Our new website is go for launch!

Aug 07 2016

Welcome to our new look website and our very first monthly blog. It's been a while coming, but we hope you will find our new look inter-web page a useful hub for all things foodie related here at Terra Viva.

Firstly, let me introduce myself. I'm Sarah and I have worked for Terra Viva since 2008, initially based in Christchurch and then in New Plymouth. Why the move from Christchurch to New Plymouth? Well, like many Cantab's our lives were twist turned upside down after the Quakes and we had to re-locate for my hubby's job. Peter, Juliet and I decided to give this working remotely thing a whirl and after 5 years it turns out that you can help to run a Garden Centre and Café from across Cook Strait quite effectively thanks to the wonders of Skype and modern air travel.

Sitting in my office here in New Plymouth, our nearly two weeks of thunderstorms and high winds seem to have passed by.  The sun is shining, albeit it the temperatures are freezing so the slow cooker is on and omitting smells that promise a round the table family dinner of "comfort food" tonight.  Down in Christchurch, the Cafe team have had a busy few weeks not only trying to keep warm, but working on our new look menu that we're planning to launch in September.

Two weeks ago, I was down in Christchurch and spent a lot of time catching up with Steve our Executive Chef and Vicky our Front of House Manager, and working on some exciting new changes for the Cafe that will tie in nicely to our new menu launch.  Watch this space for more details in the future.

As you may be aware, if you follow Peter's weekly Home and Garden Newsletter, both he and Juliet (a.k.a The Constant Gardener) are overseas at the moment.  Having travelled through Cuba and New York, they now find themselves in England catching up with family in a little spot called Ross-On-Wye.  Where exactly is Ross-On-Wye you may ask? Well it's located in South Herefordshire and  is quite the popular tourist destination.  In fact Ross-On-Wye is believed to be the birth place of modern tourism in the UK and is also known as the "Market Town" with a 17th century market house holding twice weekly farmers markets in the centre of town.  I can now see where the Constant Gardener get's her passsion for holding our Friday Markets from.

Below are an artists impression of the Market House in earlier times and how it looks today.

 

It's strawberry planting time, so this month in the Café and Garden Centre, we're running our popular Strawberry Promotion again. Simply order any dish off our menu that contains berries (of any sort), and you will receive a voucher to take through to the Garden Centre and redeem for a free strawberry plant on us. There will also be a chef's special of pancakes and strawberries running for all of August. Steve has come up with some delicious strawberry based recipes to inspire you when it comes time to harvest your strawberries around Christmas time. You can access these recipes right here......

Speaking of Christmas, as soon as Juliet is off the plane from the U.K in the middle of August, she will be heading to Auckland with Jess our Merchandising Co-Ordinator to stock up on all our Christmas goodies.
We expect these treats to start arriving in store from Labour Weekend so I will keep you posted on what exciting new lines will be heading our way.

Lastly, some fun food facts:
Strawberries are a member of the rose family
On average a strawberry has 200 seeds and isn't technically a berry, as its seeds are on the outside.
8 strawberries will provide 140% of the daily recommended Vitamin C intake for kids

And that's all from me for this month, see you here again in September.

Warm Regards

Sarah