Our Story
Family Roots
Vegetables, especially homegrown, had always been part of my heritage. I believe my Dad had a deep longing for the soil, for farming, and it found its expression in the wonderful veggie gardens he created out of the most uncompromising plots of land. Stony, barren, heat -bleached desert or grassy, windswept savanna, too much rain or too little, he always managed to grow veggies. Since he was constantly being transferred to new locations (he was an accountant with the Dept of Water Affairs, involved in dam building), it meant always starting from scratch again. Heavy work.
My Mom, on the other hand, showed incredible resilience and fortitude. A pretty, fashion conscious city girl when she married my Father, her abrupt translocation to a bare, dry, area in the Southern Free state, with no family support, was very difficult. Being Dutch, lamb was not something she enjoyed, and yet, even heavily pregnant and nauseous, lamb and cabbage, onions and carrots were on the daily menu for the first few months of her marriage, and she had to make do. My Mother developed into a wonderful, creative and imaginative cook, who did amazing things with the bountiful produce from my Father’s garden.
Family Memories
My earliest memory (about three years old?): sitting under a dusty thorn tree, wrapped in a maroon and white checked blanket, watching a flock of dirty brown sheep wending their way home after a day of grazing on the small Karoo salt-bush. Soon afterwards my Dad was transferred to Andalusia (now Jan Kempdorp) in the Northern Cape, and once more he created a magical garden. An enduring memory is picking the season’s first delicious, vine-ripened strawberries on my birthday, the 2nd of November. A special treat! I remember two beautiful old fig trees at the back door in Andalusia. In season, we used to sit in the tree gorging ourselves on the luscious, ripe figs, dripping sticky sweetness.
We once more moved, this time to the foothills of Amatola mountains near King Williams’ Town, where we initially had no running water or electricity. Water was provided in a huge old tank in the backyard, and nights were spent by candle light.
Our little asbestos house was built on a hill, which happened to block the traditional path used by the local Xhosa people when visiting, and they saw no reason to change their habits. The result was that we constantly had folk wrapped in their colourful rust-coloured clothing pass by our bedroom window. Here my Mom created a wonderful little “fairy garden” under an old tree stump and my Dad built a tunnel, covered by rampant granadilla and loo-fah vines.
When Richard and I were first married, and the children were quite small, we bought a
tired old plot in Sunny Road, Benoni. We soon had quite a menagerie of farm animals. A cow, (I made wonderful butter) a sheep (supposedly it’s job was to keep the lawn cropped) a rabbit, (later my husband experimented with mohair rabbits) a gaggle of ducks, spurwing geese, (they are huge), chickens of course, but also peacocks (noisy and not very useful birds. We never got around to roasting a peacock…..!)
With a mountain of manure, cheap labour, a strong borehole , and soil that had not been used for decades, I soon had the most magical vegetable garden. I grew all the normal things like spinach, cabbage, potatoes and carrots, but also globe artichokes, Jerusalem artichokes, asparagus, celery, strawberries, blackberries, kohl rabi and broccoli. The only veggie food we had to buy was flour and rice! On one memorable occasion my darling husband decided that the poor ducks needed a swim, and tossed them into our dam. A round, straight-sided farm reservoir. He then left for work, and left the ducks happily paddling about. Hours later, with no husband in sight, I realised that the ducks needed rescuing, and although clumsy and heavily pregnant with a huge tummy, wrapped in a voluminous preggie dress, I lowered myself into the dam and set about catching 12 furiously paddling ducks. Not an easy task!
Stay Connected
Contact Info
083 307 2877
katinkameiring@gmail.com