Wisk together whole egg, egg white with sugar, vanilla; add yogurt, salt and liqueur, and whisk again.
Mix together flour, baking powder & lavender; incorporate into egg & yogurt mixture.
Fill a frying pan with oil, about two inches high (smaller pan will take longer to fry, but will save oil) and let it heat until medium hot (test: drip a small piece of batter into oil, if it starts frying right away, it’s ready). Keep oil at medium heat.
Take two tea spoons, drip them into hot frying oil; scoop small amount of batter with one spoon, round it up with the other and drop the formed small fritula into hot oil. Continue until the frying pan is 3/4 full, as fritule need space to rise and turn over themselves, once one side is fried and golden.
Place golden fritule onto a platter lined with a paper towel, to absorb extra oil.
Sprinkle some icing sugar over the fritule and enjoy while warm!
Heat the heavy cream and half of the lavender buds to the boiling point and let rest covered for 15 minutes.
In a separate bowl lightly beat the whole egg, egg yolks and ¼ cup of sugar, add lemon rind, vanilla extract or vanilla sugar. Strain the heavy cream and discard the lavender.
Slowly add hot cream to the egg mixture, combine well and pure into ramekins or miniature bowls.
Prepare the water bath: place the ramekins into a large baking pan and carefully pour boiling water into the pan between the ramekins, so that water comes up halfway up to the sides of ramekins. Bake for 35-40 min, until the crème brulée is set while gently shaken. Remove the ramekins from the water bath, cool and refrigerate until firm and ready to serve. When ready to serve, spread 1 tbs of sugar, mixed with lavender flowers, over the top of each crème brulée and caramelize it with a kitchen blowtorch.
Welcome to Terra Lavanda! TL green & purple lavender fields have now departed into a period of winter rest, just to recover and return in abundance in the new season!
We take this extra free time to share with you lavender recipes from our kitchen. Recreated from our memory after a wonderful experience in a small country café; we just added some walnuts to spice it up!
TL Nutritious Lavender & Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients:
1 cup steel cut oats
3/4 cup boiling water
1 cup unbleached all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/3 tsp of salt
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
2 eggs
½ cup sugar
1 tbsp vanilla extracts
1/3 cup of oil
1 tbsp lemon grated lemon zest
½ tsp ground Terra Lavanda culinary lavender
½ cup of semisweet chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350º F or 175ºC
Pour boiling water over steel cut oats, cover and let sit for 10 min.
In a separate bowl mix together flour, baking powder, salt & chopped walnuts. Set aside.
Beat eggs, sugar & vanilla until foamy, beat in oil, add lemon zest & lavender. Gently fold in steel cut oat, flour mixture & chocolate chips.
Line the baking sheet with parchment paper; place batter 1 inch apart using ¼ cup measure per cookie (splash it with water before use, so that dough doesn't stick). Flatten each cookie gently to form a nice round shape.
Bake 16 – 19 minutes, until golden.Cool on a wire rack.
Terra Lavanda oasis is ready for you to visit & relax in the serene beauty of our farm, breathe in some fresh air and let go of all the tensions and stress!
Forget everything, just be in the moment, listen and you’ll hear the birds, the wind, you will ‘feel’ the quiet, silence that we all need, yet rarely give ourselves time or ‘permission’ to experience it! Relax in our gazebo and feel the gentle breeze from the lavender fields!
One day we found this picturesque piece of land right in the heart of Ontario wine country. It was much bigger than what we were looking for, but love at the first sight! A nature painted canvas come to life with its rolling terrain, gentle creek running through, bridge encapsulated with tress and the green forest in the background.
Sadly the farm was quickly coming undone, the old wooden barn that was once proud & beautiful centre of the property was falling apart, metal sheeting blown away, stacks of hay falling down from the attic, cattle stalls deserted & rusted, outside big concrete silos piercing the skies. We had lots of work to do but we were ready to reinvent it!
Going to the farm became our ‘recreation’, it left us exhausted with a sweet feeling of accomplishment every time we came back home. We knew it was critical to find the best plants and when we did we quickly placed our order. Spring came and the plants arrived at the border, but customs proved to be no easy exercise. We knew our plants couldn’t survive another day in boxes, so we spent the day filling forms, explaining to border agents what lavender is (nothing to do with pot) and pleading for same day clearance. Finally, they obliged as the border agent called across the waiting room: “Lavender Lady, your plants are ready!” Next step, planting!
We bought a brand new tractor with a bank loan, ploughed the land and got it ready for planting long straight rows with engineering precision. We learned our first lesson quickly, when we realized that lavender needs to be planted higher, on little hills to help with drainage. After a few days of planting, or should I say crawling, our last seedling was in the ground. Exhausted, we felt we did our part and naively thought from here it was up to the lavender plants to grow & bloom by themselves!
Excited to learn more about this fragrant plant we went to Provence to visit Salt, a little town called the ‘lavender capital of the world’. The trip was insightful, some fields were beautifully groomed, some full of grass, but we walked away educated students of lavender. We were excited to call home and hear about how our young plants were growing; then we heard “You must come home NOW!” A visit to the fields proved to be exciting in all the wrong ways! From a distance as they drove towards the fields, all they saw was a blanket of green! Wow, lavender grows sooo fast! Or so they thought! Coming closer, the excitement subsided at the realization that most of the green was weeds that had grown at an exponential rate, and lavender…..nowhere to be seen!
We hurried back home, all memories of sipping good French wine quickly faded when we realized what happened to our fields. The weeds were up to our waist and no lavender in sight. That particular June was very rainy, the moisture and our freshly ploughed land encouraged the weeds to flourish. We weren't about to give up, so we put on our high boots, took long poles into our hand and bravely stepped into a meter high sea of weeds. We pushed back and forth following our memory of our rows, and right down next to the ground we could see little lavender plants hidden, shy & scared to grow.
We spent the rest of the summer clearing the fields of weeds and realizing that we lost lots of plants, but also had lots that were alive and growing! There was still lots of work ahead but we learned many valuable lessons that year and within next two seasons were able to create beautiful rows of lavender.
All the hard work rewarded with gorgeous pictures of lavender in full bloom and ready to be shared with all the people that appreciate lavender as much as we do!
Born and raised in the mild climate of the Adriatic, our memories run through the rocky mountain slopes where lavender or lavanda, as we call it, grows wild and carefree, Colours of blue and purple, air filled with the aromatics scent of this untamed plant invoke a sense of beauty & well-being.
Vision of a lavender field in bloom, mesmerizing and breathtaking, is a sight never forgotten, an irresistible allure to stand near this magical plant that calms souls, fascinates eyes, and captivate senses. The idea of our own ecological farm, outdoor living and meeting people, seemed like living a dream.
Nature’s nurturing and lifegiving at its best; we were inspired..
First step was to acquire a sizeable piece of land and to begin growing lavender.
Rain, snow, summer heat couldn’t deter us from spending our weekends scouting southern Ontario for that perfect piece of land. It took days, months, seasons came and gone, and then a garage sale opened a door to a property that we had been looking for. Hilly terrain, background forest, old farm house and a creek wondering through, a piece of land we can nurture and apply farming principles respectful of nature.
