Tax avoidance

So this is what tax avoidance looks like in our house…

Just so that the Inland Revenue Department doesn’t have cause for concern, this is only avoidance of the task of actually doing the tax return, not avoiding the tax in a criminal kind of a way!

Actually, this post could also be titled “Antiquing” because that’s what happened on Friday – Mrs Urban Gardener and I took to the road and headed to some of those small towns with junk shops that have a whole lot of junk and a small supply of treasure.  A previous trip ended up with a coach horn being one of my finds… seen here with a couple of other acquisitions. 

The coach horn is perfect for calling the children home when they are rampaging through the neighbourhood (they will probably grow to hate this).

But, I digress.  On Friday, I found the perfect gem iron.

For those of you who haven’t met a gem iron, the perfect gem iron is a heavy cast iron mould for making ginger gems in.  Ginger gems seem to be a particularly New Zealand treat… so I lined up a selection of recipes and made several batches (while avoiding doing the filing that needs to be completed before I can get started on the aforementioned tax).  Consumer opinion agreed that Ellen’s Gems won – Ellen was the female half of the married couple who worked on my parents’ farm when I was growing up, so here is her recipe.

Ellen’s Ginger Gems

Makes about 12 (the number of gems in a gem iron)

1 C flour

1 tsp ginger
½ tsp mixed spice
20g butter
½ C golden syrup
¼ C sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp baking soda
½ C milk
Crystallised ginger, finely sliced (optional)

Heat the oven to 200 C and put the gem iron in to heat up (this is essential).

Sift together the flour, ginger and mixed spice.  Dissolve the baking soda in the milk.  Melt together the butter and golden syrup and add the sugar.

Pour the syrup mix into the dry ingredients, give a stir, add the lightly beaten egg, give another stir, and add the milk.  Mix to combine (it may be a little lumpy).

Grease the hot gem iron with butter (I use a pastry brush for this), and fill the gem irons to around 2/3 full (the mix will start to caramelise around the edges).  You can gently place some finely sliced crystallised ginger on top for extra ginger-ness.  Then into the oven for 10 minutes.  Turn out and eat while still warm.  Then do your tax.