Providing for her family

Annandale Farm would have supplied food for the Johnston family and their staff. We can only imagine how satisfying it might have been for Esther to provide for her family with food from her own farm. She had eight children – Rosanna, George, Robert, Julia, David, Maria, Isabella and Blanche. Whenever George was away, Esther was in charge.

Study the plan of the family farm below. It is a bird’s-eye view of the farmhouse and surrounding paddocks and buildings. The farmhouse is the orange coloured building shaped like a capital ‘I’. The two buildings to the bottom left of the farmhouse are also part of the farmhouse. The larger of those buildings would most likely have been the kitchen.

You can study paintings of the farm buildings in Activity 2 Esther’s house reinvented.

Answer this question:

• Why were kitchens built separately to the main house? [Answer in Additional Information.]

Observe the grand avenue of Norfolk Pines on the plan. They are believed to be first Norfolk Pines planted on mainland Australia.

Answer these questions: [Answers in Additional Information.]

• What could the other buildings be used for? Are there any clues?
• Could Esther and George have done all the work on the farm by themselves the farm on their own? If not, who would have helped them?

Think about this. How would Esther feel being in charge of convict servants when she had been a convict herself?

On the plan find evidence of:

• a water source
• animals on the farm
• honey making
• fruit trees on the farm. Perhaps you can work out where the orange grove might have been?

The orange grove on Annandale Farm was famous in Sydney. It had lots of large orange trees that produced the juiciest oranges. Unlike today when we can eat fresh food all year round, food availability in Esther’s time depended on the seasons. She may have had perfect growing conditions and ended up with a large crop of fruit and unable to eat all of it. Additionally, there were no fridges or freezers at that time to keep food from going off. Esther’s cooks and housemaids would have used the cellar area of the house, most likely dug out below the kitchen where it would have been cool to store food.

Answer this question:

• What could Esther do with an abundance of oranges from her orange grove?

List all the things you can think of.

One option was to preserve food. Meat could be salted, vegetables could be pickled and fruit made into jam.

Answer these questions:

• Do you grow food at home or at school?
• What do you grow?
• Does your family ever preserve food that you grow?

Sugar is a preservative in jam and when that is not available honey could be used and we know that Esther had beehives!

Write your own recipe using Esther’s oranges and honey. Come up with something unusual but delicious.

Perhaps Esther herself wrote recipes and passed those down to her family through the generations? Collect recipes from your class and compile a cookbook of handed-down family recipes from your class.