Summer is here and we are loving it in Arrowtown. 

The annual influx of holiday visitors have been enjoying time spent sitting in the garden at Provisions under the fruit trees laden with wonderful looking crops of apricots, quinces and pears.   The lakes have been great destinations to enjoy cooling off with a swim and a picnic.  No fuss meals with fresh local ingredients are the order of the day. I recommend a trip to Cromwell to enjoy pick your own local cherries and stock up on fresh apricots and new season peaches.

On the menu at Provisions are lots of lovely fresh vegetables.  Vegetables are the heroes in our summer salad and in our hugely popular Provisions brunch stack of mushrooms, tomatoes, spinach, pumpkin and peppers softly dressed with lemon hollandaise, pesto and served on our toasted homemade sourdough. Yumm!

The Provisions team have been busy baking to keep up with the demands of record crowds of customers and our freshly baked gingerbread loaves, fresh bagels and sourdough have been flying out the door. 

At Provisions in Cromwell we have started our annual cherry processing and have pulled out the old Bertuzzi cherry destoner and are filling the freezer with hopefully enough cherries to make another year’s worth of roasted cherry chutney, cherries in pinot noir syrup and cherry jam.

My other café at the Frankton marina, The Boatshed café & bistro has also been enjoying large numbers of cyclists and walkers from the Queenstown cycle track wanting to sit on the deck on the edge of the lake and enjoy a cool glass of rose or a beer and a long lunch.

I have been really chuffed to have been included in two wonderful new cookbooks, the NZ Café Cookbook which sweeps around some of New Zealand’s best cafes and we have included two recipes from the Boatshed.  My olive oil cake is also the cover of our local Remarkables Primary school cookbook and this old favourite recipe from Provisions is also included. We are selling this book at both cafes and we’d love you to buy one because proceeds go to the supporting the school.

Keep the togs and jandals on, crank up the Barbie and enjoy a great long summer.

Jane Shaw is pictured in the centre back with staff and AllBlackRitchie McCaw. Jane is the founder of Provisions, an iconic cafe, artisan bakery & store is set in a historic miners cottage at 65 Buckingham St and is open daily from 8.30am.