Like Baltic pine there are lots of other native timbers we use every day but don’t talk about – Merbau from South East Asian rain forests, Cumaru from South American jungles, even our own old growth Mountain Ash.

Years later, unaware of the history that came before him, Alex Iordanov found himself working in the kitchen of the CERES Grocery Cafe and dreaming about starting a little bakery in the Grocery kitchen.

I look up from my boots and my eyes widen. Overnight it seems like someone’s set off a golden-bomb – all along the creek bank the silver wattles are in glorious bloom.

So much happening around CERES during this wintery weather! From firewood and awards for Fair Wood, to our waste-free beetroot curry workshop, and Joes Garden Feathery Fundraiser (complete with bird-themed dress up) at the farm gate. Busy season!

My own failed veg box experience was years of composting the limp beetroot and yellowing cabbage my family didn’t eat and feeling a kind of “veg box shame”.

At this year’s Harvest Festival as the passata makers wiped the last sauce spatters away, Rosa Voto and musicians, Sancori, took centre stage to perform Stories of Harvest from Southern Italy to a gathering of harvest revellers primed to let loose.