Almond Biscotti from Margaret at Glenella Guesthouse   This morning a container of what’s turned out to be the most delicious almond biscotti I’ve ever tasted appeared on my doorstep – a trade for a bag of jerusalem artichokes and a raspberry plant. Thank you so much Margaret from Glenella Guesthouse.   Freshly harvested Jerusalem Artichokes   Suddenly jerusalem artichokes …

Food, mothers and kindness bring people together – even during a pandemic. Tonight I felt nurtured by my mother’s dearest friend in Blackheath, who sent me home with a brown paper bag filled with small jars of medlar and quince jellies to taste test. She was eager for me to compare the two.   Carole Lee My mother used to …

After devastation, the restorative forces of nature begin the process of healing. On the 22nd December 2019, Australia’s biggest forest fire, which had already destroyed an area seven times the size of Singapore, raced up the gully below Clarence St and burnt to within 10m of Eva and Bill Johnstone’s property, just above Pope’s Glen in Blackheath. It burnt all …

  There’s nothing like a warming cuppa when the wind howls and snow threatens. Even better is filling the house with the fragrance of a summer garden. With frost forecast for Monday, I braved the elements in my backyard and harvested large bunches of lemon verbena, lemon balm, mint, sage, and my remaining fennel seeds to ensure I had enough …

Our main Lockdown Project at home has been to build a Greenhouse to tide us (and Blackheath Community Farm) over winter. We are totally in love with it!   Our new greenhouse   In an ideal world we would have used recycled materials but, given how difficult it was to access them in Lockdown, we decided that supporting our local …

This autumn has been such a great season for foraging in Blackheath. We harvested our first saffron milk cap and slippery jack mushrooms on February 26 and have still been finding more this week … that’s over 2 months.     At Blackheath Community Farm, perhaps because we’ve put down so much woodchip for our paths, we’ve had a wider …

  Each year at Blackheath Community Farm we find ourselves experimenting with new plants that we just can’t wait to grow again! This season, we’ve been particularly delighted by Barry’s Crazy Cherry tomatoes (plants donated to the Farm by Hillier Windsor), a Mini White Cucumber (seeds donated by Eva and Bill Johnstone), a Chilli plant donated by Hayley and Ben …

For a young person, deciding on a career is no easy task. This was how I felt when I left high school, not knowing what different jobs were like, what jobs are out there, or what path to take to reach them. At the Blue Mountains Pluriversity, Youth Cafes offer young people an insight into different careers, giving us the …

Practising social distancing before stricter rules came into place It’s been just over three years since a group of locals, supported by The Big Fix, began work on a neglected piece of land generously made available to the community by Mountains Christian College. The dream was to create a small demonstration Farm for Blackheath village.

On January 8 The Big Fix visited renowned wildlife carer Margaret Gough at Mt Victoria in the Blue Mountains. We were thrilled that some of the wallaroos and birds that had disappeared when the fires came, were alive and healthy and starting to return. Margaret demonstrated what we can do to help provide the food and water they so desperately need …