FREE RANGE ID WIN

CHOICE, the consumer's lobby today announced their key wins for consumers in 2013, including the NSW Department of Fair Trading announced in December that it would champion a national crackdown on dodgy free-range egg labelling after CHOICE made a complaint earlier in the year.

This is an important step towards an enforceable free-range egg standard in Australia.

If you can, consider having a couple of chooks in your backyard.

Here's the label for the egg-cess bounty from my feather riot...

Gidget’s Cluckingham Palace

Fresh laid free range eggs from the happy hens: 

Gidget, Layne. Ledger, Laura and Hilda.

Keep QLD free-range

CHOICE, the consumer advocacy group note the Queensland government has stealthily scrambled its own free-range standard by increasing stocking densities to 10,000 birds per hectare.

Until recently, regulations in Queensland said that stocking densities for 'free-range' eggs must not be more than 1,500 birds per hectare.

That means they have increased densities by 667%!

Consumers who choose to buy free-range eggs should be able to do so with confidence.


Currently the Model Code has a maximum of 1,500 birds per hectare. T

his Code is now undergoing a review, however the decision by Queensland undermines these efforts.

Send your email to the Queensland government and let them know that 10,000 birds per hectare is not free-range!

You say tomato...

Making your tomato sauce out of ingredients you picked a few moments earlier is one of life’s heady pleasures. In fact it’s so damn good it’s a wonder the club of Rome haven’t put out an edict banning the activity.

After all the rain, Sunday's sunshine was bliss.

So I spent most of the day harvesting some of the nine varieties of tomatoes I grew over summer – as you can see this batch was mostly cherry and Tommy Toe.

It’s great as a pasta sauce base, or as a pizza spread or to enjoy on home made bread fresh out of the oven - Alas, I gave the chooks the leftover bread before I remembered to photograph it for the blog.

This time I used an adaptation of a Stephanie Alexander recipe From The Cook's Companion – it works a treat.

And the photo? It has not been digitally altered, this is a the colour of the tomatoes and they smell and taste amazing.

Ingredients

2 kg ripe tomatoes, roughly sliced

4 brown onions, sliced

10 garlic cloves, crushed then sliced

1 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil - check out olive oil via consumer watchdog CHOICE 

Salt and black pepper, freshly ground

A large handful fresh basil or oregano leaves torn into small pieces – I like to add both

Method

Heat oven to 180c

Tumble tomato, onion and garlic with oil and put into a casserole dish with lid

Bake at 180C for at least one hour until the tomatoes have collapsed, their skins are wrinkled and golden-brown, and juices are flowing – it will smell divine.

When tomato and onion are soft, press everything through the coarsest disc of a food mill. If I am making a pasta sauce straight away then I’ll add the skins to give some more texture…

Season to taste and add the herbs.

This freezes well.