind me of Nell...

ANZAC DAY 2013

Cover of a book titled Gallipoli 1915 by Richard Reid

Thinking of

Norm, "Bronc" and Alec

We will remember them.

Legerwood (Tas)

Most months I accompany my lovely mother-in-law on the local Probus group bus trip and we found ourselves at Legerwood for lunch. This tiny little place has had knock after knock but still it's residents put on an optimistic face. Legerwood is better known now for it's Memorial Trees and the link will show you far better pictures than I could have captured plus the stories behind each man they have been carved for.

Lunch was provided by "the ladies" of Legerwood. They are a small group and always keen to raise funds for the upkeep of the carved trees. Once upon a time it was common for ladies groups to put on soup and sandwich days but councils and regulations have pretty much put paid to all that now. Our ladies served roast beef, chicken, lamb, ham, corned meat, potato and 10 different salads with home made relish and pickles. Dessert was a choice of 7 different old fashioned sweets all for $20 a head (and amazingly dear council regs no one got sick or died!)

The table was laid in white lace cloths adorned with glorious dahlias down the centre. Bright paper napkins and the most wonderful assortment of salt and pepper shakers. I felt too self conscious to take photos of it all but it was delightful and the mix and mash of old crockery made it all the more homey and inviting. They put on a little raffle with preserves as prizes and sold recipe books and post cards of their area. Their community spirit is a shining beacon. 

This area lost a lot of their young men in the wars but still it thrived as a timber town and a dairy based agriculture but they could not survive big business. Forestry and mills went to bigger concerns and even the local dairy processing plant that used to make the famous Ringarooma butter was bought out by UHT and used to make powdered milk and then later again bought out by an even bigger concern who promptly took the business out of the town. The dairy plant is now a water bottling factory for the "Love From Tassie" brand. 

What Was Your First LP?

Let's take a break from gardening and just for fun take a trip down memory lane and think back to your first record. Here in Australia on SBS there is a show called Rockwiz and as the name suggests it's a quiz show a music albeit a bit grown up and off beat. The host Julia Zemiro asks players and guests alike 

"What was the first album you bought with your own money and the first concert you ever went to?"

So let's play.....

I didn't buy Top Of The Tots with my own money but it was certainly the first album I ever "owned" and featured songs such as:

Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep, Yellow River, The Pushbike Song, Sugar Sugar and the one the one that always made me cry, Two Little Boys (you know the Rolf Harris one) Still makes me cry every time I hear it. I was about 4yrs old.

We had a few albums through childhood but this is the first one I bought with my own money.

Yep! Screamer! What can I say...

I was no way near the age of the young ladies on the front cover so had not been caught in the "pluck your eyebrows into pencil thin semi-circles" fad but I did own some powder blue and powder green eye shadow from a pantomime I was in the year before. I was 12 and I wore tops like that young lady in the extreme top left of the shot. 

Songs included;

The Love Game by John Paul Young (had no clue what that was about), Bay City Rollers (so popular at the time), Rodger Whittaker's Last Farewell...really!? What was with that? Hardly Screamer material. High Voltage by ACDC, now you're talking. I think this record also included I'm Not Lisa and that used to make me cry too. What can I say, I'm a bit of a cryer.

So Julia, thanks for asking and my first ever concert I went to was Festival Hall in Brisbane to see Australian Crawl when I was about 14. I went with a friend from school and I have to admit that I don't remember much but I had an overwhelming feeling that I was too young to be there without a parent. When they sang "Boys Light Up" everyone in the crowd held their cigarette lighters above their heads and flicked them on in unison and in time, that was pretty speccy.

What was your first album that you bought with your own money and the first concert you ever went to?

The Cake 2012

You may remember from this post, I had made the cake this year using Grandma Murray's Christmas Cake recipe. Normally Mum makes the cake and decorates it in theme every year for me (Love you Mum x)

This year we had a fun filled day doing it together....

And I learned a LOT!

This year's colours being blue and pink we thought we would try our hand at some coloured white chocolate leaves to create poinsettias.

We melted white chocolate and used colouring powders especially made for colouring chocolate and spread it over the backs of different sized lemon leaves. Because I grow the lemons, I know they are completely chemical free. I know you can also use this method with rose leaves too.

After a minute to harden in the fridge they were easily peeled away and ready for more coatings. We mixed more colour in for deeper shades.

We used a layer of white royal icing over the cake before using dollops of melted chocolate to hold the leaves in place.

This method is very easy and effective and a great little project for a day with Mum.

I will definitely use this method in the future.

I love the beautiful vein detail on the leaves too.

So that pretty much wraps up the pink and aqua Christmas here for 2012.

(Mum's cakes from 2008-2010)