Take time to enjoy garden’s simple pleasures

Photo supplied.
Photo supplied.
Annabel Langbein spends 70% of her time in New Zealand - she travels four or five months of the year - and in Wanaka enjoys time in her vegetable garden.

That her Wanaka home and garden is ‘‘real'' not fabricated was a big part of her success, she believes.

‘‘It's more or less home when I'm in the country and the kids think of it as home.''The first thing she did when arriving in Wanaka was to rush out to the garden and see what there was to eat.

Then when she headed back to her Auckland home, she packed a chilly bin with her garden's bounty, finding she did not want to be without her garden in the city.

‘‘There's always a chilly bin going from one end of country to the other. I was out in the garden at 6am picking silverbeet and rocket and leeks and tarragon to bring up to Auckland.''

She described Wanaka as the family's ‘‘emotional home'' and, although it was a small space, it was a very nourishing one.

Annabel had developed coping mechanisms for all the travel she did, including travelling with the technology to listen to national radio and always taking her ‘‘good teabags'' with her.

‘‘It's how make home a home -then you don't feel like fish out water - can be anywhere.''

TAKE IT FREE RANGE: If it's not apricot season you can replace the fresh fruit with 2 cups drained stewed or canned apricots, plums, nectarines or peaches.


Annabel Langbein's Apricot Cremes

These fabulous, make-ahead chilled custards are so simple to put together and make a brilliant finish to summer dinner parties.

Prep 10 mins
Cook 1 hour
Serves 6
GF V

Ingredients

½ cup sugar
1 cup water
6 large apricots or plums or small nectarines or peaches, halved and stoned
2 star anise (optional)
5 egg yolks
5 tbsp caster sugar
2 cups cream
1 tsp vanilla extract

Method

Preheat oven to 150degC fanbake and arrange six 1-cup capacity ramekins or heatproof cups in a roasting dish.

Heat sugar and water in a medium pot, stirring until sugar is dissolved. Add fruit and star anise, if using, and simmer gently until fruit is tender (5 minutes).

Drain off most of the syrup and reserve for another use. Stack 2 apricot halves in the centre of each ramekin or cup.

To make custard, beat together egg yolks and sugar until the sugar is dissolved, thenwhisk in cream and vanilla extract. Divide evenly between the ramekins or cups untillevel with the top of the top apricot half.

Fill the roasting dish with very hot water tohalfway up the sides of the ramekins or cups. Cover with baking paper and bake until just set (about 1 hour).

They should still have a little wobble in the centre. Remove from oven and allow to cool. Cover and chill for at least 1 hour or up to 3 days. Serve chilled.

This recipe is an extract from Annabel's new summer annual Annabel Langbein A Free Range Life: Endless Summer (Annabel Langbein Media, $24.95), available from Paper Plus, the Warehouse and all good supermarkets and bookshops.


Freebie

We have six copies of Annabel Langbein A Free Range Life: Endless Summer to give away. Send your contact details with Annabel in the subject line to playtime@odt.co.nz by January 12.


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