The Barossa

The one thing I wanted to do in Adelaide was go to the Barossa to visit Maggie Beer's farm. My friend Alison joined us and it was nice catching up after more than 10 years.
It didn't take long to be out of suburban Adelaide and to my excitement a road detour took us right past the area where McLeod's daughters was filmed! I loved that show, sisters on the land doing it tough, and here we were driving down the country roads with rolling hills, gum trees and windmills where all the drama took place. I almost expected to see Tess and Stevie on horseback.
Anyway, it wasn't long before we were in vineyard country and we arrived at Maggie Beer's farm with shop and cafe. No, she wasn't there to greet us but her staff were so lovely, personally greeting everyone who came through the door. It is beautiful inside the cafe and shop with all her products on display and you can taste everything!
We walked around the lake and saw her grape vines and the olive grove and then the quince trees. The branches were laden with huge ripe fruit to the point that lots had fallen on the ground. Dad would not have wasted that fruit. He would have made hundreds of kilos of quince paste. Maggie couldn't be far off this years batch of quince paste and jelly. We also saw her pheasants, guinea fowl and geese and a couple of goats.
Lunch was amazing. Over looking the lake with turtles. They don't have a full cafe style menu, instead you choose one of her pâté varieties and it come in a beautiful woven picnic basket with bread and olives or pickles or salad. Evan had the terrine with chicken or it may have been pheasant or duck and it was wrapped in golden sour cream pastry. It was very, very good. My mouth is watering again. Rather than spending my money on gourmet food the kids wouldn't eat I decided they could just have Maggie's passion fruit ice cream for lunch. There were no complaints.
I then returned to the shop to make a few purchases. I think we'll be staying in free camp sites and National Parks for the next few weeks.