Thanks so much to local herbologist, Josh Neideck, who came and shared his time and knowledge with us yesterday on using herbs! What a turnout! I think it was our biggest class (in numbers) yet. We just managed to squeeze everyone in and Josh managed to answer a lot of questions in between sharing his experience with us.

It has been suggested that we ask for more recipes people use for salves and other herb based remedies to post here for those who are interested.

One of the basic ways we have used a herb, is picking a leaf of plantain (English Ribwort) to stop bleeding of cuts. I've done this for a slice on my arm , and was really pleased my 10 year old son remembered this little aid when he was swimming at a dam with his mate and his mate got cut. They were nowhere near a house, so my son was able to pick some plantain and stop the bleeding before they headed back to the house. It's very effective!

Plantain is a weed at our place, this is what it looks like (above). Very distinct ribbed leaves. In our present state of drought (I know we're getting some rain, but it's still a bit dry here!), plantain is a little more sparse than in the photo.

One thing I learned last year, is that herbs are mineral and nutrient powerhouses. I was looking at the top sources of selenium (an essential mineral) and catnip was right up there after brazil nuts. Then looking further down the selenium list, were virtually all the herbs that help with lactation. Interesting.

So in an effort to get more herbs into our diet, we bought the above book, the Herbfarm Cookbook. It's from the 90's I think, but full of French inspired wholesome goodies that feature herbs. I've tried a selection of the recipes, and they're so flavoursome! We just don't realise how much flavour we forfeit when we leave herbs out of our meals.

Josh mentioned using bicarb soda as toothpaste. Tooth powder has been around for ages, and is so much safer than commercial toothpaste (have you read those labels?!)
Our tooth powder is just this one:
 4 tablespoons bentonite clay
2 teaspoons naturally extracted baking soda 
1 ½ teaspoons unrefined sea salt
  1 ½ teaspoons clove powder, or ground cinnamon 
1 ½ teaspoons ground peppermint leaves, or 5-10 drops peppermint essential oil

 To Make
 Mix all ingredients in a clean glass jar.  
 To Use
 Sprinkle a little on a wet toothbrush and brush as normal.
 Shelf Life
 One to three years

So Josh had a list of health aids he suggested, not all herbs. Things like taking bicarb soda to alkalise the gut, colloidal silver as an antibacterial (we've done this, it's amazing stuff!), apple cider vinegar too.

As for herbs, he's a big fan of Feverfew (not so tasty, but great for fighting certain illnesses!). It grows quite well here, our survived the drought with little attention.

And the common culinary herbs are worth having...basil, parsley, coriander (he uses coriander seed for fresh breath), rosemary (great for the brain), sage, thyme...

So, if you have a recipe using herbs, that you'd like to share, please do so in the comments :-)

https://www.jamiesministryoffood.com.au/center-locations/qld

Here are a couple of opportunities you might be interested in...Jamie's Ministry of Food Mobile Kitchen is coming to Toowoomba Feb 22nd to run their 5 week cooking course.

There is space for a few more participants, and the cost has been reduced by 50%. So it's only $50 for the 5 week course! The link above will take you to the website where you can book in.

They're also looking for more volunteers "vollies" as they call them, to help set up, clean up, welcome participants and help the classes run smoothly. It's just a 2 hour commitment at the same time each week for 5 weeks. It's a great way to help out in the community, helping people learn the basic life skill of preparing their own food at home.

The mobile kitchen will be operating out of the Bailie Henderson car park, in North Toowoomba.

Coming up in March (Saturday 3rd/Sunday 4th), Dennis Angelino, of Gran Elly Orchard, is opening up his biologically organic apple farm for tours! You can head over to Thullimbah and check out what it takes to get apples from plantation to plate...without the use of toxins.

Contact Gran.Elly.Orchard@gmail.com for more info.

A while ago I posted the recipe for the best tomato sauce we’ve found…well that recipe is a great base for making your own BBQ sauce. It does still contain sugar, if that’s an issue for you, but it’s a lot more wholesome than store bought BBQ sauce!
Balsamic BBQ Sauce
3/4 Cup Tomato sauce
3/4 cup balsamic vinegar (we used organic balsamic from Wrays due to the fact that balsamic vinegar is made from grapes, which are a heavily sprayed crop unless you buy organic)
Garlic- 2-3 cloves of fresh garlic is great, but you can use 1Tbsp powdered or minced garlic if that’s what you have on hand

1/2 Tsp each of salt and pepper
1Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1/4 cup coconut sugar (or organic raw sugar)
A nice easy recipe…all you do is mix all those ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium heat and simmer away for about 15 minutes, or until the sugar is dissolved and you have a consistency you’re happy with. Then pour into a clean bottle.
I couldn’t tell you precisely how long it lasts, because it’s consumed long before we have to get concerned with use by dates But given the high level of vinegar and sugar, you should get at least 12 months of shelf life.

It's that time of year- tomato season. Rick actually started our tomatoes in a heat chamber in winter, so we'd have a head start this year. It worked. For the past 6 weeks or so we've had loads of tomatoes!

I hate waste (but am trying to come to terms with the fact that giving surplus to the chooks or the worms is not waste...hahaha), so I've been canning like crazy these past few weeks. Every time we harvest tomatoes (about every 2 days) there's about 20kg of them! So the shelves are being stocked with homemade tomato sauce, tomato paste, passata, crushed tomatoes, tomato relish...you get the idea.

We've tried a few different tomato sauce recipes, most of which the children turned their noses up at, but this one I'll share has been beautiful. If you love depth of flavour in a sauce (as opposed to a tomato sauce that just tastes like tomatoes and sugar), then you should give this one a go.

It's a variation on Matt Preston's Tomato Sauce Recipe, which can be found online.

Matt Preston’s Tomato Sauce Recipe…with some changes
 
Makes approx. 1L
2.5kg ripe tomatoes, coarsely chopped
2 large onions, coarsely chopped
10 whole cloves
10 whole allspice berries
1Tbsp paprika
2 cloves garlic
1 tsp cinnamon
2Tbsp salt
1 ½ cups sugar (we use organic raw sugar or organic coconut sugar)
2 cups apple cider vinegar
 

1. Place tomatoes, onions, spices, garlic and salt in a stock pot over medium heat. Bring to the boil and then simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally for an hour (or until the tomato breaks down and is tender).
2. Add the sugar and vinegar. Simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally for a further hour and 15 minutes, until the mixture reduces, thickens and is a saucy consistency.
3. If desired you can sieve your sauce to remove seeds. We don’t bother. At this point we puree the sauce with a stick mixer and then pour into sterilised glass bottles.
4. Store in a cool, dark place until ready to use. Once bottles are opened, they need to be stored in the fridge.
   

Like to get more wholesome fruit, veg, legumes...plants in general...in your diet?

And want it to taste amazing?

Little Seed Restaurant at 100 Russell St Toowoomba are offering plant based cooking classes for both children and adults.

Classes include One Pot Wonders, Family Bakes, Cooking for One, Condiments, Preparing a Wholesome Christmas Banquet, Little Seed Menu Secrets and The Impact of Food.

AND you get to take food home with you for some of these classes! If you've ever eaten at Little Seed, you'll know how beautiful the quality and creativity of their meals are.

To find out more, check out littleseedrestaurant.com.au/classes/

What a delicious workshop October hosted! Sourdough, but not the traditional dark sourdough.
Chris showed us how to make gorgeous contemporary sourdough featuring flavours such as honey and oats and chili and capsicum.

Now, for anyone who wants to know more, or who lost their web link from Chris, head over to gullygrove.blogspot.com.au for tutorials and recipes.

There have been requests for a soap making class...most of the SLT people have already participated in this before. But, if there are others out there who haven't yet had the chance to learn, now is a great time. Cold process soap takes 6 weeks to cure, so if you learn and start making some now you'll have a beautiful stash of home made soap for Christmas gifts!

This class will be held at Birdsong Market Garden, Tuesday October 10th, 7pm. Bookings essential

Cost $25, which will include a recipe sheet and some goodies to contribute to your first batch of soap :-)

To book, go to birdsongmarketgarden.com.au/

This question pops up at just about every class...and understandably. Because when you're learning to make your own cleaning products, beauty products and health products, you'll often come across ingredients that you've either never heard of, or have never seen available in your local stores.

And many a time when I'm asked this, it's the same answer I give, because so many of the more unusual ingredients are available in one place. N Essentials www.n-essentials.com.au/shop/oils/essential-oils/page/2/

I think I originally found N Essentials because I wanted some cocoa butter. First of all I tried the health food shop, and just couldn't bring myself to pay $30 for this tiny little 250g package of cocoa butter! Especially when some recipes call for that much in one hit! So upon looking online, I found N Essentials sold a whole kilo of cocoa butter for $33. Much better. And it's organic unrefined cocoa butter :-) I know the website clearly states it's not to be taken internally, but I actually used it in a herbal cardamom chocolate mouse cake and in making dairy free chocolate, along with using it in DIY beauty products and soap. And I lived to tell the tale.

 And while checking out the N Essentials site www.n-essentials.com.au/ I found a vast array of other items I'd seen in recipes we wanted to try at home...like evening primrose oil, argan oil, castor oil, shea butter, bentonite clay, rose water, jojoba oil and essential oils at prices much more affordable than I'd seen elsewhere.

Essential oils that are free of carrier oils, additives and are actually pure (not chemically produced) are something you use often in all these DIY recipes. While I use medicinal/therapeutic grade essential oils for our first aid and healing, those therapeutic grade oils are a bit too good (and pricey) for things like soap, candles and some cleaning products. For example, I saw a soap recipe that called for 5ml of Rose essential oil. Now, therapeutic grade rose oil can cost about $350 for 5ml! There's no way you'd put that in soap. And I saw another soap recipe calling for 5ml of helichrysum essential oil. But 5ml of the therapeutic grade costs about $130! Again, you wouldn't put in soap, or anything else non-healing related!
But on the other hand, you don't want to use low-grade 'essential' oils that most likely have additives and defeat the purpose of making your own pure products. I've had essential oils from ebay that fit this category. They very obviously smelled like they had carrier oils and/or additives in them. And please never buy or use the fake essential oils from $2 shops. You can't produce real essential oils at those prices, they don't smell genuine and I don't consider them safe to use.

N-essentials essential oils are great for these DIY recipes where you want quality, but don't need it to be therapeutic grade quality. They are totally pure, no carrier oils or additives. I tried the frankincense, bergamot and sweet orange essential oils from N Essentials and was especially impressed with the frankincense. I used it in soap, homemade kitchen spray and candles and found it held it's scent beautifully. The citrus oils were also used in soap and then washing powder. They performed well also. I think they have about 70 different essential oils to choose from. And they are stored in amber glass bottles, or metal bottles for the larger quantities (1L bottles available), which is vital with essential oils, that are compromised by plastic.

I haven't tried them myself, but N Essentials are now also stocking soap colouring powders, dried flowers/plants for soap and even soap nuts! So it's a very convenient place to collect your soap making supplies in one hit.

Hopefully this helps you as you hunt down all the new ingredients like essential oils you need for those recipes you want to try at home :-)

As many of you would know, SLT isn't running a September class, there's so much happening with Carnival of Flowers etc. I'm hoping to run something from Birdsong (located in Cranley, next to Toowoomba) in these Spring school holidays, but we had a terminally ill family member and I didn't want to arrange anything when we didn't know how long he had left. He died Sunday just gone, so now we await funeral details.

If it works out, we'll try and run a soapmaking class again, as people have asked when the next one will be. If you are interested, make sure you are on the SLT mailing list, as that is where details will be sent through. Sorry it will likely be short notice, but life's been like that lately!